This text is the preface to "Value Discovery: Brunp Recycling Technology and the Rise of China's New Energy." Some sections have been omitted.
How did a group of college students, armed with nothing but a bicycle, a worn sack, and a simple ideal, harness collective wisdom to turn battery recycling into a business that benefits countless households?
How did a grassroots enterprise, starting from street-level "junk collecting," grow into a leader in the green circular economy?
How did a battery recycling company penetrate the fields of battery materials and mining, participating in and witnessing the turbulent journey of China's new energy industry rising to the global pinnacle?
In Foshan, Guangdong, there is such a company. Over more than two decades, it has provided answers to these questions. Behind this lies the legendary journey of the Chinese battery industry gradually becoming a powerful global force. Starting from zero, this company continuously learned and expanded into new business territories. During this period, new organizational structures evolved to meet the changing growth needs of the enterprise.
This is a pure story of grassroots success, as well as a classic case of soaring alongside national destiny. It demonstrates how an enterprise, amidst the tide of the times, uses keen commercial intuition and unique business beliefs to discover value and follow the trend. This company, named Brunp Recycling, has continuously refreshed its cognition through practice and defined standards through struggle over more than 20 years of growth. Ultimately, it became a commercial pioneer in the fields of recycling, materials, and resources, writing an inspiring Chinese story.
The Path of Battery Recycling
Over the past few decades, the rechargeable battery industry has evolved from lead-acid batteries to nickel-cadmium and nickel-metal hydride batteries, and finally to lithium-ion batteries. They vary in form and are hidden in every corner of daily life. Lead-acid batteries remain active today, more than a century after their invention, due to their low cost. When people start a fuel vehicle, current surges instantly from the lead-acid battery, awakening the equally traditional engine. Nickel-cadmium and nickel-metal hydride batteries, like passersby of the era, hurriedly passed the baton of mobile energy to lithium-ion batteries. Lithium-ion batteries have a wider application range, covering small batteries for consumer electronics, large batteries for automobiles, and energy storage batteries for industrial, commercial, and household use.
If we move the time pointer from the 1970s to today, people will see Walkmans, recorders, portable DVD players, laptops, smartphones, electric vehicles, drones, and humanoid robots appear one after another. Behind these products, lithium-ion batteries provide the power. With their all-scenario coverage capability, lithium-ion batteries have profoundly influenced the process of global industrialization and energy electrification. Chinese battery enterprises stepped onto the stage of the times starting in the 1990s, exploring and practicing various technical routes along the way, eventually becoming the kings of the global battery industry.
However, during this process, the disposal of waste batteries once became a lingering shadow in people's minds. In the early days, some small workshops used nearly primitive processing methods to recover metals: some waste batteries were soaked in pools, while others were fried in iron pots. This extensive treatment method exacerbated pollution problems. This not only brought environmental governance challenges but also became a pain point difficult to erase in the industrialization process of many cities.
The original intention behind the establishment of Brunp Recycling was to find a breakthrough light amidst this shadow. From the beginning, this enterprise sought ways to let batteries be reborn and realized that batteries of different generations could move horizontally across different industries. For example, nickel-cadmium batteries can replace lead-acid batteries in specific professional settings, and nickel-metal hydride batteries have already replaced nickel-cadmium batteries. With a broad industrial perspective, one can understand the energy characteristics behind different industries. This is like Tian Ji's horse racing: high-energy-density batteries (second-class items) that cannot continue to be used in certain industries can be applied to industries with lower energy density requirements after processing. Just as mountain water flows down terraced fields, each step gets nourished in turn. Similarly, high-energy-density batteries can flow downward to industries with lower energy density requirements.
In an era when battery raw materials were scarce and expensive, Brunp Recycling discovered the business opportunity of recycling waste batteries with keen commercial intuition. Through "secondary life battery" trade, it became a pioneer in the "cascade utilization" of batteries. Brunp Recycling did not stick to inertial thinking but was good at self-negation. As the application of power batteries became increasingly widespread, safety hazards caused by the reuse of waste batteries gradually became prominent. On July 30, 2026, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued an announcement stating that the "cascade utilization" of power batteries had completely exited the historical stage. Brunp Recycling drove this process. The main theme of the era has different variations at different stages. Enterprises that aim for enduring prosperity do not indulge in past successes; this is precisely the driving force behind Brunp Recycling's continuous improvement.
