The car giant started by marrying the daughter of the king

Chapter 348 Santana Localization Community

"If you can persuade a few more students to go to Nanshan Technology, Jiang Hui will definitely have a deeper impression of you."

"After all, there are still too few college students who do not obey assignments and go directly to foreign-funded enterprises."

"I'll mention your efforts to Jiang Hui. It will definitely be beneficial to your future development."

Ji Hua is confident in his son's technical level.

Although Capital University of Technology is not as good as Peking University and Tsinghua University, it is not easy to get into it either.

The most important thing is that in the major of vehicle engineering, Capital University of Technology is currently the best.

In particular, the president Zhu Jiansheng was originally the director of the Vehicle Engineering Department. He also led the teachers and students of the School of Mechanical and Vehicle Engineering to develop important products such as the Hummer military vehicle. Now, no one can easily shake his position in the Chinese automobile industry.

There are basically no people more professional than him, and even if there are, their level is not as high as his.

There is no one who is higher in rank than him whose skills are better than his.

He is not yet 60 years old this year, and he will continue to influence China's automobile industry for a long time to come.

"Brother Jiang is still very influential in the hearts of our classmates. As long as we can make everyone feel hopeful, I think it shouldn't be a problem to persuade some people to join his company."

"But compared to going to Nanshan University of Science and Technology, I think it may be easier to persuade my classmates to go to BMW."

"After all, BMW's BMW Light is the sales champion every month, and the second product will be launched soon. Our teachers have introduced this information in class."

Ji Xia could naturally fully understand his father's good intentions.

Given the relationship between Ji Hua and Jiang Hui, Ji Xia will receive some care after going to Nanshan Technology. In addition, as a college student, it is inevitable that she will have a bright future.

But if you can make some contributions to the company before joining the company, that would obviously be the best.

"It doesn't matter. As long as we go to the factory that Jiang Hui is in charge of, it's fine."

"When you return to school tomorrow night, talk to someone first, and then talk to me about it next Saturday when you get home."

Following this conversation between Ji Hua and Ji Xia, the number of graduates from the Department of Automotive Engineering of Capital University of Technology who go to work for the BMW Group will obviously increase further this year.

Of course, this is definitely a later story.

……

"Wang Le, when can the design department design our new generation of Hongqi?"

"BMW will launch its own sedan next year. It is said that it will use 5MT manual transmission technology and 2.5L engine. It will grab a large part of the official car market."

"Santana has already taken a piece of the official car pie, and the Capital Automobile Manufacturing Plant's BJ310 is also trying to grab this piece of the pie. Now BMW is rushing in. If our Hongqi does not come out soon, we will have no chance of success."

Geng Weidong called Chief Engineer Wen Biaoshu, Deputy Chief Engineer Yu Jiang, and Design Department Director Wang Le to his office.

Zhao Guangming, the deputy factory director in charge of the Beijing office, was also sitting next to him, discussing countermeasures based on the latest situation at BMW.

"Director, our Hongqi is now designed based on the Audi 100, and the appearance has been finalized."

"The key now is that Audi is willing to sell us the engine and gearbox. Otherwise, it may take many years for us to accomplish it on our own."

Wang Le is also under a lot of pressure now.

FAW's design department originally just played a minor role and did not face much pressure in designing.

But the situation has been different in recent years. Wang Le has several more white hairs on his head.

"The Audi 100 has 1.8L and 2.3L engines, which probably don't have a big advantage over the BMW 2.5L engine."

“And in terms of gearbox, it is also equipped with a 5MT, which is also on par with BMW cars.”

“Should we consider developing more advanced products?”

Although Geng Weidong is an expert, the questions he asked made Wang Le feel like an amateur.

He also wants to develop new engines and new gearboxes.

But he knew best the strength of FAW's Design Department.

Although there are quite a few college students there, they are only capable of doing some basic work, but they lack the ability to creatively develop new products.

Moreover, the existing various production equipment and testing equipment are not sufficient to support them in developing highly competitive new products.

"Director, I'll talk to Audi again. If they're willing to sell us the 2.3L engine and 5MT manual transmission, that would be the best."

