HC TECH GP forms a partnership with EPS: Foreign capital technology localization breaks the deadlock, and the billion-dollar energy storage market welcomes a new player in "Sino-British collaboration."

According to Zhitong Finance APP, while domestic energy storage companies are still fiercely competing in the medium temperature market, the Hong Kong-listed company HC TECH GP (01116) has quietly built a "global technology + local capacity" collaborative bridge. Recently, through its subsidiary Guangzhou Meiya, it has reached a deep strategic cooperation with the international phase change energy storage technology leader Environmental Process Systems Limited (referred to as "EPS"). EPS has acquired a 30% stake in the group's subsidiary "Meiya Technology," introducing core patented technology covering the full temperature range from -100℃ to 885℃. This opens up a differentiated path for global technological collaboration amid the dual dilemmas of "technological involution" and "overcapacity" in the energy storage industry.

Technical Core: EPS Full Temperature Range Patents Build Barriers, Six Major Field Cases Validate Strength

As an internationally leading supplier of phase change energy storage technology, EPS's five core patented technologies can cover chilled water air conditioning systems in agriculture, commercial, and industrial fields, passive cooling, heating applications, cold storage load shifting, and temperature-controlled logistics, forming a full-scenario technology matrix from cooling to heating. Its technological advantages are not only reflected in "full temperature coverage"—from -100℃ deep cold environments (such as medical freezing) to 885℃ high-temperature scenarios (such as industrial waste heat recovery), far exceeding the 0℃-80℃ medium temperature limitations of most domestic companies.

Having undergone global multi-scenario verification, EPS's technological strength has established benchmark projects in six core areas:

Public Medical and Government Institutions: The Royal Wolverhampton Hospital in the UK uses a 30m³ tank (1500kWh storage) to ensure stable operation of medical equipment, while the Netherlands Cancer Institute utilizes a 45m³ tank (2000kWh storage) to reduce research costs by taking advantage of low electricity prices at night;

Educational and Research Institutions: The University of Bergen in Norway uses four 240m³ tanks (12000kWh storage) to cope with peak cooling loads on campus, and the Swinburne University project in Australia achieves a 15-20% reduction in electricity consumption;

Commercial Offices and Complexes: The Stone 34 office building in Seattle, USA (LEED Platinum certified) saves over 75% energy through a 25m³ tank (1250kWh storage), while the National Theatre in Southbank, London, recovers waste heat in conjunction with a CHP system;

Industrial Production Enterprises: Dongguan Chuangke Industrial in China uses a 100m³ tank (4250kWh storage) to shut down the chiller during the day, and the Guangzhou Hitachi Chemical Electronics Materials project minimizes circuit modifications to achieve 6400kWh storage; Transportation Hubs and Infrastructure: Norway's Bergen Airport T3 Energy Center has four 60m³ storage tanks (10,000 kWh storage) adapted to nighttime noise restrictions, while Saudi Arabia's Haramain High-Speed Railway features 73-227m³ storage tanks (3,200-10,000 kWh storage) to cope with extreme high temperatures of 55℃;

Special Function Facilities: The PREMERA medical data center in Seattle, USA, has a 30m³ custom storage tank that ensures 2 hours of cooling during grid outages, and the UK Parliament voting control room has a 6m³ storage tank (270 kWh storage) for emergency temperature control.

Cooperation Structure: 7:3 Equity + Local Ecosystem "Breakthrough, Phase Change Energy Storage Accelerates Mainstream Adoption"

China's energy storage market is at a critical juncture of "policy-driven and technological iteration." As a core technological direction in the thermal (cold) energy storage field, phase change energy storage has long been constrained by insufficient wide temperature range adaptation and delays in high-end scenario implementation. The strategic cooperation between HC TECH GP and UK EPS breaks this deadlock through a fusion model of "international technology + local ecosystem"—HC TECH GP (through its subsidiary Guangzhou Meiya) holds 70% of Meiya Technology's shares, leading local operations and capacity implementation, while EPS holds 30% of the shares, injecting core patents and global resources into the partnership. There is no specified cooperation duration, and a three-tier decision-making mechanism involving the shareholders' meeting, board of directors, and management balances efficiency and voice, ensuring long-term collaboration from an institutional perspective.

EPS chose Guangzhou Meiya as a strategic partner primarily due to the latter's localization advantages: on one hand, Meiya has a stable customer base in the traditional materials processing sector and has established partnerships with official institutions such as the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of China and data center operators, enabling rapid technology implementation; on the other hand, its scalable production capacity is expected to provide solid support for cost control.

