Behind three presses of the "Resume key"
Seeing the industrial chain under epidemic situation from an auto parts enterprise in Wuhan
Mu Dachuan heard the start of the production line again, but he didn't feel the long absence.
Since the outbreak of the New Coronary Pneumonia outbreak, his Bosch Huayu Steering System Wuhan Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Wuhan Bosch Huayu") has pressed the "Resume button" for the third time.
During the first two resumptions, when the epidemic situation in Wuhan was severe, a negative pressure ambulance company in Jiangxi urgently needed a steering machine. As its first-tier supplier, Wuhan Bosch Huayu started production urgently.
During the epidemic, Hubei's auto industry was "shut down" and 1,300 regulated parts and components companies were affected. But as Wuhan restarted the auto industry, Mu Dachuan also saw a real return to work.
From saving people to saving themselves, Wuhan Bosch Huayu's three launches of its production line have brought many enlightenments to the auto parts industry that still affects the epidemic.
Resume work to save lives
After the outbreak, the demand for negative pressure ambulances suitable for transferring patients surged. As the largest ambulance manufacturer in China, Jiangling Group organized workers to work overtime from the beginning of the first lunar month.
Zhang Ge, the purchasing engineer of Jiangling Group's automobile company, found that the spare parts inventory was only enough to support the production of more than 300 finished cars, which was far from meeting the thousands of orders received at the time.
On the second day of the first lunar month, Liu Biaomi, who lives in Jiangxia District of Wuhan City, received a phone call from the company: "Is it possible to form a team urgently and rush to the factory to resume work?"
Liu Biaomi inquired that he needed to urgently produce the steering gear needed for the ambulance for the old customer Jiangling Group.
"When Wuhan was just closed, I was really nervous. But after staying at home for a few days, I felt that I had a lot of energy to try." The head of the production island of Wuhan Bosch Huayu thought at the time, "Living in Wuhan Employees of the company heard that there were orders for ambulances, and some of them had to be sent to support Wuhan. They should all come back to work. "
He soon discovered that it was not an easy task for this large factory with more than 600 employees to temporarily put together the 11 employees needed for a production line.
Most of the employees on the production line are in their early 20s, and most of them have only children. Even if I have the will to return to the factory, my family will inevitably be worried.
Mu Dachuan, the deputy factory manager who was still in isolation at his old home in Shandong at that time, admitted that there was huge pressure in his heart. "At that time, there were not many companies in Jiangxia District who resumed work. plant."
Due to the fact that the management is mostly separated from their homes in other places, Liu Bei, the personnel manager in Wuhan, also rushed over to organize the resumption of work.
In the community where Liu Bei lived, 26 cases had been diagnosed. She worried that she would be infected when she went out, so she placed her daughter and the elderly elsewhere in advance.
Wuhan Bosch Huayu has a Sino-German joint venture background, citing the German lean production method and dividing the production area into 6 islands.
The island responsible for Liu Bumi has 74 employees and 4 production lines, of which 3 produce mechanical steering gears and one produces hydraulic steering gears. Other islands mainly produce higher value-added electric steering systems.
Ambulances use hydraulic steering gears and belong to the company's "niche" products, with sales accounting for at most 2%. This production line is equipped with 11 employees on a daily basis, the degree of automation is low, and it relies more on skilled manual operations.
Taking into account the suspension of public transportation after the closure of the city, Liu Biaomi plans to select 11 people from Jiangxia's local employees. "First consider the skill level, and then choose the one with a private car, or one closer to my home, I can take care of the transfer."
On January 31, Liu Biaomi completed the formation of the production team, and Bosch Huayu pressed the first "Resume Key". In just 3 days, a total of 1,000 hydraulic steering gears were produced, which met the production needs of the first batch of ambulances of Jiangling Group.
"Generalist" provokes heavy responsibility
In 2015, the first-phase project of SAIC-GM Wuhan Base was completed and put into production in Jiangxia. It is across the river from Dongfeng Motor Industry Cluster, and Wuhan Auto Industry's territory crosses the Yangtze River.