"If it really doesn't work, we can just use the prototype to learn from it and develop it."

Wen Biaoshu is an old-school technician who is not at all interested in patents or not.

In his opinion, since the factory attaches so much importance to the Hongqi project and is determined to create a Hongqi car that sells well, there should not be so many concerns.

Anyway, this is China, so even if Audi has some objections, it can only swallow them.

"BMW's sedan will be on the market next year, and it would be best if we could launch new products next year as well."

"In this case, we won't have enough time to develop the products ourselves. At the beginning, we might consider purchasing from Audi."

Wang Le has a strong desire to survive.

Wen Biaoshu is about to retire, so he just talks nonsense. Anyway, there is a high probability that he will not be hit by the stick when the time comes.

But Wang Le is different.

Even if there are samples of Audi's engine and gearbox, it is not easy to imitate and develop them.

Otherwise, China’s automobile industry would not be what it is today.

"From the perspective of the schedule, what Wang Le said makes sense."

"But if we import gearboxes and engines directly from Audi, the production cost of our new generation of Hongqi sedans will be high, and it will also cost a lot of foreign exchange."

Deputy Chief Engineer Yu Jiang also expressed his opinion.

He is also considered to be a person with relatively strong technical capabilities in FAW, and there is a high probability that he will take over Wen Biaoshu's job and become the new chief engineer of FAW in the future.

"The foreign exchange issue is easy to deal with. The country's foreign exchange situation has been better in the past two years. If I work hard, I should be able to get some."

Geng Weidong is quite confident about FAW's influence in China.

For factories such as the Shanghai Automobile Factory, tight foreign exchange quotas have limited their ability to increase the number of models such as Santana.

But at FAW, as long as the new Hongqi sedan is really popular, Geng Weidong feels that foreign exchange will not be a problem.

The top priority is to come up with a competitive product.

"Our design department will try its best to finalize the design of the new Hongqi sedan within this year."

Since it was decided to use the same engine and gearbox as the Audi 100, it would basically be a simple modification of the Audi 100 as the new Hongqi sedan. Wang Le was confident that these modifications could be completed on time. Soon, FAW began to take action.

Another company that is also taking action in response to BMW's move is Shanghai Volkswagen.

Their Santana is very successful now and is in short supply.

"Director Yu, I think it is necessary to speed up the localization of Santana. Otherwise, when BMW's sedan products come out, they will definitely occupy a large part of the official car market and eat into the development space of our Santana."

As the Chinese executive vice general manager of Shanghai Volkswagen assigned by the Shanghai Automobile Manufacturing Plant, Wang Huiliang has a strong sense of crisis.

“我们的桑塔纳采用的是1.6L 4缸直列发动机，最大马力87匹，最大扭矩128牛米/3000转，采用4挡手动变速箱。”

"I heard from the First Ministry of Machine Building that the new BMW sedan uses a 2.5L engine and a 5MT manual transmission, and its overall power performance is much better than ours."

"This situation is really very detrimental to our development."

Yu Jin could sense the crisis without Wang Huiliang saying anything.

During this period, the Shanghai Automobile Manufacturing Plant was doing much better, and the factory director Yu Jin was often invited to banquets.

In order to jump the queue and pick up the car, many people came directly to Yu Jin to find connections.

No matter what era it is, you definitely need to show some respect when making connections.

Yu Jin enjoyed these ideas very much.

"Yes, by then their production will not be restricted by the foreign exchange quota. They will be able to supply as many vehicles as each unit wants to purchase at any time."

"That Jiang Hui has a very good relationship with the First Ministry of Machine Building, and they have the Capital University of Technology as their backer. They are a big threat to us."

Wang Huiliang took stock of various domestic automobile manufacturers and felt that Shanghai Volkswagen’s biggest competitor was BMW.

Other countries like FAW and Second FAW are currently not their rivals.

Especially Second Automobile Works, which had not even produced a single car and was no match for them at all.

"It is difficult to increase the production of Santana, which involves the issue of foreign exchange quota."

"But it is entirely possible to increase the output of our Shanghai-branded cars as long as we make certain modifications to the production line."

"By then, we can more or less resist the impact of BMW cars."

