In 2025, a historic turning point for China's automotive market was firmly established—the retail penetration rate of new energy vehicles surpassed 50% for the first time and remained steadily above this milestone for consecutive months. The transition from fossil fuels to electricity is now a definitive trend, with the industry's competitive focus shifting from brutal "price wars" to a "value-first" approach. Within this quiet yet profound energy transformation, a critical supporting sector is experiencing explosive growth: charging infrastructure. At this pivotal moment of industry restructuring, the world's largest supplier of smart charging equipment is officially making a charge towards the capital markets. Recently, Wanbang Digital Energy Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Wanbang Digital Energy") submitted a listing application to the Main Board of the Hong Kong Exchange, with J.P. Morgan, Guotai Junan International, and CMB International acting as joint sponsors.

Prior to this Hong Kong listing attempt, Wanbang Digital Energy had planned an Initial Public Offering on the A-share market multiple times, but none came to fruition. According to the prospectus, the company first initiated its A-share listing plan in September 2020, but terminated the process in June 2023 due to strategic considerations and market conditions. In October 2024, the company again advanced preparations for an A-share listing, only to terminate it once more in November 2025. From the initial listing plan in 2020 to the present, Wanbang Digital Energy's listing journey has spanned nearly six years. As it now pivots to the Hong Kong market, what are its chances of success?

According to the prospectus, Wanbang Digital Energy Co., Ltd. is a globally leading smart charging equipment supplier and an early practitioner of microgrid systems. The company's business covers smart charging equipment, microgrid systems, and large-scale energy storage systems, aiming to build a comprehensive smart energy solutions framework. In terms of market position, the company, with its outstanding product performance and system compatibility, became the first Chinese smart charging equipment supplier to receive certification from premium international OEMs. According to market research data from Frost & Sullivan, Wanbang Digital Energy ranked first globally among smart charging equipment suppliers by both revenue and sales volume in 2024, with annual global sales exceeding 470,000 units, demonstrating its scale production capability and market penetration in the charging equipment sector.

In microgrid and energy storage business, the company has cumulatively delivered over 300 microgrid systems in China and overseas, covering various application scenarios such as charging stations, industrial parks, mining areas, residential communities, remote areas, and off-grid islands. This demonstrates substantial project implementation experience and scenario adaptability, providing systematic support for promoting renewable energy applications in transportation, industrial, and commercial sectors. Combining its leading position in charging equipment with the expansion of its microgrid business, Wanbang Digital Energy has gradually formed an energy business structure of "Equipment + Systems + Services," showcasing its comprehensive service capabilities in new energy infrastructure construction and smart energy management.

Against this backdrop, the company's revenue has grown steadily. For 2023, 2024, and the first nine months of 2025, the company achieved revenues of approximately RMB 3.474 billion, RMB 4.182 billion, and RMB 3.072 billion, respectively, with continuous optimization of the revenue structure. For the core business of smart charging equipment and services, although this segment remains the primary revenue pillar, its proportion is trending downwards. It accounted for 92.4% in 2023, decreased to 77.9% in 2024, and fell further to 71.1% in the first nine months of 2025. Within this segment, DC charging equipment contributed the most, generating RMB 1.381 billion in the first nine months of 2025, accounting for 44.9% of total revenue. The microgrid systems business showed significant growth, with revenue of RMB 516 million in 2024, accounting for 12.3% of total revenue; this increased further to RMB 608 million in the first nine months of 2025, raising its share to 19.8% and making it the company's second-largest revenue source. Additionally, the large-scale energy storage systems business, which began contributing revenue in 2024, generated RMB 281 million in the first nine months of 2025, accounting for 9.1%.

Notably, the declining share of charging equipment revenue and the rising shares of microgrid and energy storage systems reflect the company's transition from a charging equipment supplier to a comprehensive energy solutions provider. This structural adjustment indicates that its business synergies are gradually materializing and has opened up broader growth space in the new energy infrastructure sector.

