Age is just a symbol of years. Wei Jianjun, 57, is like the hands of a clock, constantly rotating around the daily events.
In the past few days, the company he is at the helm has made two new moves - the European headquarters of Great Wall Motors has officially landed in Munich, Germany, becoming a new chess piece in Europa; all the new cars of the "Great Wall System" have beaten the Guangzhou Auto Show, once again grabbing the bridgehead of the beach to Asia.
Europa, which is the west of the sunset; Asia Minor, is the east where the sun rises. What are the strategic considerations for deploying things on earth?
Wei Jianjun did not do these things arbitrarily.
Wei Jianjun, chairman of Great Wall Motors.
The corporate rule of "living to die"
"There is no sense of crisis, it is the biggest crisis." This is the crisis theory of Wei Jianjun, chairman of Great Wall Motors.
During this time, he continued to travel at home and abroad, revealing a sense of urgency in competing for the world. This also stems from the strong sense of crisis that he has, which is reflected in all his life and actions. For example, he participated in a marathon run, which is evident.
At the Great Wall Smart Factory Marathon held in May this year, Wei Jianjun appeared and raced on the same track as thousands of runners wrapped in a black sports turban and wearing a blue body shirt.
Sporting events stimulate human potential, and it is a competition for participants to PK endurance and open gaps. At the same time, this is also a contest between oneself and oneself. Although Wei Jianjun has reached the age of knowing his destiny, the competition is not an appearance show, but a run to complete the 8-kilometer race specified in the health running group. This makes people feel that Wei Jianjun is not ordinary perseverance.
This is Wei Jianjun's personality, a metaphor for a kind of entrepreneurial spirit that does not accept defeat and is super resilient.
In the race, he was very competitive in the car market. He once said: "Doing things depends on persistence, building a car requires explosive power, and it needs to have lasting endurance." ”
Wei Jianjun said this, saying the methodology of the Great Wall car. The story of the tortoise and rabbit race tells people that the winner in the end may also be a jogger. "A little bit of progress every day" is the enterprise spirit of Great Wall Motors determined by Wei Jianjun, 31 years ago, he led the company to start from a small factory in a township and embark on today's position as the leader of Chinese automobile brands, which is to rely on the endurance of never stopping and persevering.
Wei Jianjun also believes that marathon events are very much like building cars, and there are not many opportunities to run on the same track with others. In June this year, Great Wall Motors held the eighth science and technology festival, as a backbone car company in China with a current market value of nearly 400 billion yuan, Wei Jianjun stood on the stage facing Great Wall Motor executives and guests, and appealed to peers through video: In running with global peers, Chinese car companies have only one chance to lead the new track.
There are not many opportunities, and if you want to change yourself, you can only rely on yourself. Wei Jianjun said: "Only a thorough self-revolution of Great Wall Motors can have more possibilities to go further in the more brutal competition in the future." "He's, he's pushing himself hard.
At the opening ceremony of the Science and Technology Festival, Wei Jianjun announced the 2025 strategy of Great Wall Motors, and the number of enterprises given was surprising: "In 2023, Great Wall Motor's global R&D personnel will reach 30,000 people, including 10,000 software development talents; in the next five years, the cumulative R&D investment will reach 100 billion yuan." "By 2025, achieve global annual sales of 4 million vehicles, of which 80% are new energy vehicles, and the operating income will exceed 600 billion yuan."
Today, Great Wall Motors has 15,000 R&D personnel, and the same number of people will be recruited within two years, which is a witness to the speed of talent introduction of the Great Wall. At the scene, someone whispered, is Wei Jianjun too radical, why is he in such a hurry?
"Energy and intelligent vehicles are becoming new engines for the development of the automotive industry, and China already has certain advantages in these two areas, but the window period is very short and fleeting." Wei Jianjun said, "We have seen that foreign brands have begun to accelerate their layout around the world. If Chinese auto brands want to achieve transcendence in the true sense, only in these three to five years, rapidly enlarge the advantages, it is possible to lead the new track of new energy and intelligence. Moreover, the opportunity for Chinese car brands is only once. ”
This is the crisis that Wei Jianjun saw.
The hour hand is set back to July 13, 2020, which is the celebration day of Wei Jianjun's 30th year at the helm of Great Wall Motors. On the same day, the company broadcast a special 3-minute movie for employees. In the movie, Wei Jianjun's speech does not have a congratulatory message, but replaces "celebration" with "reflection", replaces "achievement" with "crisis", and replaces "immeasurable future" with "life hanging on the line". This move was a famous car industry for a while.
This crisis theory of "living to die" has added new momentum to the entire automotive industry.
Select Zero and go
"There is no way out, there is no way out." This is another crisis theory of Wei Jianjun.
New energy, networking, intelligence, sharing... Today, the global automotive industry is facing "major changes unprecedented in a century". In the face of such changes, Wei Jianjun believes that enterprises must change quickly to win.
In 2020, Great Wall Motors released three major technology brands of "lemon, tank and coffee intelligence", thus entering a new era of technological car building, scientific and technological car building, intelligent car building, and modular platform car manufacturing.
In fact, Great Wall Motors' "self-revolution" did not start here. A few years ago, Wei Jianjun led the production and sales of Great Wall Motors to climb the 1 million steps, ranking among the top 8 domestic car companies. It is said that this has made the company and itself, but he has come to a new start, starting a continuous transformation from a simple car to a "global technology travel company".
Great Wall Motor production line.
