R&D is the key

Regardless of the matching market or the replacement market, product quality is a key factor, especially for a tire company whose history and brand are not dominant. Past sales growth and customer accrual are the best proof of the quality of Magis tires, and now the company has not stopped investing in research and development.

"Automotive Business Review" reporter in Kunshan, Zhengzheng Rubber invested Rmb1bn R&D center and one of the best professional test sites in China.

The R&D center has more than 300 technicians and uses the world's most advanced R&D equipment, including the dynamic testing machine and high-speed UF. The test site covers an area of ​​more than 100 million square meters, the test track length of 5 kilometers, design speed of 240 kilometers per hour, with vibration noise, wetland cycle, a variety of road braking performance, MTS test stand and other test conditions and equipment.

According to Luo Cairen's introduction, the test site will be used by companies and agencies such as auto industry customers and automobile associations in addition to Maggies' personal use, to increase the overall level of testing in the domestic tire industry.

Under Zhengxin's subsidiary, Kunshan's R&D centers and test sites are dedicated to serving the global Majis brand. The group also has an R&D center in Xiamen, which mainly provides support for Zhengxin brand, and R&D centers in Taiwan, the United States, and the Netherlands. There is a division of labor and emphasis. Some special environmental tests, such as snow tires, domestic Heihe, foreign countries in New Zealand, Sweden, have fixed test items every year.

The perfect R&D test supports the continuous upgrading of products and technologies. Taking the waltz green environmental protection series tires just launched by Magisi this summer as an example, compared with other tires of the same specifications, its rolling resistance is greatly reduced to reduce the ground Friction achieves the purpose of fuel economy, while material improvements overcome the contradiction of small friction coefficient affecting grip. Fuel economy is not lost to similar products in terms of braking performance.

The biggest selling point of this series of products is the "high air-breathing rate" - the tire inner surface glue adds the latest scientific and technological achievements in the industry DVA synthetic materials, enhances the tightness of the rubber, and the air-retention rate is more than 30% higher than that of ordinary tires. Worry about tire pressure. This technology can also reduce the weight of the tires, coupled with a reasonable reduction in tire pressure, rolling resistance, can make the tire durability increased by 50%, to achieve the dual environmental effects of fuel conservation and extended life.

Force replacement market

After the products were approved and matched, Maggies began to develop sales channels and replace the market.

Compared with the big brands that entered the mainland market earlier, the construction of sales channel of Majes was both late and less. In 2000, it began to spread the net. There are more than 700 image stores, more than 5,000 contracted online stores, and more than 100. Home agents, the scale is not large.

Although the brand is not a strong factor, capacity constraints are also one of the reasons for the slow development of the channels of Magisi. At present, its Kunshan base has a maximum production capacity of 16 million, nearly 50% of which are exported overseas, and the rest is for manufacturers. The expansion of the replacement market has already stretched its production capacity. The company's new factory in Chongqing currently has an annual output of 8 million, and plans to reach 12 million by the end of this year.

Corresponding to the end market, Luo Cairen plans to expand the number of image stores to 1,000 at the end of this year, but he stressed that the quantity is not the most pressing demand of Margies. He also pays more attention to the image store to provide more services and improve customer loyalty. “The important thing is single-storey capacity. Now each store sells 80 tires a month on average. We hope to increase it to 100, and we don’t want to expand the store to 6,000. This is a qualitative improvement.”

In 2009, the domestic sales volume of Magisi was 10 million, and the sales amount was 2.5 billion yuan, an increase of 24% year-on-year. In the first half of this year, sales reached 1.5 billion yuan. Luo Cairen said that the company’s sales target for this year ranks among the top three in the country and hopes to reach a sales amount of 3 billion yuan. According to the low-key and conservative nature of Margies, what he said is often the goal.