Imaging motor leader makes second attempt at Hong Kong IPO; Sunnex Motor thrived thanks to O-Film, yet is also constrained by O-Film
Produced by | Frontline of Entrepreneurship
Author | Xingkong
Editor | Wang Yajing
Visual editor | Xing Jing
Reviewed | Songwen
In 1994, Japan-based Soken Inc. invented the world's first voice coil motor (VCM) for mobile phones, ushering in the era of miniature imaging motors.
Twenty years later, in 2014, this pioneer of VCM technology was acquired by Chinese capital and rebranded as 'New Soken Motor,' completing a dramatic transformation.
On July 5, 2026, New Soken Motor Co., Ltd. (short name: New Soken Motor) submitted its second application to list on the Main Board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, making another push into the capital markets.
This manufacturer specializing in miniature precision motors ranks first in China in optical image stabilization (OIS) imaging motors. Its revenue surged from RMB 855 million to RMB 19.57 billion over three years, while net profit swung from a loss of RMB 301 million to a profit of RMB 1.20 billion, delivering impressive financial performance.
However, significant challenges still loom over the company: more than 40% of its revenue comes from related parties controlled by its actual controller, cash reserves dropped by over RMB 1 billion in just four months, and growth in its core smartphone business is showing signs of weakening...
New Soken Motor’s IPO is driven both by financing needs and by the urgent necessity to seize a critical window in the capital markets before its core business loses momentum.
1. Annual revenue of RMB 19.57 billion—glory and challenges coexist
The story of New Soken Motor began with an acquisition.
In September 2014, the company was established in Jiaxing, Zhejiang Province, initially wholly owned by Soken Motor (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. In November 2016, Cai Zhenpeng acquired approximately 90.03% of the company's equity for around RMB 1.305 billion, marking a pivotal shift from Japanese to Chinese ownership.
In the following years, although their equity stake was diluted through multiple funding rounds, the Cai Zhenpeng family maintained firm control over voting rights through several shareholding platforms. Prior to the IPO, Cai Zhenpeng, his uncle Cai Rongjun, and their respective controlled companies formed a concert party, collectively holding approximately 56.97% of the voting rights in New Sich Motor.
In December 2025, Cai Rongjun officially joined New Sich Motor as Chairman. With this move, the precision motor company—originally rooted in Japanese capital—was fully stamped with the Cai family's imprint.
Currently, New Sich Motor has built an imaging product portfolio comprising optical image stabilization (OIS) motors, periscope motors, open-loop motors, and closed-loop motors. Its non-imaging products include stepper motors and brushless DC motors, which have been deployed in applications such as robotic vacuum cleaners, security surveillance, and automotive electronics.
(Figure / Imaging motor products (Source: Prospectus))
With these products, New Sich Motor delivered an impressive performance.
From 2023 to 2025, the company’s revenue surged from RMB 855 million to RMB 19.57 billion, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 51.3%.
Meanwhile, its net profit swung from a loss of RMB 301.02 million in 2023 to a profit of RMB 1.05 billion in 2024, further increasing to RMB 1.20 billion in 2025; gross margin also improved from 8.4% to 16.7%.
(Figure / Prospectus)
Based on 2025 revenue, New Sich Motor ranked fourth globally and first in China in the optical image stabilization (OIS) imaging motor segment, with market shares of 5.6% and 14.0%, respectively.
However, behind the spotlight, New Sich Motor still faces underlying concerns—the momentum driving its revenue growth is rapidly weakening.
In 2024, the company’s revenue grew by 82.9% year-over-year, but the growth rate sharply decelerated to 25.1% in 2025, and further narrowed to 19.5% in the first four months of 2026.
Profitability quality is also questionable. Optical image stabilization (OIS) motors, which account for half of the company’s revenue, saw their gross margin decline from 16.5% in 2024 to 11.7% in 2025.
