Toyota City, Aichi Prefecture, Japan, is a world-renowned motor city. Recently, SAIC Huayu Vision co., Ltd. overcame the difficulties of the epidemic and opened a branch focusing on technology research and development to the local area, adjacent to the headquarters of Toyota, the world's largest automobile company, and re-established itself as its supplier.
This is the "second handshake" between Huayu Vision and Toyota Motor.
The first time the Handshake was held, the Shanghai company was a Sino-foreign joint venture, and the foreign investors imported products developed for Toyota and produced them locally in China.
Today, after the completion of the acquisition and reorganization, HUAYU Vision has become a complete Chinese brand, which develops new high-end products with international giants with independent intellectual property rights and strong technical capabilities.
"Between the two handshakes, we understood what is the real sense of international transformation." Zhang Dongchi, secretary of the party committee of Huayu Vision, said.
"Global competition" awareness
After the reform and opening up, Shanghai introduced the Santana project. In order to realize the localization of Santana, the Shanghai Auto Lamp Factory under sachinchina at that time and the global lighting giant Japan Koito established a joint venture "Shanghai Koito", starting from supporting Santana, and soon became a well-known lamp brand in the north and south of the river. This is the predecessor of Huayu Vision.
In 2001, China joined the WTO. In accordance with the WTO accession commitment, China's auto parts have fully relaxed the restrictions on foreign ownership ratios before the vehicle industry. In Jiading, Shanghai, the Sino-foreign joint venture auto parts factory gathered here soon faced an impact. Some multinational giants directly build new wholly-owned companies in the joint venture company door, orders, customers naturally form a diversion, and even the company's management has also jumped ship.
It is precisely from the early impact of China's accession to the WTO that "global competition" has been deeply rooted in the corporate genes of Shanghai Xiaoshi. In 2006, Shanghai Koito opened a new wholly-owned company in Guangzhou, won the GM order in the United States, and then competed with the North American company of Japan's Koito.
"According to the planning of foreign investors, Shanghai Xiaoshi is focused on the Chinese market. But in the long run, our path will only get narrower and narrower. The relevant person in charge of Huayu Vision said.
Under the dual influence of foreign capital layout adjustment and commercial competition, Shanghai Xiaoshi gradually lost the support of Japanese capital, technology, and customer drainage. This means that if independent research and development capabilities are not formed, after the replacement of models and the elimination of a generation of products, enterprises will not be able to develop the next generation of products, "can only wait for natural old death" .
Knock on the door on the switch
During the "honeymoon period" of the joint venture, Shanghai Xiaoshi once shook hands with Toyota Motor, but at that time, it was basically a "handshake that did not meet".
As a Japanese company, Toyota has always been a major customer of Japanese Otoshi. Shanghai Koito also supplies lights to Toyota through a joint venture. But at that time, in cooperation with Toyota, Japan's Koito did all the preliminary work, and Shanghai Koito only needed to focus on production, in addition to delivery reconciliation, neither need nor have the opportunity to have more contact with Toyota.
With the adjustment of the layout of the Japanese koito, the Shanghai koito soon lost all contact with Toyota.
The first step to feel the competitive impact brought about by China's accession to the WTO has forced enterprises to achieve independence, autonomy, innovation and transformation with greater determination.
A number of peer companies have declined in competition, while another group of domestic auto parts companies like Shanghai Xiaoshi have risen in the "dance with wolves". They take Shanghai Jiading, Jinqiao and other areas as the center of the circle, gathered in the Yangtze River Delta, and become a strong support for the rapid development of China's automobile industry.
In 2018, the growing Shanghai Xiaoshi reversed the acquisition of the japanese Xiaoshi joint venture shares, becoming a fully controlled subsidiary of SAIC Motor and changing its name to Huayu Vision.
Although it belongs to SAIC Motor Group, China's largest car company, according to SAIC Motor's strategic deployment, HUAYU Vision and other parts companies face the entire industry and participate in global competition and cooperation.
As soon as the new company was established, the management team made up its mind to return to the Japanese market, first of all, to knock on the door that Toyota had closed.
Shortly after the resumption of contact with Toyota, the sudden outbreak of the new crown epidemic cast a shadow over overseas business. However, Huayu Vision did not waver, but set up a toyota project office in the company. The management personally leads the team and connects to Toyota through video every week to communicate the technical plan and project progress.
At the beginning of this year, in order to win the toyota's new model lamp project, the technical director Qiu Zhiping took all the materials and went to Japan first. Unexpectedly, after arriving in Japan, there were more than 7,000 new confirmed cases in Japan every day, and the government announced the cancellation of all international flights. "When I got to Toyota, I realized that I was the only one who went to this negotiation." Qiu Zhiping said that when he showed Toyota the latest technology, he found that the former joint venture, Japan's Koito, had become a commercial rival in the same field.
The development concept of "grinding out"
Time flies, and everything is strange. Losing the "relationship" of foreign capital, Chinese companies go to sea alone, why attract the attention of the world's largest car companies?
The answer is in the details. Today, in the headquarters building of Huayu Vision, there is a small canteen with special chefs and a buffet at the level of a five-star hotel.
The company stipulates that the small canteen is only open to the chief engineer and important external customers. Other personnel of the company, including the chairman and general manager, have no right to dine here, without exception.
"The company's more than 600 R & D personnel are the most valuable resources, and we insist on giving them the best treatment and honor." Zhang Dongchi said that this is the development concept of enterprises facing competition and "grinding out" bit by bit since the auto parts industry has been fully opened.
The second handshake with Toyota impressed the multinational giants not only the determination and courage of "going to the meeting with a single knife", but also the key to the chinese enterprises' diligent pursuit of technological innovation.
Car lights, from kerosene hanging lights more than a hundred years ago, to halogen lamps, to LED lights, have been changing and progressing. In the era of automotive digitalization, many traditional parts are dying, but the lights are given more technology and value expectations.
After breaking up with the joint venture party, Huayu Vision let go of its hands and feet and made full use of two markets and two kinds of resources at home and abroad. In recent years, it has won high-end lamp orders for a number of European and American auto giants in the world's blockbuster new cars, and won word of mouth in the European and American markets.
These European and American auto giants are keen on the application of new technologies. For example, Audi is jokingly called "lamp factory" by consumers, it is fascinated by the design and development of car lamps, and is always at the forefront of the world. Through long-term independent innovation, Huayu Vision has entered these frontier positions.
"Toyota has always been known for its large-scale quality stability, but in the era of great changes in the automotive industry, the global boss is also eager to seek innovation and change." The person in charge of Huayu Vision said that Toyota's recognition of Chinese companies is not because it has the shadow of the past "Sino-Japanese joint venture", but because its technical characteristics are completely different from traditional Japanese companies.
After holding hands with Toyota again, Huayu Vision invited experts to train Toyota's production quality system for the company and study the core content that could not be touched during the "first handshake". Although enterprises have formed world-class R & D and production capabilities, in the face of global competition, they seize all opportunities to learn and improve, and have long become a habit.
"20 years ago, when the Sino-Japanese joint venture was established, our engineers went to Japan for training and spent a month in the workshop to wear the soles of their shoes. Today, that momentum remains the same. The person in charge of Huayu Vision said that in the next step, the company will continue to enhance its transnational operation capabilities, maintain its technical capabilities in the forefront of the world, and further promote the Chinese lamp brand in the world.