IPPON Ippon Technologies

The Ippon trademark was created by the distribution company Merlion in the early 2000s^[1] Since that time, equipment has been produced to protect electricity under this brand name. As of the beginning of 2025, the company has 9 production sites located in China and more than 200 service centers in Russia and the CIS.

Ippon's product portfolio includes UPSs for both home use and devices for infrastructure solutions, data centers and other equipment critical to mains voltage drops. In addition, it includes voltage stabilizers, batteries for UPS and other devices, network filters and adapters for laptops.

History

2025

In Ippon prepared for the return of American UPS manufacturers to Russia

As of the beginning of 2025, there is talk on the market about the possible return of foreign UPS vendors to Russia. In this regard, the manufacturer of UPS Ippon predicts two main scenarios for the further development of the market and its business: one - if foreign market leaders do return, and the second - if not.

Ippon General Manager Mikhail Vazisov, answering TAdviser questions at a meeting with the press in Murmansk in February 2024, noted that in the first case there will be a strong competition, since foreign manufacturers, seeing the size of the market and its attractiveness, will be ready to seriously invest: install offices, bring equipment, give special conditions to distributors.

Against this background, Ippon will have to "strain harder" to leave all market participants on its equipment. The same, accordingly, would have to be done by other players who received part of the market after the departure of foreign competitors from Russia.

Here, of course, it depends on the situation, but we think that first of all it will potentially be American companies. European companies are not yet preparing to return, this is due to the geopolitical situation, - said Mikhail Vazisov. - It will be difficult, but we have already taken steps to reduce this complexity.

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Фото: Ippon

The second scenario is more positive, although in the highly competitive UPS market, where more than 50 players are now present, in any case, significant efforts will have to be made to maintain the positions already achieved and to grow. Ippon in 2025 aims to focus in certain segments: for example, in the segment of special batteries, the company sees the potential for further growth due to the fact that, already occupying a large share of the UPS market, it is now difficult to grow on it as a whole.

At the same time, the Ippon product line will develop not only towards UPS: the company has development ideas in other directions for 2025, "which are already being implemented." Through comprehensive solutions and the supply of related equipment, Ippon plans to expand its business as such, including increasing marketing support for its channel and the number of communications with the market, in order to form the right vision for the buyer of its product.

At the same time, it is especially important to develop technical competencies in a highly competitive market, says Mikhail Vazisov: "This is now the cornerstone, without this it is extremely difficult in 'heavy' solutions. Without that, whatever top-end product you have at a super low price, nothing will take off. Without a laboratory where UPSs are tested, where scenarios of their operation are implemented. "

Start of UPS production localization in Russia

Ippon began taking steps to localize production in Russia. Ippon general manager Mikhail Vazisov told about this at a press conference at the end of February 2025 in Murmansk. In particular, the company launches in the country the production of a line of low-power on-line UPSs on lead-acid batteries in the Rack/Tower form factor, "as the most popular model in this segment."

At first, we are talking about a large-node assembly, and in future plans, a small-node assembly with the entire range of necessary production operations, explained Mikhail Vazisov, answering TAdviser questions. In the first six months, the company expects to produce about 9 thousand pieces of equipment.

The production will be organized on the basis of a partner platform. On the part of Ippon, technological expertise, materials, engineering competencies, and the partner performs mechanical functions under the control of the company. The name of the partner company is not disclosed in Ippon.

If this project is successful, we will extrapolate it further to other lines, because under the current commercial conditions, this project, in addition to its ideologies in terms of technological sovereignty, also has attractive commercial potential, "Mikhail Vazisov explained.

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Фото: Ippon Press Office

At the same time, building further plans, the company will also focus on the changing economic situation, because now there is a certain warming, there is talk about the return of some vendors to Russia, and if this happens, it will "change the entire market situation, as it changed in 2022."

Ippon says that the development of local production, including will allow the company to diversify risks when working with China as the main production site. As of the beginning of the year, it has a total of 9 production sites, all of which are located in China. Wide production capacities allowed the company in a difficult current situation to diversify the risks of supplies, said Mikhail Vazisov. If something happens to one plant, then everyone else is connected.

Earlier in an interview, Mikhail Vazisov said that back in 2024 it was planned to organize the assembly of UPS in Russia. However, the implementation of the project faced a number of difficulties, including sanctions restrictions, which affected equipment suppliers and created difficulties with cross-border payments. But, despite these obstacles,^[2] Vazisov eventually managed to solve the problem with payments^[3]

The company also has big plans to enter a new segment of the market - sodium-ion batteries, with which the expansion of production is associated. They will be produced at a separate factory in China, which has an exclusive agreement with Ippon to provide the technology. Ippon itself is involved in the development of specifications and the appearance of these devices.