Market feedback has confirmed the attractiveness of this model: the joint venture has already received intention orders from multiple fields, with positive responses from high-end scenario clients in medical storage and transportation, as well as fresh cold chain. Combined with the cooperation plan, relevant businesses are expected to bring considerable revenue to HC TECH GP in 2026-2027, and the gross margin of high value-added orders will significantly exceed that of traditional businesses, promoting profit structure optimization. More importantly, this cooperation not only allows phase change energy storage to potentially upgrade from a "niche supplementary technology" to a "mainstream energy storage solution," but also signifies that HC TECH GP is leading the Chinese energy storage market into a new stage of "technological diversification, application scenarioization, and industrial ecosystemization," providing more efficient technological support for energy transformation under the "dual carbon" goals.

Market Layout: Anchoring Three High-Potential Tracks, Policy Dividends Open Up Trillion-Yuan Space

The business expansion of the joint venture precisely aligns with China's "dual carbon" goals and energy storage industry policy orientation. The "14th Five-Year Plan" for the development of new energy storage clearly states that by 2025, the installed capacity of user-side energy storage will exceed 30 million kilowatts, and the three sectors of data centers, cold chain logistics, and facility agriculture are precisely the fastest-growing sub-markets, naturally becoming the focus of both parties' efforts—this layout not only closely follows national policy directions but also accurately anchors market incremental space, laying a strategic foundation for business implementation The demand side is showing distinct structural explosive characteristics: energy consumption in data centers continues to rise sharply with the surge in computing power demand. In 2024, the market size of low-energy data centers in China has reached 277.3 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 26.7%. Despite continuous optimization of energy efficiency (with the average PUE dropping below 1.3), overall electricity consumption remains at a high growth rate, directly driving the accelerated expansion of the waste heat recovery market. It is expected that by 2025, the specialized market size for waste heat recovery in data centers will exceed 12 billion yuan, and the overall market size in the industrial sector is expected to approach the trillion yuan level. In the field of facility agriculture, the national area of facility agriculture has exceeded 45 million mu, with the process of intelligent upgrading accelerating. By 2025, the market size of intelligent facility agriculture is expected to reach 120 billion yuan, with intelligent environmental control systems as the core demand segment reaching 42 billion yuan. The demand for intelligent temperature control is driving the agricultural energy storage market to grow at an annual rate of over 20%. The energy-saving renovation market for commercial buildings is also maintaining rapid expansion, with carbon emissions in the building sector accounting for 37% of the national total in 2024. Driven by the upgrade of green building standards, it is expected that by 2029, the market size for building energy conservation will exceed 550 billion yuan, with an annual growth rate of over 15%. In addition, the deepening of power market reforms has expanded the peak-valley price difference to over 4:1, significantly enhancing the economic viability and penetration of energy storage technologies. Multiple demands are forming a resonance effect, jointly opening up broad growth space for the smart energy storage field.

It is worth mentioning that this cooperation also lays an important foundation for the overseas market layout of HC TECH GP. EPS has established mature sales channels and project experience in Europe (UK, Norway, Netherlands), the Middle East (Saudi Arabia), and Oceania (Australia). Although the joint venture company is currently focused on the Greater China region, the agreement that "overseas customer consultations will be promoted through mutual negotiation" reserves a key interface for future expansion. This means that, relying on the cost advantages of the Guangzhou base, the joint venture company can subsequently undertake high-end overseas orders from EPS, gradually forming a business pattern of "local production + global sales," thereby further opening up growth space.

Industry Value: Reshaping Competitive Logic, Promoting the Industry from "Involution" to "Upgrade"

For a long time, the domestic energy storage industry has faced the dilemma of "overcapacity in low-end production and lack of high-end technology": most enterprises are clustered in low-tech fields such as electrochemical energy storage, leading to frequent price wars; while the high-end phase change energy storage market is monopolized by European and American companies, lacking core technology and standard discourse power. The cooperation between HC TECH GP and EPS has achieved localized production of international top phase change technology for the first time, setting a new benchmark for the industry with a "technology + capacity" dual-drive model.

For HC TECH GP, this cooperation is a key leap in strategic transformation. From the 2025 global strategy brand upgrade to focusing on the smart energy storage technology field and promoting the industrialization of technology through the joint venture company, it has completed the transformation from a "traditional steel enterprise" to a "green technology group." As the revenue proportion of energy storage business increases, the company's valuation logic is expected to switch from "manufacturing PE" to "new energy PS," opening up market value growth space.

Against the backdrop of the "dual carbon" goals, the cooperation between HC TECH GP and EPS is not only a strategic marriage between enterprises but also a microcosm of the deep integration of international advanced technology and the potential of the Chinese market As new orders transform into the roar of production lines, and -100℃ cryogenic technology serves domestic medical storage and transportation, a new energy storage ecosystem composed of "global technological collaboration, localized production capacity support, and market-driven demand" is taking shape. For HC TECH GP, this Hong Kong-listed company, the door to the trillion-yuan energy storage market has just begun to open