By Yuling Chen, EDITOR

The year 2018 saw the first negative growth of national auto sales in the 28 years, a downturn of 2.76%. Chongqing should not neglect the impact.

The reason is that auto manufacturing and electronics manufacturing account for half of its industries.

Chongqing has been developed the economy of the “6+1” pillar industries (electronics manufacturing, materials, chemical engineering and medicine, equipment manufacturing, consumables, energy, and auto），Last year, only the auto industry faced a sharp decline of 17.3%.

What happened to Chongqing’s auto industry

According to the enterprise surveyed, Chongqing’s auto industry, after a round of rapid development, indeed encounters some difficulties.

Consequently, Chongqing unveiled the Guidance on Promoting the Transformation and Upgrading of Auto Industry this January. It proposes that Chongqing needs to achieve initial success by 2020. The yearly output should reach more than 3 million, including over 200,000 new energy automobiles and 800,000 smart network automobiles. In this way, the output value can exceed RMB 540 billion.

What is the plan of Chongqing’s auto enterprises in 2019 and even in the future

Zhu Huarong, President of Chongqing Chang’an Automobile Co., Ltd.

Boost the development of Chinese auto brands

Chang’an has three entrepreneurship experiences since the reform and opening-up. As of now, there have been over 17 million Chinese-brand users of “Chang’an”.

We have realized brand competitiveness has comprehensively reflected the strength of enterprises and even the whole country in the era of economic globalization.

China’s auto industry, the main support for the national economy, boasts the world’s largest scale through years of development. As a result, citizens have higher demands for the brand, value proposition and appreciation of auto consumption. It has become the highest priority to push forward China’s auto brands to a brighter future.

Therefore, as the deputy to the NPC during two sessions, I proposed the Suggestions on Boosting the Development of Chinese Auto Brands, appealing to:

Major official events to use Chinese-brand automobiles to display the image; Chinese embassies and consulates abroad and international assistance to show Chinese-brand automobiles more.

 Important media platforms to play their roles in deepening people’s understanding of Chinese brands, facilitating the development and establishing a great brand image.

 The network management mechanism to get improved, so as to build a healthy public opinion environment for the auto industry.

Ma Ke, President of Lifan Industry (Group) Co., Ltd.

Rebuild a new auto ecosphere

First of all, we should face up to Lifan’s problems in the auto industry.

Profound changes are taking place in intelligent function switching, Internet technology upgrade, as well as the marketing mode and service pattern.

Lifan is gathering the internal resources for a new auto plan. The first aim is to produce new-generation intelligent new-energy vehicles. Additionally, it also plans to build an after-sales service platform for passenger vehicles.

For both new-energy vehicles and the after-sales service platform, the core lies in the collection, processing, and application of data.

Lifan strives to create “visible” automobiles and “invisible” big data in the future. We hope to recreate a brand new automobile ecosystem.

Zhang Xinghai, Chairman of Chongqing Sokon Industry Group Co., Ltd.

Provide “custom-made” demands for consumers

Over these years, Sokon has been focusing on advancing the progress of “new auto manufacturing”.

In addition to the advanced intelligent workshop, this system also covers the R&D center established in Silicon Valley. The Group has built a technological partnership with Alibaba and Huawei and cooperated with Accenture to develop a global operation mode. Through the digital transformation in this way, it will improve its organizational capacity and finally achieves “new auto manufacturing”.

The biggest innovation of the system is to meet the consumers’ demands through intelligent manufacturing based on Internet, big data, and artificial intelligence.

The users, after a satisfying experience at Sokon’s product experience center, can place orders online with custom-made colors and configurations. According to their needs, the platform will organize the supplier to offer parts automatically and conduct intelligent production. Furthermore, the users can realize real-time tracking of the ordered product. This is what Sokon will provide for users in the future. After delivery, the factory will also supply services throughout the whole life cycle.

Gong Daxing, Chairman of Chongqing Eastern Shineray Holdings Co., Ltd., and SWM Motors

Set four strategies for different vehicle models

In 2018, the sales of Shineray’s Jinbei commercial vehicles and passenger vehicles increased by about 17%. In the second half of last year, however, I still had some worries about market expectation, technical routes, as well as policies and regulations.

In my opinion, it is necessary to focus on the enterprise’s original intention and essence in the first place.

From the micro perspective of corporate governance, we proposed consolidating the development in organization reconstruction, process analysis and personnel optimization.

The company has set a goal of selling 200,000 new automobiles in 2019. Moreover, it has made a strategy of improving commercial vehicles, optimizing passenger vehicles, developing new energy and specializing commercial vehicles.

As the cost performance is key competitiveness of commercial vehicles, we will continue to expand the share in the market segment. SWM commercial vehicle is a new brand.

One of Shineray’s highlights this year is the establishment of Shineray Intelligent Automobile Co., Ltd. Enterprises like Shineray strive to seek partners for the development of new-energy vehicles. We have to find the appropriate partner at the right time.

An annual output of 500,000 vehicles is our medium- and long-term goal.

Li Kaiguo, Chairman of China Automotive Engineering Research Institute Co., Ltd.

Develop a new joint mode in Chongqing’s auto industrial clusters

In the short run, Chongqing’s auto industry should also put its priority on stabilizing the marketing of traditional fuel vehicles. We believe the industry will see a growing number of highlights, such as fast development of independent brands like Chang’an. What’s more, Ford’s transformation will be a new thing worth expecting.

Besides product marketing, Chongqing’s auto industry should also prepare for long-term development for a motorized, intelligent, connected and sharing future.

First, I think, enterprises should cooperate to address some key issues of new-energy and intelligent vehicles. Next, they need to join hands to establish the component system.

With the restrictions relaxed for the access, Chongqing should attract more foreign auto factories to complete joint venture and cooperation with the local enterprise in technology, manufacturing and brand building. This can facilitate the overall strength of the auto industry.

With a large number of opportunities, the industry has bred excellent enterprises like Chang’an and Saic-Iveco Hongyan. Therefore, it will pull off a dramatic turnaround with determination, strengthened organizational management and filled market gaps.

Source: Chongqing Daily