Domestic grease breaks the high-end market: technological innovation drives the industry to move towards the "era of quality improvement"

The scale of China's industrial grease market is about to exceed the 19.5 billion yuan mark in 2025, and at this critical juncture of industrial upgrading, domestic grease companies are using technological innovation as a blade to break the monopoly pattern of foreign capital in the high-end market and promote the accelerated transformation of China's grease industry from "quantity increase" to "quality increase".

As the "blood" of industrial equipment, the performance of grease is directly related to the reliability and life of equipment operation. In the past, in high-end fields such as wind power, new energy vehicles, and aerospace, special greases used under extreme working conditions have long relied on imports, and products from the United States, Germany and other countries have occupied the main market share. However, this situation is being rewritten, and domestic enterprises have achieved a number of breakthroughs in the field of high-performance products through continuous R&D investment.

"Three years ago, we were still worried about the evaporation resistance of ultra-high temperature grease, and now the self-developed composite lithium-based grease can work stably for more than 10,000 hours in a high temperature environment of more than 200 °C, and the performance indicators are completely benchmarked against international first-line brands." The R&D director of a lubrication technology enterprise in Shandong said. The company's latest high-temperature grease product, which uses a new compound soap thickening refined base oil, adds extreme pressure, antioxidant, and anti-rust multi-effect additives, has been successfully applied to hot rolling equipment and wind power gearboxes of iron and steel enterprises.

This technological breakthrough is not unique. According to the data, the domestic high-performance grease market accounted for only 26% in 2020, and it is expected that this proportion will increase to more than 38% in 2025. In the grease industry cluster in East China, enterprises have increased research and development, and the production capacity of high-end products such as polyurea-based resin and bio-based grease has continued to be released, and Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shandong provinces have contributed 52.6% of the country's output, forming a complete high-end grease industry chain.

The upgrading of market demand has become the core driving force of technological innovation. With the explosive growth of the new energy vehicle industry, the demand for low-volatile and long-life grease increased by 37% year-on-year; The trend of large-scale wind power equipment has driven the demand for special greases that are resistant to high temperature and wind and sand. Domestic enterprises accurately capture market changes, and the special grease for wind power developed has passed the certification of international wind power giants, and has achieved large-scale application in wind farms such as Inner Mongolia and Gansu, making the equipment maintenance cycle longer.

Under the guidance of the concept of green development, environmentally friendly grease has become a new focus of competition. The biodegradable grease developed by many companies has not only passed the NSF H1 food-grade certification, but also can be used in food packaging equipment, and its degradation rate has reached more than 90%, which perfectly meets the requirements of the "double carbon" strategy. This green product has been exported to the Southeast Asian market and has become a new business card for domestic grease to go international.

Industry experts pointed out that China's grease industry is currently in a critical transition period, with a large market share of the top ten enterprises and a continuous increase in industrial concentration. With the integration of intelligent lubrication systems and Internet of Things technology, enterprises with the comprehensive capabilities of "product + service + monitoring" will have a competitive advantage. In the next five years, driven by the demand for high-end equipment manufacturing and the blessing of policy dividends, domestic grease is expected to achieve import substitution in more segments.

From hot roll tracks in steel mills to generator sets in wind farms, from motor bearings in new energy vehicles to packaging equipment in food factories, domestic high-end greases are injecting "lubricating power" into the high-quality development of China's manufacturing industry with stable and reliable performance.