Chinalco’s transformation and upgrading progress

In the fiscal year of 2015, China Aluminum Corporation, which had pledged to turn a profit, issued two equity transfer announcements at the end of the year. According to the announcement, the company sold 50% of Shanxi Huaxing’s shares and introduced an asset management company, Shenzhen Huarun Yuanda, as a strategic investment. The price is 2.351 billion yuan, that is, the initial bid price, and the estimated sale proceeds is about 1.2 billion yuan; the sale of 100% equity of Nanhai Alloys to Chinalco, a major shareholder, at a consideration of 210 million yuan, which is the initial tender price, and the estimated sale proceeds is about 100 million yuan. .

The announcements of the two equity transfers mentioned above implement the “reduction” strategy of turning losses from Chinalco’s parent company, Aluminum Corporation. Although the performance of Chinalco’s shares still faces many challenges, as a parent company, Chinalco has already begun research. The strategy of transition has made significant progress.

On November 6 this year, Chinalco signed a strategic cooperation agreement with China First Automobile Group Corporation (hereinafter referred to as “China FAW”) in Changchun. China National Aluminum Corporation Chairman and Party Secretary Ge Honglin attended the ceremony and held talks with Xu Ping, Chairman of the China FAW Group and Party Secretary. According to the agreement, the two parties will cooperate in the development of automotive aluminum alloy materials and application technology development, application for scientific research projects and other areas, and will share experimental development resources to explore the construction of a joint project center. Chinalco will serve as a research and development support base for FAW China and provide necessary support for the development of China FAW's science and technology; China FAW will promptly request research cooperation from Chinalco, and Chinalco will be the preferred partner under the same conditions. The two sides promised to provide the other party with convenient conditions such as scientific research exchange, sample preparation, and performance testing in the fields of automotive non-ferrous metal materials, functional materials and application technology development.

Transportation industry

Aluminum substitute steel lightweight without delay

According to statistics, last year China's auto production and sales volume continued to grow at a high rate in November last year, and the temporary boosting effect on aluminum consumption was obvious. In November of last year, China’s automotive aluminum output was approximately 325,000 tons, a year-on-year increase of 16.2% and a year-on-year increase of 17.8%, maintaining a positive growth for the second consecutive month; in addition, China’s automotive aluminum output was 2.872 million from January to November 2015. Ton, a year-on-year increase of 1.8%, changed the state of negative growth in the previous three months.

However, what needs to be seen is that the developed countries have an average of 150kg of aluminum per vehicle, including castings, forgings, plates, etc., while China currently has 100kg of aluminum for each vehicle, of which more than 80% are castings, especially aluminum. Less used. “The use of less aluminum means that the weight of our cars is higher than that of cars produced in developed countries, and each 10% reduction in car weight can reduce fuel consumption by 6%-8%. For every 100 kilograms of weight reduction, the fuel consumption per 100 kilometers can be reduced. With 0.4 liters, CO2 emissions can be reduced by 1 kilogram, and a total of 1,500 kilograms of CO2 can be reduced during the operation period.” If there is a person in the transportation industry who is unwilling to be named, he said to the “Securities Daily” reporter.

The aluminum alloy with a much lighter weight, as an alternative to steel, has long been used in many fields, from aerospace to small precision castings. "If the transport industry (eg, automobiles, trains, ships) produces a large number of aluminum alloys as materials, it will certainly reduce the total quality, thereby reducing fuel consumption, reducing emissions, and pollution levels." The industry insiders said.

As a leading company in the aluminum industry in China, Chinalco has already started to lay out "aluminum substitute steel" and "lightweight" work. "As China's economy enters a new normal with both opportunities and challenges, structural adjustments, transformations, and upgrades are endogenous driving forces for the development of enterprises. Continued advancement of major national strategies such as the Belt and Road Initiative is an external space for us to expand and promote aluminum-based industrial materials. Lightweight will be an important choice for Chinalco to achieve a win-win result in economic benefits and energy conservation and environmental protection.” Ge Honglin, chairman and party secretary of Chinalco, has said publicly.