However, at the starting point, what Brunp Recycling truly desired was not the expansion of trade, but the refinement of technology. Waste batteries can only achieve recycling without damaging the environment through industrialized processing methods. Disassembly, crushing, leaching, filtration, and extraction crystallization were the "chemical magic" that this startup enterprise yearned to master. The founding team of Brunp Recycling sought teachers everywhere, looking for sparks of technology transfer in various universities and research institutes, established a factory in Changsha, and firmly pursued the route of large-scale recycling. Brunp Recycling believed that waste industrial products left by large-scale manufacturing must be solved by large-scale recycling industries. The integration of manufacturing and recycling is the two wings of industrial civilization.
Brunp Recycling does not simply process recyclables but views the comprehensive utilization of metal elements from a systemic perspective. In terms of recycling technology, Brunp Recycling did not stick to conventional rules but adopted a "short-process" technique vastly different from the industry. It pioneered the "synergistic extraction" process for simultaneous recovery of nickel, cobalt, and manganese in ternary cathode materials, contributing a unique high-efficiency, low-energy consumption process route to the global recycling industry. Brunp Recycling proposed directional recycling technology based on "reverse product positioning design," which is a systematic innovation from theory to method. It won two awards in the "European Inventor Award" launched by the European Patent Office in 2026. This marks the first time since the inception of the "European Inventor Award" that Chinese inventors and Chinese companies have won dual honors.
When the era of power batteries arrived, Brunp Recycling foresaw the trend and embarked on the recycling journey of "large batteries."
Rise of NEVs and Security of Primary and Secondary Minerals
The technical route of China's power batteries has experienced ups and downs. From the initial flourishing of diverse technologies and leadership by foreign enterprises like those from Japan and South Korea, it gradually moved to a stage prioritizing energy density and driven by cost. The technological evolution of China's power batteries is accelerating. In just 10 years, the Chinese power battery industry went through major divergences and consolidations, ultimately becoming the global leader.
China's power battery industry rose to prominence in 2015, attracting significant attention, driven by the electric vehicle market. At that time, the biggest obstacle to developing electric vehicles was "range anxiety," determined by the energy density of batteries. In 2016, China introduced subsidy policies linked to energy density, allowing ternary cathode materials represented by the nickel-cobalt-manganese system to stand out.
At this stage, Brunp Recycling discovered greater value space and began manufacturing precursors for battery cathode materials. Leveraging its understanding of the recycling industry and profound insight into battery materials, Brunp Recycling took the lead in the industry to develop "ternary series 5 continuous small-particle precursors," setting a benchmark for the entire industry.
The process of recycling waste batteries is like turning back time, requiring the discovery of past traces from present clues. In the process of chemical element reduction and recovery, Brunp Recycling creatively proposed a philosophically meaningful proposition: "Where do batteries come from, and where do they go?" This reflection on the full life cycle drove Brunp Recycling to take the lead in proposing Directional Recycling Technology (DRT) in the industry, significantly deepening its understanding of the crystal structure of battery cathode materials. As energy density increased, Brunp Recycling took the lead in launching series 8 high-nickel cathode materials. Simultaneously, to reduce the impact of high-priced cobalt, Brunp Recycling launched efforts to "de-cobaltize."
The growth of Brunp Recycling acted like a gear, driving synchronized acceleration in powder material processing, kiln equipment manufacturing, and other technologies. This also promoted the wide diffusion of upstream and downstream manufacturing technologies in China's battery industry, forming a powerful supply chain corps that surpassed the previously leading Japanese and South Korean enterprises.
