During the 2018 Fleming-Geely Technology Exchange Day, Shen Liangyu, Vice President and General Manager of the Asia-Pacific region of Federal-Mogul Brake Services, took the opportunity to interview the Auto Aspect, not only on the current understanding of the new situation in China and the global automotive industry, but also From the strategic height, it introduces the promotion ideas of the localization strategy of Federal-Mogul. Among them, it is also the advanced experience sharing of the old multinational parts and components enterprises. It is worthy of reference by industry people, especially local enterprises.
Vice President and General Manager of Asia Pacific, Federal-Mogul Brake Business
"Car Aspects": Energy conservation, emission reduction, and consumption reduction have always been the direction of the automotive industry. In recent years, the increasingly strict regulations from the global to China have brought considerable pressure and challenges to automobile companies. As a multinational spare parts group, What efforts does Huimen do for domestic car companies to save energy, reduce emissions, and reduce consumption? What are the latest technologies and their advantages? What is the actual application effect?
Shen Liangyu: Federal-Mogul has always attached great importance to environmental challenges and developed corresponding products to deal with relevant regulations. For example, since the 1970s, asbestos has been banned globally. Since the 1990s, cesium and cadmium have been banned in Europe, 2010 In the United States, the law was gradually reduced from the use of copper in 2021, and the copper content was reduced to zero in 2025. Many years ago, Federal-Mogul began investing a large amount of resources to develop environmentally friendly products to meet customer and regulatory requirements. Copper-free NAO The material has been applied to the Audi Q5 model as early as 2016 and has been gradually extended to other models in the Chinese market. The copper-free NAO material meets the current environmental protection trend. Copper dust is polluting the environment. Federal-Mogul uses other environmentally-friendly raw materials to replace copper. Designed to reduce emissions of harmful substances and create a green future. On the other hand, China's complex road conditions make Chinese end users more demanding for performance comfort. To meet the characteristics of the Chinese market, Federal-Mogul has developed hybrid friction materials. The advantage is to achieve high performance while meeting the high demand for comfort, which will be applied to new models in the market in 2018. At the same time, Federal-Mogul has invested heavily in CAE, NVH benches and vehicle road test resources to optimize NVH matching. All of these contribute to the development of more stable brake products to meet increasingly stringent customer requirements. .
"Car Horizon": At present, China's auto market is slowing down and competition is intensifying, but multinational auto companies, including parts and components companies, are still upgrading their respective 'localization' strategies. How do you view the new changes in the current Chinese auto market? What is the impact of the door itself?
Shen Liangyu: From a policy perspective, the "Made in China 2025" document issued by the State Council in 2015 puts forward the basic policy of China's implementation of a strong manufacturing strategy and innovation-driven, quality-first. On July 1, 2018, the government lowered the whole The import tariffs on cars and auto parts also mean that the Chinese auto market is highly open and free to compete. The transformation and upgrading of self-owned brand enterprises cannot be delayed. From the industry level, the auto industry has moved to 'electric, intelligent, network, sharing' The new era. This means that after more than 100 years of development, the automotive industry will undergo major changes. Cars are no longer a travel tool, but as smart mobile terminals. All traditional car companies need to rely on technological innovation to compete for the future market.
Huimen is the inventor of brake pads, the leader in the friction material industry, a multinational group that has been developing for more than 100 years. Of course, what we have to do is: Always think about how to adapt to the trend of the times, study market demand, and adjust the company's strategic development in a timely manner. direction.
"Car Horizon": The huge changes in the domestic consumption environment are also one of the important challenges facing the automotive industry. Consumer groups, preferences and decentralized mesh ecosystem driven by consumer experience have changed the traditional chain industry pattern. How does Federal-Mogul view the changes in China's automobile consumption environment? What are the countermeasures for product development and innovation?
Shen Liangyu: At present, China is in the stage of consumption upgrading. In the past, consumers have been pursuing more product cost performance. With the improvement of material level, the change of consumption concept, the improvement of innovation ability, etc., consumers began to pursue high quality products and individuality. Consumer experience.
In addition, the Internet is also driving the transformation of consumer shopping patterns. The same is true for the automotive industry. In the past, it was mainly to meet the travel demand. The car purchase route is also limited to 4S stores and other authorized dealers. In the future, after the era of intelligent driving, people will Freed from driving, and the rapid development of the Internet has transformed the car into a smart mobile space that can become as much as a home or office. In this huge market, who has achieved innovation. The first opportunity, who will grasp the future. In the future, because the car will be highly shared, consumers may not need their own car, so we see that the car companies are actively deploying the shared travel market, such as Toyota, GM, Volkswagen, Audi, BMW, Daimler, SAIC, GAC, Geely, etc. It can be seen that the evolution of hardware manufacturers into travel solution providers is both the current situation and the auto embrace of new trends in the automotive industry.
As a traditional auto parts supplier, Federal-Mogul has been thinking about how to adapt to the trend of the times and always supporting high-quality products for the automotive market. We are not only concerned with the development of friction materials suitable for Chinese consumer trends, but also have begun to think about electric vehicles. With the advent of the era and the era of intelligent driving, what are the higher requirements for brake products? Wan Gang, vice chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, mentioned in the China Automobile Forum that only L2's intelligent brake technology can significantly reduce the probability of accidents and reduce the probability of accidents. A large number of casualties have saved a lot of property losses. This shows that the brake system is very important in the era of intelligent driving. At present, the requirements of the traditional internal combustion engine and new energy vehicles for the braking system are mainly to raise the noise. Requirement. The dependence of hybrid vehicles and pure electric vehicles on internal combustion engines is reduced or even eliminated. The noise from the engine has been greatly reduced or even disappeared. The noise of the brake system has become the focus of consumers. Entering the era of intelligent driving After that, or will put more stringent requirements on the braking performance.
