Enter BYD factory and explore the "secrets" of China's new energy vehicles
2024-08-17
한어Русский языкEnglishFrançaisIndonesianSanskrit日本語DeutschPortuguêsΕλληνικάespañolItalianoSuomalainenLatina
Four major processes in the production of a new energy vehicle
Our special correspondents to Guangdong Yang Shasha and Zhang WeilanEditor's note: "Japanese research institute will dismantle BYD ATTO3 for investigation!" The Nihon Keizai Shimbun recently reported that Japan's "New Generation Automobile Center Hamamatsu" will dismantle China's BYD pure electric vehicles in 2024. US media reported in May that the former chief engineer of General Motors pickup trucks dismantled a BYD Seagull electric car and said that the US auto industry lags behind China in designing low-cost electric vehicles by many years. A reporter from the Global Times recently went to the Greater Bay Area and walked into the BYD Shenshan Industrial Park, 100 kilometers away from BYD's Shenzhen headquarters, where he saw the complete production process of a car.“One electric car rolls off the production line every minute”After taking the high-speed rail from Shenzhen North Station for nearly an hour, the reporter arrived at the Weimen Station in Shanwei City, Guangdong Province. After getting off the high-speed rail, the reporter continued to take a taxi and took another 20 minutes to finally arrive at the BYD Shenshan Industrial Park in Xiaomo Town, Shenshan Cooperation Zone, Shenzhen. There are still many excavators working around the industrial park, and from time to time there are trucks pulling brand new BYD cars to the nearby Xiaomo International Logistics Port. Due to its remote location, BYD staff apologized and said, "It has only been less than two years since construction, and it will be fine after a while." It is understood that the first phase of the industrial park will be put into production in September 2023, mainly producing BYD Yangwang and Dynasty series models.Following the route of "How a new energy vehicle is produced", the reporter visited BYD's four major process factories: stamping, welding, painting, and assembly. The stamping factory is mainly responsible for the production of body panels and structural parts. In the factory workshop, the reporter saw that the fully automated servo press equipment stamped pieces of steel raw materials into car doors, car hoods and other parts.The reporter observed that the logo of "Jinan No. 2 Machine Tool" is very eye-catching in the stamping factory. Earlier, there was news that "behind every BYD car there is equipment from Jinan No. 2 Machine Tool", and many domestic and foreign automakers use large stamping equipment from Jinan No. 2 Machine Tool.After the parts are produced, they will be transported to the welding factory for welding. Upon entering the welding factory, the reporter saw dozens of robot arms waving at the same time, sparking and passionately welding on the production line. The process engineer of the welding workshop told reporters that the automation rate of the welding workshop has reached 87%. A total of 1,740 robots have been invested in the three factories in the first phase, which can achieve a white body assembly every 58 seconds. The white body refers to the body that has been welded but not yet painted.As we were about to leave the welding workshop, the engineer took us to see a fenced-off robotic arm. He told the reporters: "This is a robotic arm developed by BYD itself. Some of the robots we use now are foreign robots. BYD can also have its own robots!"After the coating factory treated the whole vehicle with corrosion protection and painted the body, when the reporter entered the final assembly factory, a car was basically completed. Workers assembled the parts on the production line and conducted inspection and delivery. Here, the reporter saw more peripheral suppliers of BYD, such as Fuyao Glass and Jiangsu Huanyu Fender.At the final assembly plant, the reporter also witnessed the final stage of BYD's "one electric car off the assembly line in one minute": after a new energy vehicle rolls off the assembly line, it is undergoing final testing. After the test is completed, the car rolls off the assembly line in the industrial park and is loaded, and it only takes 5 minutes to reach Xiaomo Port. In January this year, BYD's "Pioneer 1" ro-ro ship carrying more than 5,000 new energy vehicles departed from Xiaomo Port and headed for the Port of Vülissingen in the Netherlands and the Port of Bremerhaven in Germany.What is the purpose of dismantling Chinese cars?Last year, the project team of Japanese media Nikkei XTECH and Nikkei BP Research Institute dismantled BYD's pure electric car "SEAL". What do foreign countries want to find out by dismantling Chinese cars? Liu Xueliang, general manager of BYD Co., Ltd.'s Asia-Pacific Automobile Sales Division, said in an interview with the Global Times that whether it is dismantling SEAL, Seagull, or other Chinese brands of cars, behind all this is actually the recognition of Chinese automobile manufacturing by traditional overseas automobile companies. They think many things are impossible, but the development of Chinese companies in the past few decades has actually turned things that many people think are impossible into possible."When I went to Japan and South Korea, I often saw them dismantling Chinese cars." Fu Yuwu, honorary chairman of the China Society of Automotive Engineers, said in an interview with the Global Times that dismantling cars is a very common practice in the automotive industry, because the automotive industry is a highly market-oriented industry. A complete vehicle has tens of thousands of parts, and dismantling cars is a way to learn from each other. Chinese companies also buy competitors' cars from the market to dismantle them, understand the design, process, manufacturing, quality, and even cost of their peers, find out their own shortcomings, and discover the strengths of others. This is normal. Now that foreigners are dismantling Chinese