Another A-share listed company is seeking an IPO in Hong Kong. According to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange website, Wuhan Dr Laser Technology Corp., Ltd. (SZSE:300776), a ChiNext-listed company, has formally submitted its listing application to the HKEX. China International Capital Corporation Limited (CICC) is acting as the sole sponsor.
The company primarily engages in the R&D, production, and sales of laser processing equipment for high-efficiency photovoltaic cells and modules. Through this pursuit of a dual primary listing on the A-share and H-share markets, the company plans to use the raised funds to strengthen R&D for high-efficiency photovoltaic cell and semiconductor equipment, and to acquire companies in emerging fields such as advanced packaging and novel displays.
In its draft prospectus, Dr. Laser highlighted its market share in the photovoltaic cell laser processing equipment sector and emphasized its strategic expansion blueprint into semiconductors and novel displays.
However, an analysis of the prospectus reveals substantial pressures on the company's fundamentals amid macroeconomic cyclical adjustments in the photovoltaic industry. Data shows the company's contract liabilities have decreased by a cumulative amount exceeding 500 million yuan over the past two years. Concurrently, 1.254 billion yuan worth of goods in transit and an increase in accounts receivable to 1.085 billion yuan have caused a divergence between its operating cash flow and net profit.
Furthermore, the semiconductor advanced packaging and novel display laser equipment business, identified by Dr. Laser as its "second growth curve," generated no revenue in 2024. This was accompanied by a significant reduction in material costs within R&D expenses and a negative reversal of share-based payment expenses at the end of the reporting period.
During the reporting periods covering 2023, 2024, and 2025, Dr. Laser's revenue growth did not initially show significant signs of slowing. Revenue was approximately 1.609 billion yuan in 2023, growing by 25.2% to about 2.014 billion yuan in 2024. However, entering 2025, revenue reached approximately 2.031 billion yuan, representing a year-on-year increase of less than 1%.
Regarding profitability, the company recorded an annual profit of about 519 million yuan in 2025, a decrease of 1.59% compared to the approximately 528 million yuan profit in 2024. Meanwhile, the net profit margin, a key indicator of ultimate profitability, exhibited a year-on-year declining trend throughout the reporting period, falling from 28.7% in 2023, to 26.2% in 2024, and further down to 25.6% in 2025.
The prospectus indicates that Dr. Laser's contract liabilities have seen a continuous and substantial decline over the past three years. As of the end of 2023, contract liabilities stood at 1.96 billion yuan. This figure decreased to 1.761 billion yuan by the end of 2024 and fell further to 1.413 billion yuan by the end of 2025—representing a total reduction of 547 million yuan over the two-year period. The company attributed this primarily to the continuous recognition of advance payments as revenue upon equipment acceptance by customers.
In contrast to the shrinking contract liabilities, Dr. Laser's inventory levels remained high on its balance sheet. As of the respective reporting period ends, the carrying value of inventory was approximately 1.918 billion yuan, 1.723 billion yuan, and 1.569 billion yuan.
A significant portion of this inventory consists not of raw materials or work-in-progress within the production facility, but rather "goods in transit" that have already been shipped to customer sites. The prospectus discloses that the carrying value of goods in transit was 1.44 billion yuan, 1.29 billion yuan, and 1.254 billion yuan at the end of each reporting period. The presence of 1.254 billion yuan worth of equipment classified as goods in transit indicates that a large volume of shipped equipment has not yet completed final revenue recognition, likely due to delays in downstream customers' production line schedules or acceptance procedures.
This extended revenue recognition cycle and the immobilization of working capital have directly impacted the company's cash flow. According to the prospectus, net cash generated from operating activities was approximately 724 million yuan in 2023, aligning with the profit level for that period. However, this metric turned negative in 2024, recording a net cash outflow from operating activities of about 201 million yuan, mainly influenced by increased trade receivables and decreased contract liabilities. Although net cash from operating activities returned to a positive figure of approximately 111 million yuan in 2025, a gap of about 400 million yuan remained compared to the annual profit of 519 million yuan.
Simultaneous with the decline in contract liabilities and extended inventory recognition cycles, changes in Dr. Laser's collection data also reflect typical characteristics of an industry downturn. As downstream photovoltaic companies face widespread financial pressure, the settlement cycles for equipment purchases have been objectively lengthened, leading to an expansion in Dr. Laser's accounts receivable that far exceeded its revenue growth during the same periods.
