The survival rules of micro-profits during the period of metamorphosis and reconstruction of construction machinery

In August, China's manufacturing PMI was 49.2%, which was 0.9 percentage point lower than that in July. Since the beginning of 2011, the monthly PMI has fallen below the line of weakness for the second time. The macroeconomic environment in China is still facing a lot of downward pressure. The foundation for stabilizing economic growth is not stable enough. With the increase in production costs and unabated pressures on destocking, coupled with the argument that Western countries are revitalizing the manufacturing industry and emerging markets are rising Many people are worried about the prospects of China's construction machinery industry.

However, people in the industry believe that there is still room for the development of China's construction machinery market. Global machinery giant Caterpillar is very optimistic about China and is actively building factories in China. The company believes that China's urbanization process will determine that by 2025, China still needs to build more infrastructure such as roads and airports. The relevant agencies predict that by the end of the “Twelfth Five-Year Plan” period, the sales volume of China's construction machinery industry will reach 900 billion yuan, with an average annual growth rate of approximately 17%. Compared with the average growth rate of 27.5% in the past five years, although the growth rate of the industry in the future will gradually decline, the overall size of the industry will continue to expand, entering a period of steady growth in the medium to long term.

During this period, the entrepreneurs of China Construction Machinery are not paralyzed or alarmed about the economic situation in the future, and they have also strengthened their expectations for the future of the industry. However, it cannot be avoided that the current economic and market environment pressures remain. The destocking problem with excess production capacity, the increase in manpower and material costs, the restraint of core technologies and the intensification of competition at home and abroad all contribute to the accelerated transformation and upgrading of the construction machinery industry. Enterprises have stepped up the pace of transformation and upgrading, and strive to make a difference in the current unfavorable situation and actively respond to challenges. The entire industry began to experience transformation and re-engineering, and low-profit management has become an inevitable and necessary “labor pain” in the process of industrial upgrading of the construction machinery industry.

Whether the enterprise can accelerate the transformation and upgrading in such fields as technological innovation, service innovation, business model innovation, and development strategy innovation will become a key factor in whether it can smoothly respond to the external situation and pass the test of survival during the low profit period.

Overcapacity to inventory is the first step

According to statistics, in the eight years since 2002, the sales volume of China's construction machinery industry has increased by nearly fourfold—from 77.3 billion yuan in 2002 to 310 billion in 2009, with an average annual growth rate of approximately 24.4%. Among them, the year-on-year growth rate in 2003 was as high as 38%, and the year-on-year increase was 37.2% in 2007.

Cai Weici, executive vice president of the China Federation of Machinery Industry, said in an interview with reporters: "On the one hand, the country's active fiscal policy and moderately loose monetary policy have boosted the market demand for machinery industry to pick up. On the other hand, with equipment manufacturing The successive introduction of relevant supporting policies for industry and automobile industry adjustment and revitalization plans has also benefited the machinery industry.” In addition, the participation of foreign companies has further exacerbated the market competition in the machinery manufacturing industry. The reporter sent a telegram to the person in charge of a company in the Shanghai Industrial Park and said that the construction machinery products were almost invisible to the "profit-making era."

According to Su Zimeng, secretary general of the China Construction Machinery Industry Association, the current overall status of the loader industry has changed to a low new entry threshold, increased threat of substitution, increased bargaining power of customers, high bargaining power of core component suppliers, and intense internal competition. This is the epitome of the entire construction machinery industry.

If the contradiction in the continued growth of the excessive expansion of production capacity in the construction machinery industry is not resolved, the final construction machinery companies will experience the bitter consequences of blind investment. The booming real estate market in recent years has also driven the development of the construction machinery industry. “Zhang Zheng (a pseudonym), as a representative of a construction machinery manufacturing company, told reporters when he came to attend the 13th China Science and Technology Summit of the China Manufacturing Informatization Summit. “This is by no means an alarmist. If the momentum of over-expansion of production capacity in the construction machinery industry continues to grow and the contradiction of oversupply of products is not resolved, then the final construction machinery companies will experience the bitter consequences of blind investment. Zhang Zheng said.

According to Su Zimeng, secretary general of the China Construction Machinery Industry Association, the current overall status of the loader industry has changed to a low new entry threshold, increased threat of substitution, increased bargaining power of customers, high bargaining power of core component suppliers, and intense internal competition. This is the epitome of the entire construction machinery industry.

Wang Xiaohua, chairman of Guangxi Liugong Group, first thought that: At present, the production capacity of enterprises is surplus. It is not particularly difficult to change these conditions. However, products do not do well and products have no competitiveness, but it is difficult to achieve in the short term. At present, competition in the industry is fierce. I believe that companies should reduce internal friction and avoid price wars. We must focus on improving product quality and product performance.

Accelerate transformation and upgrade to break high-end technical barriers

When the report of the China Construction Machinery Industry Association talked about the challenges of the industry, the first thing that was mentioned was the lack of innovation ability and homogeneity of the enterprise. The outstanding performance was the product that each of them mainly developed the company did not: the loader manufacturer developed the excavator and tapped it. Machine manufacturers develop rollers rather than innovate on existing products.

At the time when construction sites were thriving, concrete machinery had seen this happen: The actual output of many mixing plants was less than 50% of the designed output. Despite the low production rate, the industry's low threshold for access and development prospects continues to attract investors.

Since the end of 2008, in addition to the expansion of downstream industries, equipment manufacturing industry has also been included in the top ten industry revitalization plans. Long Guojian said that at that time, he hoped that the industry associations and the competent departments would take the lead in R&D, provide financial support, and solve some high-end accessory parts.

At present, approximately 70% of China's construction machinery companies' profits are "eaten" by imported components. For example, the hydraulic parts used by excavators over 20 tons have been mastered by a company in Kawasaki, Japan.

The domestic component manufacturers are mainly small and medium-sized enterprises, and lack enterprise groups with independent intellectual property rights, prominent main businesses, and strong core competitiveness.

As the former Vice Chairman of the Hunan Provincial People's Political Consultative Conference, Long Guojian has been proposing to resolve corporate innovation issues at the two National Conferences. In particular, after the transition from the planned economic system to the market economy, “the most important thing is to use the enterprise as the main body of technological innovation. But to make the enterprise become the main body of technological innovation, I think there is still a long way to go and there are still There are many problems."

In fact, since China’s first reform of the scientific research system in 1985, it has been a difficult problem for the technicians to successfully enter the company from the institute. “Domestic companies are unable to retain technical staff and technical staff prefer to go to foreign companies because of low pay. Institutions and institutions such as graduates or civil servants are selected, "said Long Guojian.

How to create a better environment, promote enterprise innovation, and change the status of scientific research institutes into enterprises requires a higher level of impetus.

Relevant experts stated that the current world economy has entered a new adjustment cycle. In the short term, industrial enterprises should grasp the two markets well and insist on domestic demand as the main driving force for stimulating economic growth. In the medium and long term, industrial enterprises should speed up the pace of transformation, strive to enhance their own strengths, seize the opportunity to further increase technological innovation, accelerate the establishment of core competitiveness, pay more attention to product quality, and pay more attention to nurturing well-known brands in the market. Find new opportunities.