[special topic on SMM] from the vicissitudes of a hundred years to the outbreak of the new century, it is enough to read the history of copper foil in the world.

Directory:

5. Japan monopolizes the high-end copper foil market and China's copper foil import dependence is declining.

VI. Achilles heel and Future Development trend of Electronic Copper foil Industry in China

Introduction to SMM: copper foil is changing from oversupply in previous years to short supply, mainly due to the development of new energy automobile industry, which has increased the demand for lithium copper foil. At the same time, the improvement of China's copper foil capacity utilization rate and the reduction of foreign import dependence indicate that China's copper foil market is moving towards a new era.

The unique double pride of copper foil industry: electrolytic copper foil and Calendering copper foil

Copper foil is a kind of cathode electrolytic material, which is a thin and continuous metal foil precipitated on the substrate of the circuit board. It is used as the conductor of PCB. Copper foil is made of copper plus a certain proportion of other metals, copper foil generally has 90 foil and 88 foil, that is, copper content is 90% and 88%, size is 16*16cm copper foil, is the most widely used decorative material. Such as: hotels, monasteries, Buddhist statues, gold-lettered signboards, ceramic tile mosaics, handicrafts and so on.

Baidu encyclopedia copper foil interpretation may still let readers listen to the clouds and fog, from the literal understanding may be more intuitive, foil is very thin meaning. Copper foil is a very thin copper product. Copper, like paper, whose thickness is expressed in microns. Generally between 5um-135um, the thinner the wider the more difficult to produce.

Copper foil is widely used in electronic industry

Copper foil industry chain diagram

Copper foil is an irreplaceable basic material in modern electronic industry. According to the different manufacturing process, copper foil can be divided into two types: Calendering copper foil and electrolytic copper foil (at present, more than 90% of the copper foil in the world is electrolytic copper foil). As one of the main raw materials in PCB manufacturing, copper foil plays an important role in PCB, such as conductivity, heat dissipation and so on. In the rapid development of electronic information industry, copper foil is called the "neural network" of electronic product signal and power transmission and communication. It plays a very important role in the overall features of PCB. The performance, quality, processability, manufacturing level, manufacturing cost and long-term reliability of the circuit board are closely related to the quality of copper foil and the processing level of copper foil in PCB manufacturing.

Electrolytic copper foil is an important material for the manufacture of copper clad laminate (CCL), printed circuit board (PCB) and lithium ion battery. In the rapid development of electronic information industry, electrolytic copper foil is called the "neural network" of electronic product signal and power transmission and communication. Since 2002, the production value of printed circuit board in China has entered the third place in the world, as the substrate material of PCB-copper clad laminate has also become the third largest producer in the world. As a result, the electrolytic copper foil industry in China has developed by leaps and bounds in recent years.

Calendering copper foil is compressed and extended copper foil. When the copper block is pressed by the calender, it will extend in the front and back direction. It's the same principle as rolling pin. Compared with electrolytic copper foil, Calendering copper foil is more difficult to process.

The vicissitudes of the 20th Century and the Development History of Copper foil Enterprises in the World

In the rapid development of electronic information industry, electrolytic copper foil is called the "neural network" of electronic product signal and power transmission and communication. Since 2002, the production value of printed circuit board in China has exceeded the third place in the world. As the substrate material of PCB, copper clad laminate has also become the third largest producer in the world. As a result, China's electrolytic copper foil industry has developed by leaps and bounds in recent years.

From the point of view of the production department and market development of electrolytic copper foil industry, its development process can be divided into three major development periods: the initial establishment of the world copper foil enterprise in the United States and the initial period of electrolytic copper foil industry; The period in which Japanese copper foil enterprises monopolized the world market; the period when the world was multipolar and competed for the market.

The initial establishment of the world copper foil enterprises and the beginning of the electrolytic copper foil industry in the United States was between 1955 and 1970s.

1930s

In 1922, Edison of the United States invented the continuous manufacturing patent of thin nickel foil, which became the forerunner of modern electrolytic copper foil continuous manufacturing technology. According to the China Epoxy Resin Industry Association experts, the patent is in the lower half of the cathode rotating roller through the electrolyte, through a semi-circular arc anode, through electrolysis to form nickel foil. The foil is coated on the surface of the cathode roll, and the nickel foil obtained by coiling can be stripped continuously when the roller is turned out of the liquid level.

In 1937, Anaconde Copper Co., Ltd., PerthAmboy, New Jersey, USA, made use of the Edison patent principle and process mentioned above, and successfully developed the industrially produced electroplated copper foil products. They use insoluble anode "acidizing electrolysis" and "dissolving copper to precipitate copper" to produce electrolytic copper foil by continuous method to achieve copper ion balance. The creation of this method is more convenient than the Calendering method to produce copper foil, therefore, at that time, a large number of building materials products, used in building moisture-proof, decoration.

