Three Japanese Auto Giants to Tap Chinese Market

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, September 24, 2002

Three Japanese Auto Giants to Tap Chinese Market

On September 19, Japanese Nissan forged a cooperation partnership with China's Dongfeng Motor Corp., the two have decided to set up a joint venture in Wuhan next year.

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On September 19, Japanese Nissan forged a cooperation partnership with China's Dongfeng Motor Corp., the two have decided to set up a joint venture in Wuhan next year.

And last August 29 saw Toyota and China's FAW Group sign a partnership agreement, another Japanese carmaker Honda announced in July that it would set up a production base in Guangzhou.

Up to now, three Japanese carmakers have all made overall strategies to tap Chinese market.

Actually, Japanese carmakers did not enter Chinese market until 1980s and 1990s after a period of waiting and hesitation.

According to Jia Xinguang, a senior researcher in China's Auto Industry Research Institute, Japanese carmakers now change their strategy of only selling cars to China, but also including technology.

Nissan promised that by 2006, it will invest 30 billion Japanese yen in China and introduce all its car series, Toyota expressed that it will launch Toyota T-1 specially designed for Chinese on October 8, and it will set up a first class car production base in China. Honda (Guangzhou) said it would continue to expand technology and investment in China.

Insiders said that Japanese carmakers began to look into Chinese market in early 1980s, but they thought that Chinese salary was generally very low at that time, so it did not attach much importance to Chinese market, but only exported cars.

Despite Japanese cars always rank No.1 in China, but China only import 30000-40000 cars every year, while German Volkswagen and American GM, who set up factories in China at a very early time, have already earned a lot.

Among the three Japanese car giants, Honda took the lead in cooperating with Guangzhou Auto Group, it paid some 4 billion yuan in tax last year alone, its economical cars are going to be available in market next year.

Since this year, China's car output increased by 30%-40% over the same period of last year, plus German Volkswagen, American GM and Toyota, Japanese another two auto giants Toyota and Nissan can not help waiting.

Nissan and Toyota's cooperation with China's two auto giants Dongfeng and FAW will help them achieve more in China.

Jia said that latecomers surpassing oldtimers is generally Japanese characteristic, but we need to wait to see whether it will succeed.

Although Honda has a little success, its scale is not large compared with Volkswagen and GM.

Volkswagen's success in China should be greatly attributed to the shortage of various cars at that time, Guangzhou Honda, and Shanghai GM's triumph also result from China's lack of medium and high-class cars at that time. But now, as more and more cars emerge, there are not many shortages.

Apart from market factor, Japanese car manufacturers also face competitions from Volkswagen and GM.

Volkswagen's most successful factor lies in its sound sales system besides its early entry to China.

As it has announced it is no easy for latecomers to catch up with it.

Although American GM got into China in 1998, it does not pale Volkswagen in its car sales volume.

It really keeps us in suspense to see whether latecomer Japan can come up in China's market.

By PD Online Staff Li Yan

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