“The lightweighting of transportation materials is not only the trend of the material industry, but also the only way to transform the economic structure. The weight loss is a heavy environmental burden, and the increase is the development impetus for high quality. Chinalco wants to promote high-grade automotive aluminum. Entering millions of homes, China's cars can be easily installed on the road." Ge Honglin once told the "Securities Daily" reporter.

Form lightweight transportation materials

Parts production and service system

It is understood that since 2015, China Aluminum Corporation has used its own strong scientific research capabilities and production capabilities, driven by innovation to enhance the development momentum, leap-forward development of aluminum processing as the goal, to the transportation industry, "aluminum substitute steel" (cars, ships Such lightweighting as the starting point, the establishment of a lightweight promotion office, began to carry out special studies on the light weight of the transportation industry such as automobiles and ships.

In addition to the strategic agreement signed with China FAW, in August this year, Chinalco also signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Wuhan City to build a production base in Wuhan, and to build new production bases in Wuhan, environmental protection and energy saving building materials, automotive and rail transportation components. Other areas and Wuhan carry out all-round cooperation. As part of the agreement, Dongfeng Motor Corporation and Aluminum Corporation of China jointly established the “Dongfeng-Zhong Aluminum Automotive Aluminum Alloy Joint Laboratory” to jointly develop aluminum alloy application research and technology in the automotive field to carry out new materials and new processes. The research, development and application of new technologies.

In other respects, Southwest Aluminum, a subsidiary of Chinalco, has supplied aluminum alloy plates for the production of food transportation vehicles, coal carriages, tanks, tanks, etc., to a number of domestic and international transportation companies. At the same time, SWA has obtained five CCS, LR, DNV, DV, and ADS. Classification Society recognized that the production of plates, profiles, pipes and other products in the high-speed ship shell, window partitions, ship decks and marine instrumentation, ship equipment and other marine transportation industry have applied.

"Actually, Chinalco should have started to commit itself to the production of high-value-added aluminum alloy materials," said analysts within the industry.

In the asset requirements of the power sales company, the total assets are between 20 million yuan and 100 million yuan, and the annual saleable power is 600 million to 3 billion kilowatt hours. With total assets of 100 million to 200 million yuan, the annual electricity sales will be 3 billion to 6 billion kilowatt-hours. If the total assets are more than 200 million yuan, there is no restriction on the amount of electricity sold.

"At the discussion and discussion stage of this round of electrical reform, some people once proposed that the grid companies should only do transmission and distribution, and completely separate the competitive electricity sales business. However, grid companies are naturally reluctant to give up this 'cake'." A person pointed out that the grid company also has the advantage of selling talent, technology, and information systems. Now clearly involved in the power sales business, power grid companies are undoubtedly the most competitive in terms of power sales.

Since 2015, companies involved in power generation, new energy, instrumentation and other industries have announced the establishment of power sales companies. After consulting the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System, the reporter found that since the second half of 2015, hundreds of independent power sales companies have been established throughout the country.

How these companies will compete with the power grid in the future, how to obtain power resources and win customers, will gradually enter the operation stage later.

On December 8, 2015, the National Development and Reform Commission and the Energy Bureau approved the trials for the reform of the power sale side in Guangdong and Chongqing.

For a long time, the power sales business has been monopolized by power grid companies. The side of power sales has begun to open up to social capital. Once the pattern of “sole buying alone” became “buy more and sell more”, the future will inevitably constitute fierce competition for power grid companies.

As the economist of the National Grid Energy Research Institute stated, the power sales companies compete not only to sell electricity, but also to compete in all-round and comprehensive energy services.

“The marketization of electricity prices and the liberalization of sales of electricity are by no means the ultimate goal of electricity reform.” According to Zeng Ming, through the establishment of a market-based mechanism for power reform, competition is introduced in the power industry chains to increase the efficiency of energy use in China. Energy-saving and environmental protection in the energy industry are all tasks that need to be completed in this round of electric reform.

From the successful experience of the power system reforms in the United States and Germany, they all experienced a period of 8 to 10 years. China's electric reform has only just begun. Nowadays, the big screen of electricity marketization has already opened. It is worth paying close attention to how the next step in the transformation of the power grid companies is.