Chen Bin: The fragility of the automotive supply chain ecology reflects the institutional obstacles in China's manufacturing industry

Reporters Yin Limei and Tong Haihua reported from Chongqing

"We always say that China is a big manufacturing country, but also a big country in automobile production and consumption, and has ranked first in the world in automobile production and sales for more than ten consecutive years, but a 'chip' can affect the production and sales of millions of cars a year, and the fragility of the automobile supply chain ecology is a concentrated reflection of the fragility of the ecological fragility of China's manufacturing supply chain." This is only the impact of 'chips', and it is worrying that a series of products that rely heavily on imports in the supply chain, such as industrial sensors, basic industrial software, special raw materials, precision instrumentation, etc., may cause greater impacts once there is a natural disaster or man-made disaster. On October 15, Chen Bin, executive vice president of the China Machinery Industry Federation, expressed the above views at the 2021 China Automotive Supply Chain Conference.

Chen Bin, Executive Vice President of China Machinery Industry Federation

In the past two years, the shortage of raw materials such as semiconductor chips has put pressure on the global automotive industry chain, and the attention of automakers, suppliers and cross-sector enterprises to the stability of the automotive supply chain has continued to heat up. The reporter of China Business Daily paid attention to the scene of the 2021 China Automotive Supply Chain Conference that enterprises in the automotive industry have paid enough attention to the construction of automotive supply chain security. For the automotive industry, "strong chain, supplementary chain" is a protracted battle that needs to "withstand loneliness" and requires deeper and broader scrutiny from all parties in the industry.

"Since the reform and opening up, China's manufacturing industry has made brilliant achievements, and every industry can come up with iconic products that are not inferior in the world." However, in the view of related industries, as long as it is a product involving the cross-border integration of mechatronic instruments, and high-end equipment involving the integration of manufacturing, materials and information technology into one innovative development, it always feels unsatisfactory and far away from what it needs. Chen Bin said at the meeting.

In the midst of this, there are some delicate situations. According to Chen Bin, many people in the manufacturing industry believe that "the machinery industry does not pay enough attention to special production equipment, special production lines, and special testing equipment, and the energy is placed on major technical equipment and general equipment, resulting in the key equipment required on the production line of the enterprise almost completely dependent on imports, which is particularly prominent in the automotive field." But people in the machinery industry feel very aggrieved: "We have worked very hard, made great progress, and are very willing to provide services for you, but you are not cooperative, nor willing to adopt, only believe and rely on imported equipment." ”

Some people in the manufacturing industry reflected: "The electronic information industry does not attach importance to the manufacture of basic components and the research and development of basic industrial software, and the focus is on the application end of the consumer electronics and information industry, resulting in the import of high-end basic components and development software for industrial use such as 'chips' and sensors." People in the electronic information industry believe that "these products are already global commodities, even if they are successfully developed at a huge cost, no one may be willing to adopt new products, but to purchase mature products in the international market." The input-output ratio of innovative enterprises is too low, so it is still difficult to break the situation. ”

There are also people in the manufacturing industry who argue that the quality of many domestic products is unreliable, the accuracy is not high, and the life is not long, which has a lot to do with the level of raw materials. "The raw material industry such as steel and non-ferrous metals only attaches importance to the production of building materials, wires and cables, aluminum alloy doors and windows and other large-scale and wide-ranging products, and the requirements are not high, but the operating efficiency is good." The key special materials required by the equipment manufacturing industry, due to the high parameter requirements and small demand, raw material companies are difficult to bear the high cost of research and development and manufacturing and are reluctant to get involved, and almost all rely on imports. ”

The content stated by the above-mentioned people in the manufacturing industry reveals that there are current breakpoints, blockages, difficulties and shortcomings in the supply chain in the development process of China's manufacturing industry. In Chen Bin's view, this kind of "breakpoint, blockage, difficulty and short board" is ultimately due to the lack of integrated development between industries and insufficient collaborative innovation. "This shows that we did not attach importance to ecological collaboration in the past development process, and lacked the ability to build a supply chain ecology."

Chen Bin further pointed out that the fragility of the automotive supply chain ecology reflects that the biggest obstacle to the construction of the supply chain ecology in China's manufacturing industry is the institutional obstacle, lack of integration, lack of coordination, and lack of trust. Departments have boundaries, industries have barriers, and enterprises have walls, which is especially prominent in state-owned enterprises. These problems have become the biggest obstacle for China's manufacturing industry to build a new supply chain ecology and promote innovative development and high-quality development.

In this context, it is imperative to open up departmental boundaries, break down industry barriers, open enterprise walls, and integrate development and collaborative innovation. Creating a new ecosystem of the automotive supply chain requires the joint efforts of relevant state departments, related industries and enterprises to break the traditional concept of thinking, reform the original management model, work together, collaborate and innovate, and open up blockages, connect breakpoints, and overcome difficulties.

Chen Bin suggested that in guiding and promoting the construction of domestic automobile supply chain safety issues, the relevant state departments should pay attention to grasping every link in the supply chain, interlocking and linking the chains, and there must be both leading enterprises and "specialized and specialized" enterprises.

"The main purpose of promoting such a coordinated development model is to avoid duplication of support. Some of our management departments are strongly supportive of what can be done and what is easy to make achievements, which leads to the same project departments are arranging, but the key problems, difficult points and blockages are avoided, and even blame each other, and finally lost the opportunity and wasted time. Therefore, in order to build a good supply chain ecology, the boundaries of the department must first be broken. Chen Bin said.

At the same time, building supply chain security should also break down industry barriers. In Chen Bin's view, the management system of various industries in the manufacturing field was formed in the era of electrification in the last century, and the industry management has gradually evolved from the management mode of the original planned economy to the present, after reform and opening up and functional transformation, the professional management department has been abolished, and the development of the industry has basically adapted to the needs of the market economy. But it is worth noting that the gap between industries and the battle for fame and fortune are still there. In the period of rapid economic development, the industries have developed successfully, but as economic development enters the new normal, industrial development enters the stage of transformation and upgrading and high-quality development, and what is needed is cross-industry integration development and collaborative innovation. In particular, the reason why the traditional manufacturing industry has been difficult to transform and upgrade for many years, and the development of the industry is difficult, is closely related to the lack of integrated development with related industries.

At present, the situation at home and abroad is undergoing profound changes, the new crown pneumonia epidemic has had multiple impacts on international politics, the world economy and global governance, the global extreme weather is frequent, commodity prices are soaring, and the supply chain crisis is impacting the world economy, bringing new obstacles to economic recovery.

Previously, chips did not attract enough attention in the automotive supply chain, but the "small chip" had a huge negative impact on China's automobile production and sales. According to the data provided by Chen Bin, This year, China's automobile industry has been declining year-on-year for five consecutive months (May to September). According to this speculation, China may reduce the production of about 2 million cars in the whole year.

It is worth noting that the negative impact of chip shortage also affects many manufacturing areas such as mobile phones, machine tools (digital displays), home appliances, notebook computers, etc. In China, the shortage of some high-end chips even affects China's measurement, control, testing, testing and other instrumentation industries (microcontrollers, A/D converters), and chip shortages have become "stumbling blocks" restricting the innovation and development of China's science and technology enterprises.

(Editor: Zhang Shuo Proofreader: Yan Jingning)