Since Wuxi Suntech went public in the United States in December 2005, solar and wind energy have been playing a leading role in the clean technology investment stage for the past five years. Although these two areas are still receiving much attention, the eyes of private equity funds are already looking for the next clean technology investment hot spot.
The eight VC & PEs have expressed strong interest in the fields of smart grid, energy storage and nuclear power. The new generation of capital myths in the field of clean technology may be staged in these fields.
The endless stream of clean energy technologies is dazzling. How to find the next hot spot for clean technology investment will test the eyesight of VC & PE.
Smart grid VC opportunity: terminal link
"At present, there is no unified positioning at home and abroad. Personally, the definition is not very important." Feng Qingdong, deputy chief engineer of the Institute of Transmission and Transformation Automation of the Chinese Academy of Electric Power, said that China's smart grid construction is based on power generation, substation , Dispatch, power distribution, and power transmission.
But in fact, VC & PE cannot fully participate in these six links. "In fact, links such as transmission and distribution are done by some more traditional power companies. Venture capital in these areas is not particularly active." A Wang investment People in the circle said.
Liu Xiaoyu, the chief representative of the US Clean Technology Industry Investment Group in China, pointed out that China and foreign countries have different concerns about smart grids. Foreign countries are more concerned about electricity meters and some decentralized energy control systems, such as smart monitoring and electricity meter facilities for each household. .
Feng Qingdong also talked about the difference between China and foreign countries: "The development of smart grids in foreign countries like the United States and Europe starts with the electricity link, and our country starts with the transmission grid, but we have not given up on the link to electricity."
In fact, VC & PE has begun to eagerly test smart meters in China, including the venture capital fund VentechChina from France.
"Smart meter terminals can send very targeted consumption analysis data back to the power supply bureau, and the network of power supply is everywhere." Guo Jia, a partner of VentechChina, said that the country is currently exploring emerging network functions such as the Internet of Things. Realization through the smart grid can save the country a lot of unnecessary, inefficient and inefficient construction investment.
People in the investment community with the surname Wang believe that there are opportunities for smart meters, but there are not many cases now.
"We didn't see some specific investment cases in the first two quarters of 2010, but there were more abroad." Liu Xiaoyu said that in the second quarter of 2010, investment events in the field of smart grids abroad were dominated by home energy management system companies.
The three largest investments are: OpenPeak successfully raised US $ 52 million, with investors including Intel Capital; Consert received US $ 17.7 million from GE Energy Financial Services, Qualcomm, Verizon, etc .; GreenWaveReality received US $ 11 million from the California Clean Technology Fund Financing.
Although the home market of smart grids is valued abroad, it does not seem suitable for China.
"The domestic consumer market in the smart grid sector in China is limited, because the driving force for household purchases is to save money and expenses." Chen Lihui, a partner in the investment consulting firm Hezhong Capital, said that ordinary people will care about the cost of living if they buy a set of equipment Hundreds and thousands of dollars are needed, and the electricity bill saved is only a few dozens of dollars. The average family will not consider buying, and the family market is scattered. It is relatively difficult to do.
Therefore, Chen Lihui believes that most of the customers of the smart grid should be large enterprises and public utilities. "For large power consumers, if there is a 30% to 40% savings, it is a significant cost reduction."
"We are in contact with some smart grid equipment chip companies and solution companies to see if there is an opportunity for investment." Chen revealed.
Capital chases battery energy-saving technology
Obviously, although VC & PE is optimistic about the smart grid, a large-scale "start" is still lurking. At this time, the energy storage industry has clearly become the focus of capital favor.
For example, a series of investment incidents have occurred in the field of energy storage: in 2007, Qingyun Venture Capital invested in energy storage product provider Huineng Technology; in 2009, CNOOC and Tianjin Jinneng Investment Company signed an agreement to produce lithium batteries for a local electric vehicle mainly for electric vehicles. Tianjin Lishen Battery Co., Ltd. ’s manufacturer invested 5 billion yuan; in 2010, Puneng announced the successful completion of the third round of financing of up to US $ 32 million. Puneng is a vanadium battery company focusing on energy storage technology.
