Introduction: This year marks the twentieth anniversary of China's accession to the WTO, as one of the first foreign-funded enterprises to build a joint venture factory in China after China's "accession to the WTO", the German luxury automobile manufacturer BMW Group has been interpreting the development concept of achieving win-win results in open innovation with practical actions.
Since April 1994, the BMW Group has set up a representative office in Beijing, and the German luxury car manufacturer has been in China for 27 years. With a rich product lineup and excellent customer experience, BMW has won the favor of many Chinese consumers and has been in the top three of the Chinese luxury car market for many years. In the first nine months of this year, the BMW Group, together with its dealer partners, actively responded to market challenges, delivering a total of 669,637 BMW and MINI vehicles to Customers in China, an increase of 19.6% over the same period in 2020.
At present, China has become the largest single sales market in the world for the BMW Group. In a recent media interview, Dr. Peter, Director of Corporate Finance and China Affairs at the BMW Group, said: "Over the past 20 years, we have witnessed a rapid growth in global trade. This has benefited many economies around the world, especially China. China's wise decision to join the WTO has greatly benefited China. For Germany, China has been its most important trading partner for five consecutive years from 2016 to 2020. For the BMW Group, China has become our largest single market. China's accession to the WTO was a key factor in achieving all these achievements. This shows that global trade and cooperation drive shared prosperity. ”
BMW, which advocates open innovation, has also been using practical actions to contribute to promoting global economic and trade cooperation and the development of China's scientific and technological innovation. During this year's Expo, about 120 BMW cars departing from bmw group's German Dingefen plant took the China-Europe express train and arrived at the Chengdu International Railway Port. This is the third "BMW special train" since October this year. This means that BMW has officially opened the first overland vehicle import channel outside the sea freight mode. Over the next three years, it is expected that 12,000 BMW and MINI brand cars will be imported annually through Chengdu.
It is estimated that the arrival of the vehicle from Germany to Chengdu via the China-Europe express train to the final delivery to the customer is nearly 30 days faster than the sea. This means that BMW dealers in western China will be able to receive new cars faster, which will help customers pick up their cars earlier. At the same time, compared with ocean freight, rail transport distances are shorter, take less time, and carbon emissions are greatly reduced – every BMW and MINI brand car imported through Chengdu will reduce carbon emissions by an average of 56% in logistics.
Gao Le, President and CEO of bmw group greater China, said: "BMW actively responds to the 'Belt and Road' initiative and makes full use of the resources of the return carriage of china-Europe express trains, opening up an important land transport channel. While enhancing our ability to resist risks in logistics, we also hope to contribute to the promotion of Sino-German and Sino-European trade. ”
Open innovation, mutual benefit and win-win
BMW also actively carries out cross-border cooperation with Chinese technology companies and strongly supports the development of Chinese start-ups. In 2015, the BMW Group established the "BMW Startup Garage", whose function is to find high-potential startups around the world, match their solutions with the needs of BMW's business units, and aim to become a bridge gateway to help startups enter the automotive market and help BMW's various business segments access to cutting-edge technologies. In China, BMW provides Chinese start-ups with the top development platform and first-class global resources in the automotive industry through systematic selection and incubation work, helping young Chinese enterprises to combine advanced innovative technologies with the future development needs of the automotive industry and promote the commercial application of innovative technologies.
In addition, the joint innovation base in Shanghai has officially launched operations in May this year, which marks another achievement of open innovation advocated by BMW. At present, more than 20 start-ups have settled in the base, and their technologies cover strategic innovation areas such as digitalization, electrification and sustainable development.
From "Made in China" to "Created in China"
When we evaluate whether a foreign company is sincere about the Chinese market, we first consider the question of whether it will establish an R&D center in China. Kai-Fu Lee, CEO of Innovation Factory, has said that the establishment of R&D centers in China by multinational companies is of great significance. Foreign-funded R&D centers may form a "butterfly effect" of technological spillover in China, which is of positive significance to the construction of an innovative country.
At present, the BMW Group has established the largest R&D system in China outside Germany, with three R&D centers located in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenyang. The R&D center in Beijing focuses on vehicle verification testing and model certification and improvements according to the needs of Chinese customers; the Shanghai R&D center focuses on future mobility trend research, creative design and digital products and services, including the development and application of autonomous driving and intelligent interconnection; the Shenyang R&D center adjacent to BMW's production base and power battery center focuses on the development of electric mobility and localization of production.
In 2019, the BMW Group established Lingyue Digital Information Technology Co., Ltd. in Beijing. As the first digital company established by the BMW Group in the world, Lingyue's core mission is to promote the Group's digital construction in the fields of omni-channel marketing, sales management and customer lifecycle management in China, and to empower BMW's "customer-centric" operational transformation.
It is worth mentioning that since its launch in September 2020, the My BMW APP, jointly developed by Lingyue and BMW China's R&D team, has exceeded 3.4 million total users and more than 1.4 million monthly active users, and it has become an important contact point connecting car owners, fans and the BMW digital ecosystem. The APP launched in China is customized for the needs of Chinese users, taking the lead in adding three major sections of "Community", "Membership" and "E-commerce", these functional settings have been positive feedback from Chinese users, and have been successively borrowed by the My BMW APP in other markets of the BMW Group, which fully proves the wisdom and insight of BMW's digital team, and also reflects BMW's concept of "in China, for the world" from one side.
BMW believes that dealers play a central role in creating a seamless online and offline digital experience for customers, so it is particularly important to promote the digital transformation of dealers. At the end of October last year, the "SPARK-DMO" dealer customer business operation platform developed by Lingyue was officially launched, which comprehensively docked the sales and after-sales service needs generated by customers through different business channels, enabled dealers to efficiently complete daily core business through digital means, and obtained first-hand business information, and assisted management to optimize dealer business operations through visual reports. Up to now, "SPARK-DMO" has achieved the full network coverage of dealers, helping dealers to achieve cost reduction and efficiency improvement, and optimizing the customer experience.
It can be seen that since the BMW Group released its digital strategy in China in October last year, it is accelerating digital transformation and innovation initiatives from multiple dimensions to continuously enhance the digital experience of Chinese customers.
More than 40 years of reform and opening up is a great course of common development and progress between China and the world. China has contributed more than 30% to world economic growth for many consecutive years. Dr Peter said that in the more than 20 years of development in China, the BMW Group, like many other companies, has benefited from free trade to a large extent. On the other hand, the BMW Group has also made great contributions to China's economic development and growth, such as creating jobs, assuming social responsibility and actively paying taxes. Looking to the future, the BMW Group sincerely welcomes the measures taken by the Chinese government to further open its markets and improve its business environment. These two points are very encouraging signals for the world market.