1. Overview of the missile system
The definition of a missile is a weapon that relies on its own power device to propel, is guided by the guidance system, controls its flight trajectory, guides the warhead and destroys the target. . There are many classification methods for missiles. The most used classification methods are classified according to the aerodynamic shape and flight trajectory of the missile. They can be divided into two categories: ballistic missiles and winged missiles. Under each category, they can be subdivided into many subcategories. As shown in Figure 17.
Among them, a ballistic missile is a missile that flies along a preset ballistic trajectory and throws a warhead to a predetermined target. According to the nature of operations, ballistic missiles can be divided into strategic ballistic missiles and tactical ballistic missiles. Strategic ballistic missiles are generally medium-range, long-range and intercontinental ballistic missiles. Tactical ballistic missiles are generally short-range ballistic missiles. The development trend of ballistic missiles in the future is mainly to improve the penetration capability, improve the hit accuracy, expand the global strike capability and mobile launch capability.
The winged missile is a kind of self-controlled aircraft with a warhead that is powered by a rocket engine or an air-breathing engine. The normal force required for maneuvering is provided by the aerodynamic force of the lift component. According to the type and location of the target, the winged missile is It can be subdivided into surface-to-air missiles, air-to-air missiles, surface-to-surface missiles, air-to-surface missiles, anti-ship missiles and anti-tank missiles. It is characterized by high guidance accuracy, strong maneuverability, complex system composition and structure, and the future development directions of winged missiles include expansion of autonomy, intelligence, modularization and standardization, and expansion of flight airspace.
Although there are many types of missiles, almost all types of missiles are composed of four parts: warhead, power system, guidance system and missile body structure, as shown in Figure 18. The functions and specific classification of each part can be seen in Table 9.
Due to the complex composition of the missile, the general design and development process is long, mainly including two aspects: scientific research and trial production. In order to solve the key problems in the trial production and develop a new type of missile weapon system with advanced level, in addition to a lot of in-depth scientific research work, it is also necessary to repeatedly iterate in the development process (the specific process is shown in Figure 19). As shown), therefore, the period from the design to the equipment of the missile as a whole is generally long, and the whole process generally takes about 5-15 years.
The performance indicators of the missile itself mainly include three aspects. The flight performance includes the range, flight speed, altitude and maneuverability; the use performance mainly considers the launch preparation time and reliability; the economic requirements mainly involve the economic requirements of missile weapon production and Use economic requirements, etc.
2. Status of the missile equipment industry market
2.1 Market Scale of Complete Missile Equipment
At present, the international political and security situation is complex and volatile, uncertain factors have increased significantly, and the international security situation is facing new challenges. As global arms transfers are closely related to political economy, regional conflicts, and international counter-terrorism, the overall international arms trade market has shown an upward trend. According to the new edition of the "Global Arms Trade Report" released by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) in Sweden in 2019, since the beginning of the 21st century, the export value of the world's major arms exporting countries has maintained growth. The transaction volume increased by 5.48% compared with the previous cycle (2010-2014) and 20% compared with 2005-2009.
Missile weapons have always been an important part of the international arms trade market due to their outstanding features that are different from general offensive weapons, including high power, long range and high precision. At the same time, the trade of missile weapons and equipment is affected and restricted by a variety of international environmental factors, including international military trade policies and regulations, international political trends, national security environment and military strategy, the relationship between importing and exporting countries, and the quality and price of weapons themselves. It can be seen that there is a certain volatility in the current global missile weapons and equipment transactions, and the annual transaction order volume is basically between 60-100. Since the outbreak of the global financial crisis in 2008, the transaction volume of missiles has declined, and then affected by the situation in the Middle East, the import scale of missile weapons in India, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and the United Arab Emirates has increased rapidly, and the global missile weapons transaction volume has also begun to rebound, and in 2013- peaked in 2014. Although the global missile trading fever has cooled down again, since Trump was elected as the US president, the major changes in US domestic and foreign affairs, the new variables brought about by Brexit, the continued turmoil in Syria, the geopolitical conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Yemen The conflict between the Saudi coalition and the Houthis, the refugee crisis, and the accelerated spread of religious conflicts, and the global spread of the new crown epidemic in 2020 have exacerbated the above international uncertainties. We judge that the future global arms trade market transactions will be further improved and Consolidation, the global missile trading market is also expected to usher in recovery growth again.
