Chapter 544 Jiangnan Province’s Dream of Making Cars

Jiangnan Province had the idea of ​​making cars before, but state-owned enterprises had to go through strict approval to make cars, and the technical reserves were not up to standard. In addition, the state had very strict control over car companies in the past period of time, so no car companies appeared in the province. However, there were several tractor factories with good performance.

There is nothing wrong with wanting to make mini cars in Jiangnan Province. At least the development conditions in Jiangnan Province are much better than those in Wuhu, where Chery Automobile was founded. Not only is there no problem with funds, but the raw materials are also sufficient and convenient. The only difficult problem is the engine, which can be directly provided by Fan's Automobile Manufacturing Company at this time, and the price will not be more expensive than imported engines.

All kinds of convenient conditions can ensure that the car manufacturing industry in Jiangnan Province can be developed rapidly in a very short time, but Fan Wubing also has a problem of worrying, that is, if a mini car is launched now, will it really be accepted by the majority of users?

You should know that when Chery's QQ first appeared, it was questioned by many people before entering the rapid development period. If I were to do such a project, I would also need to go through this stage. Therefore, Fan Wubing considered that he should make some efforts on the model and strive to make Jiangnan Province's mini car directly into a classic model, at least to make everyone happy to accept it at first glance.

It should be said that the competition in the field of automobile manufacturing has never stopped. Especially since the 1990s, the competition in this field has intensified. Domestic traditional automobile manufacturing cities such as Changchun, Shanghai, Wuhan, and Xi'an have had a long time of manufacturing experience, but Jiangnan Province used to only make domestic tractors. If you want to compete with them, you must come up with something new.

Fan Heng talked to his son about this aspect. He used to be engaged in military enterprises, and he was naturally very familiar with these automobile manufacturing companies that were originally born out of military enterprises in the 1990s. Therefore, when talking about it, he was still a little worried.

"If Jiangnan Province is making cars, isn't it too late to start? Not to mention that it can't be compared with joint ventures, it can't even be compared with some old domestic auto manufacturers." Fan Heng said to his son.

"That's not necessarily true." Fan Wubing naturally has his own opinion on this. He said to his father, "The competition in the auto manufacturing industry is obviously very fierce, so the smartest competition is to avoid competition. We have to make something of our own that others don't have, so that we can naturally occupy the market. As long as there is a market, the rest of the things will be much easier."

When mentioning the matter of making cars, Fan Wubing gave an example, "Great Wall Motors is doing well. Their pickup trucks have good sales and are sold abroad."

As the pickup truck king in the domestic auto manufacturing field later, Great Wall Motors was just a small township factory in Bangzidi that did modification. They modified almost all the models that could be seen in China at that time, including vans, station wagons, and light trucks.

But this is not a long-term solution after all. Around 1993, Great Wall Motors once tried to enter the sedan market by making modified cars, but after the introduction of the automobile industry policy, such modified cars could not be licensed in many places, so they had to give up.

Later, after investigating the US and Thai markets, they found pickup trucks. Although pickup trucks are a fashionable model in the United States, what really made them see the opportunity was the popularity of pickup trucks in Thailand. China and Thailand are both developing countries, and the Chinese market is much larger than the Thai market. Models that have a market in Thailand must also be good in China.

At that time, although some state-owned small and medium-sized enterprises in China began to produce pickup trucks, the prices were high and the technical level was relatively poor, so the people did not buy them. In order to be prepared for the battle, Great Wall Company conducted an extremely detailed investigation of the pickup truck market, and then adopted a one-step pricing strategy to lower the price so that Chinese consumers could afford it.

When most domestic pickup trucks sold for more than 90,000 yuan, Great Wall pickup trucks dropped to 80,000 yuan and quickly gained a foothold in the market. The high-quality and low-priced Great Wall pickup truck quickly emerged in the industry. This year, the production and sales reached 7,000 units, making it the leader in the domestic pickup truck industry.

Fan Heng is quite familiar with Great Wall Motor Company. When he was in Panshi, he paid attention to the development of Great Wall Motor Company. If he had not suddenly come to Jiangnan Province to take up his post, he might have also thought of imitating Great Wall Motor Company and building an automobile manufacturing plant in Panshi.