Many suppliers came to Jiangxia, including Bosch Huayu, headquartered in Shanghai.
According to public information, the automobile is Wuhan's largest pillar industry, and its output exceeded 1.7 million units in 2018. At present, it has formed a "triple-legged" industrial pattern in Jiangxia District, Economic Development Zone and Hannan District.
Affected by the epidemic, Wuhan's auto industry has fallen into a "shutdown" and domestic and even global industrial chains have been hit.
To resume work in an epidemic situation, there must be someone first. For some manufacturing enterprises with low production line automation, the absence of employees in important skill positions will cause production interruption.
Ruan Yingshun, the squad leader, served as a "firefighter" when the company first resumed work, making up for the vacancy on the emergency production line.
This native Jiangxia native studied car maintenance in secondary school.
"In the past, almost all of the farmland and fish and shrimp farms I saw in Jiangxia. In the past few years, car factories began to increase, and friends who worked outside the field came back to work one after another." Ruan Yingshun said.
From each process to the entire production line, to all the processes of the entire island, Ruan Yingshun, who is professional and studious, has become a "versatile" with a job-wide operation.
Liu Biaomi said that 20% of the employees in this island have the ability to pass positions, and 60% -70% of the employees can operate multiple positions. "In the special case of an epidemic, the production line can be quickly responded by restarting."
In Mu Dachuan's view, in such an unexpected situation, the company's management level, corporate culture and cohesion are all facing great tests.
Order pressure layer by layer conduction
The duration of the epidemic exceeded Zhang Ge's imagination. Orders for ambulances continue to increase, and parts such as steering gear continue to tighten.
"After the Spring Festival in the past, the upstream and downstream construction started as scheduled, and there was no problem with the production connection. This year, affected by the epidemic, the supplier delayed the start of the construction, and there are many orders, and there is a big gap in the material inventory." Zhang Ge said.
At that time, the epidemic was still spreading, and the production pressure of Jiangling Group once again spread to Wuhan Bosch Huayu, as well as to other companies in the industrial chain.
On February 11, after 14 days of quarantine, Mu Dachuan prepared to resume work for the second time. He flew from Shandong to Shanghai, and then rented a car for 11 hours before returning to Wuhan.
For Mu Dachuan, before the second resumption of work, he encountered many difficulties. "After some employees’ parents let the children out for the first time, they did not agree with the life and death for the second time. What to do if the child is infected, can't go anymore. "
Personnel manager Liu Bei remembered that in mid-February, many families had outbreaks of cluster infections, and the epidemic situation in Wuhan became more and more stringent. Employees returned to the factory for the second time and could not return home after work, all living in factory dormitories.
Qin Qiushi, an employee who lives in Jiangxia District, is responsible for equipment maintenance in the workshop. There will always be some failures when the equipment is restarted, and he will be indispensable every time he resumes work.
The day I went to work for the second time, I drove to pick up his colleague before, and I couldn't go there temporarily. He didn't want to trouble others, so he rode a 15km bicycle and spent more than 2 hours to the factory.
"My parents were afraid that I would go out to get this disease, and I would have to be isolated for treatment. I was very worried." 24-year-old Qin Qiushi felt that he could not delay the ambulance production because of himself.
In the past few days, Liu Bei spent a lot of thoughts to take the company's protective measures together into photos and short videos, and let employees transfer them to their families, hoping to dispel their concerns.
On February 21, Wuhan Bosch Huayu restarted for the second time. The demand for spare parts for this resumption is large, and it is necessary to coordinate the supply of dozens of upstream suppliers.
You Zhaoci, deputy general manager of Wuhan Jiaxun Auto Parts Co., Ltd., also rushed back to Wuhan from his hometown in Xuzhou, Jiangsu at this time.
The company is only 5 kilometers away from Wuhan Bosch Huayu. It mainly produces steering gear casings and is the core component supplier of the latter.
When Wuhan Bosch Huayu resumed work for the first time, You Zhaoci's company still had some stocks, and did not resume work synchronously, but only arranged for vehicles to send products to the other party's factory.
