Construction Machinery: Seeking Self-Transcendence Breaking Through Foreign Firms

From 1997, the first pump truck was designed in China, and now 80 meters of pump truck products that Zoomlion has been available have gone through 34 years. Companies including Zoomlion and Sany Heavy Industry have broken down and created a world record for pump trucks through continuous upgrading and technological upgrading. Chen Xiaofei, vice president of Zoomlion, said with emotion that in the face of fierce market competition both at home and abroad, construction machinery companies must achieve self breakthrough and surpass before they can seize market opportunities and create wealth and value.

For most domestic and foreign construction machinery companies, China is a huge market, and at the same time, it is full of "the smell of gunpowder." Overseas machinery giants such as Komatsu of Japan, Caterpillar of the United States, Volvo of Sweden, and Doosan Heavy Industries of Korea have all entered the country and battled with Chinese companies in a blue ocean.

However, they are also the beneficiaries of the rise of domestic infrastructure and economic growth. From 2000 to 2008, the construction of domestic roads, airports, ports, and industrial facilities has experienced rapid development. Although the country has also been affected by the global financial crisis in 2008, after the Chinese government launched a few trillion yuan in investment, the construction machinery industry still At a rate of two digits per year, it looks like snowballs have accumulated wealth.

It was reported that Sany Heavy Industry had revenues of 41.3 billion yuan in the first three quarters of this year, an increase of nearly 60% year-on-year; in 2010, XCMG Group achieved sales of 50 billion yuan, and this year it is expected to exceed 80 billion yuan; Liu Gonghe The company is looking forward to achieving 100 billion yuan in sales revenue in 2015.

The doubt behind the figures is: In the end, how do domestic companies break through the siege of other foreign-funded enterprises and continue to lead the domestic machinery market?

Chen Peiliang, deputy general manager of Zoomlion, said in an interview with the reporter of the “First Financial Daily” that excavators have already had an overall excess production capacity. Some companies have started to use the method of sending cars and delivering high-end gifts for emergency sales; in addition, fixed asset investment also Faced with the risk of decline, Suzi Meng, secretary general of the China Construction Machinery Industry Association, also stressed that the growth rate of the domestic construction machinery industry will also drop from about 30% this year to 17%.

"The improvement of the company's performance can only be achieved through continuous upgrading of product technology and management." Chen Xiaofei said that Zoomlion, a company that has been restructured from a national research institute, is a step-by-step breakthrough in the technical difficulties of the industry. If the company does not attach importance to R&D, then the company’s annual sales revenue will also be reduced by half.

Liu Xiaohong, chairman of Liugong, emphasized that for Liugong Group, if it is to achieve the goal of 100 billion yuan, it must also accelerate its efforts in product R&D, thereby increasing the proportion of overseas market revenue to the company’s overall income during the “12th Five Year Plan” period. As much as 25%.

With the help of external forces in order to quickly catch up with overseas giants in technology, many domestic companies have introduced overseas advanced mechanical technologies into China by increasing mergers and acquisitions. In 2001, Zoomlion acquired the world-renowned British horizontal directional drilling company at that time. From 2003 to 2008, the company carried out nine large-scale mergers and acquisitions, and the company received extraordinary development. After merging CIFA Italy in 2008, the company also became the world's largest concrete equipment manufacturer.

“Another way to integrate R&D into products is to have an in-depth understanding of the current market demand, and then continue to improve their existing products.” Ma Zhu, deputy general manager of XCMG’s technology division, said that the original domestic did not pay attention to high-end The development of equipment, but in recent years, China's equipment supply in high-end equipment, especially highways, airports and track is also increasing.

This is mainly because high-end products not only have the advantages of job quality and performance, but they also pay more attention to environmental protection and efficiency improvement, which is what customers want.

However, in some important technologies, there is still a big gap between China and overseas companies. For example, the “removing the building machine” (which is equipped with engineering equipment such as broken guns, hydraulic shears, thumb clips, etc.) often appears in disaster relief, and there are almost no manufacturing companies in the country. Another type of special excavator, commonly known as "engineering loading" (applicable to the clean-up of collapsed buildings in the disaster area, the removal of reinforced concrete walls, and assistance in rescuing buried people), is not what Chinese companies are good at.

In addition, the hydraulic components and engine equipment of most domestic excavators are imported from abroad. Such products are almost controlled by companies in Japan, Kawasaki, Germany Rexroth, and ZF. In addition, including high-end core components such as power shift transmissions, brake-driven axles, slewing bearings, and multi-way valves, few domestic companies are involved. Jia Xiaowen, the secretary-general of the China Construction Machinery Industry Association's accessory branch, once pointed out that in the next five years China will focus on solving the short board problem of key components.

Although after years of development, Xugong Group has solved a number of technical problems, but a high-level XCMG Group also expressed to reporters the company's ambitions in parts and components business: as early as 2006 Carlyle Group plans to invest 4.5 billion yuan to acquire Xugong In the case of machinery shares, the two parties considered the plans for joint venture projects and parts cooperation projects. In the future, companies will still increase the company’s production and sales of hydraulic parts and other parts through acquisitions and other methods. XCMG not only needs to meet its own machine production needs, but also actively seek out other partners or ways to enter China's self-produced high-end components into overseas markets.