If the joint venture car companies 40 years ago were to achieve "market-for-technology", then the new joint venture era is to achieve "technology-for-market" and reverse export Chinese technology, and even brands. Take Changan as an example, the EZ-6, a pure electric/range-extended new energy B-class car launched by the joint venture, provides a good research model for how the joint venture can break through in the existing market environment.
Forty years ago, China agreed to set up foreign joint ventures in China, with the fundamental focus being – market for technology, which means opening up the huge Chinese mainland market to foreign investment in order to obtain foreign car companies to help China improve its automobile development capabilities, including learning from foreign advanced manufacturing and management experience.
After 40 years, the market environment has undergone tremendous changes. Chinese car companies represented by BYD and Geely have achieved remarkable results in capital operation, supply chain vertical management, core technology development, etc., and have made rapid progress in Sandian and intelligent development. Chinese car companies have also changed from the role of "little brothers" in the past to a new force that all foreign car companies dare not underestimate, even "leaders". Auto giants such as Ford are lamenting: "They are ahead of us."
Between the above advances and retreats, on the one hand, China’s local brands have become stronger and bigger, achieving "brand spillover", on the one hand, the share of foreign brands in the country has shrunk, and the voice over has weakened, which has caused the competitiveness of joint venture car companies to decline, and led to a topic:How can joint venture car companies respond to market changes? Are they losing ground or even withdrawing from the Chinese market, or are they shrinking their front line and actively transforming?
The terrified Ford CEO
And the aggressive Mazda president
The Wall Street Journal published an article on September 14 local time, "What is Ford CEO scared of in China?", the article said that after visiting China, Ford Motor CEO Jim Farley told the company’s board members that Chinese automakers are moving at the speed of light, the artificial intelligence and other technologies used in cars are completely different from existing technologies in the United States, and these Chinese electric vehicle manufacturers that provide smooth digital functions are using low-cost supply chains to beat competitors on price and aggressively expand into overseas markets.
"In just a few short years, Chinese electric carmakers such as BYD have wrested significant domestic market share from once dominant foreign competitors through low prices, high-tech interiors and rapid iterations of vehicles. Now, the Chinese carmaker is rapidly expanding into Europe, the Middle East and other Asian markets," the article said.
After Mr. Farley and a group of Ford executives took a test drive of Changan on the test track, everyone was stunned by the technological advancements of their partner, Changan – a smooth and quiet ride with a high-end, tech-savvy and easy-to-use interior. "Jim, it’s completely different," John Lawler, Ford’s chief financial officer, told Mr. Farley after the test drive. "They’re ahead of us."
Mazda executives share the same feelings as Ford executives. Deng Zhitao, executive vice president of Changan Mazda Automobile Co., told the author: "The president of Mazda Mao Long came to China on the second day of his tenure, and this year’s Beijing Auto Show came to the scene to release the EZ-6. At the Beijing Auto Show, Mazda’s parent company sent about 200 people to conduct a comprehensive research and analysis on the competition and changes of new energy in China, which shows that Mazda’s parent company attaches unprecedented importance to the Chinese market. Without high-frequency communication, it is difficult for foreign parties to understand the changes in the Chinese market."
Deng Zhitao, Executive Vice President of Changan Mazda Automobile Co., Ltd.
Regarding the changes in awareness of the Ford and Mazda brands, Deng Zhitao, executive vice president of Changan Mazda Automobile Co., Ltd., commented:"The leadership of the Mazda brand is very determined and enlightened to transition to electrification, so embrace new things quickly. Ford is also making changes to electrification, but the speed needs to be accelerated."
Changan Mazda Model:
The "New Joint Venture Model" of Receivism
In the current context of accelerating the intelligentization of domestic automobiles, joint ventures are facing the dilemma of failure to advance and retreat. There are even opinions that under the impact of China’s local market, most joint ventures will withdraw from the Chinese market. Is there really no market outlet for joint venture car companies?
Objectively, most joint venture car companies are not fully prepared when dealing with this wave of changes, and the parent companies of Chinese and foreign parties also lack sufficient organizational resources to allow the joint venture to achieve transformation. In the fields of three power and intelligence, foreign parties do not have accumulated and technological advantages, and many Chinese investors may not have much strength. Even if the latter has technical advantages, deep cooperation cannot be realized because the two sides have not reached a sufficient consensus.
As the saying goes, it’s easy to turn around, and it’s not the big Macs like Toyota and Volkswagen, GM and Ford that are rapidly transforming and "blossoming" in this regard, but Mazda from Japan. Why? This may come from Mazda’s sense of crisis and recognition of China’s advantages.
Mazda has a deep foundation in the field of traditional car manufacturing, while Changan Automobile has been deeply cultivated in the fields of Sandian and intelligence for many years, and both have their own advantages. At the dawn of the new joint venture era, Changan Mazda, as a joint venture, gives full play to the advantageous resources given by both shareholders to achieve a strong alliance.
