The current task of hippocampus is, of course, to find funds, on the one hand, to protect the shell; On the other hand, the pressure to strengthen investment in this project is still great.

Text/"Autobots" Qi Ce

On March 24th, Hainan Mazda and Toyota (China) Investment Co., Ltd. signed the Framework Agreement on R&D Strategic Cooperation and Industrialization of Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicles (hereinafter referred to as the Hydrogen Agreement). Jing Zhu, chairman and founder of Haima Automobile, has been talking about this for a long time.

As a representative of the 14th National People's Congress, Jing Zhu has repeatedly proposed to build a hydrogen energy project in Hainan and develop the hydrogen energy industry. Unexpectedly, he really pushed him forward.

Reasons for betting on hydrogen energy in hippocampus

Will the management of hippocampus be improved? It should be difficult unless Toyota is willing to directly inject capital into the hydrogen projects of both parties. The agreement has no actual content, it is a veritable framework agreement, and all terms are naturally unrestricted.

Moreover, although the "hydrogen agreement" mentioned "promoting commercial operation", it did not involve joint venture or capital injection and lacked operational deployment. Promoting commercialization is an end rather than a means.

Such an agreement may not be what Zhu Jing finally wants, but it is the best one at present. Toyota's own hydrogen-fueled passenger cars have been commercialized, and they all have a hard time, so far there is no profit.

Therefore, it is hopeless for hippocampus to expect to make money temporarily. The agreement does not directly help the current operation of Haima, but increases the pressure on cash flow.

Since Zhu Jing returned to be the chairman of HNA Mazda on 20 17, Haima has not turned losses, but has continued to decline. By the end of 2022, Haima had lost 6.6 billion yuan in six years, and its business had long been marginalized. Moreover, at the end of 20021,the OEM contract between Haima and Tucki failed to be renewed, making life even more difficult for Haima.

Both traditional energy sources and electric vehicles have been tried by Haima, and the results are not good. Its monthly sales volume has dropped to the level of 2000 vehicles, and it has become a local enterprise in Hainan, losing its brand's ability to radiate the whole country.

In the capital market, the listed seahorse has long tasted the taste of "wearing a star and a hat", and managed to keep its shell by selling houses and other operations. Due to the announcement of the pre-loss of 65.438+0.2 billion-65.438+0.8 billion yuan in 2022 in June of this year (which is likely to reach the upper limit), it is facing the problem of shell protection again.

In the past two months, the scandals of Haima, Didi and Xiaomi have been shattered. The "hydrogen agreement" signed this time did not win the understanding of investors, and Haima's share price fell continuously on the same day and in the following trading days.

It seems that the capital market also thinks that it is doubtful whether the agreement with Toyota can make money. Even if I can, I can't quench my thirst.

Content supported by Hainan provincial government

But this matter can't be seen only from the enterprise level, but also enlarged.

202 1, the 30th anniversary of the establishment of Hainan Special Zone, the four strategic orientations given to Hainan by the central authorities are "comprehensively deepening the reform and opening-up pilot zone, the national ecological civilization pilot zone, the international tourism consumption center and the national major strategic service guarantee zone".

Many people interpret these positions as prohibiting Hainan from engaging in industry, which is obviously wrong. Hainan's natural resources endowment is not suitable for heavy industry, because both tropical and subtropical industries are unique, and it is clear that the customs will be closed in 2025 and a free trade port will be established, which also determines Hainan's industrial focus, that is, the development of zero-carbon industry and its industrial chain.

In this car, except electricity, hydrogen energy meets the requirement of zero carbon, provided that the source of hydrogen energy meets the requirement of carbon emission.

At the end of September last year, Hainan Province issued the "Implementation Plan for Peak CO2 Emission in Hainan Province", indicating which clean energy sources to develop, including natural gas (ocean), methanol production by capturing carbon dioxide, ecological carbon sink, and hydrogen energy utilization. To the disappointment of hippocampus, there is not much ink on hydrogen energy-hydrogen has not gained a prominent position.

There is only one master plan, that is, to establish the whole industrial chain of hydrogen production, storage, transportation and use, and to create a hydrogen energy development path of one area (the first demonstration area of hydrogen energy industry), one ring (the island-wide scene application demonstration ring) and multiple points (the landing platform of hydrogen energy industry development).

This policy is also a framework, and it is almost impossible to expect government funds to be disbursed after this policy. However, the government will give the green light to the "hydrogen industry chain" and allow it to be rolled out on a large scale (the whole island). At present, the hydrogen industry is characterized as a "demonstration", which means that it is not optimistic about commercial value for the time being.

As a downstream application link, hydrogen fuel vehicles must be driven by enterprises to promote the development of upstream infrastructure. At the same time, enterprises should also invest some funds to participate in the infrastructure construction of upstream "system, storage and transportation".

According to past experience, the only application of hydrogen energy vehicles that can make local governments pay the bill is bus projects. A few fixed energy supply points can support the scene service mode with fixed lines and relatively fixed mileage. Moreover, such public utilities are generally loss-making projects supported by the government and are essentially public welfare. The government can accept a little more compensation.

However, in the private car scene, if it is only an island, the application is relatively narrow. Hydrogen energy needs to be produced, stored and transported at high prices.

Why did Toyota choose hippocampus?

Toyota has proved that the hydrogen industry is a capital and technology-intensive industry with huge initial investment. In the later stage, it is necessary to expand the scale, continue to expand the user base and operate for a long time in order to dilute the cost. In the case of low profit, it is difficult for hydrogen energy projects to win by quantity.

