Since December 1, excavators, loaders and other non-road mobile machinery from the "National III" emission standards to the "National IV" emission standards, green development has become a must answer in the construction machinery industry.

Since 2022, enterprises in the construction machinery industry have planned ahead, seized the outlet of emission standard switching, actively promoted transformation and upgrading, and made remarkable achievements in the development of high-end and major equipment, breakthroughs in electrification and intelligence, as well as the improvement of international competitiveness.

Promoting technological innovation

On July 26, 2022, the world's largest rotary drilling rig XR1600E was released in the new intelligent manufacturing base of Xugong Foundation Construction Machinery Co., LTD. The product successfully solves the construction problem of super-large diameter and ultra-deep pile in the complex environment of super-large bridge engineering, and will boost the efficient construction of "super project".

The relevant person in charge of Xugong foundation introduced that, after years of technical accumulation, the company has fully mastered the core technology in the field of basic engineering construction equipment, has the industry's most complete type spectrum of super-large tonnage rotary drilling rig, and has achieved batch sales and application.

Since 2022, Chinese construction machinery enterprises have, as always, implemented the strategy of innovation-driven development, strengthened the close integration of industry, university, research and application, put a number of internationally advanced and world-leading engineering equipment on the market, and promoted and applied a number of scientific research achievements and major technical equipment, which have better met the needs of national economic construction and major projects.

"Continue to promote innovation, Chinese construction machinery in the last two years continuous flowering." Lyu Ying, deputy secretary-general of the China Construction Machinery Association, told reporters that not only a number of high-end construction machinery and major technical equipment have been developed and applied, but also many equipment have made major breakthroughs in the limit parameters.

Lv Ying introduced that, for example, the development of the ultra-small shield tunneling machine with a diameter of less than 3 meters has been successful. Such a small volume needs to be loaded with many functional parts, and many problems need to be solved in the integration of components and lightweight of mechanism parts. For example, the automobile crane to achieve lightweight, open a wider range of applications.

Behind the improvement of the performance and parameters of the whole machine is the improvement of the level of the whole construction machinery industry chain. A number of large backbone complete machine enterprises in China have been accelerating the process of localization of parts, actively carrying out research and development, manufacturing and testing of high-end parts. The localization rate of high-end parts has been continuously improving, and new progress has been made in the development and testing of some key parts. A number of core component manufacturers have accelerated the deep integration of the industrial chain with the whole machine enterprises. Some have moved from the production of alternative products to the host supporting market, and some have entered the supporting supply system of high-end brand construction machinery manufacturers, realizing the industrial upgrading.For the exploration of high-end construction machinery industry, Du Youwei, academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences and professor of Nanjing University, said at the International Summit Forum on Innovation and Frontier Technology of construction machinery Industry in Xuzhou, China, that the biggest difficulty for high-end construction machinery and its key components is the new materials suitable for them. The upstream and downstream industry chains of construction machinery should make collaborative innovation, accelerate the deep integration of "government, production, education, research, finance and application" of the new material industry, and realize the independent control of key core technologies and high-end core components as soon as possible.

Accelerating smart transformation

Recently, after the preliminary trial, SANY International officially delivered 15 "Electric Pioneer" pure electric wide-body dump trucks to Gansu Tailongsen Mining. In the performance presentation held at the end of the first quarter of 2022, the relevant person in charge of Sany International said that in 2021, the sales proportion of intelligent and electricized products in the company's total products has increased to about 15%. In the future, under the premise that electric technology can fully meet different working conditions, the company will no longer develop fuel version products.

Under the background of low-carbon development, the construction machinery industry has made outstanding achievements in green development. Tianyan data show that in the past five years, the compound growth rate of the number of patent applications related to electric construction machinery has reached 30%. At present, the permeability of electric construction machinery is low in China. With the continuous maturity of lithium industry chain and further decrease of battery cost, the permeability of electric construction machinery will increase rapidly in the next 3 years.

Lv Ying analyzed that the price of new energy products of construction machinery is still relatively high, on the one hand, because the quantity has not risen, on the other hand, the industrial chain is not mature enough. Now the leading enterprises in the industry are doing new energy products, and the technological route is similar. Who can do it finally depends on the integration ability of the industrial chain. In the future, with the increase of application scenarios, there will be considerable development space for new energy products.

