Hunan Changyuan Lico Co Ltd, an enterprise with direct investment from SDIC Unity Capital, made its debut in the Star Market of Shanghai Stock Exchange on August 11, 2021. With an issue price of 5.65 yuan per share, Changyuan Lico (stock code: 688779.SH) recorded a sharp rise of 271.68% with an opening price of 21.00 yuan per share. Money raised from the public offering will mainly be used to expand output capacity of cathode material for e-vehicle lithium ion batteries.

Changyuan Lico is committed to supplying high safety, high energy density and high cycle index materials for new energy batteries. Its main products include ternary cathode material and precursor, lithium cobalt oxide cathode material and sphere nickel, etc. Between 2016 and 2019, Changyuan Lico ranked top two in terms of ternary cathode material shipment in the domestic market.

Lithium ion battery is mainly composed of cathode material, anode material, diaphragm, electrolyte and battery case, etc, of which, cathode material plays a leading role in energy density and safety of batteries and accounts for 30% to 40% of the total cost of lithium ion batteries. Thus, cathode material is a core material of lithium ion batteries. In cathode material system, lithium ion battery can be divided into multi technique routes of lithium cobalt oxide, lithium manganese oxide, lithium iron phosphate and ternary material, etc. Ternary cathode material has become an important development trend due to its advantages of high energy density, large discharge capacity, good cycle performance and relatively stable structure, etc.

Changyuan Lico takes the lead in domestic ternary cathode material R&D

Based on the research of ternary cathode material, Changyuan Lico has developed quite a few core technologies such as ternary precursor co-precipitation technology, preparation technology of high voltage NCM, and preparation technology of high voltage lithium cobalt oxide, etc. Changyuan Lico has undertaken a series of technology projects including the 13th Five-Year Plan new energy vehicle key project of the Ministry of Science and Technology, Hunan province project of emerging industry with strategical importance, and a project from the Hunan Provincial Natural Science Foundation, and takes a leading position in high efficiency cathode material industry.

Changyuan lico is one of the earliest domestic enterprises devoted to the research and development of ternary cathode material and precursor and is also among the first to have formed mass production capacity of such materials.

Through surface control technique of ternary precursor, ternary precursor produced by Changyuan Lico enables lithium material to react more efficiently with back-end ternary cathode oxide in sintering process, reduces impedance of back-end ternary material, and increases cycle performance of ternary cathode oxide material under high temperature conditions.

Changyuan Lico also takes a leading position in single crystal ternary cathode material technology and its mass production products cover NCM523, NCM622 and NCM811. Related products of the company increase nickel content and reduces cobalt content which, therefore, increases capacity while reduces cost under the condition of guaranteed conductivity level and high-and-low temperature performance.

By December 31, 2020, Changyuan Lico had a total of 51 patents and established a first class R&D team consisting of 238 people, accounting for 22.33% of the total staff of the company.

Changyuan Licao is one of the leading domestic firms in shipment of ternary cathode material

Ternary cathode material produced by Changyuan Lico is mainly used in the manufacturing of lithium ion batteries and in the downstream sectors, it is used for e-vehicles, 3C and energy storage, etc. In recent years, the market of ternary cathode material is embracing explosive growth due to robust demand for new energy vehicles, especially for longer range e-vehicles. GGII data indicates that the ratio of ternary battery in power cell industry reached 43.98% in 2017, 53.88% in 2018 and 61.54% in 2019 respectively. In the passenger car power cell sector, the ratio was 75.82% in 2017, 83.29% in 2018 and 88.80% in 2019 respectively.

At present, Changyuan Lico has successfully entered the supplier systems of the country’s mainstream lithium ion battery producers such as CATHL, BYD, EVE Energy and Sunwoda Electronics, etc. During the same period, Changyuan Lico was the only ternary cathode material supplier awarded with the honor of 2018 Excellent Supplier and 2019 Excellent Supplier of CATHL. Changyuan Lico was also awarded by EVE Energy as 2018 Strategic Partner and 2019 Strategic Supplier and is the largest supplier of ternary cathode material to EVE Energy.

According to GGII statistics, Changyuan Lico was among the top two in ternary cathode material shipment in the domestic market between 2016 and 2019, and in 2016 and 2018, it ranked the first in this sector. High nickel content is the development trend of ternary cathode material industry. In 2020, the combined sales of the company's high nickel 8 series NCM and NCA hit more than 1,000 tons and sales income from them accounted for more than 10% of the company's total ternary cathode material.