The next wave of expansion among 100GWh-scale manufacturers has become tightly linked to the replacement of long-duration products and the battle for system orders.
On October 15, at the World Energy Storage Conference, Vice Minister of Industry and Information Technology Xiong Jijun proposed further improving the capacity warning mechanism, accelerating the shift from scale expansion to quality-and-efficiency-oriented development, and emphasized improving efficiency, cycle life, and long-term operational reliability to effectively safeguard energy storage project returns.
On the same day, Hithium Energy Storage Technology announced that cumulative shipments had surpassed 200GWh. Company co-founder and president Wang Pengcheng told Wallstreetcn and other media that long-duration energy storage orders have already been booked through the end of 2027. But when discussing how to reduce costs next, he said: "The cost-reduction dividend that relies purely on expanding production scale will indeed gradually narrow."
Long-Duration Orders Underpin Expansion
Long-duration orders give 100GWh manufacturers a reason to continue expanding capacity, but they also require them to find a different approach to cost reduction. At the same power rating, as storage duration lengthens, customers need to buy more batteries; simply adding batteries according to the original configuration also increases investment. Manufacturers such as Hithium Energy Storage Technology and EVE Energy Co., Ltd. are bringing large-format cells and supporting systems to market together, hoping to reduce component and assembly costs so that longer-duration products can also be accepted by customers.
In the view of Hithium Energy Storage Technology's management, future incremental growth will come more from four-hour and longer storage, data centers, and other new scenarios. Customer procurement is also extending from cells to systems, and overseas markets are moving further toward AC-side and full-station delivery.
By taking on system and even full-station orders, battery manufacturers will have to directly face owners' investment and operational requirements, and will also compete with established integrators for the same group of customers. The growth of long-duration energy storage is changing the business scope of 100GWh manufacturers.
Long-Duration Orders Underpin Expansion
Data released on October 15 by the China Automotive Battery Innovation Alliance shows that China's energy storage battery sales in September reached 73.5GWh, up 104.4% year-on-year, significantly faster than the 35% growth of power batteries in the same period.
From cumulative shipments surpassing 100GWh in August 2025 to crossing 200GWh in October this year, Hithium Energy Storage Technology took only a little more than a year. When discussing this round of growth, Wang Pengcheng was more willing to talk about the company's previous years of investment in research and development, manufacturing, and overseas markets than about market demand alone. In his explanation, large-capacity long-duration products developed in earlier years have begun volume delivery, and domestic and international bases are also coordinating production.
Luo Guangsheng, vice president of Hithium Energy Storage Technology's R&D Management Center, linked changes in duration to the rising penetration of renewable energy. New energy generation and peak electricity consumption do not always occur in the same time period. The higher the share of wind and solar generation, the more electricity needs to be shifted across time periods.
One- to two-hour storage can no longer cover the regulation needs of some scenarios.
Statistics released by BJX Energy Storage Network on October 12 show that in the first three quarters of this year, the energy storage system zero-procurement tenders it tracked totaled 112GWh, of which projects of four hours or longer reached 74.75GWh, accounting for 66.75%. With discharge power unchanged, extending from two hours to four hours requires doubling the configured battery capacity. Even if the number of projects remains unchanged, battery demand measured in GWh will increase.
Wang Pengcheng revealed that demand for four-hour and longer storage at Hithium Energy Storage Technology is rising rapidly, and long-duration orders have been fully booked through the end of 2027, with corresponding order support at its Chongqing and Shandong bases.
Hithium Energy Storage Technology began developing long-duration storage in 2022, subsequently rolled out cells and systems, and launched an eight-hour solution in 2025. Wang Pengcheng recalled that in 2022 market demand was not yet clear, and customers had not figured out how long-duration storage should be used. Simply increasing the number of batteries could certainly extend duration, but customers might not be able to bear the corresponding cost. The company needed to create products suited to long-duration applications and reduce the investment required for the entire solution. Otherwise, the extra batteries customers bought could drag down the project's investment return.
Overseas customers are also increasing. Luo Guangsheng said Hithium Energy Storage Technology's products have entered more than 40 countries; Wang Pengcheng expects the share of overseas revenue to continue rising this year. With domestic long-duration demand and overseas orders increasing at the same time, Hithium Energy Storage Technology needs to ramp up production of new products.
Guo Licheng, executive deputy general manager of Hithium Energy Storage Technology's Chongqing operation, introduced that the 1175Ah second-generation product line at the Chongqing base is ramping up and is expected to reach full production by the end of this year; the 1300Ah line corresponding to the next-generation eight-hour storage product has already begun construction.
Beyond the production lines, Guo Licheng also discussed local supporting infrastructure: the Chongqing base passes quality standards and process control requirements to suppliers, relying on nearby materials, structural components, and equipment companies to improve supply response speed. For continuous delivery of large-volume orders, materials and components must also be in place according to the production rhythm.
Battery Manufacturers Begin Competing for System Orders
In Wang Pengcheng's judgment about the coming years, long-duration storage and new application scenarios often appear together. In addition to four-hour products, Hithium Energy Storage Technology continues to develop eight-hour products and has also proposed a lithium-sodium combination solution for data centers: using eight-hour lithium batteries to handle longer-duration energy regulation and one-hour sodium batteries to use high-rate characteristics to respond to load fluctuations.
"The cost of lithium batteries has not yet reached its endpoint," Wang Pengcheng said. He remains optimistic about sodium batteries' high-rate and other product characteristics and believes lithium and sodium batteries will complement each other. Short-term raw material price fluctuations will affect the pace of development and application but will not fundamentally change this direction. Hithium Energy Storage Technology is also exploring scenarios where sodium batteries can be used alone and has not limited their use to pairing with lithium batteries.