Today, China's power battery production accounts for more than 70% of the global total, and among the top ten manufacturers globally, seven are Chinese enterprises. Upstream of these dominant battery brands is a well-organized Chinese supply chain. Whether it is cathode and anode materials, electrolytes, separators, or the equipment to manufacture these products, Chinese manufacturers have achieved astonishing results. Similarly, regarding key mineral resources such as nickel, cobalt, and lithium used in power batteries, China's new generation of mining enterprises has also achieved remarkable success globally. Brunp Recycling, stepping to the rhythm of the times, is becoming an industry leader in material manufacturing and resource sectors.
Big industries have big trends. With improvements in battery materials, especially changes in battery system structures, lithium iron phosphate (LFP) began to show advantages in cost and safety compared to ternary cathode materials. Starting from 2021, LFP regained its advantage. By 2024, with the explosion of the energy storage market, LFP became the mainstream technical route with significant advantages.
Brunp Recycling needed to leave its comfort zone and conquer new technical territories. In Yichang, Hubei, Brunp Recycling struck up a new melody of struggle. At this bend of the Yangtze River, Brunp Recycling invested heavily to completely transform Yichang's phosphorus chemical industrial park into a new energy material industrial base centered on lithium iron phosphate. Upstream and downstream enterprises flocked in, promoting Yichang to become the "Capital of New Energy." As a large number of industrial workers migrated in, housing prices and popularity in Gudian Town around the factories surged. This is a typical portrayal of the interaction between top-tier enterprises and urban livelihoods. The river flows majestically eastward, ceaselessly.
The development of batteries has always been closely tied to specific elements. Yichang's phosphate mines suddenly transformed from phosphorus chemical raw materials into key resources for the lithium iron phosphate industry chain. The global pattern of mineral resources also underwent massive changes due to the explosive growth of China's battery industry. The development history of Brunp Recycling has always been accompanied by the breathtaking fluctuations of nickel, cobalt, and lithium price curves. Behind these unpredictable rises and falls lie the shadows of global commodity giants and the industrial control policies of mineral resource nations. High-stakes multi-party bargaining is the sole theme of this curve. Only by immersing oneself in the game is it possible to change the passive situation of Chinese manufacturing.
China's electric vehicle and energy storage industries have established advantageous positions globally. However, to sustain this advantage, Chinese enterprises need to seek initiative in upstream lithium battery minerals globally, providing guarantees for sustainable industrial development. Chinese enterprises' aggressive expansion stimulated the vitality of global mining. Without the great development of China's power battery industry, cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, lithium mines in the South American "Lithium Triangle," and nickel mines in Indonesia would not have shone so brightly in the global mineral landscape. The rise of China's power battery industry is a key measure to safeguard the resource security of national strategic industries. Brunp Recycling also began to go abroad, laying out bases in Indonesia and establishing its own nickel mine sites.
As more retired batteries accumulate, they will become part of the "urban mines." These recovered nickel, cobalt, and lithium metals can effectively alleviate China's heavy dependence on overseas primary ores.
When the penetration rate of China's NEVs reaches 60% and the stock of NEVs grows, the reuse of recycled battery metal materials will significantly alter the global mineral landscape. The Full Chain Integrated Industrial Park (IEIC) in Yichang, Hubei, covers over 6,000 mu (approx. 400 hectares), ranking first in single-site scale globally. The recovery rates for phosphorus and iron exceed 90%, and the lithium recovery rate reaches 96.5%. Key raw materials such as phosphorus, iron, and lithium are reborn, achieving efficient recovery and utilization of phosphorus-iron slag. One out of every five waste power batteries nationwide is "reborn" in Yichang. As the only global circular economy enterprise capable of simultaneously recycling and processing both ternary lithium batteries and lithium iron phosphate batteries, Brunp Recycling plans for a total recycling capacity exceeding 1 million tons by 2030. The regeneration of critical mineral resources holds vital strategic significance for national industrial security. Through meticulous recycling technology, Brunp Recycling has completely rewritten society's definition of waste industrial products.
From electric vehicles to power batteries, then to the upstream supply chain, and further extending to mines, the entire Chinese industrial and supply chain marches in unison, forming a column. Such orderly grand formations were completed rapidly over the past 20+ years, especially in the last decade.