While deepening its presence in the Chinese market, Wanbang Digital Energy continues to advance its global layout. Currently, its smart charging equipment and microgrid systems cover approximately 70 countries and regions worldwide. In the first nine months of 2025, the company's overseas revenue reached RMB 572.9 million, accounting for 18.6% of its total revenue for the period, indicating that international business has become a crucial pillar of its growth. The company particularly views Europe as a key pivot in its global strategy, focusing on promoting charging equipment and related services in the European market through Schneider eStar, a joint venture established with Schneider Electric. The high requirements of the European market for product quality, compliance, and service systems not only help establish brand and technology benchmarks but also lay an important foundation for future expansion into other emerging markets.

Furthermore, Wanbang Digital Energy is continuously improving its global network, planning to establish marketing and service centers in five key regions: Africa, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, South America, and North America, to further enhance local service capabilities and support systematic business expansion worldwide.

However, it is important to note that while operating revenue continues to grow, the company's profitability faces structural pressures. During the reporting periods, the company's overall gross profit margin gradually declined from 33.4% in 2023 to 24.6% in the first nine months of 2025, a cumulative decrease of approximately 8.8 percentage points. According to the company, the gross margin decline is mainly attributed to three factors: intensified industry competition putting pressure on product pricing; rising costs for some raw materials; and the increasing proportion of the microgrid and energy storage systems businesses, which have relatively lower gross margins, exerting a structural impact on the overall profit level. Against this backdrop, the company's net profit also showed a year-on-year declining trend during the reporting periods, reaching RMB 493 million in 2023, RMB 336 million in 2024, and RMB 301 million in the first nine months of 2025, reflecting the dual challenges to profit quality from the industry environment and business transformation during the scale expansion process.

Driven by sustained policy support, China's charging infrastructure industry is in a period of rapid expansion. In September 2025, the "Three-Year Doubling Action Plan for Electric Vehicle Charging Facility Service Capacity (2025-2027)" explicitly proposed that the number of charging facilities nationwide should reach 28 million by the end of 2027, doubling service capacity, and systematically deploying tasks for improving the charging network, enhancing efficiency, and optimizing services. In December of the same year, the National Energy Administration held a special symposium to further promote the implementation of the plan. Propelled by both policy and capital, the industry's scale has expanded rapidly—by the end of November 2025, the cumulative number of charging facilities nationwide had reached 19.322 million, a year-on-year increase of 52%. However, the "land-grabbing" phase of rapid expansion has also exposed some issues: some enterprises prioritize construction over operation, underinvesting in talent development, standardized delivery, and market education, leading to a disconnect between technological iteration and public awareness, which constrains the overall service quality and sustainable development capacity of the industry.

From a global market perspective, the charging equipment industry still possesses considerable growth potential. The market size grew from RMB 21.41 billion in 2020 to RMB 59.70 billion in 2024, achieving a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 29.2%. Structurally, while AC charging equipment grew rapidly in the earlier phase, DC charging equipment is expected to become the main growth driver from 2024 to 2030, with the market size potentially exceeding RMB 196.23 billion, representing a CAGR of approximately 21.9% during that period. Regionally, although the Chinese market has shown significant growth, with the global acceleration of EV adoption and increased policy support overseas, the growth rate of international markets is expected to gradually surpass that of the domestic market, becoming a key growth pole for the industry in the next phase. Overall, driven by increasing sales of smart devices, continuous technological evolution, and the global energy transition, the charging equipment market is expected to maintain a steady development trajectory.

In summary, Wanbang Digital Energy's current bid for a Hong Kong listing comes at a critical juncture characterized by the accelerating global energy structure transition and the charging infrastructure market's evolution from scale expansion to value deepening. Leveraging its global leading position in smart charging equipment and the business synergies formed with its microgrid and energy storage systems, the company has initially built a comprehensive energy service framework of "Hardware + Systems + Operations." However, the challenges it faces are equally clear: under the dual pressures of intensifying industry competition and business structure transformation, balancing scale growth with profit quality, and converting policy-driven market opportunities into sustainable competitiveness will be key determinants of its long-term value. Looking ahead, with the advancement of the domestic "Three-Year Doubling" action plan and the rapid release of charging demand overseas, the charging infrastructure industry still holds definite growth potential. For Wanbang Digital Energy, the listing represents not only an expansion of financing channels but also a public test of its strategic execution capability, technology integration efficiency, and global operational proficiency. Whether it can successfully navigate the dual stages of capital markets and industrial transformation to advance from an "equipment supplier" to a "leader in energy solutions" remains to be proven by time and performance.