EVE Energy Co., Ltd. is also stepping up long-duration products. EVE Energy Co., Ltd., whose cumulative energy storage shipments reached 150GWh in December last year, disclosed in this year's interim report that its 628Ah cell has entered mass production, while next-generation large cells and higher-integration systems are still under development. The Mr.Giant system equipped with 628Ah cells is positioned by the company for four-hour and longer applications.
Large cells ultimately need to be installed in systems, and duration is determined by the energy and power configuration of the entire system. Even when increasing the capacity of a single cell, how they are combined and at what power they discharge correspond to different project requirements. Only when battery manufacturers also produce supporting systems can they be in a position to take on customers' system procurement.
Luo Guangsheng told Wallstreetcn and other media that domestic customer procurement is shifting from cells to systems. Hithium Energy Storage Technology has already taken on subsequent manufacturing steps at its Chongqing base. According to Guo Licheng, long-duration energy storage cells can be packaged into 195kWh battery packs and then integrated into a standardized 6.25MWh system, with related manufacturing completed at the same base.
If customers buy the entire system, they will hand over component matching, assembly, and testing to the supplier. In addition to managing their own cells, battery manufacturers must also handle the efficiency, safety, and lifespan issues of the entire product. Previously, they sold cells to integrators; now, by directly taking on system procurement, the increased contract revenue also includes this work.
Overseas customers also ask suppliers to do more. Luo Guangsheng said procurement demand has moved from DC systems to the AC side, and even full stations, and Hithium Energy Storage Technology is also laying out corresponding solutions. After battery cabins are delivered to the site, grid-connection adaptation, commissioning, and other work still need to be completed. As the delivery scope expands, suppliers must connect factory production with the project site.
The 400MW/1600MWh energy storage project under Germany's LEAG, which broke ground on August 31, has adopted this type of arrangement. HyperStrong's German subsidiary is responsible for battery system supply, electrical equipment integration, and turnkey construction of energy storage facilities, while another partner is responsible for infrastructure such as high-voltage switchgear.
If a battery manufacturer only supplies cells, integrators remain its customers; if it goes out to take system orders itself, the two sides may appear in the same tender. And when it comes to full-station delivery, it must also cooperate with local engineering partners.
After the Scale Dividend Narrows
In the first half of this year, EVE Energy Co., Ltd.'s energy storage battery revenue grew 69.15%, while gross margin fell 1.36 percentage points year-on-year; Sungrow Power Supply Co., Ltd., also in energy storage systems, saw gross margin fall 7.49 percentage points, while HyperStrong, calculated according to disclosed revenue and costs, improved by about 3.5 percentage points year-on-year.
Sungrow Power Supply Co., Ltd. explained in a performance exchange that storage duration, revenue regional structure, and lithium carbonate prices all affect gross margin. Industry sales growth may not offset an individual company's rising raw material costs; larger system order amounts may also leave different profit margins depending on delivery markets and project mix.
On the manufacturing side, expanding production can spread fixed costs, but material usage, production processes, and defect losses will not automatically decrease as total capacity increases. Once a production line is close to full utilization, further increases in output require new equipment investment. Wang Pengcheng believes that after companies reach the hundreds-of-GWh level, the marginal benefits of continuing to pile on scale will narrow, and product innovation should be given higher priority.
He cited Hithium Energy Storage Technology's 1175Ah four-hour cell as an example to explain how large cells reduce system costs: when total storage capacity is similar, increasing the capacity of a single cell reduces the number of cells used in the system, and there is also room to compress connectors, structural components, and assembly steps.
The manufacturing difficulty of large cells also increases accordingly. Luo Guangsheng mentioned that material systems, process design, and quality control need to be adjusted together to balance safety, consistency, and cost. If a new design increases defect losses, the component costs saved may be consumed during production.
Guo Licheng introduced that Hithium Energy Storage Technology predicts cell capacity in advance in Chongqing and adjusts process parameters during production; data from raw materials to equipment operation and processes, and then to finished product voltage and capacity, is also connected to trace each cell's production process and control batch consistency.
After owners buy the system, they still need to recover their investment through operation. At the same power rating, the additional configured electricity must be dispatched and cover more high-price periods to generate corresponding revenue. Capacity degradation reduces deliverable electricity, and efficiency losses and downtime also affect returns. Customers need to calculate recoverable revenue on this basis before deciding how much to pay for the extra electricity.
When discussing the next stage of competition, Wang Pengcheng repeatedly mentioned overseas local services and operations and maintenance. In his judgment, production scale will gradually become a basic condition, and he places more value on manufacturers' ability to develop products for new applications and continuously provide services overseas. Hithium Energy Storage Technology hopes to establish a local service system overseas, providing overall solutions and full-lifecycle services; in addition to shipping products from factories, it must also deploy personnel and service resources in the markets where projects are located.
HyperStrong's interim report includes a "product quality assurance" provision, with a balance of 201 million yuan as of the end of June this year. It was formed "to provide after-sales service for products" and corresponds to the estimated expenditure needed to fulfill related obligations in the future.
The replacement of long-duration products gives battery manufacturers the opportunity to participate earlier in the design of system solutions. Hithium Energy Storage Technology develops large cells together with supporting systems, so the savings brought by cell design can be further amplified by reducing system components and assembly steps. What battery manufacturers provide to customers also extends from the price of a single cell to the cost of the entire long-duration product. This will directly enter the original business scope of integrators.
The long-duration market gives battery manufacturers more opportunities to directly take on system business, and also sets more specific requirements for integrators: when upstream suppliers can already provide supporting systems, integrators need to rely on their own system design and engineering delivery to turn the same cells into more competitive project solutions.
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