How are the employees of Ningxia Little Giant Machine Tool Company treated?

Ningxia Little Giant Machine Tool Co., Ltd., a Sino-foreign joint venture with excellent returns controlled by the Chinese party, has become a wholly Japanese-owned company under favorable circumstances.

The Chinese side holds an absolute advantage of 75% of the equity. On the surface, the chairman is Chinese, the company is in Ningxia, China, and most of the workers and leaders are Chinese. The company seems to be in Chinese hands, but in fact, Because it does not master core technologies and lacks core competitiveness, China has been reduced to the role of a wage earner from the beginning. Core technology is the most important thing for multinational companies, and there are few successful cases of obtaining core technology from joint ventures. We keep saying that we want to "use foreign capital," but in fact we often "get used by foreign capital."

The "Little Giant Case" calls on us to refresh our traditional thinking on attracting investment and take the road of independent innovation.

The little giant is "too soft-hearted" and the Japanese merchant "is a small fish eating a big fish"

Wang Xuewei, the former director of Ningxia Great Wall Suqi Foundry, is over 70 years old, but he has been Most of the time, in addition to taking care of my wife's condition, I also go to petitions and report Little Giant's problems everywhere. Wang Xuewei said: "I just don't understand that China is the major shareholder. Why are companies at the mercy of Japanese companies while they are constantly making progress?"

During the investigation, the reporter learned that Little Giant Machine Tool Co., Ltd. is owned by Ningxia, China. Great Wall Machinery Group Co., Ltd. and Japan's Yamazaki Mazak Co., Ltd. jointly invested in the establishment and officially opened on May 29, 2000. According to the contract, the joint venture period between the two parties is 20 years. Yamazaki Mazak invested in the company through technology transfer, accounting for 25% of the shares, and Ningxia Great Wall Machinery Group accounted for 75% of the shares.

Less than five years after the company was established, the performance of the little giant is booming, but the joint venture road has come to an end. The small shareholder Yamazaki Mazak Co., Ltd. of Japan, "the small fish eats the big fish", will Ningxia Great Wall Machinery Group Co., Ltd. is kicked out and has exclusive access to the future "money" of the little giant.

Since the opening of Little Giant Machine Tool Co., Ltd., it has been completed and put into production in one year, profitable in two years, and reached design capacity in three years. In 2004, it established a production system with a monthly output of 50 CNC machine tools, exceeding the design capacity by 40 Above, the products have also increased from the four models at the time of opening to 17, creating a miracle for new domestic machine tool manufacturers and bringing many new ideas to domestic peer companies.

Just when the business was operating well, the Japanese side suddenly changed its face and stated that it no longer wanted to join the joint venture. Either the Japanese side would withdraw and the Chinese side would run it, or the Chinese side would withdraw and the Japanese side would run it. It seems like there are two ways, but in fact there is only one way, and China has no choice but to withdraw! This is because China has not learned Japan's core technology at all in a few years. If it accepts this plan, the machine tool factory will become a pile of scrap metal with no future for development at all.

In March 2005, Ningxia Little Giant changed its identity and became a wholly Japanese-owned company in China. Its rapid development momentum is eye-catching. When the factory was first established, there were only about 100 employees, but now it has quadrupled to more than 420 employees. At the beginning of the establishment of the factory, the annual production capacity was more than 400 machine tools, and now it can reach 1,500 machines. The factory building has also been doubled.

Sun Wenjing, general manager of Little Giant Machine Tool Co., Ltd., took reporters to see the factory area and introduced that the company's factory covers an area of ??12,000 square meters and has a world-class machine tool manufacturing environment. In May 2005, Little Giant Company started the second phase of expansion, expanding the factory by 12,000 square meters, adding 11 high-tech equipment, and reaching a monthly production capacity of 100 units. In September 2005, the company gradually introduced the "world standard machine" NEXUS series products newly developed by Yamazaki Mazak Corporation, from the initial four varieties to about 19 varieties now. All products are supplied to the Chinese market to meet the strong market demand. Little Giant's goal is to build the largest CNC machine tool production base in China.

"It took Mazak 12 years to sell 2,000 machine tools to the machine tool company in the United States, but it only took six years to sell 2,000 machine tools in China." Sun Wenjing, general manager of Little Giant Machine Tool Co., Ltd. explain.

It is difficult for a puppet major shareholder to be the master

At the beginning of the establishment of the factory, almost all the funds required were borne by the Chinese side, and the Japanese side only invested in technology and management. The Chinese side holds an absolute advantage of 75% of the equity. On the surface, the chairman is Chinese, the company is in Ningxia, China, and most of the workers and leaders are Chinese. The company seems to be in Chinese hands, but in fact, due to the lack of core competitiveness, the Chinese side From the beginning, he was reduced to the role of a wage earner.

