Business / Companies

Taizhong does heavy lifting for China's industrial sector

By Li Yang in Taiyuan (China Daily) Updated: 2014-02-25 07:29

A Taizhong warehouse stocked with high-speed train wheels. The company, which is the only Chinese exporter of the product, shipped 220,000 wheels and 100,000 axles to foreign markets from 2008-13. The products went onto subway cars, freight trains, mining cars and high-speed trains. Li Yang / China Daily

Record of firsts

Throughout the 1980s, in cooperation with foreign partners, Taizhong made dozens of "first of a kind" heavy machines in China.

"We were shocked by the level of technology and management of foreign companies. It was like a meeting between two industrial eras," recalled Zhang Zhide, Taizhong's chief executive officer and head engineer.

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"We were all 'learning machines' and made full use of every minute to make up the time lost in political movements. Yet, we always knew that one day, we'd have to make machines of our own design."

Taizhong's international cooperation was at low ebb in the 1990s. Its engineers used that time to digest and absorb the technology acquired in the 1980s.

By the late 1990s, Taizhong was able to make most of the heavy equipment China needed, and it even started exporting to some developing countries.

To raise its international market share, Taizhong started inviting experts from German, Austrian and Japanese companies to improve its technological standards.

Taizhong became the first listed machinery company in China in 1998.

At the turn of the millenium, Taizhong began exporting forging and rolling mills, cast and forged pieces, cranes and mining equipment to about 50 countries.

Taizhong made the largest puncher in 1999, the largest bridge crane in 2000, the largest ladle crane in 2005 and largest bucket mining excavator in 2008.

Sales increased by 33 percent on average annually from 2001 to 2008, when they reached 10 billion yuan ($1.6 billion).

By next year, the group aims to generate sales of more than 30 billion yuan, with exports accounting for more than 30 percent.

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