Machine tool remanufacturing industry slump expects policy support

Since the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the 11 ministries and commissions of the National Development and Reform Commission jointly issued the "Opinions on Promoting the Development of Remanufacturing Industries," the concept of "remanufacturing" has received continuous attention, and machine tool remanufacturing is the three major remanufacturing fields in parallel with auto parts and construction machinery. One, caused great concern in the industry. However, the development of the machine tool remanufacturing market is not easy and even people feel that the speed of advancement is somewhat slow. Wei Liancheng, chairman of the China Mechanical and Electrical Equipment Maintenance and Transformation Technology Association and chairman of the Machine Tool Remanufacturing Industry Technology Innovation Strategic Alliance, stated that “the remanufacturing of machine tools, especially the industrialization of machine tool remanufacturing, is currently subject to both policy and market constraints.”

The remanufacturing of machine tools undoubtedly fits the concepts of circular economy and green environmental protection. Therefore, the heat has not diminished in recent years. According to statistics, compared with manufacturing new products, remanufacturers can save energy by 60%, save materials by 70%, and save costs by 50%. Therefore, remanufacturing not only can obtain better economic benefits, but also can simultaneously obtain immeasurable environmental and social benefits.

Wei Liancheng pointed out that in accordance with the current domestic market with 8 million machine tools, estimated annual elimination rate of 2%, the annual phase-out amounted to 160,000 units, actually forming a large remanufacturing market base.

Professor Cao Huajun, deputy director of the Institute of Manufacturing Engineering of Chongqing University, has a more systematic and comprehensive study of machine tool remanufacturing technology. He pointed out that machine tool products should have a complete chain of sales-maintenance-remanufacturing, borrowing from the concept of the automotive aftermarket, and machine tools. Remanufacturing should belong to the aftermarket of machine tools, and will form a larger profit space. Different from the remanufacturing of auto parts, the remanufacturing of machine tools is mostly creative remanufacturing, which realizes the function upgrade and numerical control, and does not belong to restorative remanufacturing, showing higher added value.

Maintenance and renovation are still the mainstream

At present, the main force engaged in the remanufacturing of machine tools in China is the professional machine tool remanufacturing enterprise. It is actually a machine tool repairing and transforming enterprise. In addition, there are also machine tool manufacturers and CNC system manufacturers. These three types of enterprises constitute the current domestic machine tool remanufacturing. main body.

China's machine tool remanufacturing business still remains at the stage of maintenance and numerical control transformation. “Especially maintenance and renovation of large and heavy machine tools are the main factors, so obviously it is difficult to form batch and industrialization.” Wei Liancheng believes that compared to mature remanufacturing industries in Europe and America, the repair and reconstruction of our large and heavy machine tools is in remanufacturing. Primary Stage.

According to Wei Liancheng, there are currently hundreds of equipment reform companies in the domestic market. They come from two systems. In recent years, many enterprises have separated the auxiliary businesses, such as machine repair workshops and branch factories, and established independent businesses. At the same time, a large number of professional and technical personnel have formed private reform companies have emerged, they together formed the current machine tool repair and transformation industry.

In fact, Wuhan Huazhong Automation Technology Co., Ltd., which is a pilot unit for the remanufacturing of machine tools of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and Jinan Xinjier Technology Co., Ltd., which is also a member of the alliance, have connections with Wuhan Heavy Machine Tool Group and Jinan Second Machine Tool Group.

Machine tool manufacturing companies have great advantages in remanufacturing, but the reality is that due to the very good market conditions of new machine tools, these companies often do not have the energy to engage in remanufacturing operations, and they also worry that remanufacturing products will affect the sales of new machine tools. Machine tool manufacturers even have a natural resistance to remanufacturing operations. This is exactly what Wei Liancheng describes as a market constraint.

Circular Economy Policy Orientation

At present, the machine tool industry in developed countries such as the United States, Japan, and Germany has been sluggish, but the transformation of machine tools has become a new growth point. This is very worthy of reference for China's machine tool industry.

In the United States, there are more than 300 companies specializing in machine tool remanufacturing. The classification is very fine. Professional companies are responsible for the remanufacturing of large multi-functional machines, gear processing machines, and metal cutting machine tools, and after-sales and quality assurance are provided. Europe and the United States have formed a relatively complete old logistics system. Remanufacturers recycle used machine tools through various channels, evaluate the value, redesign, and mark the “remanufacturing” label after manufacturing, and re-enter the market. This actually avoids the suspicion of remanufactured products that are feared by most users in the country.

Remanufactured products are regarded as “counterfeit and shoddy” products affecting the reputation of the enterprise. Most machine tool manufacturers are very worried. This actually reflects that the system of remanufacturing product positioning, supervision, and certification is still missing or unclear. Policy issues such as intellectual property rights and taxation are indeed one of the important reasons for the current low re-manufacturing enthusiasm of enterprises. In particular, it is difficult to offset the sales tax of re-manufacturing enterprises' VAT.

The industry believes that the relevant departments should accelerate the development of the machine tool remanufacturing industry from the perspective of circular economy, encourage machine tool manufacturers to enter the remanufacturing market, promote the industrialization of machine tool remanufacturing, and provide clear preferential policy support as soon as possible, such as tax incentives and financial subsidies.