The reporter witnessed with his own eyes the contract signed by China and Japan at that time at Little Giant Company. From beginning to end, there was no content for the Chinese side to learn and master core technologies. There were only some clauses for the Japanese side to train Chinese workers to apply them. content produced by the operation. This means that the heart of this joint venture is always in the hands of the Japanese side. In fact, China is just following foreign companies to do some money-making work, making a small profit, and cannot learn other people's technology.

According to Xu Guangyuan, chief engineer of the former Ningxia Heavy Industry Department, before the joint venture, Ningxia had two machine tool factories, both of which had a glorious history, but are currently facing losses. According to the autonomous region's initial joint venture intention, it wanted Japan to establish a joint venture with one of the machine tool factories. However, the Japanese side firmly disagreed and insisted on starting a new business, with Ningxia Great Wall Machinery Group Co., Ltd. and Mazak cooperating. The parent company of Ningxia Great Wall Machinery Group Co., Ltd. is actually Ningxia Great Wall Suqi Casting Company. It is a company that mainly produces castings, and it is an enterprise that has never produced a machine tool. Xu Guangyuan said: "Obviously, Japan wanted to completely control the enterprise from the beginning. On the one hand, it asked China to invest huge sums of money to build the factory, and on the other hand, it completely obeyed Japan's orders in terms of production."

The autonomous region at that time The Department of Heavy Industry held many joint venture demonstration meetings. Although many experts raised doubts, the Japanese side was very firm. For the sake of the overall investment promotion of the autonomous region, Ningxia made concessions and agreed to the joint venture.

A stone from another mountain or a wolf to be lured into the house?

What consequences will Little Giant’s sole proprietorship bring to Ningxia? There is still debate. Sun Wenjing, who once served as the chairman of the Little Giant joint venture on behalf of China and is now employed as the general manager of a wholly Japanese-owned company, said that Little Giant's sole proprietorship has great positive significance, at least bringing employment to hundreds of workers in Ningxia and increasing tax revenue. In addition, , Japan can attack jade with stones from other mountains, which will promote and promote the machinery manufacturing industry in Ningxia and even China.

However, many experts and industry insiders hold objections. Sun Zhicheng, the former chief engineer of Dahe Machine Tool Factory who has worked in the Ningxia machine tool industry all his life, said that Japan has seriously encroached on the Chinese machine tool market at an extremely small cost. Squeezing the living environment of domestic machine tool companies and firmly controlling core technologies to reduce China to a "horse boy" is tantamount to inviting a wolf into the house. Core technology is the most important thing for multinational companies, and there are few successful cases of acquiring core technology from foreign parties in joint ventures. The R&D bases of multinational companies are generally located in their own countries, and they will not invest their core technologies in joint ventures. They regard the joint venture in China as a processing plant or even just a production workshop.

An engineer at Ningxia Dahe Machine Tool Factory said that the benefits of foreign investment to employment are actually a link that we have been vague about. On the surface, joint ventures and sole proprietorships need workers, but we should see that little giants build factories At that time, it only recruited more than 100 people, but it almost overwhelmed two local machine tool factories in Ningxia with thousands of people, causing more unemployment than employment. It's that simple.

In addition, domestic enterprises are already short of talent, coupled with the increasingly serious loss of technical talent in recent years, forming a vicious cycle of a lack of technical research and no follow-up technical and talent support. Almost all the original R&D team of Ningxia Dahe Machine Tool Factory was poached by the newly established local Japanese-owned enterprise Little Giant Machine Tool, and its chief engineer also switched jobs to Little Giant. The situation at Great Wall Machine Tool Factory is better, but it has also lost dozens of important technical personnel in recent years.

Wang Xuewei, former director of Ningxia Great Wall Suqi Foundry, said that we keep saying we want to "use foreign capital," but in fact we are "being used by foreign capital."

Wang Xuewei emphasized: “Our officials are elected every few years, and the development of the enterprise is a long-term benefit. After the main leaders of the joint venture were transferred, the Japanese broke the contract.

There are many such cases across the country, and we should reflect on the local investment promotion mechanism. "(Reporter Huang Huiqing)

In recent years, the scope, scale, and intensity of foreign mergers and acquisitions of Chinese enterprises have shown unprecedented growth momentum. Issues that may affect national economic security have also attracted attention from all walks of life. At present, relevant departments The regulations enacted are not enough to prevent multinational companies from monopolizing mergers and acquisitions in China's high-end industries and markets. Therefore, in the formulation process of the anti-monopoly law, relevant regulations should be further improved and an inter-departmental professional agency directly affiliated with the State Council should be established for effective management. and control.

Many people still remember that CNOOC’s acquisition of the U.S. company Unocal was blocked by the U.S. national security review. In the future, foreign mergers and acquisitions of Chinese companies may also be subject to China’s national security review. The draft Anti-Monopoly Law, which is being submitted to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress for second review, adds new provisions, requiring that in addition to anti-monopoly review, foreign mergers and acquisitions of domestic enterprises should also conduct national security review in accordance with relevant regulations.