Booming Fiberglass Industry

Glass fiber was born in the 1930s. It is an inorganic non-metallic material produced from main mineral raw materials such as pyrophyllite, quartz sand and limestone and chemical raw materials such as boric acid and soda ash. It has low cost, light weight, high strength and high temperature resistance, corrosion resistance and a series of advantages. Glass fiber is an excellent functional material and structural material.

The domestic market ushered in a period of expansion.

My country's per capita annual glass fiber consumption is much lower than that of developed countries. In 2019, my country's per capita glass fiber consumption is about 2.8kg, while the consumption of developed countries such as the United States, Japan, and the European Union is about 4.5kg.

The top three fields of glass fiber application in China are construction, electronic appliances, and transportation, accounting for 34%, 21%, and 16% respectively.

Among them, the largest consumption of glass fiber in the field of electronic appliances is the electronic cloth used to make the copper clad laminate (CCL) in the printed circuit (PCB), and the electronic cloth consumes most of the electronic yarn (about 95%). Domestic electronic yarns are being replaced by domestic glass fiber products, and the proportion of imports in my country's electronic yarn production has been decreasing year by year, and some high-end products have gradually achieved import substitution.

With the continuous advancement of 5G commercial use, the demand for PCB has increased significantly. The large-scale construction of data centers and the increased demand for servers will become the biggest driving force for short-term growth of the PCB market. It provides long-term demand support for PCB, and there is a high probability that the electronic field will bring an incremental market to glass fiber in the future.

The trend of global energy and environmental policies has made lightweighting of transportation a long-term issue in the industry, and the application of lightweight materials such as glass fiber reinforced composite materials is one of the main approaches, but there is a big gap between my country and the world's leading level. Germany, the United States, and Japan are countries that currently use a relatively high proportion of lightweight materials for automobiles. Among them, the application of lightweight materials in automobiles in Germany accounts for about 25%, which is the highest in the world. The application of lightweight materials in my country's automobiles is in line with the advanced level of foreign countries. There is a big gap. For example, the amount of aluminum and steel is about half of the international advanced level, and the amount of magnesium alloy is about 1/10 of the advanced level in Europe. There is still a large room for growth in the demand for glass fiber for automobiles in my country.

According to the data of China Fiber Composites Network, in 2021, the national glass fiber output will reach 6.24 million tons, compared with 258,000 tons in 2001, the CAGR of my country's glass fiber industry in the past 20 years is as high as 17.3%. From the import and export data, the national export volume of glass fiber and products in 2021 will be 1.683 million tons, a year-on-year increase of 26.5%; the import volume will be 182,000 tons, maintaining a normal level.

The glass fiber industry also has obvious cyclical characteristics. With the continuous growth of electronics, automobiles, wind power and other fields, the future market prospects are relatively broad, so the upward phase of the cycle is expected to be extended.