To observe how all this happened, the development history of Brunp Recycling provides a good explanation. Since its inception, Brunp Recycling has responded to industry calls and adjusted its pace accordingly. Here, we can see how the entire ecosystem intertwines, advances together, and develops synergistically during high-speed industrial growth. Competitiveness between nations is constantly reshaped by the ebb and flow of overall supply chain strength. Japanese and South Korean enterprises lagging in the EV sector turned them from leaders to followers in the power battery industry. Recycling technology for waste batteries is gradually controlled by Chinese enterprises. Just as China became the leader in global rare earth refining technology, Chinese recycling enterprises matured synchronously, leading the development of metal regeneration technology. Chinese enterprises are equally active in the upstream mines.
Brunp Recycling's complex business landscape brings both technical complexity and challenges in organizational management.
Characteristics of Innovation
However, for Brunp Recycling, these issues are merely routine. Every time Brunp Recycling opens a new chapter, it adheres to the unique principle of "not taking the obvious path." This unconventional approach is not deliberate eccentricity but a key choice to establish competitive advantages. Followers can only see the backs of leaders; only by forging a new path can one build a strategic moat.
Based on this, in the early handling of waste ternary batteries, the Changsha base of Brunp Recycling adopted unusual methods. The traditional recycling process involves crushing batteries first, then leaching, separating, and crystallizing into various sulfates, finally selling them to precursor factories. If the puzzles from different manufacturers and processes are pieced together, the clumsiness and redundancy of this production system become apparent. Nickel and cobalt in battery black powder need to change from solid waste to liquid, then crystallize separately into solids again. When preparing precursors, crystalline salts are re-dissolved and mixed into solutions, then synthesized via co-precipitation. From waste recovery to battery material preparation, metal components undergo repeated transitions of "solid—liquid—solid—liquid—solid."
Brunp Recycling refused to repeat this old path and took the lead in introducing the "synergistic extraction" process. Black powder no longer undergoes preliminary dissolution and crystallization but goes directly from solution to precursor. This "solid—liquid—solid" input-output process avoids unnecessary back-and-forth underwater maneuvers for the "three brothers" of nickel, cobalt, and manganese, reducing process complexity and significantly lowering energy consumption. The essence of a perfect world should be simplicity within complexity. Brunp Recycling's "short-process" technology is the ultimate expression of industrial aesthetics. And such engineering practice stems from the concept of "directional recycling."
Guided by the belief that "recycling eats from a hundred homes," Brunp Recycling is committed to developing various recycling technologies. While some enterprises "pick and choose," recovering only precious metals, Brunp Recycling recovers all types of metals regardless of value. In 2015, when lithium prices were low, Brunp Recycling took the lead in tackling lithium extraction technology and achieved mass production the following year. However, at that time, many battery recycling enterprises still focused only on extracting high-value metals like nickel and cobalt, discarding lithium with waste fluids. Brunp Recycling's advance in technology R&D allowed it to seize market opportunities again as lithium prices gradually rose. In the recycling industry, "thorough recovery and turning waste into treasure" aligns with business ethics, moral virtue, and technical belief. Only by mastering advanced technology can one accept and recover all kinds of waste indiscriminately. "Not taking the obvious path" is actually Brunp Recycling's self-motivation for establishing strategic advantages, constituting the company's core competitiveness.
When LFP returned to being the industry mainstream, Brunp Recycling once again replicated the "not taking the obvious path" strategy with exquisite craftsmanship. The Nickel Pig Iron (NPI) produced by Brunp Recycling in Indonesia contains both nickel and iron components. The conventional method is to remove iron via precipitation as waste slag first, then extract nickel. Brunp Recycling developed unique separation techniques specifically for this. After nickel extraction from NPI, it flows into the production stream of ternary cathode materials, while the iron joins the preparation army of LFP materials. This "one tree blooming two flowers" process accurately reflects Brunp Recycling's unique innovation philosophy.