"You mean, in addition to making micro cars, we can also make pickup trucks?" Fan Heng asked his son.

Fan Wubing shook his head and said, "Of course we don't need to compete with others for business. Although pickup trucks are good, they are restricted vehicles in many big cities. How can we enter large and medium-sized cities with developed economies and strong purchasing power? What I mean is to directly make SUVs."

In the automobile manufacturing industry, there is a recognized rule that pickup truck manufacturers will transition to SUVs when they develop to a certain stage. The latter is higher-grade and more profitable, and more importantly, it can be driven into the city.

"Nowadays, the price of imported SUVs is more than 200,000 yuan, and the high price makes ordinary consumers stay away. If the price can be lowered like pickup trucks, there will definitely be a market for domestic SUVs." Fan Wubing explained to his father Fan Heng, "I thought about it. If we make SUVs ourselves, the technology is fully achieved, but the cost is relatively small. I estimate that we can make it within 100,000 yuan, and the quality will not be much worse than that of the other party. If you calculate it this way, the market prospects are very promising. At least the car we make has significantly improved performance, structure, and appearance compared with domestic SUVs of the same price, and the stability, comfort, and firmness of the whole vehicle are also much stronger."

SUVs are sports multi-purpose vehicles, mainly referring to those four-wheel drive off-road vehicles with avant-garde designs and novel shapes. Generally, the front suspension of SUVs is a sedan-type independent suspension, and the rear suspension is a non-independent suspension. The ground clearance is large, and to a certain extent, it has both the comfort of a sedan and the off-road performance of an off-road vehicle. Because it has a MPV-style seat multi-combination function, the vehicle can carry both people and cargo, and has a wide range of applications.

SUV has two major characteristics. One is sportiness, that is, it must be able to run, not only accelerate, extremely high, but also have high passability and strong adaptability. The second is that it has multiple functions, that is, it can not only carry people, but also has strong comfort, and has strong cargo capacity and strong traction capacity.

The biggest feature of off-road vehicles is that they have strong passability and certain cargo capacity, but their sportiness and comfort are not outstanding. After strengthening these deficiencies of off-road vehicles, they can be called SUVs. With the development of automobiles, purebred off-road vehicles are becoming less and less, and there is a trend of evolution towards SUVs. Therefore, it is difficult to determine whether a certain car is an SUV or an off-road vehicle.

The real founding model of the SUV concept is the Cherokee produced by Chrysler in the United States. Its design concept is derived from the concept that off-road vehicles only emphasize passability. It mainly improves the comfort of the vehicle, removes the heavy non-load-bearing body of the previous off-road vehicles, and quotes the design concept of sedans, replacing it with a light load-bearing body structure like most sedans. But it does not completely sacrifice off-road performance, and still has relatively strong power. It adopts 4x4 drive form. The key concept is to emphasize comfort.

In the United States, where it originated, SUV has always been the top best-selling models. This is because it is suitable for both urban walking and outdoor running, and it is very compatible with the personality of the new generation who pursue publicity and love to be close to nature.

However, in China, SUV has not become popular because of the price issue, so Fan Wubing thought that since he wanted to make such a low-priced model, he would not raise the starting point a little bit. Now if he wants to make SUV with independent intellectual property rights, the cost is very low. Fan Wubing estimated that even if it is sold for 80,000 yuan, there will be very considerable profits. The most important point is that he has the technology and does not need to pay tuition fees from others.

Fan Heng is somewhat enthusiastic about car manufacturing, because he knows very well what the automobile manufacturing industry means to a province?

No one may have counted how many industries a car can drive, but there is no doubt that the automobile industry has a high degree of correlation, scale benefits and huge driving effect.

Generally speaking, the automotive industry chain mainly includes four aspects: the first is product technology, which mainly refers to product development; the second is the procurement of parts; the third is automobile manufacturers; and the fourth is sales and services.

The entire industry chain upstream involves industries such as steel, machinery, rubber, petrochemicals, electronics, textiles, and glass; the downstream involves insurance, finance, sales, maintenance, gas stations, catering, hotels, and other industries. The length of the automotive industry chain is unmatched by general industries. Because of this, many local governments will cultivate the automotive manufacturing industry as a pillar industry.