1950s

In 1955, Yates engineers who developed and designed electrolytic copper foil equipment in Anaconda, and Dr. Adler broke away from the company and independently formed Circuitfoil (hereinafter referred to as CFC, a manufacturer later known as Yates). Yates later set up plants to produce electrolytic copper foil in New Jersey, California and the United Kingdom.

In 1957, Clevite and Gould were derived from Anaconda. They also began to produce electrolytic copper foil for printed circuit boards. After that, Gould set up electrolytic copper foil plants in Germany (then West Germany), Hong Kong, Ohio, Arizona and the United Kingdom to supply the production of copper-clad laminates and PCB. In the late 1950s, Gould has become the largest electrolytic copper foil manufacturer in the world.

In 1958, Hitachi Chemical Industries and Sumitomo Bakelite (both of which are major CCL manufacturers in Japan) established a joint venture to establish the Japanese Electrolytic Company. After that, Japan Fukuda Metal foil Industry Company (referred to as Futian Company), Guhe Electric Industry Company (referred to as Guhe Electric Company) and Mitsui Metal Mining Company (referred to as Mitsui Company) set up electrolytic copper foil production plants one after another. To construct the electrolytic copper foil industry for PCB in Japan. At that time, Japanese copper foil factories used intermittent electrolysis: the use of electroforming technology, qing copper plating bath, polar roll for stainless steel, electrolytic copper as soluble positive. This inefficient mode of production, the whole of Japan can produce thousands of meters of thin copper every month.

1960s

In the 1960s, PCB has gradually spread to all fields of the electronic industry, and the demand for copper foil is increasing rapidly. According to the expert of China Epoxy Resin Industry Association, in 1968, Mitsui (Mitsui) introduced the technology of continuous electrolysis to produce copper foil from Anaconda Company of the United States for the first time, and produced this kind of electrolytic copper foil in the factory of Shangwei Town, Qiyu County.

Guhe Electric Company (Furukawa) also introduced copper foil production technology from CFC Company in the United States. The copper foil production plant established by Guhe Electric Company in Tochigi Prefecture, Japan was completed in 1972. In addition, Japanese Electrolytic Company and Fukuda Company (Fukuda) started the production of industrial electrolytic copper foil by using the technology of continuous electrolytic copper foil and the surface treatment technology of copper foil developed by Japan Electrolytic Company and Fukuda Company. Several major copper foil factories in Japan made rapid progress in technology and production in the early 1970s.

In the early 1960s. Benxi Alloy Factory (and now Benxi Copper foil Factory), Northwest Copper processing Plant (now Baiyin Huaxia Electronic Materials Co., Ltd.), The Shanghai smelter (now Shanghai Jinbao Copper foil Co., Ltd.) relies on its own technology. Started the electrolytic copper foil industry for PCB in China. In the early 1970s, it was possible to produce raw foil products in large quantities. During that period, the coarsening technology of copper foil mainly depended on the processing of several domestic copper clad laminate manufacturers. In the late 1960s, the "anodizing" coarsening method was successfully developed by Beijing Insulation Materials Factory. After coarsening on the Calendering copper foil, it is realized on the electrolytic copper foil. In the early 1980s, the copper foil industry in mainland China realized the surface coarsening technology of cathode polarization of electrolytic copper foil.

Analysis on the Global present situation of Copper foil Industry

Global capacity utilization rate is increasing year by year, industry supply has shifted from surplus to short supply.

Data source: CLP copper foil branch

Judging from the production capacity and output data of the global copper foil industry, the production capacity increased from 591000 tons in 2011 to 632000 tons in 2016, with a compound annual growth rate of 1.35%. Production increased from 350400 tons in 2016 to 506300 tons in 2016, with a compound annual growth rate of 7.64 per cent.

Although the global production capacity has not increased much in recent years, the output of the industry has increased steadily, and the capacity utilization rate has gradually increased, from 60% in 2011 to 80% in 2016. The supply of the industry has slowly shifted from a surplus in the previous few years to a situation in which supply falls short of demand.

According to data from relevant industry associations, global copper foil production capacity will reach 78 / 880000 tons in 2017-2018, with growth rates of 23.41 per cent and 12.82 per cent, respectively. China is a major contributor to future capacity releases.

Analysis of domestic production capacity and output

Data source: CLP copper foil branch

China's copper foil production capacity increased from 232700 tons in 2011 to 329000 tons in 2016, with an annual compound growth rate of 7.17 percent, and output increased from 194300 tons in 2011 to 291600 tons in 2016, with an annual compound growth rate of 8.46 percent. Growth figures for capacity and production in recent years have been better than the global average. In terms of capacity utilization, domestic capacity utilization has been basically maintained at about 80% in recent years, which is obviously better than the global industry data.

