Longi Partners with Jingkong Energy as Top PV Players Dive into Energy Storage Market

LONGi Green Energy, a leading player in the photovoltaic sector with a market value of 130 billion yuan, has quietly acquired a stake in Jingkong Energy in Suzhou, marking a strategic shift in the industry. This move is not merely a crossover but represents a collective effort by four major photovoltaic giants—LONGi Green Energy, JinkoSolar, Trina Solar, and JA Solar—to enter the energy storage market, initiating what can be described as a “breakthrough battle.”

As the photovoltaic industry grapples with a price war and shrinking profit margins, energy storage is emerging as a crucial key for these giants to overcome growth limitations. Unlike the homogenized competition in traditional photovoltaic businesses, the energy storage sector demands not only technological advancements but also the ability to integrate “photovoltaics + storage” systems.

With LONGi’s recent investment, the company aims to benefit from Jingkong Energy’s technological expertise in energy storage systems and battery management. This capital infusion will rapidly address LONGi’s energy storage deficits and position the company advantageously for an integrated “photovoltaic-storage” ecosystem.

Exploring the Divergent Energy Storage Strategies of the Four Leading Photovoltaic Giants

Although LONGi Green Energy is relatively late to the energy storage sector, it has established a clear strategic path to catch up. In addition to acquiring a stake in Jingkong Energy, its wholly-owned subsidiary, Wuwei Chuwei New Energy, has developed a comprehensive industrial layout that encompasses energy storage services, new energy technology research and development, and efficiency technologies for electricity consumption.

In April 2025, LONGi formed a deep strategic partnership with Flow Battery Technologies, integrating monocrystalline photovoltaic technology with core flow battery innovations to create synergies in project development, technology research, and smart operation and maintenance. Notably, at the beginning of 2025, LONGi was awarded a utility model patent for “an energy storage system and power generation system,” marking the beginning of a robust technological reserve.

JinkoSolar leverages its “full-link penetration” industrial experience to demonstrate strong execution in the energy storage field. Its subsidiary, Jinko Energy Technology, has established a production line for 5GWh energy storage cells and a system integration factory, with a forecast of over 1GWh in energy storage system shipments in 2024 and an ambitious target of over 6GWh in 2025.

The product matrix of Jinko Energy encompasses all scenarios, including source-side, commercial, and residential applications, achieving significant growth in overseas high-profit markets, which directly boosts the revenue share from energy storage. According to Wu Dianfeng, General Manager of Jinko’s product division, the company has completed a full technological loop from cell production to software algorithms and system integration, creating a formidable technological barrier.

Trina Solar is witnessing a “global blossoming” of its energy storage business. Its subsidiary, Trina Storage, has established three production bases in Changzhou, Chuzhou, and Yancheng, with a total planned capacity of 24GWh. By the end of June this year, Trina’s cumulative energy storage system shipments had exceeded 12GWh, with expectations to reach 8-10GWh for the entire year of 2025.

Since launching its energy storage business in 2022, JA Solar has developed a comprehensive four-part collaboration capability encompassing sales, research and development, manufacturing, and supply chain. Its three product lines—BlueStar for residential storage, BluePlanet for commercial applications, and BlueGalaxy for source-side storage—cover a wide range from household photovoltaic storage to large-scale energy storage stations. In particular, JA Solar’s outdoor cabinet products for commercial applications achieve over 90% efficiency on the AC side and maintain a temperature difference of less than 3°C between cells, ensuring stable output at full power, leading to extensive application and validation in distributed energy and zero-carbon park projects both domestically and internationally.

Policy Resonance: A Golden Era for Photovoltaic Companies in Energy Storage

Recent supportive policies from the national level have provided institutional guarantees for photovoltaic companies venturing into energy storage. In September 2025, the National Development and Reform Commission and the National Energy Administration jointly issued the “Special Action Plan for Large-Scale Construction of New Energy Storage (2025-2027),” focusing on applications such as industrial parks, computing facilities, commercial complexes, integrated photovoltaic and charging stations, distributed photovoltaics, and communication bases, while actively innovating in models like green electricity direct connection, virtual power plants, smart microgrids, and integrated source-grid-load-storage interactions.

According to incomplete statistics from the CESA Energy Storage Application Sub-Association’s industry database, from January to August 2025, 526 new local policies related to energy storage were implemented in China, covering subsidies, planning, storage allocation, and electricity price trading across the entire supply chain. For example, Anhui Province has mandated that photovoltaic projects connected to the grid for the first time after 2025 must allocate energy storage equal to no less than 10% of installed capacity for a duration of 2 hours; Guangdong Province, through peak-valley price differentials expanded to 1.2-1.8 yuan/kWh, has significantly enhanced the profitability of energy storage projects.

Explosive Growth in Energy Storage Demand

On the market side, the demand for energy storage is experiencing explosive growth. In 2024, the global new energy storage market added an installed capacity of 74.2GW/175GWh, representing year-on-year increases of 52.67% and 69.08%, respectively, with China, the United States, and Europe accounting for over 90% of the installed capacity, with China contributing more than 60%. It is anticipated that the global new installation scale will exceed 90GW/220GWh in 2025.

In terms of technological routes, lithium iron phosphate batteries dominate the mainstream market due to their mature manufacturing processes. However, in the long-duration energy storage sector, the commercialization of flow batteries and hydrogen storage is accelerating, with third-generation vanadium battery systems achieving energy densities exceeding 200Wh/kg and cycle lifetimes reaching 20,000 cycles.

Building Competitive Moats in the Energy Storage Race

Amidst the energy transition wave, while the prospects for photovoltaic companies entering the energy storage market are promising, they face multiple barriers. Technological breakthroughs are paramount—energy storage systems need to continue improving in energy density, cycle life, and safety. For instance, Jingkong Energy, which LONGi has invested in, has achieved significant reductions in delivery cycles through modular designs for liquid-cooled energy storage modules; JinkoSolar has established a comprehensive technological moat from cell production to software integration.

Cost control is another critical battleground. Tongwei Co., Ltd.‘s independent shared energy storage project at Jintang, utilizing lithium iron phosphate battery technology, benefits from the supply chain advantages of the photovoltaic sector, resulting in cell procurement costs significantly lower than the industry average; JA Solar has optimized the costs of residential energy storage systems through large-scale production and vertical integration.

The revenue model is also shifting from singular equipment sales to diversified services—Ningxia’s 200MW/400MWh shared energy storage project has achieved an internal rate of return (IRR) of 8%-12% through capacity leasing; the frequency modulation compensation price for Shanxi’s AGC frequency modulation project has increased to 0.8-1.2 yuan/MW, with an IRR exceeding 15%.

Collaborative ecological capabilities are key to breaking through barriers. Trina Solar utilizes its brand strength and channel network as a leading global photovoltaic module supplier to share global distribution channels for energy storage products and reuse after-sales systems; JinkoSolar quickly opens up sales channels for its energy storage products by leveraging its overseas high-profit market channels.

Photovoltaic and Energy Storage Integration: Reshaping the Future of Energy

As photovoltaic companies transform their accumulated industrial momentum into a competitive advantage in the energy storage sector, the “chemical reaction” between photovoltaics and storage continues to evolve within the power grid. This convergence not only addresses the intermittent challenges of renewable energy but also fosters a closed-loop ecosystem of power generation, storage, peak shaving, and carbon trading.

The construction of this ecosystem signifies not only a victory for technological collaboration but also a significant innovation in industrial logic.