In summary, there are many problems worthy of our consideration. Only by grasping the market demand can we not be eliminated by the times.
"Car Horizon": In recent years, with the rapid growth of China's automobile ownership, the scale of the automotive aftermarket is also expanding. The rapid development of the Internet industry has also led to the rise of various domestic automotive e-commerce platforms. What did Famen see from it? Opportunity? Is there any action in this area?
Shen Liangyu: As car ownership continues to increase year by year, it has become particularly important to occupy a commanding height in the automotive aftermarket. Therefore, while deepening cooperation with OEMs, Federal-Mogul has its own plans in the aftermarket, while multi-channels It is the key word in planning. The Chinese auto market is probably the most complex auto market. In the US, parts suppliers deliver products to fixed dealers and then distributors. In China, where e-commerce is more developed, In addition to the traditional sales channels, there are also diversified new channels. In order to meet the needs of Chinese consumers for quality products and diversified services, Federal-Mogul has chosen to cooperate with local channels to combine their respective advantages to promote the development of both businesses.
China's two major e-commerce giants Alibaba and Jingdong have become partners of Federal-Mogul products a few years ago. In October last year, Federal-Mogul and the local car maintenance B2C e-commerce platform to establish a strategic partnership with the car to raise a car. Work together to promote the standardization of products and services in the automotive aftermarket. In terms of the quality of the products in the aftermarket, in the field of automotive safety products, Huimen feels that there is no market and pre-installation market. The market segment will provide the same quality products to ensure the consistency of product quality.
"Car Horizon": The domestic auto market has put more stringent challenges on the integration and innovation capabilities of component companies. In order to better adapt to the needs of the Chinese market, we will seize the market opportunity, and more and more parts companies will not Resatisfied with serving only as a 'supplier' in the traditional sense. What is the current cooperation between Federal-Mogul and China's automakers? What breakthroughs have been made in the form and depth of cooperation in recent years?
Shen Liangyu: In the next five years, the Chinese market will be the main growth area of the Federal-Mogul brake business. In 2017, the growth of the Huimen brake business in Asia far exceeded the average growth rate of the automobile market. Although the Chinese auto market entered a low-speed growth period in the next few years, we I feel that I am not afraid. Instead, I believe that the current background of industrial transformation and upgrading provides a great opportunity for Federal-Mogul. Our goal is to double our business in 2022.
With the upgrading of China's industrial structure and the maturity of technological innovation, in recent years, the main brand has relied on independent innovation, and its market share has increased significantly. It is worth mentioning that independent brands are gradually moving from low-end and low-end markets to low-end and high-end markets. High-end market where core technology wins. For example, Geely, Great Wall has established high-end brands and achieved very good market response. The quality upgrade of the whole vehicle is inseparable from the excellent spare parts supplier. Huimen saw this opportunity and actively Local layout of local market operations.
In order to strengthen the in-depth cooperation with local automakers, we develop formulas that are more suitable for the characteristics of the Chinese market through localized R&D centers and R&D teams. In terms of comprehensive services, we are in major brand R&D centers such as Great Wall, SAIC. Geely and others have launched a series of technical roadshows, the main purpose of which is to provide a comprehensive understanding of customer needs and provide targeted solutions to achieve win-win cooperation. At the same time, we also carry out annual technical seminars to strengthen customers. Communicate and communicate the latest technical achievements to customers in a timely manner. In addition, each year, Federal-Mogul China invites third-party research companies to conduct face-to-face communication with customers, listen to customers' voices in a timely manner, and submit improvement plans based on customer feedback.
Benefiting from the localized strategic layout and diversified strategic steps, in recent years, Federal-Mogul has indeed achieved good results, customer satisfaction has improved significantly, business has maintained rapid growth, especially the business of self-owned brand cars has doubled. It is exactly what we are very happy to see.
"Car Horizon": As a century-old store, what advanced experience does Federal-Mogul have in supplier management for the parts industry?
Shen Liangyu: As an important part of the smooth operation of the business, the supplier system plays a pivotal role in the promotion of Federal-Mogul in Asia and ensuring the provision of quality products to consumers and customers. In the early 1818, the door-to-door brake business was held in Hangzhou. The first supplier conference in the world to express gratitude to global and local suppliers and to explain the expectations and requirements of Federal-Mogul for suppliers. Currently, Federal-Mogul has its own supplier management system and is willing to help suppliers improve product quality. To achieve a win-win situation. Federal-Mogul will measure which suppliers can meet the needs of specific projects, and introduce suppliers that meet the needs in the initial stages of the project to improve R&D efficiency.
In the past ten to fifteen years, the quality of Chinese local suppliers has made leaps and bounds, so they have also gained more business opportunities. At present, some local suppliers have entered the Federal-Mogul global supplier system, among them. Many products are even applied to the European and North American markets. However, it is undeniable that the possibility of negative impacts from poorly managed suppliers still exists. How to evade such risks, an important criterion for Federal-Mogul to select suppliers Yes, the supplier must satisfy the Federal-Mogul 'Code of Conduct'. According to the standard, the supplier must not only meet the requirements for quality, price, etc., but also meet the requirements of environmental protection. The “Code of Conduct” of Federal-Mogul is to hope to supply together. Business, on the basis of improving product quality and establishing a reliable partnership, together become a spokesperson for sustainable development and ethical business practices.