In response, Xin Sike Motor explained: 'Temporary delays in end-customer demand have led to shipment postponements and weaker absorption of production costs.'
From 2024 to the first four months of 2026, the company’s capacity utilization rate for OIS motors plummeted from 87.1% to 53.0%.
In other words, weakening demand from major customers has left the company with idle capacity, making it harder to spread fixed costs over fewer units.
Fortunately, the gross margins of Xin Sike Motor’s open-loop and closed-loop motors remain relatively high, helping to support overall profitability—the company’s blended gross margin edged up slightly from 15.9% in 2025 to 16.7%.
However, capacity utilization rates for many products have dropped significantly, raising external concerns. As of the end of April 2026, the capacity utilization rate for open-loop motors fell to 27.0% from 69.9% in 2025, while periscope motors remained at 33.9%. Four out of the company’s five product lines now operate below 60% utilization.
(Chart / Prospectus)
Meanwhile, the company continues to advance construction of its periscope motor factory in NamCheong and its brushless DC motor factory in Dongguan. These new facilities may struggle to contribute profits immediately upon launch; instead, substantial depreciation and amortization expenses could further erode already fragile profitability in the short term.
2. Rise and fall both tied to O-Film
When discussing the development of New Thinking Motor, one cannot overlook O-Film. The fates of these two companies are tightly bound together by one person—Cai Rongjun.
Cai Rongjun is the chairman and actual controller of O-Film, and also serves as non-executive director and chairman of New Thinking Motor.
Cai Zhenpeng, vice chairman and chief executive officer of New Thinking Motor, is Cai Rongjun’s nephew, and the two together are controlling shareholders of New Thinking Motor.
In other words, both New Thinking Motor and O-Film are essentially family-controlled enterprises of the Cai Zhenpeng family.
This relationship has been amplified to the extreme at the operational level.
From 2023 to the first four months of 2026(hereinafter referred to as: the reporting period), revenue contributed by O-Film to New Thinking Motor amounted to RMB 324 million, RMB 432 million, RMB 594 million, and RMB 290 million, respectively, accounting for 37.9%, 27.6%, 30.4%, and 41.7% of its relevant revenue.
Among these periods, O-Film was its largest customer in 2023, 2025, and the first four months of 2026, and its second-largest customer in 2024.
(Figure / Prospectus)
Meanwhile, O-Film is also one of the suppliers to NewSight Motor, providing it with lenses, automation equipment, and other items for testing purposes.
The financial consequences of this deep entanglement between the two parties are already evident.
During the reporting periods, NewSight Motor’s trade receivables and notes receivable amounted to RMB 341 million, RMB 648 million, RMB 672 million, and RMB 828 million, respectively. As of May 31, 2026, this financial metric further increased to RMB 921 million.
(Chart / Prospectus)
From 2023 to 2025, trade receivables from O-Film rose from RMB 92 million to RMB 132 million, representing a cumulative increase of approximately 43%.
By the end of April 2026, trade receivables from O-Film further climbed to RMB 232 million, marking a 75.68% increase compared to the end of 2025.
Such a large volume of related-party receivables now accounts for approximately 28% of NewSight Motor’s total trade receivables during the same period—four times the company’s cash reserves (RMB 57.068 million) at the time.
With nearly 30% of its receivables concentrated among related parties, any operational volatility or slowdown in payment timing from O-Film would directly expose NewSight Motor to significant collection risk on these RMB 232 million receivables, severely impacting its already fragile cash flow.
Data shows that O-Film has reported negative net profit attributable to shareholders excluding non-recurring gains and losses for six consecutive years. In the first half of 2026, O-Film expects a net loss attributable to shareholders of between RMB 360 million and RMB 460 million, indicating a bleak profitability outlook.
(Chart / O-Film Financial Data (Source: East Money))
Moreover, O-Film’s own history serves as a mirror. In 2021, O-Film was removed from Apple’s supply chain, causing its earnings to plummet—its first-half 2021 net profit dropped by over 90% year-over-year. Having once entrusted its business lifeline entirely to Apple, O-Film is now tying the fate of Xin Sike Motor to itself. Will capital markets view this cycle favorably?