By the time the other party resumes work for the second time, his inventory has been digested. Under the joint coordination of Jiangling and Bosch Huayu, You Zhaoci also urgently organized 13 employees to return to work.
Holding groups to keep warm together
Wuhan Bosch Huayu resumed its work for the second time until March 11. During this period, in addition to the nearest Jiaxun Auto Parts and other companies, Mu Dachuan also had to coordinate suppliers in Shandong, Anhui, and Shanghai. Logistics obstruction has become the biggest obstacle.
In the past, the single-part demand for parts was not high, and logistics was dominated by joint orders. During the epidemic, the consolidated bills have not been restored, and only special vehicles can be coordinated to pick up the goods from supplier manufacturers.
"Because the headquarters is a joint venture, compliance requirements are very high, we must first go through the process. The logistics company we were able to contact at the time was not in the supplier list, we had to take a special process, and spent a lot of effort to overcome These difficulties. "Mu Dachuan said that the freight rate of the special car was 3-5 times higher than that of the competing order. At that time, the car source was very small, and the freight rate had increased by 10 times.
In addition, after the steering gear is produced, it must be transported to a service area in Jiangxi by a special vehicle for killing, and then the Jiangling Group will send the car away.
"The production rhythm is very tight. The parts that arrive today will be used tomorrow, and we will step on the production. Once we can't deliver it to the warehouse in time, we may stop the production line tomorrow." Zhang Ge said.
According to Zhang Ge, despite the increase in costs, the steering gear supplied by Wuhan Bosch Huayu is still settled at the previously negotiated price.
"As far as I know, some suppliers even import some spare parts by air in order to meet the supply requirements." Zhang Ge said that in the past, logistics costs will be included in the quotation, and they no longer bear additional costs. In the epidemic situation, after the two parties communicated, they shared part of the logistics costs.
"As much as possible to make suppliers less loss, everyone is protecting the production of ambulances regardless of cost." He said.
Mu Dachuan conservatively estimated that before March 11th, in order to support the production of ambulances, including freight, employee subsidies and other expenses, the two resumption of work invested an additional 8-9 million yuan to remove the profit of the product and lost about 500,000 yuan.
"The company can't help but consider the revenue, but this time it can't be too much, and it can't affect the production of ambulances," Mu Dachuan said.
You Zhaoci also calculated an account for the reporter: In order to provide spare parts for the steering gear, temporary work resumed for nearly a month, losing 1.5 million yuan.
But the supplier also said frankly that even if it does not resume work in advance to support the production of ambulances, the enterprise will lose money, "depreciation of fixed assets and employee salaries accounted for the bulk."
Of the six or seven hundred suppliers of ambulances produced by the Jiangling Group, more than 100 are located in Hubei, and many of them provide key parts and components. "Once key parts are missing, the production line will be stopped." Zhang Ge believes that during the epidemic, Hubei supplies The support of the quotient is sufficient.
Public data show that Hubei's automobile production and the number of parts and components enterprises above designated size are about one-tenth of the country.
"The steering gear produced by Bosch Huayu can be done by other suppliers, but it does not match the model, and it will take at least a few months to redevelop." Zhang Ge said.
Blocked overseas supply chain
As the epidemic situation gradually improved, from the middle of March, Wuhan auto industry restarted.
OEMs represented by Dongfeng Honda and SAIC-GM Wuhan Branch have gradually restored production capacity. Wuhan's hundreds of billions of yuan in the automotive industry chain is turning again.
As the suppliers of these two major vehicle manufacturers, Wuhan Bosch Huayu started the third resumption of work simultaneously.
"The impact of the epidemic on the factory is still quite serious, and the production capacity in March can only be restored to 70-80% of the same period last year." Mu Dachuan said that the factory usually produces 24 hours in two shifts, and some production lines can open 14 shifts per week during peak season . At present, some production lines are down, and only 6 classes are opened a week.
"Currently, overall sales have only reached half, and many products haven't started asking for goods. Domestic orders have recovered, but the outlook is unknown, and we are still waiting to see." You Zhaoci said.