Ippon considers this technology to be very promising. Sodium was developed at the same time as lithium, but due to such a lithium feature as a higher density, the latter is now more popular than sodium. Demand for it stimulates, among other things, the development of the electric vehicle industry, and as demand increases, the price of it also increases. In addition to small vehicles, sodium-ion UPSs are used, for example, in the field of renewable electricity and in UPSs. Among the advantages of sodium-ion batteries, they work better at sub-zero temperatures, unlike lead and lithium batteries, which allows them to be used outdoors without heating sources, as well as their fire safety, which is especially important for applications where safety is extremely important.

But at the same time, the production of sodium-ion batteries in Russia, most likely, the company will not organize, said Mikhail Vazisov. He made a reference to the difficulties with organizing the production of lithium batteries on the territory of the Russian Federation with state support (the Rosatom project), noting that under current conditions, the production of batteries - both lithium and sodium - is not possible for the company in Russia. For such production, a completely different level of investment and technological equipment is needed, "at this stage it is futile."

Ippon did not disclose revenue indicators and its dynamics at the end of 2024. However, the company says that at the end of the year they increased their market share, although the year was difficult for it due to the fact that there was a transformation of production and a redesign of the model range. Previously, the company sold a "huge number" of small UPSs, but now they are less in demand, and "heavy" equipment sells better.

Mikhail Vazisov, answering TAdviser's questions, noted that the UPS market in Russia is now very competitive, very saturated - there are more than 50 players on it, and it remains attractive, including from the point of view of marginality.

2024: Transformation of production processes

In May 2024, Ippon began transforming production processes due to the imposition of sanctions that caused supply problems, including IT goods. The main task was to optimize logistics to fulfill obligations to customers. As part of the diversification of risks, the approach to the formation of a production base was changed, which made it possible to increase the number of production sites by 2.5 times and reduce dependence on suppliers. This process was not easy, as there was also a complete recycling of the product range.

2023: TAdviser interview with CEO Mikhail Vazisov

The history of the Ippon brand in the Russian market began more than 20 years ago. What changes have occurred to him over the years, how the Russian market for uninterruptible power supplies has transformed during this time and what customers want in November 2023 told TAdviser Mikhail Vazisov, general manager of Ippon. Read more here.

2022: Entering the first position in the Russian UPS market

According to the analytical company ITResearch, Ippon in 2022 came out on top in Russia in terms of UPS sales in both monetary and physical terms. This happened against the background of the departure from Russia of almost all leading foreign UPS vendors, who were actively replaced by new, primarily Russian manufacturers. It is followed by APC by Schneider Electric, primarily due to the serious groundwork of the first months of the year, and then CyberPower and Powercom.

In 2022, sales in the UPS market in Russia amounted to 1.13 million devices worth $312 million, which compared to the previous year means a decrease of 17% in units and 14% in money, respectively, analysts^[4] estimated^[5].

2007:35% of the Russian UPS market

According to the analytical company ITResearch, in 2006 the Ippon brand occupied the 32.7% of the entire UPS market (in unit terms), and in the third quarter of 2007 Ippon's share reached 35%. In total, according to Ippon brand manager Igor Poluektov, over 2.7 million devices were sold over five years, of which over 1 million were sold in 2007. At the same time, sales growth in units over the past year amounted to about 40%.

In addition to Russia, which is the main consumer of Ippon UPS, equipment under this brand has been supplied to the markets of Belarus for three years, to Ukraine for a year and to Kazakhstan for a little less than a year. In these markets, Ippon's share of the pieces is 15, 8 and 20%, respectively, according to Merlion.

As of the end of 2007, Ippon purchases about 1.5 thousand companies from all regions of Russia. At the same time, according to the Merlion analytical service for November 2007, 37% of all purchases of devices were carried out by retail companies or OEM-partners, 36% - by resellers, 9% - by participants in the Positronika franchise project, 7% - by companies from the CIS, 7% - by federal networks and 3% - by system integrators.

Vasily Mochar, Deputy Director of ITResearch, then noted: "The emergence and formation of the Russian brand Ippon is a classic success story and worthy of study in the form of a case under the MBA program" Strategic Marketing. " Merlion not only took advantage of its off-the-shelf distribution channel by "loading" it with the cheapest UPS devices on the market, but did so at a time when there was a significant unmet demand for affordable products and, more importantly, a huge latent (latent) demand for UPS as a product. "

Notes