'We will consider applying to the competent authorities for a special compliance survey on Aisin. 'On May 11, at the Autonomous Semi Automatic Transmission Seminar, the China-Europe Association’s Gear Transmission Industry Branch, Secretary General of the China Automotive Automatic Transmission Innovation Alliance, Li Shengqi Publicly stated that in the short period of time, Aisin’s use of non-advanced, non-energy-saving and environmentally friendly products in joint ventures will have an adverse impact on the future development of autonomous transmission companies.
The full name of Aisin is Aisin Seiki Co., Ltd. As a world-renowned transmission manufacturer, it is rapidly expanding its footprint in the Chinese market through a joint venture with automotive companies.
According to public information, on April 24 this year, Aisin announced a joint venture with Guangzhou Geely Group Passenger Vehicle Co., Ltd. and Zhejiang Geely Group Co., Ltd. of Zhejiang Geely Holding Group to achieve an annual output of 400,000 sets of 6AT transmissions. Days later, Aisin announced the expansion of its Tangshan Aisin Gear Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Tangshan Gear) production line with an annual production capacity of 400,000 units. In 2004, Aisin also established a joint venture with China FAW as Tianjin Aida. Automatic Transmission Co., Ltd. joint venture.
'Aisin is expanding its production capacity by joining forces with Chinese auto companies and then competing with autonomous transmission companies.' Li Shengqi said.
Aisin changed its strategy in China
In fact, this is not the first time that Aisin has entered into a joint venture with a Chinese company. In 1996, Toyota’s Aisin and Tangshan Gear Factory jointly established Tangshan Gear to produce a manual transmission. In 2003, China completely withdrew from Tangshan Gear and sold all of its shares. To the Japanese side. For a long time since then, Aisin has been providing transmissions for FAW Cars (9.300, 0.00, 0.00%), Great Wall Motors and other automakers, but there has been no joint venture.
In markets outside of China, Aisin almost never takes the initiative in joint ventures, because its transmissions are needed to supply the global market, and it is not for sale. Today, Aisin abruptly conducts intensive joint ventures in China, which has shocked the industry, or shows that it is changing its strategy. A related person who once worked in Aisin said.
According to data from Aisin's official website, in 2016, Aisin’s sales in Japan’s domestic market accounted for 58.2% of global sales. Its main customers are Honda, Mitsubishi, Suzuki, Nissan and Toyota.
At present, Japanese automakers such as Nissan and Toyota have announced plans for new energy vehicles. For example, Toyota Motor has announced that by around 2025, Toyota will not have a model that uses traditional internal combustion engines as a power source. Instead, it will be an electric vehicle. Traditional fuel oil The gradual exit of the car means that the AT (automatic transmission) and CVT (continuously variable transmission) will also be delisted. This is not good news for Aisin.
'As Toyota and other Japanese car companies continue to promote new energy vehicle programs, Aisin can only make strategic adjustments, or its performance will be affected.' At the above seminar, Zhao Ying, a researcher at the Institute of Industrial Economics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences said.
Autonomous transmission company for help
As Aisin's expansion of production in China accelerated, autonomous automatic transmission companies began to 'could not sit still'.
'I hope we can reserve a few market segments through policy. For example, if we can increase the price of foreign brands a bit, autonomous automatic transmission companies will work hard to reduce costs, and then go to occupy market segments. ' Ningbo Shuanglin Auto Parts Pan Yuming, deputy director of Shanghai R&D Center of Investment Co., Ltd. said.
Cheng Haibing, vice president of the Transmission Research Institute of the JAC Automotive Technology Center, also believes that 'the state should limit joint ventures in terms of industrial policy, such as scale, compliance investigation, number of joint ventures in the same company, etc., and be included in the national strategic development. In the areas of hybrid power, pure electric, smart networked vehicles, etc., set the appropriate entry threshold.
According to statistics, in 2014, China’s autonomous automatic transmissions accounted for less than 5% of the domestic market; in 2016, the output exceeded 10 million units, accounting for 7%; in 2017, the output of autonomous automatic transmissions has exceeded 13 million units, accounting for About 10%.
Although domestic autonomous transmissions are growing rapidly, they are still not optimistic from the viewpoint of loading rate. The data shows that up to now, the loading rate of autonomous automatic transmissions is about 20%, and that of joint venture automatic transmissions is more than 50%.
'At present, the automatic transmission is the most imported single component in our auto parts.' Xu Xiangyang, deputy director of the National Passenger Vehicle Automatic Transmission Engineering Research Center, frankly stated.
In response, An Qingheng, the head of the China Automotive Industry Advisory Committee, believes that 'the automatic transmission is an important factor that restricts the sales of self-owned brands. The highest failure rate is in the transmission. If the transmission is not good, consumers will not buy a car. However, for the joint venture of Aisin, the autonomous transmission company should be calm.
"Daily Economic News" reporter learned that at present, whether it is an independent parts and components company such as Shengrui Drive, or a main engine plant such as Great Wall Motor Co., Ltd., they are all participating in the development of autonomous automatic transmissions.
Aisin is facing a compliance investigation?
It is worth noting that, whether it is a joint venture with Guangzhou Automobile, Geely, or Tangshan Gear, the production object selected by Aisin is the 6AT transmission.
It is understood that in 2002, the development of the Aisin 6AT transmission was successful. It has been a 16-year history. Today, Aisin has developed from the 6AT transmission to the 8AT, 9AT, and 10AT transmissions, of which the 8AT transmission is also on products such as Lexus. Application. In addition, Aisin has upgraded the product to hybrid, plug-in hybrid and pure electric.
As the world's largest manufacturer of 6AT transmissions, Aisin has long been able to recover its investment costs. Therefore, for Aisin, the 6AT transmission is also considered to be a product that will soon be out of the market. In the most critical period of China's autonomous automatic transmission breakthrough, Aisin uses it. The technology is relatively backward, the products that are about to exit the market, and the Chinese car companies will enter into joint ventures, and as a result, they will be bound to the Chinese mainstream vehicle companies. I think the harm is very great. ' Xu Xiangyang said.
In this context, does Aisin face a compliance investigation?
In this regard, Li Wanli, an expert from the Academic Committee of the China International Engineering Consulting Company, believes that 'according to the assessment criteria for the health status of the automotive industry in the Medium- to Long-Term Development Plan for the Automotive Industry, the weight of the AXIN event has multiple . '
An Qingheng also believes that 'at present, China does not have a policy of restricting the joint ventures of auto parts companies. From this perspective, Ai Xin's joint ventures in China are not illegal, so the investigation of its compliance needs to be calmly considered.'
In fact, because the automatic transmission industry technology is the industrial foundation of hybrid and plug-in hybrid technology, if you lose the automatic transmission industry, it means that you lose the core technology of hybrid and plug-in hybrid new energy vehicles. The entire industry is very There may be a situation in which foreign capital is heavily relied on. In this situation, even in the face of competition from foreign companies such as Aisin, autonomous automatic transmission companies must take the initiative and actively transition.
'From a global perspective, in the next five years, the market share of AT and CVT will gradually decline, and the automotive transmission will develop in the direction of highly efficient products such as AMT and ECT. This is also a major challenge for autonomous automatic transmission companies. Song Jian said.
