SoftBank Chief Executive Masayoshi Son has announced a partnership with Chinese automaker BYD to supply 300 million masks a month to Japan starting in May.
Son said on Twitter that SoftBank would work with the Japanese government's "mask team" to prioritize the supply of two different types of masks for healthcare workers to address shortages caused by the outbreak.
As one of the world's largest new-energy vehicle companies, BYD gained a new identity during the outbreak -- the world's largest mass-produced mask factory. Today, BYD's mask production line is at full capacity, with a daily production capacity of 5 million respectively.
Respirators: I'm too hard
And as the epidemic continues to spread, many countries are drawing on the experience of Chinese companies switching to the production of medical supplies and coordinating the transition of their manufacturing companies to produce respiratory and other equipment in short supply.
Ventilators play a very important role in this outbreak. The new coronavirus damages lung function and produces a large amount of mucus in the lungs, which prevents the absorption of oxygen and reduces blood oxygen saturation concentration, further harming the body. The role of the ventilator is to ensure the oxygen level in the blood by delivering oxygen outside the body, maintaining the vital activity needs of critically ill patients, and buying time for more clinical means of treatment.
In other words for critically ill patients, the ventilator has become an indispensable piece of equipment in the process of saving the lives of new crown patients.
Earlier this month, CNN reported that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said that at the current rate of depletion, the local stockpile of much-needed ventilators for critically ill patients would be depleted in six days.
There is a huge shortage of ventilators as the outbreak continues to spread around the world. The American Society of Critical Care Medicine estimates that the shortage of ventilators in the United States may reach 760,000 units, and with the addition of countries such as Italy, Spain, Britain and Germany, the future shortage of ventilators will be as high as millions of units.
But unlike common epidemic prevention supplies such as masks, ventilators, as an expensive, long production cycle and complex supply chain, are usually regarded as intensive care unit equipment, and thus capacity and production are largely limited.
It's been reported that it can typically take as many as 40 days to produce a ventilator, and assembly requires trained staff. In addition, a ventilator is made up of a wide range of parts and components from suppliers all over the world, meaning that short-term increases in production are not easy to achieve during an epidemic.
European and U.S. carmakers are switching to respirators
The U.K. was the first country to advocate that carmakers switch to respirators.
In mid-March, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson delivered a speech to companies including Ford, Honda, Rolls-Royce and excavator maker JCB, discussing whether their production lines could be used to switch to the production of medical equipment, including ventilators. This comes after the UK's Department of Health revealed that in a worst-case scenario, an extra 20,000 ventilators would be needed for the NHS (NHS England), which only has about 5,000 adult ventilators and 900 children's ventilators.
And at the moment, Vauxhall, Honda and Toyota have already begun manufacturing preparations for ventilators and other related equipment.
Italy is at the center of the pandemic, and the country's government has moved to dramatically increase the number of ICU beds, many of which will need ventilators to keep patients breathing.
FCA, Ferrari, and and parts maker Marelli are working with Siare?Engineering, a medical device maker based in northern Italy, to make ventilator parts and possibly help with ventilator assembly. Italy has asked Siare to boost monthly production of ventilators from 160 to 500 units after the outbreak brought the healthcare system to its knees.
German carmaker Volkswagen is also exploring the use of 3D printing technology to make ventilators along with other manufacturers around the world in the face of the growing epidemic in Germany, according to Reuters. VW has formed a task force to look at how 3D printing can be used to help make ventilators and other medical devices. It's worth bringing up the fact that VW has more than 125 industrial 3D printers.
A similar script is playing out across the Atlantic in the United States. The U.S. has initiated the Defense Production Act, which authorizes automotive companies such as Ford, General Motors and Tesla to manufacture respirators.
As previously reported by The Wall Street Journal, GM is working with ventilator maker Ventec?Life?Systems to arrange for 1,000 workers to produce ventilators at its parts plant in Indiana, with an expected capacity of 10,000 units per month. Rather than retrofitting GM's existing production lines, the companies are said to be using excess factory space to build the ventilator line, and the main technology will still be provided by Ventec. GM says it will deliver 6,000 units in late April.
Also involved in ventilator manufacturing is Ford. Ford has partnered with GE Healthcare and 3M to produce much-needed medical equipment and supplies such as ventilators for paramedics, first responders and patients. As previously planned, Ford will produce 1,500 ventilators by the end of April, 12,000 by the end of May and 50,000 by July 4 of this year. In addition, UAW workers will participate in the effort on a voluntary basis, with workers working three shifts.
Last week, Tesla posted a small YouTube video about four minutes long showing off the Tesla-brand respirator. The best part about the ventilator is that it was possible to build a prototype of the respirator using only existing parts on hand. As Tesla's vice president of engineering, Lars?Moravy, explains, Tesla can help healthcare organizations without encroaching on medical equipment resources.
In addition to this prototype, Musk tweeted that Tesla plans to restart its Buffalo, N.Y., factory to produce ventilators in partnership with Irish ventilator maker Medtronic.
In fact, the "wartime" mobilization of car companies is nothing new. Historically, U.S. automakers have helped the government produce much-needed equipment. During World War II, General Motors, Ford, and other automakers transformed automobile factories to make tanks, airplanes, and other military equipment and weapons, earning Detroit the nickname "Arsenal of Democracy".
While a number of car companies are confidently joining the respiratory conversion war, but there are still experts and the media are pessimistic. Previously, the head of medical technology of the German Machinery Production Association, Niklas?Kuczaty, said that in just a few months, it is unrealistic to produce complex medical products such as ventilators. In addition to the technical barriers to production mentioned above, car companies face other challenges in producing ventilators, such as quickly completing the vetting process to qualify for production.
But does that mean it's not a good idea for car companies to switch to producing ventilators? Obviously not. Car companies have enough strength to switch to most of the world's industrial products, but in order to switch to the fastest speed, or to make full use of existing resources, such as parts suppliers to join the identity of the relevant industries, or with medical equipment manufacturers to cooperate. After all, the epidemic is current and time waits for no one.
Wen/Lily Sun
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
WeChat search "AutoCommons " and "one sentence review" to follow the WeChat public number, or visit the Daily Automobile news network for more industry information.
This article comes from the authors of AutoCommons, and does not represent the views of AutoCommons.