Auto parts are an important part of the automotive industry. The cost of purchasing raw materials for auto parts accounts for more than 70% of the cost of the whole vehicle. Accelerating the development of the auto parts industry plays an important role in reducing the cost of automobile manufacturing, enhancing market competitiveness, further promoting the development of the overall automotive industry, and boosting the local industrial economy.

In recent years, while vehicle manufacturers such as Great Wall, ZTE, and Changan are developing rapidly, a large number of parts companies have also sprung up around them. Many companies can produce a full range of specifications of engines, batteries, wheels, rolled parts, wiring harnesses, seats, steering gear assemblies, frames, transmissions, interior decorations, stampings, and other parts required for most automobiles. They have established a relatively systematic and complete domestic and overseas marketing system. Their products can not only meet the needs of local vehicle production, but also be sold in large quantities throughout the country and even abroad.

The vigorous development of parts companies has further strengthened the determination of local government leaders to build a complete automotive industry chain. The whole vehicle plus parts is a two-wheel drive automotive industry development model. Putting the parts industry in a more important position is the potential and hope of the automotive industry development.

Ever since he heard his son suggest that he invest in the automobile manufacturing industry, Fan Heng has thought about these problems and decided to immediately introduce policy measures to support the development of the automobile parts industry, attract domestic and foreign auto parts companies to invest and build factories in Jiangnan Province, carry out professional collaboration in accordance with the requirements of modern production, realize a zero-distance, zero-inventory production model, significantly reduce the cost of complete vehicles, and comprehensively enhance the competitiveness of Jiangnan Province's automobile industry.

He plans to focus on supporting new maintenance-free batteries, aluminum alloy wheels, universal joint front drive shafts, nylon tubes, automotive air conditioning hoses, brake pipes, automotive light bulbs and other component products, and actively support a batch of products with a certain scale and manufacturing level. Auto parts manufacturing companies display products such as automobile transmission cases, clutch housings, transmission gears, tires, interior and exterior trim parts, molds, etc., completing the automobile industry chain in Jiangnan Province.

After Fan Heng told Fan Wu Bing his thoughts, Fan Wu Bing also nodded in surprise. He did not expect that his father Fan Heng had also silently worked hard on this aspect. , if I hadn’t mentioned spending money on a project today and talked about building a car by the way, I’m afraid I wouldn’t have known that my dad had so many detailed thoughts in his heart.

Being able to consider issues from the industrial chain of the entire industry is enough to show that Dad Fan Heng's vision has improved and he has begun to consider issues from a global perspective. This is a welcome progress. If it were done when he was in Panshi , I’m afraid I haven’t thought of so many things.

After hearing his son's comments, Fan Heng said with a smile, "Everyone must make progress. That is natural. In the past few years, in addition to work, I have also paid great attention to study. I have made reference to some economic models at home and abroad." , I also asked teachers to give specific guidance on several key industries, so it’s not surprising that I know these things.”

"However, our main target in the future is the overseas market." Fan Wubing reminded his father Fan Heng.

SUVs are high fuel consumption models. As domestic oil prices are about to continue to rise, their sales will inevitably be affected. Compared with the domestic market, especially in Russia and the Middle East, oil resources are relatively abundant, and people are not as concerned about automobile fuel consumption as domestically. It is an ideal market for exporting SUVs and other large fuel-consuming vehicles.

However, if you want to occupy overseas markets, you must rely on strength to speak for itself. For a long time, domestic automobile exports have been stagnant. An important reason is the lack of core technology.

Take the export of cars as an example. Since most of the current domestic car manufacturers are joint ventures, their products are basically not produced independently. As an overseas factory of foreign automobile giants, the export of products to China does not count at all.

Therefore, most of the joint ventures with foreign automobile giants have mediocre export performance, which is also an important reason for the slow growth of domestic car exports.

"As long as we find the right market positioning, complete our own brand and core technology, we can decide whether to export and how much to export. We don't have to be controlled by others, so there is no need to worry about the market." Fan Wubing told his father.