Judging from the distribution of orders for various types of missile weapons and equipment in the world from 2008 to 2017 (see Figure 23), anti-tank missiles generally have the characteristics of low price and flexible operations, and the transaction volume is the highest. 65%, with the current deterioration of local conflicts such as the Middle East, anti-tank missiles are expected to continue to maintain the highest proportion of missile weapons and equipment transactions in the future
According to the forecast of missiles (including guided weapons) in the "2018 World Missile Briefing" released by the Teal Group, the global missile production in 2019-2027 is expected to reach a total of 317,900 pieces, with an output value of more than 130 billion US dollars. The details are shown in Table 10 and Table 11.
Specific to my country's missile market, the demand mainly comes from defense demand and military trade export demand. The current situation is as follows:
① Defense needs
In terms of national defense demand, under the background of the stable and healthy growth of my country's military expenditure, my country's weapons and equipment have made certain progress. It has not yet been completed, and the level of informatization needs to be improved urgently. Military security is facing the risk of technological surprises and the widening of the technological generation gap. There is still a big gap between the level of military modernization and national security needs, and there is still a big gap compared with the world's advanced military level. The proportion of equipment expenses in the composition of military expenditures has increased year by year, indicating that my country is continuously increasing efforts to promote the modernization of national defense and the military and deepen the reform of national defense and the military. In the context of the army's comprehensive strengthening of military training and preparations and increasing actual combat exercises, missiles, as an indispensable expendable weapon and equipment for the modern army, are expected to maintain a stable and sustained increase in demand with the steady growth of my country's equipment costs. This can also be verified by the data disclosed by the Aerospace Science and Industry Group, one of the main bodies of equipment R&D and manufacturing of my country's missile weapon system. After 2016, the growth rate of the aerospace defense and other business income of the Aerospace Science and Industry Group has exceeded the increase in my country's military expenditure. speed and the growth rate of equipment costs in military spending.
At the same time, in the context of the staged victory of the epidemic in my country, some politicians in a few countries such as the United States have tried to divert their attention, shirk responsibility, or because of ideological prejudice and other factors, to politicize and smear the epidemic out of domestic political needs. In this context, my country's demand for weapons and equipment represented by missile weapons and equipment is also expected to increase.
To sum up, we judge that a large amount of military expenditure has been invested in the development of weapons and equipment in my country, the quality of domestic equipment has been significantly improved, and the military trade has achieved a surplus. Harvest period; at the same time, with the current military intensifying actual combat exercises, the demand for missile weapons as expendable weapons will also grow rapidly; in addition, under the background of tense Sino-US relations, my country's representative of modern weapons and equipment, missile equipment. Demand may continue to grow.
② Arms export
According to the "International Situation Report of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (2020)", the global situation and the world pattern in 2020 will show eight major trends: the global economy has entered an era of ultra-low interest rates, the game of interests in global governance has become increasingly fierce, regional and bilateral cooperation has advanced rapidly, In the field of international strategy and security, the East-West separation trend is intensifying, the competition among countries in cyberspace is more prominent, the competition in science and technology is more intense, the risk of nuclear proliferation is rising, and extremist behavior is showing a trend of internationalization. In the context of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the United States still maintains sanctions on Iran and Venezuela during the epidemic, and other events show that the epidemic has not played a significant role in alleviating geopolitical conflicts, although the promotion of the international arms trade market may be affected by certain epidemics However, judging from the fact that the international arms trade market has maintained a growing trend during several major epidemics since the 20th century (see Figure 25), we judge that the negative impact of the new crown pneumonia epidemic on international arms trade is limited. The increase of unstable and uncertain factors may have a greater positive stimulus to international arms trade. Overall, we predict that the steady growth trend of global arms trade since the 20th century is expected to continue in the future, and the growth rate of global arms trade may even increase rapidly.
To sum up, we believe that the market demand for my country's missile weapons and equipment is expected to maintain a stable and rapid growth overall, both in terms of domestic demand and exports.
2.2 Market Situation of Missile Subsystems
Due to the variety and quantity of the components and components that make up the whole missile machine, its R&D and production belong to systematic engineering. The weapon systems that generally belong to systems engineering can be divided into six stages from R&D and production to application, namely feasibility demonstration, program design, engineering development, production finalization, use and support, and decommissioning and destruction. The specific work of each stage is shown in Table 12.
Specifically for missile equipment, the first five stages of the missile's life cycle are the stages that require input costs. Among them, the cost of feasibility demonstration, program design, and engineering development is the cost of research and development, while the input cost of production and finalization belongs to the cost of production, use and development. The guaranteed input cost belongs to the later operation and maintenance cost. It can be seen from the composition of the input cost of each stage in the whole life cycle of the weapon system (see Figure 26) that the input cost of the missile weapon system in the production and finalization stage and the use and maintenance stage accounts for a large proportion (about 80%), while the demonstration stage, scheme The total investment in the stage and the engineering development stage (collectively referred to as the R&D stage) is relatively small (about 20%), indicating that the R&D cost of the entire missile only accounts for about 20%, while the production cost and operation and maintenance cost can account for 80%.