According to the China Construction Machinery Association, the proportion of electric driving products in forklifts has risen from 27.7 percent to 60 percent. Lifting working platform electric rate has exceeded 90%; Electric or hybrid cranes and bulldozers have realized small batch production; Other construction machinery electrification has also made a new breakthrough.

At the same time, construction machinery industry in the intelligent attack. On October 31, 2022, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced the 2022 pilot demonstration list of the integrated development of the new generation of information technology and manufacturing. With its innovative practice and leading strength in digital intelligent transformation, Sany Group was selected as the first batch of "Digital Leader" enterprises. Also in October, the World Economic Forum (WEF) released a new list of 11 beacon factories in the global manufacturing sector, and SANY Changsha No. 18 factory was listed. The No. 18 factory is the second certified lighthouse factory in the global heavy industry after SANY's Beijing Piling machine factory.

Yi Xiaogang, director, CEO and chief engineer of SANY Group, revealed that before and after the intelligent manufacturing transformation of Lighthouse Factory, the number of production line workers in Changsha No. 18 factory has been reduced by nearly two thirds, but the capacity has doubled, from the original monthly production of more than 400 sets of equipment to more than 900 sets of capacity. The benefits brought by intelligent manufacturing have been greatly improved. At present, Sany Group is accelerating the transformation of digital intelligence. The company has put forward the "three three" strategy, hoping to use 3,000 workers and 30,000 engineers in the future to achieve 300 billion yuan of sales.

Deepening the international market

With the continuous improvement of product competitiveness, more and more construction machinery products go abroad and become the best seller in the international market.

Data from China Construction Machinery Association showed that 220,797 excavators were sold from January to October 2022, down 26 percent year-on-year. Among them, 131,340 units were sold in China, down 46.4% year on year. Exports reached 89,457 units, up 67.3 percent year-on-year. Since April 2021, the sales volume of domestic excavators has continuously declined in one month compared with the same period last year, while exports have maintained a rapid growth trend.

"The rapid export growth reflects the gradual strengthening of the overseas competitiveness of Chinese excavators." Sany Heavy industry relevant person said.

Chinese construction machinery industry enterprises actively carry out international development strategy and improve product technology level and international market reputation significantly. Up to now, the overseas business of enterprises in the industry has covered more than 170 countries and regions. Overseas research and development, manufacturing, marketing, service and human resources have been further improved and improved, which has become a strong support for expanding the international market and establishing international brands.

Lv Ying said that the rapid growth of exports is the result of a variety of factors, such as the improvement of the competitiveness and service ability of construction machinery enterprises, the expansion of business coverage and the deepening of user penetration. At present, the international market still has a lot of room to open up, including the replacement of existing market stock, and the new application fields brought by product upgrading and process innovation.

"Many companies have done a good job of internationalizing their layout and have their own advantages and characteristics in marketing services." In the future, more industry synergy should be reflected, and enterprises should cooperate with each other to support each other overseas, smooth all links of the industrial chain, and jointly maintain a good competitive environment, Lv suggested. Fundamentally speaking, we need to continue to deepen supply-side structural reform and improve more details. In the future, with the improvement of R&D, manufacturing and industrial chain coordination, Chinese enterprises are capable of doing better in the international market.

Looking ahead to 2023, what is the future of the construction machinery industry? Su Zimeng, president of China Construction Machinery Industry Association, said that the three departments recently jointly issued the "Notice on consolidating the recovery trend and Strengthening the revitalization of Industrial economy", which provides a new policy guarantee for consolidating the recovery trend of the construction machinery industry. Under the influence of multiple adverse factors, China's economy is expected to achieve steady growth in 2022, which will have a positive impact on next year's economic development. Under the guidance of the policy orientation of stabilizing expectation and employment, China's investment in infrastructure and manufacturing will grow steadily. Coupled with the continuous implementation of measures to stabilize growth in various regions and sectors and the strong resilience of China's construction machinery export, the industry is expected to continue to show a stable operation in 2023.