Data source: CLP copper foil branch

The trend of New Energy vehicles is irresistible. The demand for Lithium Electric Copper foil is rising step by step.

According to the classification of primary consumption of copper in China, copper consumption mainly includes copper rod wire, copper strip, copper rod, copper tube, copper foil and so on.

Copper foil accounts for a small proportion of copper consumption in China

Unlike other copper, copper foil is in short supply, mainly due to the development of the new energy vehicle industry, which has increased the demand for lithium copper foil, and due to the conversion of factories that produce standard copper foil (higher processing fees). Resulting in an overall shortage of copper foil.

According to the data of the output of various types of copper foil in recent years, the proportion of annual output of lithium copper foil was only 5.98% in 2011, increased to 20.20% in 2016, and before 2016, the proportion of copper foil production increased from 5.98% in 2011 to 20.20% in 2016. The development of China's copper foil industry mainly benefits from the steady growth of the PCB industry (judging from the 10 per cent annual compound growth rate of the PCB industry in recent years and the annual compound growth rate of 8 per cent of the domestic copper foil industry output is basically in line with this conclusion). And the development of 3C lithium battery.

From the perspective of sub-application, the growth rate of electronic circuit copper foil decreased year by year from 2013 to 2015, and the industry warmed up and the growth rate increased in 2016. Lithium copper foil benefited from the development of traditional 3C lithium batteries between 2012 and 2015, with a growth rate of about 30%, although the growth rate slowed in 2015. However, with the development of the power battery industry with higher demand for copper foil (3C batteries require about 800 tons of copper foil per GWH, the demand for power batteries is about 1000 tons, and the unit demand has increased by about 12.5 percent). Growth rose again to about 40% in 2016.

Therefore, it is expected that with the explosive growth of the domestic new energy automobile industry, it has led to the rapid development of the lithium battery industry. Copper foil, as one of the important parts in the lithium battery, will also grow rapidly with the development of the lithium battery industry in the future.

Japan monopolizes high-end copper foil market and China's copper foil import dependence is declining.

Source: China Customs Information Network

Although the global proportion of copper foil output in China in recent years is more than 50%, but in the high-end copper foil, China's production capacity is still very insufficient, although the import volume in recent years is decreasing year by year, but the import proportion is still about 30%. In terms of export, the export volume of copper foil in China has been declining year by year in recent years. From the import and export unit price data, China's copper foil mainly imports high-end products, exports low-end products.

China's copper foil accounted for 27% of copper exports in 2016

At present, the main countries that produce copper foil in the world include mainland China, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, the United States and other countries, but in the high-end electrolytic copper foil, production technology, equipment manufacturing technology and market share are monopolized by Japan. The world's leading high-grade electrolytic copper foil suppliers include: Mitsui Metal, Japanese Energy, Guhe Electric, Fukuda Metal and Japanese Electrolytic five major companies.

Generally speaking, the domestic demand for high-end copper foil, especially for high-end lithium electricity copper foil, is still mainly imported. Therefore, it is expected that in the future, domestic copper foil enterprises with strong technical strength are expected to gradually seize the domestic high-end copper foil market. Realize import substitution.

Data sources: China Customs Information Network, China Power Association Copper foil Branch

Since about 30% of China's copper foil needs to be imported, it is necessary to analyze the apparent consumption data (output + import volume-export volume). Judging from the apparent consumption data of the domestic copper foil industry in recent years, It remained basically stable until 2015, with consumption reaching 389700 tons in 2016, mainly due to the growth in demand in the power battery industry and the recovery in the PCB industry.

Achilles heel and Future Development trend of Electronic Copper foil Industry in China

The problems existing in the development of electronic copper foil industry in China can be summarized as follows: "two gaps are widening" and "one management crisis exists".

The main results are as follows: 1) the individualization of copper foil varieties among domestic enterprises is different in development direction and degree, resulting in a widening income gap between enterprises.

At present, the differences in the development direction and speed of copper foil varieties among enterprises in China are becoming more and more obvious, which makes the income gap between enterprises increase. The development of individualization of copper foil varieties refers to giving full play to the advantages of enterprises (from technology, equipment, intellectual property rights, region, market, energy, capital, upstream and downstream connections, etc.) according to the needs of the market. To focus on the development of high performance, high added value, market potential of copper foil varieties and characteristics. An enterprise develops a personalized variety of copper foil, creates its own brand, and occupies a larger market share of this variety, which is the embodiment of the improvement of the technical level of the enterprise and the starting point for the transformation of the product structure. It is one of the important ways to improve the low situation of enterprise management industry. "the army is unusual, the water is not constant (" Sun Tzu Art of War "), each enterprise according to its own advantages to develop the variety and characteristics of copper foil personalized, can not copy other enterprises in this regard want to business model.

2) the gap between the technical level of high-grade copper foil products of domestic enterprises and that of overseas enterprises is widening.