In the production and finalization stage, as described in Section 2.1, the entire missile is mainly composed of four parts, namely the warhead, power system, guidance (and control) system and the body structure. The cost proportion of the above four subsystems in the overall missile is shown in Figure 27. It can be seen that the proportions of the ballistic missile guidance system, power system, warhead and others (including the missile body structure) are relatively close; It is an air target missile, and the cost of the guidance and control system is obviously more prominent than that of other subsystems, which shows that with the continuous improvement of the performance (especially mobility) of current military aircraft such as fighter jets and unmanned aerial vehicles, it has driven the determination of the precision strike capability of the missile. The performance of the guidance system requires the improvement of indicators, and the improvement of performance will directly drive the increase in the cost of the guidance and control subsystem. We predict that the cost of the guidance and control subsystem may continue to remain high in the future.
3. Analysis of Missile Equipment Industry Chain
The upstream of the missile R&D and production industry chain is mainly engineering development, which specifically involves the overall demonstration, design (including the overall design and sub-system design of the missile), simulation testing, and testing of the missile. Relevant enterprises and institutions affiliated to military industrial groups such as the Ordnance Industry Group participated in the implementation, and some scientific research institutes, factories and private enterprises participated in the customized development, production and experimentation of prototypes. Based on Figure 26, it can be seen that the upstream of the missile manufacturing industry chain accounts for the missile industry. About 20% of the overall market size.
The midstream of the industrial chain is mainly based on mass production after missile development and finalization, which can be further subdivided into the industrial chain according to component supporting processing and production, sub-system (component) integration, and final assembly integration. Among them, the supporting processing and production of components and sub-systems (components) are participated by enterprises and institutions affiliated to military industry groups such as aviation industry, aerospace technology, aerospace science and industry, weapons industry, and China Electric Power Technology, as well as private enterprises. The military-affiliated final assembly plant participated. Based on Figure 26, it can be seen that this part accounts for about 60% of the overall market size of the missile industry.
The downstream of the industrial chain is mainly composed of equipment support after the missiles are delivered to the army, maintenance and life extension, etc., and is mainly participated by the enterprises and institutions of the central enterprises of the military industry and some private supporting enterprises. Based on Figure 26, it can be seen that this part accounts for about 20% of the overall market size of the missile industry.
The specific missile development industry chain and each part of the related listed companies are shown in Figure 28.
4. Development trend of missile equipment technology
As an important part of the contemporary information war, the missile technology development trend is mainly determined by the improvement direction of the missile's operational index requirements, and can be decomposed and established to the technical development of the supporting processing and production of various components and components. on trend.
4.1 Overall Technology Development Trend
From the perspective of the technical prospects of the whole missile, according to the classification method in Figure 17, it can be divided into two categories to discuss the technical development trend of ballistic missiles (strategic missiles) and the technical development trends of winged missiles (tactical missiles).
First of all, in terms of ballistic missiles, since the Gulf War, the great efficacy of ballistic missiles in the war has prompted countries around the world to attach great importance to and compete to develop ballistic missile manufacturing and penetration technologies. With reference to the development of foreign ballistic missiles, the technical development trend of ballistic missiles can be summarized as follows:
(1) In terms of overall design, the missile design is more modular and generalized, and improving the missile can improve the space and meet more operational requirements;
(2) In terms of guidance, the guidance accuracy of ballistic missiles will continue to be improved by adopting the composite guidance method;
(3) Carry out life extension work to continuously extend the service life of missiles;
(4) Enhance the penetration capability of missiles by using technologies such as stealth, fast-burning engines, and maneuvering orbit changes;
(5) Submarine-launched ballistic missiles will become the main force of strategic missiles in the future due to their good concealment, strong maneuverability and high survival probability.
In terms of winged missiles, due to the many types of missiles included, the functions and target characteristics of various types of missiles are quite different, so they need to be classified and discussed. The specific technology development trends of missiles are as follows:
(1) In terms of anti-tank missiles, the main technical development direction is to develop advanced anti-tank missile guidance technology; apply advanced warheads to improve damage and penetration capabilities; research new engine propulsion technologies; have combat capabilities against various targets ; Achieve soft launch to improve battlefield survivability.
(2) In terms of surface-to-air missiles, the main technical development direction is to have the capabilities of anti-jamming, anti-spoofing, and high damage in complex battlefield environments;
