The Expo has been held for four years so far, and the "old friends" among the exhibitors have accumulated many stories, including twists and turns.
At this year's Expo, the reporter learned about the changes in the hearts of the two exhibitors - they have "changed their minds" with their Chinese partners in recent years, or "if they are separated", but then it is difficult to give up, and then "change their minds".
Danish pump: regret "missing the second CIIE"
For example, Grundfos in the technical equipment exhibition area. Headquartered in Denmark, Grundfos, the world's largest circulating pump manufacturer, this year with its "smart prefabricated intelligent pump group" new products, at the Expo for the world premiere, with its "factory prefabrication, on-site equipment" and "digital twin" and other characteristics, to seize a new round of energy saving and emission reduction market in China.
Pumps are large implicit energy consumers, and pump energy consumption accounts for up to 10% of global electricity energy consumption. At the same time, less than 1% of pumps widely used in industrial, commercial buildings, civil buildings and municipal water industry can be digitally monitored. Grundfos is to cut these two major pain points, its collection of global engineers to develop the "smart prefabricated intelligent pump group", after the production of Suzhou base, and then in The first trial in the transformation of two old heat exchange stations in Zibo City, Shandong Province, the result is that after a heating season, the two heat exchange stations are 80% and 19% more power saving than before the transformation. At the same time, Grundfos uses the "digital twin" technology to dynamically monitor and analyze the pump's operating status and energy consumption, and users can have a good idea of the pump's signs, life, etc., thus changing from "experience-driven" to "data-driven", reducing unplanned downtime by 70%.
More importantly, this intelligent pump set is Grundfos' global R&D, made in China, the first trial in China, and then made its global debut in China. This move proves that the global company's role in the "Chinese market" has been redefined.
The reason for going out of the unusual way is that the company has a process of 'not knowing' to 'slowly understanding' to 'fully engaged' in the Chinese market." Zhang Xiaoyan, vice president of Grundfos China, said.
Founded in 1945, Grundfos is a family-owned company that currently sells in more than 80 countries around the world, and its association with China was 26 years ago.
In 1995, the company's second-generation head made a decision on the board of directors to "go to China, the sooner the better." In 1996, Grundfos invested in Suzhou to build a factory; in 2001, in the first year of China's accession to the WTO, Grundfos sold about 200 million yuan in China; and in 2020, its sales in China have exceeded 3 billion yuan, accounting for 10% of its global sales, and China has replaced the United States as Grundfos' largest market in the world.
It can be seen that the decision of the second generation of enterprises to overcome public opinion in the past has now reaped great returns. For the Chinese market, Grundfos is naturally grateful, so at the first CIIE in 2018, Grundfos followed the group exhibitors the Danish Industrial Products Federation and appeared at the Danish National Pavilion of the CIIE. However, at the second CIIE, Grundfos was absent. By the third and fourth editions, Grundfos has resumed its entry into the Expo and has now signed the booth of the fifth CIIE.
For why "walked and came back", Zhang Xiaoyan's explanation is that because in the second session of the Expo, a large number of Danish enterprises organized a grand appearance in the food and agricultural products exhibition area, which is equivalent to opening another way of presentation of the "Danish National Pavilion", Grundfos in the industrial field felt "incompatible", and gave up the exhibition for a while. But the company quickly regretted it. In 2020, the company had no hesitation and decided to abandon the group exhibitors to participate in the exhibition on their own, go straight to the technical equipment exhibition area, win the 60 square meters booth, and overcome the impact of the epidemic to participate in the exhibition sincerely. This year's Expo, the company's exhibition area has been expanded to 100 square meters. ”
A very important reason for such a quick "repentance" lies in the trust and commitment to Chinese customers. "Among our Chinese customers, a large number of them are investment groups and construction groups in various provinces, and as members of local procurement trading groups, they come to the Expo every year to visit and place orders. Only when they see Grundfos firmly exhibiting, they will be very calm and proud. Zhang Xiaoyan said frankly, "I finally found that I accidentally 'made a mistake' that year." We deeply feel that we should cherish the Expo even more, because the Expo is a necessary platform for us to communicate with our Chinese partners and enhance trust, and it is the best opportunity for us to pay tribute to the Chinese market. ”
After holding hands with the Expo again, Grundfos showed greater sincerity – in 2021, the company will place one of its four global headquarters, the commercial building headquarters, in Shanghai, China. In addition, the company has planned to continue to increase its investment layout in China in addition to the Suzhou and Wuxi factories.