After Yu Jin said this, Wang Huiliang immediately became nervous.

The Santana produced by Shanghai Volkswagen and the Shanghai-branded cars produced by Shanghai Automobile Manufacturing Plant are in competition with each other.

Even Santana is still assembled using the production line of the Shanghai Automobile Manufacturing Plant, and its own new factory has not yet been completed.

At this time, if the increase in the production of Shanghai-branded cars is placed above higher priority projects, it will definitely not be a good thing for Shanghai Volkswagen.

"Director Yu, Shanghai-brand cars are expensive, have low configuration, consume a lot of fuel, and are old. They have been in production since 1958, and have been in production for more than years. They have long been unable to keep up with market demand."

"In the past, people had no choice. We were basically the only domestic automaker that mass-produced cars, so the sales of Shanghai-branded cars were quite good. At one point, there was even a scene where people came with sacks of money to buy cars."

"But times have changed. Whether it's Santana or the BJ310 produced by Capital Automobile Works, their performance is much better than that of Shanghai-branded cars."

"Last year, our production and sales of Shanghai-branded cars had dropped to 3000 units, and we were about to be overtaken by Santana."

Historically, Shanghai-branded cars were produced from 1958 until they were discontinued in 1991, with a total of 79525 units produced.

As the only mass-produced sedan in China before the reform, it has also experienced its own glorious moments.

It’s just that the market is changing too fast, and the Shanghai-branded cars, which look like old cars, can no longer keep up with the pace of development in all aspects.

Shanghai's automobile manufacturers do not have the ability to carry out comprehensive upgrades and replacements, so it is inevitable that it will eventually be eliminated by the market.

In this case, no matter from which angle Wang Huiliang considered it, he did not support reviving the Shanghai-branded cars and making a big fuss about it.

"What you said makes sense, but Shanghai-branded cars don't require foreign exchange."

"Is it possible for us to install the Santana engine on the Shanghai brand car? This can greatly improve the performance of the car and minimize the use of foreign exchange."

Yu Jin proposed a plan that sounded feasible.

However, Wang Huiliang immediately refuted it.

"The engine performance of the Santana is better than that of the Shanghai brand sedan, but the difference between the two is too big."

"One is a 1.6L engine and the other is a 2.2L engine. The weight and size alone are different."

"This requires substantial modifications to the engine compartment of the Shanghai brand car, and the re-adjustment of the installation positions of a series of surrounding parts."

"The most critical thing is that even if the Santana engine is installed on a Shanghai brand car, a series of problems will arise due to the matching of the engine with the entire body and chassis."

“This is not something that can be solved by simply replacing an engine, but a completely new project.”

Knowing that it was impossible, Wang Huiliang would definitely stand up and oppose it.

For a person of his level, the relationship between him and Yu Jin is no longer a simple superior-subordinate relationship.

To a certain extent, they are also competitors.

At least within the Shanghai Automobile Manufacturing Plant, Wang Huiliang and Yu Jin both have their own circles.

Everyone's interests are not completely consistent, and the people below will fight with each other from time to time.

"This is not okay, that is not okay. Are we just going to sit there and watch BMW's new sedan take away the market after it comes on the market?"

Yu Jin complained very dissatisfiedly.

"We will speed up the localization process of Santana to the greatest extent possible, establish a Santana community, and let the relevant supporting factories work with us."

“This should be the most important thing we should do at this stage.”

Wang Huiliang gave his opinion very affirmatively.

He is the executive vice president of Shanghai Volkswagen, and is considered to be a company leader together with the general manager sent by Volkswagen. Naturally, he hopes to develop Santana's business.

"Then we should set a goal to make 50% of Santana's parts localized within next year, so that we can have more foreign exchange to order parts and assemble more Santana."

Following Yu Jin's instructions, the Shanghai public also took quick action.

The entire Chinese automobile industry has ushered in a new wave of changes and developments.

Historically, the rapid development of China's automobile industry is closely related to the localization of Santana.

It was only after Santana was localized that domestic supporting factories achieved technological breakthroughs for many auto parts.

Especially in the development of private auto parts companies, Santana's localization has made a significant contribution.

(End of this chapter)