On the evening of July 2, Syngenta Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Syngenta Group") disclosed its prospectus (draft), which will soon be listed on the China Science and Technology Innovation Board. Plant protection ranks first in the world, seeds third in the world, crop nutrition ranks first in China, and digital agriculture services lead the world in the world... Not only that, but in terms of sales revenue, Syngenta Group is currently the world's largest agricultural technology company. In 2020, Syngenta Group's annual sales revenue was 152 billion yuan, equivalent to 22 billion U.S. dollars at the average exchange rate in 2020, surpassing Bayer's 21.5 billion U.S. dollars and Corteva's 14.2 billion U.S. dollars in annual sales.

        It can be said that Syngenta Group is a highly competitive giant in the field of global agricultural technology and innovation in terms of enterprise scale, business map, industry status and innovation strength. The world's leading innovative ideas and excellent resources promote the progress and modernization of China's agricultural science and technology.

        According to the prospectus disclosed on the official website of the Shanghai Stock Exchange on July 2, Syngenta Group plans to issue no more than 2.786 billion new shares on the Science and Technology Innovation Board, that is, no more than 20% of the total share capital after the issuance, and the raised funds will be used for cutting-edge agricultural technology. Research and development, expand production and business, pay for major M&A projects in progress, etc., so as to consolidate the sustainable and healthy growth of the company in the future, ensure its leading position in the global industry, and promote the high-quality development of global and Chinese agriculture.

Dig deep into Chinese market opportunities

        Syngenta Group, which was registered in the Shanghai Free Trade Zone in 2019, integrates the agricultural businesses of Switzerland's Syngenta, Adama and Sinochem Group. Subsidiaries of the sector. It is understood that Syngenta Group currently has four major business units, including Syngenta Plant Protection, Syngenta Seeds, Syngenta Group China and ADAMA, with operations in more than 100 countries and regions around the world.

        Syngenta Group is in the first echelon of the global agricultural field, and its overall operating income has ranked first in the industry for two consecutive years. It is worth noting that China has become the market with the greatest growth potential for Syngenta Group's future development.

        The details disclosed in the prospectus show that the plant protection business of Syngenta Group in China, through the integration of the plant protection business resources of Syngenta Plant Protection, Adama and Sinochem Group, currently ranks first in market share in China; the seed business, through integration The varieties and business resources of Syngenta Seeds, China Seed Group, Sanbei Seed Industry, and Quanyin Hi-Tech ranks second in China in terms of market share; the crop nutrition business, which is operated and operated by Sinochem Fertilizer, is the country's leading crop nutrition supplier and Distributor, the market share ranks first in China. In addition, Syngenta Group has built China's leading farmer-centered innovative agricultural service platform, integrating big data resources to help the transformation and upgrading of China's agriculture.

        The prospectus also shows that the operating income of Syngenta Group in the first quarter of 2021 increased by 10.8% year-on-year to 42.8 billion yuan; the annual operating income of 2020 increased by 5.1% from the previous year to 152 billion yuan. Among them, Syngenta Group's growth in the Chinese market is even more rapid. China already accounts for more than 20% of Syngenta Group's global revenue. In the first quarter of 2021, Syngenta Group China's operating income increased by 37.8% year-on-year to 10.5 billion yuan; in 2020, the annual operating income increased by 9.7% year-on-year to 32.3 billion yuan.

Promote the innovative development of the seed industry

        In fact, for Syngenta Group, the focus of the market is more on "technology" rather than traditional "agriculture". According to the prospectus, Syngenta Group has top scientific research and innovation capabilities in the fields of plant protection, seeds and biological preparations, advanced R&D platforms all over the world, and more than 7,000 professional R&D talents. As of the end of 2020, Syngenta Group had a total of 11,351 authorized patents worldwide. From 2018 to 2020, Syngenta Group's annual R&D investment exceeded 9 billion yuan, accounting for more than 6.5% of the year's operating income, which is the highest level among companies on the Science and Technology Innovation Board.

        After the Central Economic Work Conference at the end of 2020 proposed to "fight a seed industry turnaround", the No. 1 Central Document in 2021 made specific arrangements for the development of the seed industry, and clearly proposed the orderly promotion of the industrial application of biological breeding. Zhao Jiuran, director of the Corn Research Center of the Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry, said that the safety of seed industry is inseparable from food security. Only by solving the problems of seeds and arable land can the security of food production be guaranteed.

        It is understood that at present, Syngenta Group's seed business has more than 120 R&D centers around the world, and the Beijing Innovation Center is one of the seven most important R&D centers in the world. In addition, Syngenta has established high-standard R&D bases in Wuhan, Yangling and other places, and started the construction of the National Corn Seed Technology Innovation Center.

        Statistics show that in 2019, the total R&D investment of national seed companies (excluding Syngenta Group) was RMB 4.2 billion, which was less than half of the R&D investment of a company in Syngenta Group that year. It is foreseeable that in the future, Syngenta Group will give full play to its own advantages, introduce the world's advanced biological breeding technologies and products into China, and promote the innovative development of China's seed industry.

"Go light" after reorganization

       Four years ago, ChemChina completed the acquisition of Swiss agrochemical giant Syngenta, making it the largest overseas merger and acquisition of a Chinese company so far. But with the completion of the acquisition, problems such as high debt, weak global market growth, and unclear prospects for business integration have also followed.

       Four years later, Syngenta Group appeared in the public eye with a new look. In terms of performance, its overall operating income has ranked first in the industry for two consecutive years. In terms of asset structure, Syngenta Group, which was restructured last year, is quite different from the asset structure when it was acquired before. It has newly added high-quality agricultural assets under Sinochem Group and ChemChina, and is positioned as a company based in China. , Globally operating agricultural innovation technology enterprises.

        An important turning point was in 2018, when Ning Gaoning, chairman of Sinochem Group, concurrently served as chairman of ChemChina, and a series of layouts began. In the same year, an alliance named SAS was formally established. The three letters refer to Sinochem Group, Adama and Syngenta respectively. The purpose is to promote the cooperation and synergy of the three parties in the agricultural sector. On January 5, 2020, Sinochem Group and ChemChina announced at the same time that they would inject their global agricultural assets into the newly established Syngenta Group, and then officially operate. This also means that the world's leading agricultural innovation technology companies with Chinese-funded backgrounds have officially started operations, and the global agricultural technology industry pattern between North America, the European Union and China has been formally formed.

        The content disclosed in the prospectus shows that Syngenta Group achieved a strong growth momentum in the first quarter of 2021, with operating income increasing by 10.80% year-on-year and net profit increasing by 44.91% year-on-year. At the same time, Syngenta Group has greatly reduced its own business risks through debt optimization. After completing the debt restructuring in 2020, the asset-liability ratio will drop to 40.51%, which is lower than the average level of comparable listed companies in the industry, and the debt level is healthy. This figure was 57.2% and 56.3% at the end of 2019 and 2018, respectively.

    The "lightweight" Syngenta Group's listing on the Science and Technology Innovation Board will attract wider and more diversified investors to pay attention to China's agriculture, promote the high-quality development of my country's agriculture, and help the country's rural revitalization.

(Information source: transferred from Pesticide Information Network)