Deng Zhitao said: "Mazda highly recognizes the position and technology of Changan’s parent company in the field of Sandian. This time, the EZ-6 product also uses Changan’s Sandian technology and architecture in an all-round way. At the same time, Changan’s parent company also recognizes Mazda’s capabilities in design, control, quality, and safety. Therefore, during the design and development of the EZ-6, we were divided into three teams, namely Changan’s team, Mazda’s team, and Changan Mazda’s team. Each team has clear responsibilities. For example, in terms of control, design, quality and craftsmanship, it is led by the Mazda team. In terms of Sandian Intelligence, Changan’s team is responsible for the final acceptance. It can be said that the EZ-6 is a product produced under the high recognition and high compatibility of our parent companies.
It can be said that Changan Mazda’s flexible and pragmatic operating mechanism has played a huge advantage: compared with other joint venture brands, Changan Mazda is more flexible; and compared with new car manufacturers, Mazda has played an advantage in design and quality control.It can be said that Changan Mazda reflects the flexible mechanism and efficient operation of the new joint venture era, which can be understood as "Mazda’s brand advantage + Changan Automobile’s new technology empowerment"; in this way, the joint venture can not only continue to play the advantages of foreign capital in vehicle manufacturing, but also play to China’s late-mover advantages in new technologies such as intelligence, and achieve vertical integration of the supply chain, accelerate product launch, timely adjustment and optimization, and rapid iteration.
Deng Zhitao gave an example: "From the supply chain level, the EZ-6 uses many excellent domestic supply chains. For example, the EZ-6 battery originated from the Ningde era, and it is a 3C battery, including the zero-gravity seat. In the field of joint venture new energy, there are also few products that can be equipped with double zero-gravity seats, including the range-extending battery used by AVIC Plaza. The battery cells of AVIC Plaza are also fully 3C-level. In the future, OTA upgrades will continue to be carried out, adding intelligent assisted driving such as automatic off-ramp. At present, our intelligent driving system should be the latest and best research results of Changan Institute of Science and Technology."
Sample significance of EZ-6:
The "first battle" of joint venture new energy transformation
At a time when Changan and Mazda have reached a consensus to actively promote the transformation of Changan Mazda, the Chinese market has become the first choice to test the new joint venture and its products. If the market sells well and achieves initial success, then you can go overseas to participate in international competition. On the contrary, if you fail to succeed in the Chinese market and fail to return, then this new joint venture model will face severe tests and questions from the outside world: Can you do it?
When it comes to this topic, Deng Zhitao’s expression is very serious: "We believe that the Chinese market must be a very important core market for developing a global product. At present, there may be more car brands in the Chinese market than any other car market in the world. So if the Chinese market is’not good ‘, I believe it will not be able to compete in the future global market. This is what I call the’spillover’ of the Chinese auto market. The fierce competition in the Chinese market is now expanding to the global scale, and it may become more intense next year. Therefore, the spillover of competition will form a strong global effect. When we develop the EZ-6, we hope to first do a good job in the Chinese market. If the domestic market can do well, I believe we can also do well in the global competition in the future."
"We must first do a good job in the Chinese market. If the Chinese market is not good, let alone the global market. If the joint venture wants to deal with the competition of domestic independent brands in the future, the Chinese market is the bridgehead; how to compete well in the Chinese market. How to do a good job in upgrading and iterating technology is very critical for Changan Mazda," Deng Zhitao said.
Once the first battle of the EZ-6 is successful, then the process of the experience accumulated in the development process of this product will be continuously reproduced on the subsequent models of Changan Mazda. "Through the EZ-6 product, a team will be formed to precipitate a set of processes. The so-called process, I think, is the methodology in the product development process and the entire Quality Standard and acceptance system. Through the precipitation of the entire process system, in the future, on our second, third and fourth products, we will use Changan Mazda’s process to manage the development of the current product." Deng Zhitao added.
At this year’s Beijing Auto Show, the relevant person in charge of MIIT visited the Changan Mazda booth and gave a high evaluation of the MAZDA EZ-6 product. The relevant person in charge pointed out: "In the process of new energy development, you can’t build cars behind closed doors. I hope other domestic joint venture brands can learn from Changma; if the EZ-6 product can have a good performance in sales, whether it is for the development of the entire industry, the parent company of both parties, the local government, and the country, it has played a positive and exemplary role. In the past, the joint venture model was based on the market for technology, which also drove the rapid development of the automobile industry chain. It can be said that enterprises cultivate the industry chain, such as Tesla and Apple. In the future, we also hope that the domestic automotive industry chain system can also feed back the enterprise and provide better’nutrition ‘for the development of the enterprise, so as to form the’flower’ of the joint venture brand. "
From the perspective of the EZ-6 product, it reflects not only the traditional inherent value of the joint venture brand (derived from Mazda), but also the innovative value of the new joint venture era (such as range extension technology and intelligent driving technology, derived from Changan Automobile).
The biggest market opportunity for joint venture car companies to launch new energy models is that some users have both brand requirements for the product, and hope that it can match the products of their own brands in terms of electrification and intelligence. EZ-6 products have their own market opportunity points similar to "Tianji horse racing". When competing with joint venture competitors on the same stage, its performance in three electricity and intelligence will give them extra points. Compared with the same level of independent brand models, Mazda’s vehicle mechanical quality and quality sense, reliability and comparative advantages.
Users want both, and joint venture new energy products are both available. Can the two resonate at the same frequency?
