Zoomlion - one of the top manufacturer of Construction Machines
India is an important market for Zoomlion. Our focus is not only to offer products to this market but also to provide our services and experience to Indian customers. As we have been setting up our Zoomlion India sub-company and other operational facilities such as branch office, spare parts and training centre, we are determined to set up a plant very soon after feasibility study and plant siting are completed. Apart from cranes, we are preparing to introduce our pavers, bulldozers and rotary drill rigs in to the Indian market, says Mr. Yanming Xiong, Vice President, Zoomlion Heavy Industry Science & Technology Development Co. Ltd and General Manager, Mobile Crane Division Zoomlion in an Interview with S.A.Faridi.
For NBM&CW readership community, would you like to brief us on important developments of the company in the last 17 years?
ZOOMLION, a hi-tech public company based on national construction machinery institute is a top brands in equipment industry. With 17 years' efforts, ZOOMLION created a miracle from "7 employees and 75,000 US dollars loan" to the top 20 in global construction machinery manufacturers with nearly 4 billion US dollars revenue in 2008. After the acquisition of Italy CIFA in 2008, Zoomlion ranks No.1 in the world market share of concrete machinery products; annual production of mobile cranes over 8000; tower cranes over 2000; and environmental and sanitation machinery production over 3000.
At present, production bases locate in Hunan, Shanghai, Shaanxi, Guangdong of China as well as Milan of Italy, that is, nine industrial parks with a total area of nearly 3,000,000 square meters. Zoomlion has international management systems of technical development, manufacturing processes and logistics, as well as strong sales network and perfect service system covering the whole domestic market and extending to the oversea market. Zoomlion integrated management system which involved in quality (ISO9001), environment (ISO14001) and occupational health and safety (OHSAS18001), accessed to German TÜV Rheinland authentication. Zoomlion's products take the lead in having obtained CE certification according to EU standard in Chinese construction machinery industry,and acquired GOST certification and Korean Safety certification.
Currently with over 1000 sales and after-sales engineers, Zoomlion sales network spread all over China and more than 20 overseas branches and offices: USA, Gulf, Australia, Russia, Algeria, India, Brazil, Ukraine and Vietnam etc. CIFA has about 100 independent dealers in more than 70 countries.
What have been Zoomlion landmark acquisitions? How these thoughtful acquisitions have made Zoomlion brands as the most preferred brand worldwide in construction manufacturing space?
Recent acquisition of CIFA was Zoomlion's master stroke making Zoomlion a new force in concrete machinery segment. What are Zoomlion future plans in concrete machines and expansion in new areas of business beneficial to Zoomlion, CIFA and to the industry at large following CIFA's acquisition?
On September 28, 2008, Zoomlion signed a purchase agreement with Italy's Compagnia Italiana Forme Acciaio Spa (CIFA), the world's third largest concrete machinery maker. Zoomlion paid 163 million euros ($206.8 million) for a 60 percent stake in CIFA to become a leader in the sector. This achievement realized the coordination between Zoomlion and CIFA. The operation mode of "one group, more brands" promotes Zoomlion to the first group in concrete machinery in the world. In european market, Zoomlion serves as tactical brand and aims at gaining market share to competitors positioned in the price sensitive segments of the market. CIFA serves as strategic brand in Europe and aims to gain market share from the medium and upper end segments. Specifically, CIFA aims at gaining leadership in the western and eastern european markets in concrete pumps applications and striving to become the leading Brand for the tunnelling concrete applications worldwide.
Zoomlion ranked 17th in the world in construction machines manufacturing. Will you please tell us about group's complete product range?
Since its establishment, Zoomlion annual growth rate remains at 60%. Moreover, Zoomlion is the construction machinery business which has the world's most complete product chain, in 13 categories, 28 series and over 450 types, covering concrete machinery, mobile crane, tower crane, road machinery, earthmoving machinery, environmental sanitation machinery, pile foundation machinery, fire fighting machinery, bulk material transportation equipment and special vehicles.