The prospectus reveals that the net carrying amount of trade receivables (after deducting expected credit loss provisions) was approximately 739 million yuan as of the end of 2023. This increased to 895 million yuan by the end of 2024 and climbed further to 1.085 billion yuan by the end of 2025. Notably, while revenue grew by only 0.8% year-on-year in 2025, the net accounts receivable increased by 21.25% year-on-year.
The prospectus also discloses that Dr. Laser's trade receivables turnover days showed an increasing trend year-on-year, rising from 139 days in 2023, to 148 days in 2024, and then jumping significantly to 178 days in 2025. This indicates a substantial lengthening of the time cycle from revenue recognition to actual cash collection, pointing to a material slowdown in customer payment patterns.
The decline in accounts receivable turnover efficiency necessitates higher provision pressures for bad debts for Dr. Laser. Net impairment losses on financial assets were only 19.174 million yuan in 2023. This figure rose to 93.48 million yuan in 2024 and increased further to 99.275 million yuan in 2025. The company stated this was mainly due to the deteriorating financial conditions of some downstream customers in the photovoltaic industry, which is in a cyclical downturn phase, with several listed companies turning from profit to loss, leading to increased credit risk, coupled with the growth in trade receivables.
Compounding the expansion in accounts receivable is Dr. Laser's high customer concentration and its complex customer-supplier overlap business model. The prospectus shows the company's revenue is highly dependent on a few core customers. In 2025, for example, sales revenue from the largest customer, Customer E, alone reached 517 million yuan, accounting for 25.5% of the annual revenue. Revenue from the second-largest customer, Customer F, was 360 million yuan, representing 17.7%. This means over 40% of Dr. Laser's 2025 revenue and the corresponding accounts receivable exposure are concentrated with just two photovoltaic enterprises.
It was also noted that several of Dr. Laser's core customers are also its suppliers. Among the top five customers during the reporting period, Customers A, B, C, E, and F all had dual roles as both customers and suppliers. The company attributed this "customer-supplier overlap" primarily to the need to purchase samples from suppliers for equipment testing and calibration, requirements for building its own photovoltaic power stations at its facilities, and the need to retrieve customers' old equipment for upgrades and modifications.
Beyond solidifying its core photovoltaic laser equipment business, expansion into semiconductor advanced packaging and novel displays is a key strategy emphasized by Dr. Laser in the prospectus.
The prospectus repeatedly mentions applying ultrafast laser technology to key processes like Through Glass Via (TGV) micro-hole processing, Printed Circuit Board (PCB) drilling, and Micro LED mass transfer, aiming to build a "second growth curve." However, an objective analysis of the revenue details from the relevant business segment and the structure of R&D expenses reveals that the commercialization progress of this cross-sector business appears exceptionally slow in terms of data.
The "Semiconductor Advanced Packaging and Novel Display Laser Equipment" segment generated revenue of approximately 7.77 million yuan in 2023, accounting for 0.5% of total revenue that year. However, in 2024, revenue from this business segment dropped to zero, with the prospectus explaining this was due to "no equipment being accepted during the year, hence no revenue was recognized." In 2025, this segment generated only 354,000 yuan in revenue, constituting a mere 0.1% of the company's total annual revenue. Throughout the entire reporting period, the cumulative recognized revenue from this promising new business line was approximately 8.124 million yuan.
Accompanying the slow commercial progress in semiconductors and novel displays is a reduction in Dr. Laser's total R&D expenses at the end of the reporting period, along with unusual changes in the internal expense structure. Financial data shows that after R&D expenditures of approximately 251 million yuan in 2023 and about 283 million yuan in 2024, there was a significant contraction in 2025, with an 18.8% decrease year-on-year to approximately 229 million yuan. The company stated this was mainly due to reduced costs associated with the development and testing of R&D prototypes and a decrease in unvested share-based payment expenses.
According to the breakdown of R&D expenses by nature disclosed in the prospectus, "material costs" within R&D expenses were about 54.66 million yuan in 2024. By 2025, this item had sharply decreased to approximately 22.13 million yuan, a drop of 59.5%.
Besides the sharp decline in material costs, the "share-based payment" data within the R&D expense details also presents a noteworthy accounting phenomenon. Share-based payment expenses included in R&D costs were 5.415 million yuan and 6.264 million yuan in 2023 and 2024, respectively. However, in 2025, this figure was negative 3.11 million yuan.
Regarding issues such as over 1.2 billion yuan in goods in transit extending the recognition cycle and the low revenue from semiconductor advanced packaging and novel display businesses, inquiries were sent to Dr. Laser's securities department and official website email on the morning of April 22. No response had been received by the time of publication.
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