Article Reprint Source: China Economic Herald

New energy vehicles have become the biggest highlight of the automotive industry. The lithium battery industry is booming and the iteration cycle of products and technologies is accelerating, which also puts forward higher requirements for equipment manufacturers.

The consistency and stability of slurry have a key effect on the quality of lithium battery cells during the first stage of slurry preparation. Wang Xie, general manager of the battery homogenizer division of ONGOAL Technology Co., Ltd., (hereinafter referred to as ONGOAL TECH), said the company has developed a new generation of high efficiency slurry mixing system, which has been verified by the battery manufacturing head company, to meet the new cycle power battery large-scale high efficiency high-quality production needs.

Diversified layout, specializing in the lithium field

Public information shows that ONGOAL TECH was established in August 2008, mainly focusing on material handling equipment and industrial automation. At present, ONGOAL TECH has provided equipment, systems and solutions for more than 300 customers, covering major domestic lithium battery, battery materials, rubber and plastic, chemical, food, pharmaceutical and other industries.

Among them, in the field of lithium electro-slurry mixing, the main equipment and systems of ONGOAL TECH include Dual Planetary Mixer, powder feeding system, pneumatic conveying system, slurry conveying system, etc.  They are mainly used in the manufacturing process of the first stage of battery production.

With the accelerated expansion of the new energy industry, the demand for lithium equipment has increased greatly, and ONGOALTECH is driven by the rapid growth of the market, especially its star product, Dual Planetary Mixer, which has been used on a large scale in the head enterprises of the lithium industry because of its stable performance and good slurry mixing effect.

A new high efficient slurry mixing system

According to Wang Xie, with the booming development of the lithium industry, the iteration cycle of lithium equipment and production technology is also very fast, and ONGOAL TECH make technical innovations to its products almost every year.

Launched many years, Dual Planetary Mixer is now updated to the third generation.

We have been continuously adjusting our products based on the experimental data in practice. Many products and technologies have been upgraded in the feedback from customers, Wang Xie said, “This is where a new generation of efficient slurry mixing systems comes in.”

Although the semi-continuous high efficiency slurry mixing technology of mixing while feeding on the market has solved the core problems of high energy consumption, large volume and high investment of traditional slurry mixing technology, however, there are still some disadvantages, such as low slurry mixing efficiency, high temperature rise, low capacity, easy overload and so on.

Based on this, ONGOAL TECH developed a new high efficiency slurry mixing system, which can greatly improve the slurry mixing efficiency and solve the problems of unstable pulp, high energy consumption, pollution and large floor space of traditional slurry mixing process.

Wang Xie said that ONGOAL new generation of high efficiency slurry mixing system has achieved three important breakthroughs: Firstly, heat production is reduced without affecting slurry mixing efficiency. Secondly, the impeller structure is improved to solve the bottleneck of capacity enlargement, which can be achieved from 20L to 3000L, or even larger models. Thirdly, the innovative working principle of "dispersion-mixing-predispersion-re-discharge" is adopted to improve efficiency and at the same time. It is not easy to block, return or even overload the material.

At present, ONGOAL new high efficiency slurry mixings ystem has been verified and evaluated in a large number of banding processes with domestic mainstream battery enterprises, and the pulp processing performance, temperature rise, discharge and slurry mixing efficiency have been recognized, with substantial improvement over peers.

Technological innovation continues to unleash the development potential

There is another reason for the continuous technological innovation and R&D investment. ONGOAL TECH has become an important partner of many head battery companies, and several R&D projects have deep participation of head companies.

"Many customers will invite us to intervene in advance in the development of equipment and the upgrading and optimization of production lines when developing new products," Luo Caihua, Chairman of ONGOAL TECH, introduced that ONGOAL TECH has two types of active R&D teams and passive R&D and design teams, and the active R&D team is precisely set up to match the invitation of customers.

"Our customers have higher demands on the process, and the new generation of high efficiency slurry mixing system is exactly what our customers demanded and developed in collaboration," Wang Xie introduced, which requires ONGOAL TECH to continuously invest in R&D capital and manpower, but also consolidates advanced level in the field of equipment R&D.

In addition, Luo Caihua is very clear about hot lithium-ion industry. At present, thanks to the blowout of the electric vehicle market in China, Europe and North , the mismatch between supply and demand in the industrial chain is prominent, for equipment manufacturers is a rare opportunity. But, he says, “After the 2024, the industry still needs 'rice oil' and 'people who cook' , but does the 'rice cooker' still need to be purchased all the time?”

Based on the long-term sustainable development of enterprises, Luo Caihua believes that the necessity to advance the layout of the industry into a smooth period of stable and sound development, therefore, to build the core competitiveness of enterprises is particularly important. In the view of ONGOAL TECH, to have a stable market share, set up a competitive barrier and market moat is particularly important, technology innovation is the most important.

"The next research and development direction of the homogenizing division is battery screw continuous inevitable slurry mixing technology," Wang Xie revealed that the current research and development project is progressing well.

Homogenization is the front-end process of the whole battery process. At present, ONGOAL TECH has mastered the two mainstream homogenization processes of dual planetary homogenization and high-speed dispersion homogenization, and when the dual-screw continuous inevitable homogenization project is successfully developed, ONGOAL TECH is expected to build a strong technical moat and continuously strengthen its core competitiveness.