Shanxi Securities: The AI consumer electronics era is approaching, and the demand for cooling materials is highlighted
The Zhitong Finance App learned that Shanxi Securities released a research report saying that heat dissipation has become a key issue limiting the iterative development of consumer electronics, accounting for 55% of the statistics on the causes of electronic device failure. As the penetration rate of AI phones and AIPC increases, the bank expects the AI mobile phone cooling market to increase from US$1,885 billion to US$3,513 billion from 2025 to 2028, and the AIPC cooling market from US$2,131 billion to US$7.070 billion. With the rapid development of downstream applications and the shift of the global electronics manufacturing industry to the domestic market, the domestic cooling industry continues to develop and expand. Domestic companies already have the strength to compete with international and Taiwanese manufacturers, and the localization process is expected to continue to accelerate.
The main views of Shanxi Securities are as follows:
Cooling has become a key issue limiting the iterative development of consumer electronics
Temperature is the main factor affecting the stability and reliability of electronic and electrical products, accounting for 55% of the statistics on the causes of electronic equipment failure. With the upgrading of consumer electronics products, product power consumption continues to increase, and heat dissipation has become an urgent problem for consumer electronics. According to different heat transfer methods, heat dissipation methods are also divided into passive heat dissipation and active heat dissipation. Among them, passive heat dissipation includes thermal conductive interface materials, graphite films, heat pipes, heat evaporation plates, etc. Active cooling includes air cooling, liquid cooling, etc.
The passive cooling scheme has been gradually upgraded, and the penetration of active cooling continues to increase
In the smartphone field, the “thermal interface material+graphite film+thermostat plate” combination has replaced the traditional “thermal interface material+graphite film” combination and has become the mainstream cooling solution for high-end smartphones. The latest AIAgent mobile phone restructured the AI system, and the demand for computing power of mobile phone chips has been upgraded once again, and the requirements for cooling solutions are more stringent. Therefore, it is expected that the penetration rate of high-end cooling materials such as thermostats will continue to grow rapidly. At the same time, passive cooling is limited by physical laws. When the chip's power consumption exceeds 5W, the passive solution can no longer control the junction temperature within a safe threshold, and active cooling such as air cooling and liquid cooling are required as supplementary cooling modes. Currently, various models such as Red Magic 3, Red Magic 11 Pro, OPPOK13 Turbo Pro, and Huawei Mate80 Pro have adopted air-cooled and liquid-cooled cooling solutions. In the PC field, cooling models are relatively mature. They mostly use active and passive heat dissipation methods to combine various materials such as heat transfer interface materials, graphite heat dissipation films, heat pipes, and cooling fans.
AI cooling contributed to core increments, and the VC market size increased rapidly
Benefiting from the streamlining of end-side models and the upgrading of chip computing power, etc., the penetration rate of AI phones and AIPC continues to increase, and the market size is growing rapidly. In 2025-2028, we expect the AI mobile phone cooling market to increase from US$1,885 million to US$3,513 billion, with a CAGR of 23.07%; AIPC cooling market size will increase from US$2,131 billion to US$7.070 billion, with a CAGR of 49.15%. By product, graphite film, thermostat, etc. have a steady increase in permeability due to excellent thermal conductivity. In terms of thermostats. The global market size is expected to grow from 1.49 billion to 12.21 billion in 2026-2035, with a CAGR of 26.37%. In terms of graphite films, the global market size is expected to grow from US$1.4 billion to US$6 billion in 2025-2035, with a CAGR of 15.6%. Compared to developed countries, the domestic cooling industry started to develop later. However, with the rapid development of downstream applications and the shift of the global electronics manufacturing industry to the domestic market, the domestic cooling industry continues to develop and expand. Domestic companies such as Suzhou Tianmai and Siquan New Materials already have the strength to compete with international and Taiwanese manufacturers, and the localization process is expected to continue to accelerate.
Key company concerns: 1) Suzhou Tianmai. 2) Si Quan New Material. 3) Zhongshi Technology. 4) Feirongda. 5) Intelligent manufacturing by Lingyi. 6) Jiebang Technology.
Risk warning: risk of downstream demand fluctuations; risk of technology research and development falling short of expectations; risk of increased market competition; risk of rising raw material prices.