It is indeed heartening that Zoomlion has celebrated its 17th Anniversary, focusing on the unveiling of Zoomion QUY 1000 Crawler crane. What are the main technical attributes of Zoomlion QUY 1000 Crawler crane?
Zoomlion QUY1000 crawler crane is designed and manufactured in order to meet the increased market demands in the construction of nuclear power plants, oil refineries, chemical plants as well as steel plants.
Combining the international advanced technology, suggestions from customers, and long-term accumulated knowledge and experiences, Zoomlion QUY1000 crawler crane meets the international advanced standard.
Product Characteristics and Advantages are Max. loading moment: 15800t.m; Max. lifting height: 198m. Heavy Fixed Jib" Configuration for Lifting Large-size Container, Reliable Safety System: Combined mechanical, electronic and hydraulic safety devices are fitted on the crane, which include CAN bus control technology, intelligent control technology and patented jib hydro-pneumatic tilting-back support. Convenient Conversion on Jobsite and Strong Adaptability to Various Road Condition, Modularization design applied in the crane makes the assembly and dismantling of the crane simple, reliable and convenient. The key components including hydraulic and electrical elements are all provided by international acclaimed manufacturers, which further enhances the reliability of our products. Remote Monitoring System GPS / GPRS.
In crane segment Zoomlion has a long history with extensive crane products portfolio. Is it possible to quantify crane products manufactured over the years and important projects worldwide from Antarctic region to other regions including India where Zoomlion crane products have been effectively deployed?
So far, Zoomlion crane has registered a production capacity of more than 100,000 units of cranes with various models. Zoomlion perform actively in the Antarctica, Bird Nest (Beijing Olympic), Three Gorges Project, Qinghai-Tibet Railway (the highest altitude railway in the world), port construction project in Philippine, the refinery construction project in Singapore, the steel plant in Brazil, the refinery project in Tunis, the bridge construction project in Russia, the assembly of mining equipment in Australia, Essar steel plant and Reliance thermal power plant project in India, and so forth. Zoomlion products has taken worldwide presence in as many as 70 countries and regions in North America, Europe, Australia, Africa, Middle East, Southeast Asia.
A word about Zoomlion Mobile Crane Branch Company, its scale of operation, annual production capacity, crane product range, and also sales revenue of the company?
Zoomlion crane industrial park covers an area of over 660,000 square meters and its annual production value exceeds more than 15 billion yuan and annual output capacity more than 10,000 units, which consists of truck crane ranging from 8t to 150t, all terrain crane from 180t to 350t and crawler crane from 50t to 1000t. Zoomlion scored a sales volume of more than one billion USD in 2008.
Recently Zoomlion made its presence more pronounced with the tie-up with Escorts Construction Equipment Ltd (ECEL) for marketing Truck mounted crane products in India. How this business synergy will be helpful to elevate the marketing of both the companies in providing technically superior options to the customers?
On one hand, Escorts has witnessed moderate development with many years of experience in the construction machinery industry in India, it has established high reputation in the industry and excellent service team as well as extensive marketing network. Meanwhile, it has 30 years of experience in the production of crane and has the production capability. On the other hand, Zoomlion unswervingly sticks to its basic development strategy—internationalization strategy. Highly emphasizes the emerging market as India, Zoomlion hopes to enhance its cooperation with Escorts with the help of its reputation and status in the industry and its network. At the same time, Zoomlion has nearly 50 years of experience in the manufacture and production of cranes, hence can launch extensive communication and cooperation in the techniques and technology of crane, and jointly provide customized products and services that meet the demands of local customers. It is a win-win cooperation between Zoomlion and Escorts.
How your tie-up with Action Construction Equipment (ACE) for the marketing of Crawler & Tower crane and other products is proceeding. Any new product is likely to be added as per market requirement?
