China's Flat Glass Industry Surpassed RMB 10 Billion in Profits Last Year: Driven by Policies, Technology and Market
1. Industry Profit Hits a New High, RMB 10 Billion Profit Demonstrates Development Resilience
In 2024, China's flat glass industry delivered an impressive performance, with annual profits exceeding RMB 10 billion. Amid the complex market environment, it has shown strong development resilience. This achievement is not just a pile of cold data, but a joint result of leading enterprises such as CSG A and Irisohyama Co., Ltd. relying on policy response, technological breakthroughs, and market deepening. It marks a phased victory in the industry's transformation from scale expansion to high-quality development.
2. Policy Dividends Released, Green Buildings Become the Core Engine
The full popularization of green building standards has become a key driver for the industry's profit growth. The green building material application requirements specified in China's 14th Five-Year Plan, combined with the EU's building energy efficiency renovation policies, have formed dual benefits, directly driving a surge in demand for high-performance energy-saving glass. CSG A is a beneficiary of this trend. Its Low-E insulated glass has maintained a leading position in China's high-end market. In 2024, the sales volume of coated glass increased by 12.2% year-on-year, and the sales volume of insulated glass also achieved a steady growth of 4.72%. The gross profit margin of such energy-saving products is 14 percentage points higher than that of ordinary glass, making it an important pillar of the enterprise's profits.
At the same time, the strict implementation of the capacity replacement policy has accelerated the industry reshuffle. Under policy regulation, the blind expansion of low-end production capacity has been curbed, and industry resources have concentrated on leading enterprises. By focusing on high-end fields such as high-generation substrate glass, Irisohyama Co., Ltd. achieved a year-on-year growth of 81.52% to 99.67% in net profit attributable to shareholders in 2024, and its non-net profit even achieved an explosive growth of 171.49% to 204.73%, fully demonstrating the profit advantages of high-quality enterprises under policy guidance.
3. Product Structure Upgraded, Remarkable Results in High-end Transformation
Technological iteration has promoted the upgrading of product structure towards high-end and diversification, which is the core support for profit growth. Relying on the industrial Internet platform, CSG A has built an intelligent factory and optimized the production line through digital twin technology. This not only shortens the delivery cycle of customized glass products but also significantly improves the yield rate. In the photovoltaic field, its developed Building-Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) glass solution has been successfully applied in the zero-carbon demonstration park in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, enabling buildings to have both energy-saving and power-generation functions and opening up a new profit space.
Irisohyama Co., Ltd. has made breakthroughs in the electronic glass track. As one of the few domestic enterprises with stable mass production capacity of high-generation substrate glass, it completed and put 10 G8.5+ substrate glass production lines into operation in 2024. The products have passed the certification of leading enterprises such as BOE and TCL Huaxing and achieved full production and sales. In the same year, the revenue of the substrate glass business increased by 21.9% year-on-year, among which the sales volume of G8.5+ products increased by as much as 93.2%, becoming the company's second growth curve. The photovoltaic glass business of CSG A also performed brilliantly. In 2024, its sales volume reached 438.64 million square meters, an increase of 25.77% year-on-year, and its daily melting capacity ranked among the top in the industry.
4. Optimized Market Layout, Two-way Efforts in Domestic and Foreign Demand
The differentiated layout of regional markets has effectively hedged against the risk of fluctuations in a single market. In the domestic market, major projects such as the zero-carbon demonstration park in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and green buildings in Xiongan New Area have provided stable orders for CSG A's energy-saving glass and BIPV glass; the infrastructure boom in the central and western regions has driven the growth of demand for basic glass, forming a complement to the high-end market in the eastern region.
In terms of the overseas market, countries along the "Belt and Road" have become a new bright spot for export growth. By refining the international market layout and increasing the signing of high-quality projects, CSG A has significantly improved the order complexity; the substrate glass of Irisohyama Co., Ltd. not only supplies domestic manufacturers but also radiates to Taiwan region, seizing market share in the wave of domestic substitution. Through the two-wheel drive of "domestic deep cultivation + overseas expansion", these two types of enterprises have provided solid support for the industry's RMB 10 billion profit.
5. Synergistic Efforts in the Industrial Chain, Cost Reduction and Efficiency Improvement Highlight Competitive Advantages
The synergy between upstream and downstream of the industrial chain has further improved the industry's profit level. By coordinating the centralized procurement of bulk raw materials and strengthening the lean management of the entire production process, CSG A has effectively reduced procurement and production costs; at the same time, it has built a raw material supply circle with a radius of 200 kilometers, reducing logistics costs by 18%-22%. Through cost reduction and efficiency improvement measures, Irisohyama Co., Ltd. increased its gross profit margin by 4.5 percentage points year-on-year in 2024, and the period expense rate was continuously optimized, among which the financial expense rate decreased by 1.09 percentage points year-on-year, significantly increasing the profit space.
On the technical side, the upgrading of CSG A's float glass process and the technological breakthrough of Irisohyama Co., Ltd.'s high-generation substrate glass have jointly promoted the improvement of the industry's production efficiency. The former's ultra-white "Blue Diamond" series glass has become a benchmark in the segmented field, and the latter's G8.5+ substrate glass has realized batch import substitution, both of which have built competitive advantages through technical barriers.
6. Future Outlook: A New Journey for the Industry Under Multiple Opportunities
Looking forward to the future, the profit growth of the flat glass industry still has sufficient momentum. With the advancement of the urbanization process and the implementation of the old house renovation policy, the demand for architectural glass will remain stable; the outbreak of emerging fields such as Building-Integrated Photovoltaics and intelligent buildings will continue to drive the demand for high-end glass. Projects such as the technological transformation of CSG A's Wujiang photovoltaic line and the expansion of Irisohyama Co., Ltd.'s Xianyang substrate glass base have laid the foundation for the next round of growth.
Under the guidance of the "carbon peaking and carbon neutrality" goals, the market space for green energy-saving glass will be further expanded. The industry will continue to take technological innovation as the core and high-quality enterprises as the leader to achieve dual improvement in profit scale and development quality on the track of high-end manufacturing and green low-carbon development.
