Three types of players in the energy storage arena: energy storage companies, lithium battery companies, and photovoltaic companies
In terms of market trends, experience in energy storage technology research and development and project development, energy storage subsidy policies and develop strategic goals, wind, and solar development scale, distributed energy development scale, electricity price level, time-of-use price, electricity demand-side charging, auxiliary Driven by factors such as the service market, the global energy storage industry has broad development prospects and will maintain a steady growth trend in the future.
At present, there are mainly three types of players in the domestic energy storage market. The first type is energy storage brand vendors, the second type is lithium battery companies, and the third type is companies that cross borders from photovoltaics, wind power, and other fields.
Players in the first category: energy storage brands
Energy storage brand vendors are energy storage system integrators in the general sense, directly facing the end market and customers, including households and large and medium-sized energy storage, purchasing lithium batteries and other equipment for integration, and then delivering personalized energy storage systems. The core technology requirements for energy storage system integration are not high. The core components, especially lithium batteries, are purchased from outside. Its core competitiveness is a product design and market development. The key is the market, especially the brand and channels.
In the energy storage industry, system integrators provide full battery energy storage systems (BESS). Therefore, it is usually responsible for purchasing individual components, mainly battery modules/rack, power conversion system (PCS) and other equipment; assembling the system; providing comprehensive warranty; integrated control and energy management system (EMS); usually providing project design and engineering Professional knowledge; provide operation, monitoring, and maintenance services.
Energy storage system integrators will gain more market opportunities, and they may develop in two directions in the future: first, product-led promotion of standard system integration services; second, scenario requirements reverse customized system integration services. Energy storage system integrators are playing an increasingly important role in the power system.
The second type of players: lithium battery providers
Various signs indicate that the energy storage market has entered an important time node for large-scale commercial use. With the accelerated development of lithium batteries in the energy storage market, after the first taste of the energy storage market, some lithium battery companies have also incorporated the energy storage market into the main channel of the company's strategic planning.
There are two main ways for lithium battery suppliers to intervene in the energy storage business. One is to act as an upstream supplier and provide standardized lithium batteries to downstream energy storage brands with a relatively independent role; the other is to enter the downstream system integration and directly face the end market, upstream and downstream. Integration.
Lithium battery companies will also directly carry out energy storage business for end-users, which does not prevent them from delivering standardized lithium battery modules to other energy storage customers, or even OEM for them.
High safety, long life, and low cost are the three major focus points of the energy storage market for lithium battery applications. Taking the safety as the core benchmark, improving product performance through material/technology/process innovation, and tapping the potential to reduce costs from the perspective of the industrial chain are aimed at An important focus of lithium battery companies in the energy storage market.
The third type of players: photovoltaic companies cross-border
With favorable policies and optimistic market expectations, photovoltaic companies are becoming more enthusiastic about investment and expansion, and photovoltaic + energy storage has gradually become a prerequisite for prioritizing market entry.
According to reports, there are currently three types of photovoltaic companies that are relatively active in energy storage applications. One is the power station developers or owners to understand what kind of configuration the photovoltaic power station needs, whether it conforms to the functions of the smart microgrid, and whether it conforms to the industrial policy support. The second category is component companies. The current major brands are large-scale component companies. They have the ability to vertically integrate resources and it is more convenient to combine photovoltaics and energy storage. The third category is inverter companies, who have a deeper grasp of energy storage technology, and it is more convenient to transform from inverter products to energy storage products.
Photovoltaic is an important scenario for supporting energy storage on the power generation side of new energy. Therefore, the market channel of photovoltaics has naturally become a market channel for energy storage. Whether it is distributed photovoltaics, centralized photovoltaics, photovoltaic module companies, or photovoltaic inverter companies, the market and channel advantages in the photovoltaic industry can be converted into market development for the energy storage business.
Regardless of the power grid development requirements and energy supply requirements, the large-scale implementation of photovoltaic + energy storage is a necessity, and the follow-up and promotion of policies will inevitably lead to the rapid development of the photovoltaic + energy storage industry.
