German machine tool companies focus on developing the mid-end market in China

Data show that global machine tool consumption increased by about 9.3% last year, but this year has slowed down. Martin Kapp, chairman of the European Machine Tool Council and the German Machine Tool Manufacturers Association, said recently that the world's machine tool consumption is expected to increase by only 2% this year, but the total consumption will reach an unprecedented 68.1 billion euros. And there are indications that next year's machine tool consumption will resume rapid growth and create a new industry record. Although the global market demand for machine tools has slowed down this year, China's machine tool market still maintains a relatively fast growth rate, leading the development of the Asian market. As the world's largest producer and consumer of machine tools, China is playing an increasingly important role in the global machine tool market. Martin Kapp said that China has become the largest market in the European machine tool industry, and its growth rate is also the fastest. According to the forecast of the German Machine Tool Manufacturers Association, by 2017, China's machine tool consumption will be between 30.6 billion and 37.6 billion euros, while this figure was 23.9 billion euros last year. Wilfried Schaefe, executive director of the German Machine Tool Manufacturers Association, said that China is an important export destination for Germany, accounting for nearly 30% of total exports in 2012. Data show that the German machine tool industry exported about 8.3 billion euros last year, of which more than 2.4 billion euros came from China. While exports from the German machine tool industry fell by 3% in the first half of the year, exports to China rose by 6%, accounting for 27% of the total. This makes it necessary for the German machine tool industry to maintain its market share in China. According to reports, in the eyes of German companies, the mid-end market is the most potential market. However, in the mid-end product market, German companies face strong competition from Chinese companies. Because the technological level gap between the two countries in this field is relatively small, Chinese companies provide better services to customers. The survey of the German Machine Tool Manufacturers Association shows that compared with German machine tool companies, Chinese companies usually establish service and distribution centers covering the mainland to ensure that they can fulfill the 1-2 year warranty and full-life after-sales promised to customers. Serve. Even on holidays, the after-sales staff of Chinese companies can arrive at the customer's location within 48 hours to provide customers with repairs and spare parts at a lower cost. In contrast, the customer experience of German machine tool after-sales service is not ideal, which is mainly due to the gap with Chinese machine tool companies in response speed and maintenance cost. Therefore, the German Machine Tool Builders Association calls on German machine tool companies to properly localize products with small Ru0026D and technology gaps in China, and enter a large number of markets through local production, but still maintain an import strategy in the field of high-end products. Narrow the service gap with Chinese machine tool companies, enhance service flexibility and communicate with customers.