Auto terminal and EV charging gun maker notes optimistic market ahead

Electrical terminal, wiring and connector maker K.S. Terminals Inc. expects order visibility to reach Q2, amid strong growth in the EV market as reported at its earnings call last week.

The company is looking at two-digit growth for this year's goal, eying significant demand from green energy selections and automotive terminals and charging guns for electric vehicles, notably the latter. In the past several years, K.S. Terminals have seen such a significant increase in demand for charging guns that this year, the company has decided to set up a factory focused on meeting EV charging gun orders. Construction of the new factory is forecasted to wrap up in early-2023.

During K.S. Terminals' conference call, the company reported on its earnings for the first two months of 2022, which saw green energy making up 71% of revenue, automotive connectors at 19.6%, and home appliance connectors at 9.4% Company representatives said their forecast of order visibility was based on predictions of demand during the resurgence of COVID-19 cases in China, as the lockdowns will delay deliveries of raw materials and products.

The new factory will expect five new production lines for EV charging guns, an addition to the existing two lines.

The revenue forecast is difficult to offer estimates, K.S. Terminals representative told the media, citing unstable metal and raw material prices and a volatile exchange rate. If copper prices fluctuate too much, it will likely reflect on the end product prices, as it had already been raised twice last year.

K.S. Terminals pointed out that the global connector scale is as high as about USD$76.7 billion. According to Bishop & Associates data, the Chinese connector market will reach USD$25.2 billion in 2020, accounting for 32.85% of the world, while the global EV sales were expected to hit about 3 million units in 2020 31 million by 2030, a tenfold increase. In terms of the total number of EV charging guns (private + public) in the world, in 2020, it is 9.5 million, and it is estimated that by 2025, it will reach 45 million to 65 million, a five to six-fold increase.