In fact, the heat of energy storage comes from the fact that it is a key device in the fields of smart grid, solar energy, wind energy, electric vehicles and so on.
"It helps to break the bottleneck of access to wind power and photovoltaic power generation." Mu Feng, the co-founder of Pengeng, is optimistic about the prospects of energy storage technology. He believes that energy storage technology can respond to many new energy problems, such as reducing Supporting the demand for transmission line capacity, alleviating the peak pressure of the power grid, eliminating fluctuations in wind power and photovoltaic power generation, and reducing the operating costs of off-grid power systems.
The "wind and fire" scene of the energy storage industry is not only reflected in the fields that represent the future direction of new material batteries such as lithium batteries. In terms of traditional lead-acid batteries, VC & PE has not given up, that is, optimistic about the "energy-saving improvement space of lead-acid batteries" .
"We are paying attention to battery management technology. In fact, the focus of this technology application is on the first generation of lead-acid batteries." Detong Capital Shao Jun said that because lead-acid batteries have many advantages over lithium-ion batteries, Such as safety, stability, cost. If you can manage the lead-acid battery well, extend the life of the battery by using lead, and reduce the lead consumption to half, whether it is energy saving or environmental protection is a very good thing. It is not the case that holds the same judgment.
"The cost of lithium batteries is difficult to fall to the level of direct PK with lead-acid batteries. At present, some people in China and the United States have put forward technical improvement ideas, which can make the cost of lead-acid greatly drop again, and the charge and discharge efficiency directly approaches lithium batteries." Managing Director Wang Junfeng said, "It sounds very exciting, but we are still carefully verifying and actively exploring."
Although capital is optimistic about the energy storage industry, it is also quite cautious when it really "shots."
"We are very careful about investing in this area because we don't want to invest in areas that are immature, imperfect and have potential safety hazards," Wang Junfeng said.
It is understood that VentechChina has looked at all the companies that make batteries in the entire industrial chain of new electric vehicles, and finally decided not to vote for any one.
Financing of nuclear power equipment industry
In addition to smart grids and energy storage, nuclear power is also a concern for VC & PE.
China's nuclear power sector has long been dominated by state-owned capital. Currently, only three companies, China National Nuclear Corporation, China Guangdong Nuclear Power Corporation, and China Power Investment Corporation, can operate as controlling owners of nuclear power plants.
Judging from the news from the National Energy Administration's energy economic situation conference in the first half of July 20th, the brewing "Emerging Energy Industry Development Plan" proposed that by 2020, the installed capacity of nuclear power will reach more than 75 million kilowatts. This scale is nearly 9 times that of the existing unit (908 million kilowatts).
Such attractive development prospects make VC & PE also have to pay attention to nuclear power. But so far, there have been few investment cases in this area.
The eye-catching case that can be seen is that in 2009, the US private equity fund Quad-C invested $ 25 million in Shijiazhuang Gongda Chemical Equipment Co., Ltd. This is also the first time that this field has received investment from an international private equity fund.
In addition to the outstanding state-owned capital, VC & PE hesitated because of the high technical threshold and safety issues in the field of nuclear power. Nevertheless, it is not without opportunities. Capitals hope to find opportunities in the refined industrial chain.
"The entire shell of the fourth-generation nuclear reactor is made of graphite, so there will be opportunities for the production and processing of graphite," said Chen Lihui, the managing partner of Hezhong Capital.
In addition, Chen Lihui pointed out that the state requires domestic production of many key components of nuclear reactors, so that domestic related companies can look for opportunities.
"Private enterprises can make a difference in nuclear power equipment, such as pipes, pipelines, etc." Analysis of the aforementioned investment surnamed Wang.
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