Small countries can do nothing about this level of investment. Relying on foreign capital and foreign technology, the scale is also difficult to go up. With such high cost and high unit price, it is difficult to be competitive.

So the investment location is more important than the technology itself. Toyota has invested for many years, and even took the lead in fixing the entire hydrogen industry chain technology group (regardless of the economy for the time being). It has painstakingly and conditionally opened thousands of patents for free, but it has been fluctuating. As a result of the complete withdrawal of German and American brands, Toyota and Hyundai are the only passenger car brands in the world that play with hydrogen.

Toyota has always wanted to expand its circle of friends and find big country partners. At the end of 2022, Toyota released the second generation Mirai at Guangzhou Auto Show, and 50 vehicles were imported by GAC Toyota. Due to Toyota's own subsidy, the price is 750,000. These cars have never been seen since. As far as Guangzhou Automobile is concerned, it has long decided to switch to electric vehicles, and it seems that it has no interest in this potential project.

Toyota therefore found its third China partner Haima.

Hippocampus relies on Hainan to develop hydrogen energy. The problem is that Hainan is more and more like a semi-island economy. Even if it is not closed, the scale of the automobile market will not go up. In 2022, the sales volume of new cars in Hainan was162,000, including 74,000 new energy vehicles, accounting for 45.6%, and the penetration rate was already high.

The new model of Haima will fully use the second generation Mirai, and it is difficult to do better than Toyota in cost. The only hope is to obtain hydrogen. Haima is cheaper than Toyota, but this is already the cost of users, and the price is difficult to come down. The financial situation of Haima is difficult to give subsidies like Toyota.

In this way, the forward loop is difficult to expand. The validity period of this agreement framework is 10 years, not to mention whether the hippocampus can live 10 years. Even at this moment, the hippocampus has not responded. Although Jing Zhu is good at dancing with long sleeves and constantly looking for funds for the loss-making Haima car, it may not be a good idea for a car company that has been losing money for years to maintain a project that requires long-term blood transfusion.

The problem of providing for the aged in Hainan

Hainan Province has no other choice. Haima is the only local enterprise. Hainan province has taken measures to gradually obtain the upstream source of hydrogen energy.

202 1, 1, Haima's "High-pressure Hydrogenation Integrated Station for Hydrogen Production by Photovoltaic Electrolysis of Water" was officially completed in Haikou. Photovoltaic power generation, and then decompose water to obtain hydrogen, which is an appropriate "green hydrogen". 95% of hydrogen in the market comes from petrochemical and coal smelting by-products, namely "grey hydrogen". There is also a kind of "blue hydrogen" in the middle, that is, hydrogen is made from fossil energy with carbon capture measures, and the carbon emission intensity is greatly reduced.

The advantage of the integrated station is that the transportation of hydrogen is avoided, and the storage pressure is reduced to a relatively small level (fixed production by sales and fixed sales by production). Haima didn't say the hydrogen production capacity of this comprehensive station, but how many cars can it actually serve (Toyota Mirai II has three 70MPa storage tanks with 5.6kg of liquid hydrogen) is not optimistic.

In this respect, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi and Hebei, which are rich in scenery and energy, have natural advantages. The cost per kilogram of hydrogen produced by photovoltaic/wind power in Inner Mongolia has been reduced to about 10 yuan, which can actually compare with fossil energy such as natural gas.

However, Hainan has dense vegetation, many mountains and few open spaces. Even if offshore wind power generation is deployed on a large scale in the future, its cost cannot be compared with that of Inner Mongolia and other places.

202 1, Sinopec invested in the construction of "Qionghai Boao Yinfeng Hydrogenation Station" in Hainan, with a daily hydrogen supply capacity of 500kg. This is also a demonstration project, which was built to ensure the annual meeting of Boao Forum. In 2022, Sinopec built the No.1 hydrogen production unit of Hainan Refinery in Danzhou, using the method of residue hydrogen production, which is also ash hydrogen. Even the preparation capacity of this "grey hydrogen" is scarce in Hainan.

There are super petrochemical projects in Zhanjiang, Huizhou, Fujian, Zhangzhou and Quanzhou. If we rely on these projects to build hydrogen production capacity, we can easily meet the hydrogen demand of Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian and Hainan in the next 20 years.

The result was chosen in Hainan, a palm-sized place. If Toyota wants to apply its own series of hydrogen patents more widely, it is better to rely on the mainland than Hainan. The choice of Hainan and Haima is based on the wishes of partners, not on industrial laws.

What Hainan needs to do is not to directly allocate funds for the project, but to provide some subsidies to replace some taxis with hydrogen energy and support Haima's plan.

The outlet of Haima hydrogen project lies in: getting the upstream and downstream, making complete application scenarios according to time, and piling up to a certain amount (it is planned to reach the operation scale of 2000 vehicles in 2025).

If these operating shelves are built and run for a year or two without problems, Guangdong and even Guangzhou Automobile Group may be interested, so it is expected to be rolled out. Haima is expected to go ashore, and Toyota can realize its carbon reduction vision and recover its investment in these years.

At present, it has just started, and it is difficult to make money after investing for several years, so it needs to be persisted. The current task of hippocampus is, of course, to find funds, on the one hand, to protect the shell; On the other hand, the pressure to strengthen investment in this project is still great. Copyright statement This article is the original manuscript of Autobots and may not be reproduced without authorization.

This article comes from Autobot Media, the author of Easy Car Number, and the copyright belongs to the author. Please contact the author for any form of reprint. The content only represents the author's point of view and has nothing to do with the car reform.