Brunp Recycling's forward momentum is both a magical journey of chemists solving equations and an exploratory expedition of commercial maneuvering. The recycling industry is the scaled-up amplification of laboratory chemistry. The key value of the recycling industry relies on dual insights into downstream users and upstream minerals. Starting from recycling, Brunp Recycling gradually built a unique Y-shaped strategy, grasping primary ore resources on one hand and recycling utilization on the other, jointly supporting the stability of the battery material supply chain. This has forged Brunp Recycling's unique strategic positioning and commercial temperament.
However, what Brunp Recycling needs to overcome are not just technical difficulties but also blind spots in social perception. People have many misconceptions about recycling, unaware that power battery recycling involves integrated technologies of chemistry, materials science, and automotive engineering. Brunp Recycling has consistently taken the lead in developing industry standards, pushing the industry from disorder to order. Since its inception, Brunp Recycling began establishing industry standards for consumer battery recycling in the non-ferrous metals sector. Subsequently, it promoted the construction of recycling standards in the chemical and automotive sectors. This led Brunp Recycling to become the secretariat lead unit of the National Technical Committee for Standardization of Power Battery Recycling and Utilization in 2026. "Not taking the obvious path" and "leading standards" are the two unique genes of Brunp Recycling, mutually reinforcing each other to drive the enterprise forward.
Brunp Recycling's corporate culture is full of linguistic vitality. It created many penetrating buzzwords, vividly expressing the consensus the enterprise hopes to consolidate. Here, "Market Depth and Slope" is a set of strategic concepts describing the relationship between future and reality, used to solve the matching problem between downstream market demand and factory capacity. "Chickens talking to ducks" describes the cultural dilemma managers face when going global initially, fostering a solid style of "cross-cultural communication, documented requirements." Brunp Recycling is an enterprise adept at growth, using "finding methods ten times better" to achieve process innovation and breakthroughs. It "cultivates itself," transforming every difficulty into organizational perfection and renewal. Regarding talent, Brunp Recycling advocates "sitting at the table with the best," absorbing nutrients from excellent domestic and international enterprises in strategic consulting and human resource building. Clear springs have their sources; this is the "good roots for people and good values for enterprises" that Brunp Recycling has always upheld. The spring eyes of deep wells and the gushing vitality make Brunp Recycling a uniquely tempered company.
For the public, recycling may seem like a somewhat unfamiliar industry, but its rapidly developing business story is not isolated; it is part of the numerous legends of China's electric vehicles. The global EV and power battery industries are like an erupting active volcano, with hot lava reshaping the industrial landscape and order. Situated within this, Brunp Recycling, like surging volcanic magma, constantly redefines its boundaries. The torrent of the great era rushes ceaselessly, and excellent enterprises rise with the trend. Looking back at Brunp Recycling's footprint, one can see the collective rise of China's battery industry. Those figures are remembered by more and more people, becoming trump card forces. Their present and future can almost be found in clues, clear or subtle, within Brunp Recycling. The headquarters building of Brunp Recycling is filled with floor-to-ceiling windows, offering an excellent viewpoint to observe magnificent scenery.
This book is a work exploring the recycling industry and the circular economy. Currently, the circular economy has become a key topic beyond environmental protection, closely related to industrial security and national strategy. This book shifts the lens to the often overlooked recycling industry, which serves as an excellent observation deck for the strong rise of China's electric vehicles and the curtain-raising of the circular economy. However, the battery recycling industry is exceptionally complex. Without explaining the composition of cathode materials, the manufacturing process of precursors, and the acid-base solutions and various crystalline salts involved in recycling, one cannot appreciate the brilliance of this industry's story. This book strives to use accessible language to describe processes that may seem tedious at first glance but are full of changes.
Brunp Recycling's corporate development experience is like a kaleidoscope; every rotation reveals different patterns. From all perspectives, the diversity of the company itself is highly readable. What Brunp Recycling excels at is discovering unusual strategic clues from information asymmetry. This is exactly why we sincerely invite readers to read this book. Brunp Recycling's perspective on discovering value is an excellent window for us to recognize the diversity and resilience of China's supply chain.
About the Author
Lin Xueping: General Manager of Beijing Lianxun Power Consulting Co., Ltd., author of "Value Discovery," "The Great Outbound," and "Supply Chain Offense and Defense."