In Mu Dachuan's view, the company's customer structure advantage has been highlighted in difficult times.
This company supplies Wuhan GM, Dongfeng Shenlong, GAC Honda, Changan Ford and other large vehicle manufacturers. Some customers have reduced the volume and some have increased customers, which can hedge some market changes.
However, as foreign epidemics have changed, as an important link in the global automotive industry chain, Chinese auto companies and suppliers have experienced a new round of impact.
After the third resumption of work, Wuhan Bosch Huayu resumed supply to Korean automotive customers, but orders from Tata Motors of India were greatly affected by local epidemic prevention and control policies.
Relative to overseas orders, Mu Dachuan is more concerned about the supply channel of imported parts. According to him, the headquarters is already assessing the procurement risks of overseas parts and components to see if they can find alternative suppliers in China.
Zhang Ge and colleagues have to judge the supply risk of imported parts every day, "Each part is carried out separately to confirm how much inventory is left. If the key parts are out of stock, the production plan of the corresponding model can only be moved back.
"A French supplier closed the factory, we have no solution at all, we can only find other suppliers. But communication takes time, and it needs the approval of the major shareholders." Zhang Ge said.
The steering gear casing produced by Jiaxun Auto Parts has internal seals produced in Europe and America. You Zhaoci said that the current inventory can still meet demand in the short term, but replenishment has been difficult, depending on changes in foreign epidemics.
Once the inventory of imported parts is insufficient and international logistics is not smooth, manufacturers either stop production lines or look for domestic substitutes.
Localization is not easy, and You Zhaoci is quite touched by this: replacement suppliers must be approved by customers. For example, German automobile customers have system requirements, and if replacement parts are involved, they must be authorized by the customer headquarters. After going through all the procedures, the process is very tedious.
"Some OEMs specify the use of parts of a certain brand, and generally they are not allowed to be replaced, or only one replacement opportunity is given once a year." Mu Dachuan said.
Despite the difficulties, advancing the localization of suppliers is an opportunity associated with this crisis. Some companies have already selected spare domestic suppliers and are actively conducting verification work.
"It used to be hard to push, but now is a good time. If you don't change overseas suppliers, you may be out of stock. Customers think about their products and need to make some changes." Mu Dachuan said.
Force yourself out of the comfort zone
In the long run, the epidemic "black swan" will not only impact the enterprise's production plan, but also make the industry's prospects full of variables.
Mu Dachuan believes that now in the cold winter of the automotive industry, companies have some financial pressure. If the product is in stock and cannot be sold, it will take up too much money.
He believes that enterprises should now turn to stability and make decisions after the market is stable.
You Zhaoci also felt the pressure of funds. "This period is more difficult. I am trying to find ways to return the funds, and I have to open source and cut costs."
"The sales volume is adjusted according to market demand, the initiative is not in our hands, only the internal procurement costs can be reduced." You Zhaoci said.
Before the third resumption of work at Bosch Huayu, some foreign R & D personnel had already started remote resumption at home before returning to the factory. Some employees did not take the office computer home before leaving, Mu Dachuan coordinated with the courier company and sent some computers to the employees' homes.
Mu Dachuan said that in recent years, the company has been striving to get out of the comfort zone and actively seek change by strengthening independent research and development and intelligent manufacturing. "Now the production capacity and efficiency are not bad, but if there is no plan strategically, others will soon divide your market share."
In the first quarter of the previous year, the deputy director was busy on a business trip, traveling between suppliers, customers and headquarters. During this time, he has less busy and busy, and has more time to calm down and think about the gains and losses of work, and how to improve production management and work efficiency.
The four production lines on the island where Liu Biaomi is located have gradually resumed their busy days. He said he hadn't eaten crayfish in a long time, and Wuhan was in season when crayfish was full of fragrance, but he couldn't care about it.
Ruan Yingshun was on the way to work and occasionally saw an ambulance passing by, and an idea came up in his mind-the steering machine of this ambulance is probably made by us. (Reporter Wan Yanhao)