Japanese Stationery: Or China's supply chain is the most reliable
Compared with Grundfos, the Expo exhibitor lihitlab is the "elder of the four dynasties", starting from 2018, the four sessions of the Expo have not been lost.
However, lihitlab still took the initiative to admit to reporters that he once "empathized and did not fall in love".
lihitlab is a High Quality Stationery Company with a history of 83 years in Japan. 6 years ago, Chinese businessman Xu Jun found that there was a trend of "stationery control" in China's consumer market, and took the initiative to find Yuki Muroda, executive director of Lihitlab, and asked to take the general agency right of the brand in China. At that time, Murata had no interest and confidence in the Chinese market, but he did not expect that in just 3 years, Xu Jun would push the Chinese market to the second position of the lihitlab overseas market. This long-established Japanese company no longer dares to slacken off, frequently invests new products in China, and continuously and firmly participates in the Expo.
At the first CIIE, Lihitlab Executive Director Yuki Muroda (left) at his booth.
Murata retained the participation certificate of the previous CIIE.
Before the opening of this year's Expo, Lihitlab Company looked like after the exhibition was completed.
However, in recent years, considering the rising cost of land and labor, the Japanese company has successively transferred some of its product production lines from manufacturing bases such as Zhejiang and Guangdong to Southeast Asian regions such as Vietnam, Myanmar and Cambodia. Dai Rui, the person in charge of Lihitlab's China business, told reporters that a self-built factory in Southeast Asia initially only undertook simple PP (polypropylene) production line products, as well as some pen bags and other products that need to be sewn with man-machine cooperation. However, in recent years, Japanese companies have increasingly found that China's dividends such as land, labor, factory operating costs and tax incentives have gradually disappeared, and Japanese companies have made special calculations for this purpose, and the cost of the same category and quality products in China and Vietnam is 30%. Therefore, around 2017, Japanese companies began to transfer the production lines with high technical requirements such as high-quality fabric pen bags and storage bags from China to Southeast Asia.
Among the products of lihitlab, some fabric pen bags, bags and other products that require human-machine cooperation and sewing are gradually transferred to Southeast Asia.
"However, this epidemic has exposed the shortcomings of the supply chain in Southeast Asia." Dai Rui told reporters that on the one hand, it is the quality of delivery. Due to the epidemic, the quality control team of the Japanese company could not go to the Southeast Asian production base to guide production and control standards on the ground. As a result, the defective rate of goods received was significantly improved. Some customers have found the details of a variety of pen bags changes, and have asked lihitlab: the original pen bag stitches are neat and straight, how come now it has become crooked?
In contrast, the Chinese manufacturing factories before the epidemic have long been quite mature and self-disciplined, even if there is no Japanese quality control team to "fly" to inspect, "whether it is raw material procurement standards, production processes or the advanced degree of assembly lines, they are fully in line with the high quality requirements of Japanese companies." The quality of the goods handed over is still nothing to say. ”
Lihitlab's hot-selling silicone cartoon pen holders and other products are completed by the Chinese supply chain, and the quality is nothing to say.
The greater impact on this Japanese company is that under the epidemic, only China has taken the lead in resuming work and production in the world, and the epidemic prevention and control is effective, but other manufacturing bases, production and supply are extremely unstable - shortage of goods is a greater disaster for enterprises, if the factory can not complete orders, the company has no products to sell, it is a waste of business opportunities. ”
Therefore, at the end of last year, Lihitlab began to move some important production lines back to China.
"The epidemic has become a touchstone, and in contrast, the completeness, stability and reliability of China's supply chain are all highlighted." Dai Rui told reporters that even if there has been a brief "change of heart" or "if it is left", he believes that these overseas companies that have changed their minds and returned again, "they are no longer their past selves, their emotional attachment to China will be deeper, and the binding between Chinese partners and users will be stronger than ever." ”
Column Editor-in-Chief: Li Ye Text Editor: Li Ye
Source: Author: Li Ye