cars, it shows that Chinese companies have overall advantages in the new track of intelligent electrification, which is a sign of the progress of Chinese cars.Liu Xueliang said that it is not that foreigners cannot make electric cars like BYD, but that they cannot copy the Chinese automobile model from the perspective of scale and industrial chain. He believes that the reason why automobile costs could not be reduced in the past is that many core technologies are in the hands of foreign companies. In the field of gasoline vehicles, China does not have much pricing power for automobiles, but new energy vehicles are different from the traditional industrial chain. Core technologies such as batteries and motors are independently developed by China, so there is an opportunity to reduce costs. In addition, costs of course also depend on scale. If a large-scale market is formed, costs can naturally be reduced.“Rewriting the development of an industrial chain”Data shows that in the first half of 2024, BYD exported a total of 203,400 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 173.8%. So far, BYD has entered 78 countries and regions around the world, and has invested in and built factories in many overseas regions such as Brazil, Hungary, and Thailand. In an interview with a reporter from the Global Times, Liu Xueliang detailed BYD's experience in going overseas over the past decade.BYD announced on July 18 this year that it would officially enter the Vietnamese market and will launch three pure electric vehicles, BYD Seal, Dolphin, and ATTO3 (Yuan PLUS), in Vietnam in October. In Thailand, BYD has established an automobile manufacturing and assembly plant, which officially started production on July 4. In addition, many Chinese automakers, including SAIC, Great Wall, and Nezha, have also announced the construction of factories in Southeast Asia."Southeast Asia is a place where the automotive industry is now highly competitive, but the development prospects are huge." Liu Xueliang said that BYD first went overseas with electric buses, and had a good reputation in Japan and South Korea, countries with developed automotive industries. On this basis, BYD is still summarizing its experience in going overseas with passenger cars. "Vietnam has its own independent brand of automobiles, VinFast, and Japanese and Korean brands have also been deeply rooted in the local market for many years. BYD has not yet produced cars in Vietnam, and Vietnam's tariff rate for importing original cars from China is 50%. These are the challenges we face." But Liu Xueliang believes that "the first step must be taken. If all the conditions are 100% met, then we may not have a chance in the future."BYD's production base in Thailand has been in operation for more than a month, which is a typical example of BYD's complete industrial chain going overseas. In Liu Xueliang's words, it is "the real meaning of Chinese automobile manufacturing rewriting the development of an industrial chain." In the factory in Thailand, BYD's industrial chain includes both domestic supporting partners and some local parts manufacturers in Thailand.Regarding the outside world's view that enterprises going overseas will "teach apprentices and starve the masters", Liu Xueliang said "there is no such worry". He believes that now no one in the world can do without anyone else, and no one can do without anyone else. Development cannot stand still. Only by continuous innovation, constant self-challenge, and continuous opening up can we achieve real and lasting development.In contrast, Chinese automakers, including BYD, have been facing challenges in developing the Japanese and Korean markets. Japanese media reported that pure electric vehicles are slowly gaining popularity in the Japanese market. In 2023, the sales of pure electric vehicles (including light vehicles) in Japan will account for only 2.2% of the total new car sales, mainly due to the lagging construction of charging infrastructure. Liu Xueliang recalled that the Japanese and Korean markets have not yet gained full trust, BYD has not yet entered the Korean market, and has only been in the Japanese market for two years."Nikkei Chinese" used the title "BYD relies on the seal to 'leap over the dragon gate' in Japan" to describe BYD's sale of the pure electric sedan "Seal" in Japan on June 25 this year. In Japan, the standard version of the Seal is priced at 5.28 million yen (about 240,000 yuan), which is basically the same as Tesla Model 3 (5.313 million yen). According to the report, at the press conference held in Tokyo, the president of BYD Japan Atsuki said, "We pin the fate of the company on the Seal, and hope that it can become a car that changes BYD's trend.""The market share of sedans in many overseas markets is declining. People prefer SUVs. It is a challenge to win the hearts of some people in the Japanese market with the Haibao sedan," said Liu Xueliang. According to him, the Haibao is also BYD's first mid-to-high-end car to go global, targeting the overseas mid-to-high-end consumer market. "The market may have gotten used to the fact that Chinese-made fuel vehicles are synonymous with cheapness, but in the field of new energy vehicles, we have the opportunity to redefine Chinese car brands.""I hope the era of measuring Chinese products by price will end." Liu Xueliang believes that it is difficult for BYD to end this era on its own. For Chinese cars, a more responsible overseas positioning is to enter the global market with high-performance cars, go overseas first with mid-to-high-end products, win the market's redefinition of Chinese brands, and then find the right time to push more cost-effective products overseas.Fu Yuwu said that if Chinese cars want to change their cheap image, they must adhere to long-termism in brand building, and their products must have excellent quality. The concept of brand and service first should never be slackened. "If you don't persist, it's impossible to suddenly emerge in the automotive industry."▲
