Thermal Management
热管理Heat pumps, valves and pumps that keep battery, motor and cabin at temperature. Margins sit in commercial vehicles and data-centre cooling, not passenger cars.
- Sanhua auto parts revenue and marginH1 2026
- ¥6.46bnup 9.9%, 27.56%
- Tuopu thermal management marginH1 2026
- 16.08%
- Yinlun margin: passenger cars vs digital and energyH1 2026
- 12.66% vs 25.31%
China's position
Yinlun earned 25.3% in digital and energy cooling and 23.6% in commercial vehicles against 12.7% in passenger cars; Sanhua's auto parts earned 27.6%.
Overview
What it is
An electric vehicle needs to heat and cool its battery, its motor and electronics, and the cabin. Suppliers make valves, pumps, heat exchangers, compressors and the controllers that run them, and increasingly sell them as integrated modules. The same parts are used for cooling data-centre servers and energy storage.
Where China stands
Three listed companies show how the business differs by customer:
- Sanhua (三花智控, 002050.SZ) earned ¥6.46bn from auto parts in the first half of 2026, up 9.9%, at a 27.56% gross margin, alongside ¥10.44bn from air-conditioning and refrigeration parts. It says its products are in the supply chains of most leading new-energy vehicle makers, which is its own claim (2026 interim report, pp. 9, 13, 14).
- Tuopu (拓普集团, 601689.SH) earned ¥1.02bn from thermal management systems, up 3.8%, at a 16.08% gross margin. It says its thermal technology has also been applied to liquid-cooled servers, storage and robots, with cumulative orders for those new areas of ¥1.75bn (2026 interim report, pp. 8, 13).
- Yinlun (银轮股份, 002126.SZ) had revenue of ¥9.03bn, up 25.9%, with passenger cars at a 12.66% margin, commercial vehicles and non-road at 23.61%, and digital and energy cooling at 25.31% (2026 interim report, pp. 8, 18).
The margins are not like for like, since they cover different product mixes, but they point the same way: parts for passenger cars earn the least.
Our view: thermal management for passenger cars is a low-margin, price-competitive business, and the suppliers are moving toward commercial vehicles and data-centre cooling where Yinlun's filing shows margins about twice as high. That shift also explains why Tuopu and Sanhua stress liquid cooling in their reports.
What to watch
- Data-centre cooling revenue. Yinlun's digital and energy line rose 41.3% and Tuopu reports ¥1.75bn of orders in new areas; neither is yet a large share of sales (Yinlun p. 18, Tuopu p. 13).
- Passenger car margins. They were 12.66% at Yinlun and 16.08% at Tuopu, so any change in the next report shows whether passenger car thermal parts are holding up.
- Integration. Tuopu invested in a compressor maker in the half to complete a compressor-plus-heat-pump system (Tuopu p. 13).
Key companies
- Sanhua Intelligent Controls三花智控002050.SZ · 2050.HKAir-conditioner and car thermal-management valve maker that says robot actuators are in batch delivery, without giving any robot revenue.
- Tuopu Group拓普集团601689.SHNingbo auto parts maker in small-batch delivery of robot actuators, which earned ¥14.0m in H1 2026, about 0.1% of its revenue.
- Yinlun银轮股份002126.SZHeat-exchanger maker whose H1 2026 revenue rose 25.9% to ¥9.03bn; its commercial-vehicle and data-centre lines earn about twice its passenger-car margin.
Key metrics
| Metric | Period | Value |
|---|---|---|
| Sanhua auto parts revenue and marginSanhua 2026 interim report, pp. 13, 14 | H1 2026 | ¥6.46bnup 9.9%, 27.56% |
| Tuopu thermal management marginTuopu 2026 interim report, p. 8 | H1 2026 | 16.08% |
| Yinlun margin: passenger cars vs digital and energyYinlun 2026 interim report, p. 18 | H1 2026 | 12.66% vs 25.31% |