1. Industry development history

FPC manufacturing industry appeared in the 1960s. The United States and other countries with advanced electronic technology first applied FPC to the application fields of high-end electronic products such as aerospace and military. After the cold war, FPC began to be used in civil products. At the beginning of the 21st century, the market of consumer electronic products developed rapidly, which promoted FPC Industry to enter a high-speed development period. However, due to the rising cost of production in Europe and the United States, the focus of FPC production has gradually shifted to Asia, forming the first wave of FPC Industry Transfer. This wave makes FPC Industry in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and other countries and regions with good manufacturing foundation and production experience grow rapidly. In recent years, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan are also facing the problem of rising production costs. FPC Industry has started a new industrial transfer. FPC manufacturers in developed countries have invested and set up factories in China, and China, as the main recipient country of FPC Industry, has benefited from the new wave of industrial transfer.

The development of FPC Industry in mainland China is later. In the late 1980s, sporadic FPC process research and development began to appear. The products are mainly used in military industry and high-end electronic production. In the early 1990s, the development of electronic products in mainland China was slow, and FPC Industry was slow. In the late 1990s, due to the accelerated progress of FPC technology, the continuous transfer of electronic products industry to the mainland of China and other factors, FPC demand was booming rapidly, and the industry began to break out.

According to the number of layers, FPC can be classified into single-layer FPC, double-layer FPC and multi-layer FPC. Based on the single-layer FPC manufacturing technology, the related manufacturing technology is realized by lamination technology, as follows:

Source: public data sorting

Since the 1990s, electronic products have been developing in the direction of thinness, and FPC product features are consistent with it. With the rapid growth of electronic industry, FPC has been widely used in most electronic products, becoming one of the most important components in the field of electronic products.

Application fields of FPC


Source: public data sorting

2. Global industry development status

Since 2005, intelligent electronic products have been gradually popularized. FPC, as the printed circuit board most suitable for intelligent electronic products, has become one of the biggest beneficiaries in the development of intelligent electronic industry. Its application field has been expanding, becoming the fastest growing PCB type, and its proportion in PCB market has been rising. According to the data, the total output value of PCB in the world in 2012 was affected by the slowdown of global economic recovery, which was only 2.56% higher than that in 2011, but FPC increased by 23.62% year-on-year, accounting for 17.72% of the total output value (3.02% higher than that in 2011), ranking second only to rigid flex composite board in the main PCB types. In 2013 and 2014, after the high-speed growth in 2012, the growth rate of global FPC market slowed down, but the growth rate is still higher than the overall growth rate of PCB.

In 2015, the global PCB output value reached US $57.628 billion, a decrease of 4.19% compared with 2014. Excluding the factors of exchange rate change and price change, the PCB output value actually increased by 1% in 2015, while FPC still increased by 6.08% year-on-year to US $11.842 billion.

Growth rate of different kinds of PCBs in the world in 2012-2015 (by product type, unit: USD million)


Source: public data sorting

As of 2015, the global FPC market is about US $11.842 billion, accounting for 20.55% of PCB market. By 2017, the total output value of PCB in the world is expected to reach 65.7 billion US dollars, of which FPC output value will reach 15.7 billion US dollars, and the proportion in PCB output value will further rise to 23.90%, becoming the fastest growing sub industry in PCB industry.

Global PCB and FPC Industry market scale and forecast in 2005-2015 and 2017


Source: public data sorting

3. Global FPC Industry Distribution

The global FPC production enterprises are mainly Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. In 2015, the top ten FPC enterprises in the world were from these three countries and regions, accounting for 9 seats, with obvious scale advantage.

On the other hand, due to the increasing cost of production in developed countries and the increasing freedom of international trade, FPC Industry is gradually transferred to China and other countries or regions with certain technical strength and low production cost. Large international FPC manufacturers have invested and set up factories in China, so the domestic FPC enterprises are small in scale, but the FPC output value in China is in the leading position in the world. According to the report released by WECC, in recent years, the proportion of FPC output value in China's region to global output value has been increasing, from 6.74% in 2005 to 47.97% in 2015, which is likely to be maintained in the future.

Distribution of global FPC output value by place of origin, 2005-2015


Source: public data sorting

4. Current situation of domestic FPC Industry

According to the report, since 2006, although the growth of China's FPC GDP has slowed down or even decreased in some years, it has shown an overall upward trend. In 2015, China's FPC output value reached 35.322 billion yuan, with a compound growth rate of 9.48% in nine years.

China's FPC output scale in 2006-2015


Source: public data sorting

The output value of FPC in mainland China is rising, accounting for nearly 50% of the global output value, but most of the output value is occupied by joint ventures and foreign-funded enterprises. Depending on the strong R & D strength of the parent company and the complete upstream and downstream industrial chain, joint ventures and foreign-funded enterprises have obvious advantages in technology and capacity scale.

Because most of the important upstream raw material and downstream electronic product manufacturers are foreign manufacturers, there is no complete national industrial chain in China, and domestic manufacturers are limited by the lack of supporting equipment and raw material industries, so they are relatively competitive in the international market