It goes pretty well so far. With the cooperation with ACE, Zoomlion tower crane and crawler crane has build up a good brand image and dominated over 1/3 of the market share, and step by step we are introducing more products like material handling equipment. But every time before introducing a new product into Indian market, we always make sure that it will bring values to Indian customers and the industry.
At the moment we are preparing to introduce our pavers, bulldozers and rotary drilling rigs into Indian market, and we are looking for partners on these product lines. We value a win-win partnership with our local distributors.
China and India are emerging as world's powerful manufacturing base for sophisticated construction equipment. How brand Made in China and Made in India can be complementary promoted to take advantages of emerging global marketing efforts synergized to each other advantage?
For ZOOMLION's localization in India, we'll definitely consider establishing business collaborations with local manufactures. We've been talking to some of top manufactures in their respective industries about supplying parts and components locally for ZOOMLION. For example, some parts of our crawler crane will be supplied in India locally, and recently our new 22M truck mounted concrete pump with Ashock Leyland chassis, which is specially customized for our Indian customer, has already been sold to India.
Like India and other countries, China too has announced a massive stimulus package to revive the sagging market. What has been the impact of the financial package on the health of construction equipment industry in China?
In November, 2008, Chinese government worked out a plan of investing 4 trillion RMB Yuan (about 571 billion USD) to promote economic growth during 2009-2010. This move is significant to China's construction machinery industry since the plan mainly focuses on fixed assets investment, and will undoubtedly lead to a high growth of China's construction machinery market from 2009 to 2010.The main benefit from the 10 major areas to the construction machinery industry focuses in the foundation construction of railway, road transportation, water conservancy and after-disaster reconstruction and low-income housing construction, which can bring about 44 billion RMB saleroom to construction machinery industry.
Railway is the key area of this foundation construction. In the first four months of this year, the total capital invested in railway reached 103.23 billion yuan, increased by 170.5% comparing with the same time last year, which is the highest in the history. Anticipatively, it is said that the total investment in railway in 2009 will also reach 600 billion yuan, and the new investment will reach about 300 billion yuan. It means that 15 billion yuan will be poured into construction machinery industry.
What are your plans for the Indian market? Are you planning some investment in terms of putting up a factory or will you just expand your dealership there?
India is an important market to Zoomlion. The situation now happening in India is very likely to the situation happened in 1980's in China, we have noticed that in India the power plants, highways and the port construction is the main focus of Indian Government. This also happened in China in last century. That's why Zoomlion have much more experience and expertise to supply the suitable equipment to these mega construction projects and we believe we can offer very good products and also very good service to Indian market.
For example, a 600 mega power power plant, how to construct it, the lifting solution etc. where Zoomlion have expertise can help Indian companies with suitable equipment and solutions. So our focus is not only to offer the product to the Indian market but also to provide our service, experience and solutions to Indian customers. As we have been setting up our Zoomlion India sub-company and other operational facilities such as branch office, spare parts & training centre, we are determined to set up a plant very soon after feasibility study and plant siting are completed.
What is the market share of Zoomlion in China and in the world?
Currently, we are number six in the world market according to the verdict. But as per our calculation we are number four as we at Zoomlion crane division include just our truck crane and crawler crane and not rest of the other cranes like tower crane, Knuckle boom crane and so on. Ranking depends on the types of products being included in each companies product portfolio and because of this difference in calculation results is different in ranking.
But we don't think this ranking is really important. The most important thing, we believe is that the market accepts our products and our Brand Zoomlion.
Where do you see Zoomlion after five years in the world?
Target to Zoomlion group is very clear, we want to join the top ten within ten years. We are clear that we want to join the top ten, globalization is definitely necessary. How to realize the globalization of Zoomlion group, we have all opinion for this. From the view of our CEO Mr. Jan, retain the extend of the products and make the range of the products increase. We are still very young and after ten years, we'll see the results. This is all due to hard work.
NBMCW November 2009
