Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

Article | Intelligent Theory of Relativity

Author | Chen Xuanbin

In the past January to September, the increment of charging infrastructure was 2.432 million, the sales of new energy vehicles was 6.278 million, and the incremental ratio of charging piles to new energy vehicles was 1PUR 2.6. There is still much room for growth since the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology previously put forward the goal of "achieving the ratio of vehicles to piles by 2025 to achieve the ratio of vehicles to piles by 1:1 in 2030". The tuyere of the charging service market will continue to expand with the maturity and popularity of new energy vehicles. Has a very good business prospect.

According to the latest data released by the China charging Alliance, as of September 2023, the cumulative number of charging infrastructure in the country was 7.642 million, an increase of 70.3 percent over the same period last year. As the "new infrastructure" of the current era, the growth of the charging service industry has accelerated significantly in recent years, driven by both market and policy.

Under such a trend, but all enterprises that get on this "express" can always usher in their own carnival in the tuyere. Energy chain Intelligence is one of the representatives. According to its 2023 Q3 results, its quarterly revenue exceeded 170 million yuan ($23.4 million), a year-on-year increase of 536%.

Obviously, Energy chain Intelligence has embarked on a road of rapid development. However, for such a nearly doubled performance, it is difficult to say whether it is the lift of the market tuyere, or the struggle of the chain of wisdom and electricity. Taking a closer look at the business data and business behind the growth, the industry rookie still faces many problems and lurks risks in its business model.

01 be on guard against "pigs on the tuyere"

Lei Jun once said that even a pig can fly when standing on a tuyere. Admittedly, in many booming industries, especially in key areas with policy support, many enterprises can take off with homeopathy, thus covering up many of their own problems. even let the outside world replace the growth trend of the industry into the enterprise.

At present, the charging service industry is on the rise, Neng Lianzhi power plant has been on the market tuyere, although there is an increase, but the commercial risk feedback from the operating data is not low.

On the one hand, energy chain intelligence's asset-liability ratio is still expanding compared with the previous quarter, as high as 90.58%, far exceeding the general warning line of 70%. In the past three quarters, Energy chain Intelligence lost 680 million yuan, compared with an operating loss of 447 million yuan in the previous quarter. In the face of expanding losses, it is still unknown how much money it will need to "burn" later.

On the other hand, revenue growth, which is most valued by Energy chain Intelligence, is more likely to be "thrown" with money. Specifically, the Q3 gross profit of Energy chain Intelligence increased by 46.828 million yuan compared with Q2, while the marketing expenses of the same period increased by 161 million yuan month-on-month. In other words, if you can make a profit of 1 yuan, you have to invest nearly 4 yuan in marketing expenses.

It is not difficult to find that the financial risk of energy chain smart electricity is still relatively high. At present, Nengchuan Zhi Dian still has 396 million yuan in cash and more than 500 million yuan in short-term debt. When the asset-liability ratio is more than 90%, the amount of short-term debt is larger than the funds on the account, which means that short-term financing is likely to face more serious operational problems.

In addition, according to the latest data on November 8th, the shareholding of Nengchuan Zhidian is surprisingly low, at 0.30%. In other words, there are almost no large institutions as ballast protection plates. By contrast, in the same period, the institutional shareholding of Xilai Automobile was 31.45%, and bilibili also had 19.14%.

The pig flying in the tuyere is not a pig's ability after all, once the tuyere changes, then the pig's situation will be very awkward. Not long ago, the three head operators, Special call, Star charging and Cloud Fast charging, removed their shelves from App, which is owned by Nenglian Smart Electric, and announced that they would jointly build a high-quality and stable charging Internet, which not only started the war between the charging pile directly connected platform and the third-party aggregation platform, but also meant that the platform advantage of Energy chain Smart Electric in the charging service market was facing fundamental weakening.

It is obvious that the competition logic of the charging service market has changed fundamentally from the bottom, and the third-party aggregate flow platform, which is commonly used by energy chain smart electricity, is being rejected by the charging pile directly connected platform in the upper reaches of the industrial chain. the new order and pattern are facing a reshuffle. The tuyere is changing, and the position of Energy chain Intelligence in the charging service market may not be as stable as expected.

02 Energy chain Intelligence's "reverse" operation

Looking at the trend of the times, due to the progress of the underlying technology, the service logic of many industries is changing, such as cars to smart cars, home appliances to smart homes-- in the process of this transformation, selling products is no longer the main way to make money in its business model, but selling services is the corresponding smart cars, subscription services provided to users in smart home scenarios, and so on.

This is a lighter and lighter industry path, which emphasizes enriching subscription services in the concept of sustainable development and providing long-term value to users. However, energy chain Zhidian, as a new hot player in the current market, is "doing the opposite", giving people a feeling of getting heavier and heavier.

According to the Q3 financial report in 2023, in the revenue structure of energy chain smart power, the revenue of offline energy solutions based on EPC and energy storage is 139 million yuan, accounting for 81%. The revenue of sustainable charging service is only 31.506 million yuan. By contrast, offline energy solutions have become the main source of revenue for Energy chain Intelligence.

So, in this transformation, has Energy chain Intelligence become a new energy asset operator as desired? At present, it is hard to say that the offline energy solution of Energy chain Intelligence is an asset-heavy project and does not seem to have the same sustainable development capabilities as SaaS subscription services.

In other words, the current quarter's EPC revenue will be difficult to maintain in the next quarter, unless it continues to open up new markets. But how many new markets can be tapped by Nengchuan Intelligence?

Maybe Nenglian Smart wants to be a "water seller" in the new energy industry, but for now it is more like a "well digger", that is, helping other service providers set up charging service scenarios. However, in this way, it means that Nengchuan Zhidian can not focus on "selling water", "wells" are not their own, and what they do is an one-time project-based service.

In the long run, time may prove that if it is not adjusted, the pace of energy chain intelligence will become heavier and heavier.

03 is written at the end

Most of the time, the awkward situation of the industry often stems from the problem of self-positioning, which is probably the case with Nengchuan Smart Power.

On the one hand, in the field of charging services, energy chain Zhi Dian seems to want to be a "winner-take-all" and to be a third-party platform for aggregating traffic. as a result, the price war annoys ecological partners, facing the situation of rising up and setting up their own doors, and the accelerated loss of platform competitiveness.

On the other hand, Nengchuan Zhidian goes deep into the new energy asset operation market and does the business of the contractor, and the intention behind it seems to be to keep an eye on the current "new infrastructure" to make a lot of money.

However, once the tuyere of new energy is over, when the charging service industry enters the stock competition stage, without the continuous increment at this stage, it will be very difficult to continue.

So, what the energy chain smart electricity does is to keep looking for increments. Today, the energy chain Zhidian shouted to enter the energy storage market, is a performance.

However, the situation in the energy storage market is not so good. At present, the entire energy storage market is facing a downward cycle, and players in the industry are plagued by problems such as capacity process, inventory overstocking and falling prices. at the same time, there are many large companies and capital from various industries coming in, and everywhere is crowded with ambitious manufacturers.

Admittedly, energy chain Zhidian is also one of them, but in the face of such an inward volume of the Red Sea market, how many fruits can be picked back in the game at this time? Don't rip open another loss hole.

Of course, the more "red" the market, the more wonderful business stories can be told. If Energy chain Intelligence only tells a diversified business story in the new energy industry chain, it is a good direction to enter the energy storage market.

It's just that if it goes on like this, Zhidian needs to pay attention to whether its "heavy" disease can be alleviated in the future market, so as not to be unable to go on.

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