Chinese consumers are no strangers to the Suzuki brand, and 30 years ago, a Suzuki King motorcycle would have made anyone's home more stylish than a BMW 5-series today. Unfortunately, due to poor management, the Suzuki brand withdrew from the Chinese market last year.
However, did you know that March 15 of this year marks the 100th anniversary of the Suzuki brand? So what other amazing things has this brand, which we remember as being focused on building cars and motorcycles, done in its long history?
In 1887, Suzuki's founder, Michio Suzuki, was born in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan, into a rural family. Those familiar with Japanese history know that Hamamatsu is the cradle of Japan's famous manufacturing industry, where Honda and Yamaha both got their start.
The experience of harvesting cotton with his mother as a child led Michio Suzuki to develop an industrial dream of turning cotton into white cloth by means of machinery and equipment. 1901, Michio Suzuki was apprenticed to an apprentice, and eight years later, he started his own factory, Suzuki Loom Works. The looms produced by this company were of consistent quality and excellent performance, and once launched, they were filled with orders, earning Suzuki his first bucket of gold.
But the good times didn't last long, and the ensuing World War II decimated the originally thriving loom business, and Michio Suzuki seized the opportunity of the post-war resumption of production to start producing transportation, and Suzuki's earliest creation was the motorcycle. The principle is very simple, on the basis of the original bicycle to add a set of single-cylinder two-stroke internal combustion engine, drive the bicycle forward.
Gradually, the higher-end and more sophisticated business of four-wheeled vehicles came to be covered by Suzuki, and with the onset of the two global oil crises, the compact, ultra-low-fuel-consumption Suzuki minivan was widely accepted, and sales skyrocketed once again.
At this time, Suzuki, which was making a lot of money, also had the money to start expanding in other areas, such as marine hookups, which is now almost one of the best brands in the world, and the models cover a wide range of horsepower ranges, which are popular with consumers.
In the field of medical equipment, Suzuki's presence is also very strong, rechargeable power-controlled wheelchairs to solve the problem of traveling inconvenient patients, a sensation in the medical community at the time.
It was the spirit of tireless development in every field that made Suzuki a world-famous multinational, but it was also the obsession that prevented it from integrating perfectly into the Chinese market. But whatever the case, let's congratulate Suzuki on its 100th birthday.
This article was written by the author of Automotive Home, and does not represent the views of Automotive Home.