In recent years, great changes have taken place in the world copper foil industry and market: a number of Japanese copper foil enterprises, which originally had large production capacity and advanced copper foil technology, have been "slimming" in recent years. Or stop producing ordinary copper foil varieties. At the same time, the pace of introduction of their high-order copper foil varieties is accelerated, and the improvement of performance level is accelerated. In the high-order, high-performance copper foil market permeability, China's copper foil enterprises have not shown a general improvement. In many high-performance copper foil market, in the past one or two years, the scale of demand is expanding, at the same time, the "threshold" is also increasing. In this context, China's copper foil enterprises in these types of high-end copper foil competitiveness, the actual performance is not satisfactory. On the technical level of high-order copper foil products, the gap is widening with Japanese companies, or even a Taiwanese company and a South Korean company, which bought US-funded copper foil companies in 2015.

3) at present, domestic enterprises in China are facing the potential crisis of overcapacity and another sharp decline in operating efficiency.

In recent years, domestic enterprises in China have been developing the scale of conventional copper foil in recent years, as well as the scale of copper foil for conventional lithium batteries, which is very hot in the market at present. Especially since 2015, blindly to lithium copper foil-based large-scale production line expansion, enterprise construction. According to the investigation and estimation, the planned annual production capacity of the new lithium battery copper foil project in China during the 13th five-year Plan period will reach more than 200000 tons, and the production capacity of lithium battery copper foil will reach about 25 ~ 300000 tons at the end of the 13th five-year Plan period. More "appetite", more enterprises, to compete for this piece of lithium battery copper foil "cake" (domestic production and sale of lithium battery copper foil 42000 tons in 2015), China's domestic copper foil production capacity of blind expansion, new construction, It is bound to lead to a potential crisis of greater overcapacity and another sharp decline in operating efficiency in the industry in the future. In the face of the tendency to focus on the pursuit and shift to the current demand for lithium copper foil in the current industry, another concern is that it may affect the copper foil for PCB.

The relationship between supply and demand, as well as slowing down the pace of upgrading of copper foil technology for PCB in domestic enterprises.

Future Development trend (New Energy vehicles)

The vigorous development of new energy automobile industry also brings benefits to copper consumption, especially copper foil. The amount of copper used in each traditional car is about 20 to 30 kilograms, while the amount of copper used by new energy vehicles is about twice as much as that of traditional fuel vehicles, so the increase in copper consumption for new energy vehicles in the future will be a major attraction in the growth of copper consumption. According to the CAAC, 262000 new energy vehicles were produced from January to April 2018, an increase of 113 per cent over the same period last year. According to the government's plan, production of new energy vehicles will reach 2 million by 2020, maintaining a compound growth rate of nearly 40 per cent. Therefore, the new energy vehicle is the most certain industry in the future growth, and the amount of copper growth brought about by the new energy vehicle is also determined.

According to the forecast values in the "New Energy vehicle Industry report" released earlier, it is estimated that the global sales of new energy vehicles will reach 3.64 million by 2020, assuming that the matching capacity of bicycle batteries is 30KWH. Well, it is estimated that the global demand for vehicle power batteries will be about 109.2 GWH by 2020, and it is assumed that vehicle power batteries account for about 80% of the whole power battery industry, and power batteries account for 65% of lithium batteries. By 2020, the global demand for lithium batteries will be about 210GWH.

Assuming that the average use of copper foil per GWH lithium battery is 900 tons / WGH, the global demand for lithium copper foil is estimated to be about 189000 tons by 2020. Corresponding to the global demand of 85500 tons of lithium copper foil in 2016, the compound annual growth rate reached 21.93 per cent. On the whole, the future development trend of the industry is relatively stable.

At present, China's electronic copper foil industry has encountered a good opportunity. In view of the new situation and existing problems in the electronic copper foil industry, we appeal to and advocate domestic copper foil production enterprises. First, we should not blindly expand and build new copper foil projects. To prevent the emergence of a new round of domestic overcapacity and vicious competition; Second, it is necessary to speed up the pace of scientific research and technical transformation of enterprises, enhance the level of independent innovation, develop intellectual property strategy, and better meet the needs of the development of downstream industries; Third, enterprises should consider the long term, rationally formulate the price mechanism, realize the linkage between upstream and downstream enterprises, and jointly promote the healthy and orderly development of the industrial chain. Fourth, we should advocate the advent of multi-variety and characteristic products, catch up with and surpass the advanced level of the world, and strive to achieve full coverage of the quality of all kinds of products demanded by downstream industries. Fifth, improve the manufacturing level of domestic copper foil equipment, especially speed up the pace of innovation in intelligent production and quality control, develop equipment manufacturing scale on the basis of high quality, and strive to realize the localization of omni-directional copper foil equipment and equipment.