3. Slowing growth in core smartphone business, betting on dexterous hands
Xin Sike’s prospectus tells a transformation story: 'from smartphone motors to a multi-scenario-driven platform.'
This is largely tied to the slowing growth of its core revenue pillar—the smartphone business.
In 2024, this segment generated RMB 1.43 billion in revenue, surging 82.0% year-over-year; by 2025, however, its year-over-year revenue growth sharply decelerated to just 7.8%.
In the first four months of 2026, this business recorded RMB 511 million in revenue, down approximately RMB 160,000 from the same period last year, signaling an emerging downward trend.
(Chart / Prospectus)
In fact, global smartphone shipment growth has also slowed significantly. According to IDC data, worldwide smartphone shipment growth declined from 6.4% in 2024 to just 1.9% in 2025.
Against this backdrop of slowing smartphone industry growth, Xin Sike Motor’s non-smartphone business share rose markedly—from 6.9% in 2023 to 24.4% in the first four months of 2026.
However, a closer look reveals that the composition of its non-smartphone business remains unbalanced.
Among these, the handheld imaging and action camera segment has grown rapidly, generating revenue of RMB 129 million in the first four months of 2026, already accounting for 19.1% of total revenue;
Meanwhile, nearly all other non-smartphone businesses have largely stagnated. Security and surveillance revenue reached RMB 45.04 million in 2025, down 2.3% year-over-year; in the first four months of 2026, it grew by just 6.8% year-over-year.
Although the smart home business has seen some growth, its absolute scale in 2025 was only RMB 24.525 million, representing a mere 1.3% of total revenue.
In other words, outside of smartphone-related operations, only the handheld imaging and action camera segment—the lone bright spot—is driving performance growth.
Currently, New Think Motor is also expanding into emerging sectors such as embodied robotics and the low-altitude economy.
In November 2025, New Think Motor signed a strategic cooperation agreement with a leading robotics company and began commercial sales of dexterous hand joint motor modules in 2026.
However, as a late entrant, it faces significant challenges.
For example, MOONS’ Industries has already built a full-stack component platform covering 'motors + drivers + transmission + closed-loop control' and can mass-produce core drive modules for dexterous hands and upper-limb joints. ZW Motor unveiled its self-developed 20-degree-of-freedom complete dexterous hand at CES 2026, having started product iteration and customer validation earlier.
New Think Motor did not sign its robotics cooperation agreement until November 2025 and only began commercial sales of dexterous hand joint motors in 2026, significantly lagging behind peers like MOONS’ Industries and ZW Motor in terms of technological depth, validation by top-tier customers, and pace of scaled production.
More critically, the technical roadmap for robotic dexterous hands has yet to converge, with different manufacturers focusing on distinct approaches—posing a risk that New Think Motor could back the wrong technology path.
More importantly, whether its cash flow can last until the day its story comes to fruition.As of April 30, 2026, it held RMB 57.068 million in cash and cash equivalents and RMB 50.024 million in financial assets. Although its short-term bank borrowings were less than RMB 40 million, these funds must support the construction and ramp-up of two new factories, cushion the impact of slowing smartphone business, and bridge the gap while its robotics segment transitions from prototypes to mass production—any hiccup in this chain could stretch its liquidity to the breaking point.
(Figure / Prospectus)
This offers some insight into why New Thinking Motor is once again pushing for a listing on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. However, given its competitors’ lead and its relatively limited cash reserves, the company’s window to make a successful push into the capital markets is narrow.
*Note: The featured image in this article is from Shetu.com and is licensed under the VRF protocol.
Risk Disclaimer: The above content only represents the author's view. It does not represent any position or investment advice of Futu. Futu makes no representation or warranty.Read more
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