Thought is the precursor to action. Wei Jianjun first showed the results of the new enterprise spirit, which is the "21-character cultural motto" of Great Wall Motors - the mission vision of "green wisdom tide playing the hi world", the core value of "honesty and trust, innovation and change sharing", and the spirit of enterprise "progress a little bit every day." ”
This is the self-improvement of the enterprise, which can also be described as "self-revolution". Because, under the guidance of this idea, Great Wall Motors has derived a series of new operation and management ecosystems in product research and development, brand cultivation and marketing services, ensuring the sustainable self-repair and adjustment of enterprises.
Wei Jianjun said that this was a new departure.
In fact, crises are everywhere, and the key is whether we can turn "crisis" into "opportunity".
Looking for opportunities in danger, Wei Jianjun took the lead in completely completing an organizational change within Great Wall Motors, which is to reconstruct the enterprise organization, mechanism, process and operation ecology, and form a 3.0 version of the organizational structure of "strong back office, large middle office, and small front desk".
Wei Jianjun said: "A strong backstage is to reserve high-quality, more cutting-edge technology, through a large number of frontier pre-research investment, so that we can maintain a leading position; the background in a broad sense is not only technology, but also includes the quality of the mechanism, human resources policy, strategic layout, capital operation and other content." In the operation of the small front desk, the big middle platform is ready to provide timely supplies and support at any time. With the small front desk facing users as the core, the organizational form of 'one car, one brand and one company' has been formed, and several operating organizations have been created. ”
This is again a response to new markets, new situations, and an operational readjustment.
In order to compete for overseas markets, Great Wall Motor's product research and development is building a "seven countries and ten places" research and development layout covering Asia, Europe and North America. In terms of production, it has established three full-process vehicle plants and five KD plants in Russia, India and Thailand overseas. "At the same time, we are promoting vehicle projects in South America, Europe and other places, and will continue to deploy in key overseas markets in the future."
This was implemented under Wei Jianjun's new thinking. The new direction of Great Wall Motor is to focus on building an international enterprise.
"Dayu governs the water and turns blockage into thinning." With this as the idea, Wei Jianjun developed and launched Dayu Battery, with the aim of turning the company's actions into Chinese projects. He said that Dayu Battery has 8 new design concepts and has obtained dozens of core technology patents, which have been opened to the whole society free of charge.
The technical achievements are shared with others, which is also the level of Great Wall Motors' rise.
Be a disruptor of the industry
"If we don't see disruptive changes, it must be us who are being disrupted." This is another crisis theory of Wei Jianjun.
The past is over, the future is coming. In the past two years, the Great Wall Motor Boat led by Wei Jianjun has locked a new course, and the change thinking is reflected in all aspects of the enterprise.
Lattes, mocha, divine beasts, this is the new car that debuted on the booth; "Haval Tiantuan", "mecha technology" and "trend control", which is a new language to show the audience. On November 19th, Great Wall Motors launched the 19th Guangzhou International Automobile Exhibition with the theme of "Intelligent Technology To Create a New Ecology", and people felt a different Great Wall.
Today, the Great Wall Motor brand is named, which makes people feel full of fun. Wei Jianjun is using a very creative "Great Wall-style" nomenclature to bring a new feeling to the outside world.
The change shows the vigorous vitality and innovation of the enterprise. Wei Jianjun said that Great Wall Motors will continue to take the user as the center and continue to transform into a more competitive "global intelligent technology company".
It is always someone else who evaluates oneself. How did Great Wall Motors' interesting brands get named? Wei Jianjun once explained that the naming rights of Great Wall products have long been handed over to "outsiders", and the new models are named through online name solicitation and voting.
Novel naming, which is also a subversion. The new platform named after Great Wall Motors also uses vivid and vivid words such as lemon, tank, and coffee.
In terms of products, Wei Jianjun constantly subverts the previous concept of car manufacturing. As far as the hydrogen fuel cell model of Great Wall Motors is concerned, the first hydrogen energy vehicle under the lemon platform has begun to be launched, and the second generation of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles may be launched in 2023.
In August this year, 100 Great Wall hydrogen energy heavy trucks have run on the transportation line, which has created a global first.
Usually dressed in overalls, treat people warmly and kindly; do not like to be deified, this is Wei Jianjun's simplicity. He also pays great attention to inner cultivation and self-improvement, and with this helmsman, the company is constantly changing.
In the future, there are many more that will change. However, Wei Jianjun's pilot enterprises are still "making a little progress every day".
■ Reporter's Note
Never accept defeat is a winner
A person who never stops walking must have continuous motivation. Where did Wei Jianjun's motivation come from? That is the entrepreneurial spirit that never accepts defeat.
This has to be compared with foreign industry masters to see if they can do it or not. Now it seems that Wei Jianjun and Great Wall Motors can do it. For example, in the field of hydrogen energy vehicles, Great Wall Motors is not walking slower than others, and some technologies have been ahead of others.
This also requires always maintaining an innovative mentality to see if there are new deeds and new achievements. Wei Jianjun did not rely on memories to live his life, but thought more about how tomorrow would be and what might be. For example, during the company's 30th anniversary celebration, he asked, will Great Wall Motors survive next year? As it turns out, isn't this year better?
To build a city of quality life and call for entrepreneurship, we need high-quality development of enterprises, and we need a team of high-quality entrepreneurs. Market vitality comes from entrepreneurship, from people, from entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs have opportunities in hand, responsibilities on their shoulders, great potential, and never say defeat to forge a true entrepreneurial spirit.