Affected by the epidemic, the global automobile industry suffered a major blow.
Car companies close 100 factories, and global car production will be halved?
Like the suspension of production experienced by China car companies, the factories of overseas car companies are also faced with the situation that they have to stop production in order to avoid the widespread spread of the epidemic caused by large-scale gathering. Recently, many car companies including Ford, Toyota and Volkswagen announced that they would stop production.
Toyota plans to suspend production at five Japanese factories from April 3. Among them, Toyota Kyushu Miyata Factory mainly produces Lexus CT, es, NX, UX, RX and other models. According to Gu Ge, since all the models currently on sale in Lexus are purely imported, prospective Lexus owners generally have to wait about three months to pick up their cars. If the factory stops production, the time for China consumers to pick up their cars may be extended.
Not only that, Toyota's factories in Europe, North America, the Philippines, Malaysia and other places have to be temporarily closed. As the world's largest automobile group, Toyota's global sales in 2009 was 20 10742 million vehicles, up 1.4% year-on-year. Affected by the global epidemic, Toyota, which has maintained steady growth, will face a decline in 2020.
Ford Motor Company, another big auto giant, also announced earlier that its North American and European factories will stop production, and it will also suspend the production of vehicles and engines in its factories in India, Thailand, Vietnam and South Africa. Ford said that on the one hand, the factory stopped production because of the safety of the company's employees, on the other hand, the supply of spare parts was difficult and the demand dropped sharply, so the factory had to be closed.
This decision is not easy for Ford, which is seeking to turn losses into profits and achieve a comprehensive recovery. At present, Ford has withdrawn its previously announced financial performance target for 2020, which will be re-released at the end of April. Fortunately, as another main battlefield of Ford, the China automobile market is releasing a good signal.
In an official statement, Volkswagen, the German automobile company at the center of the storm, announced that most German and European factories would stop working one after another, and the initial planned shutdown time was about three weeks. However, Volkswagen's factory in China has basically resumed normal production.
Diss, the "helmsman" of Audi AG, said that under the influence of "China experience", Volkswagen is closing its European factories in an orderly manner, and more and more employees are working from home, and some process systems are also making adjustment plans according to the development of the epidemic. At present, Volkswagen has reservations about its performance expectations in 2020, and it is expected that the car delivery this year will be consistent with last year.
The epidemic swept the world, and no car company was spared in the "catastrophe". In addition to the above Volkswagen, Ford, Toyota, GM, Nissan PSA, FCA and other car companies also suffered heavy losses, including domestic independent car companies. Global trends remain unclear. Although the China market is expected to pick up in the second quarter, some professional organizations in the industry predict that global automobile sales will drop by nearly 40% year-on-year! Is this data exaggerated or conservative? We won't know until the end of the year.
Learn from China car companies, and overseas car companies have also started to produce masks and ventilators.
COVID-19 first spread widely in China, which caught us off guard, but it also accumulated valuable experience in stumbling. Today, the whole world is shrouded in the same shadow. It is a shortcut to "copy homework" from China.
In the past, Wuling Automobile and Guangzhou Automobile Group produced masks and donated them to the society, which reflected the responsibility and social responsibility of big car companies. Now, Volkswagen, GM, Nissan, Ford, Ferrari and other car companies have also begun to switch to the production of short-term medical equipment such as ventilators. In the United States, Tesla, Ford and General Motors have expressed their readiness to provide assistance to the government.
On the other hand, FCA plans to renovate a factory in China and produce masks in the next few weeks. FCA has set a monthly production target of 65,438+0,000 masks, which will be supplied to the police/medical ambulance personnel/police in the United States, Canada and Mexico later.
Volkswagen, which has several factories in China, has also started a new production plan-producing masks, which will be donated to the German health department later. Volkswagen also decided to provide all-round assistance to the German medical system, including purchasing protective clothing, medical gloves, thermometers and ventilators from China and transporting them to Germany.
If the epidemic does not pass, the global automobile industry will be mired in the mud. At this time, car companies should concentrate their superior resources and make every effort to provide a solid force to fight the epidemic. There are more car companies to join!
It is gratifying that the results of China's "anti-epidemic" have begun to appear, and all walks of life are returning to work in an orderly manner. However, with the improvement of economic globalization, China's economy will also be seriously affected by foreign epidemics. The automobile industry is just a microcosm of it. The "catastrophe" is coming, and I wish people all over the world success in fighting the "epidemic"!
This article comes from car home, the author of the car manufacturer, and does not represent car home's position.