USD 300 Million
invested in factories in
China
to date
SHANGHAI
--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sep. 9, 2015--
AGCO
(NYSE:AGCO), a world-leading manufacturer and distributor focusing
on agricultural equipment, today held a press conference to announce the
opening of its brand new manufacturing base in
Changzhou. To date,
AGCO
has invested
USD 300 million
in factories in
China. “China is one of the
world’s largest farm equipment markets and
AGCO
has attached great
importance to the market,” said Martin Richenhagen, Chairman, President
and Chief Executive Officer of
AGCO
. “The opening of the new
Changzhou
location will further enhance our R&D and manufacturing capacity in
China
, and is a critical step in the implementation of our development
strategy for the
Asia Pacific
region.”
This Smart News Release features multimedia. View the full release here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20150909006149/en/
AGCO Executives and Local Government Officials Celebrate the Grand Opening of AGCO's
New Manufacturing Base in
Changzhou, China
. (Photo: Business Wire)
Since entering
China
in 2001,
AGCO
has taken a series of measures to
expand the business and benefit local customers. The establishment of
the new
Changzhou
factory shows its continuous confidence and commitment
to the Chinese market. The new site will serve both domestic as well as
export markets with its professional products and covers a total area of
nearly 200,000 square meters. Established as a manufacturing and R&D
base with state of the art technology, the company aims to gradually
reach an annual capacity of 20,000 tractors, 30,000 engines and 40,000
rear axles and transmissions, and further promote the localization of
product manufacturing in
China
.
The launch of the new
Changzhou
factory is undoubtedly of great
significance. “AGCO has already invested
USD 300 million
into existing
and new manufacturing sites in
China
. We are now operating a total of
five manufacturing sites in
Changzhou
,
Shanghai
, Daqing and Yanzhou
respectively across the country and employ more than 1,500 people,” Gary
Collar, AGCO Senior Vice President and General Manager of
Asia Pacific
explained. “Our whole-machine and spare parts equipment produced in
Changzhou
are for the domestic market, but are also exported to other
Asian and international markets. We aim to offer comprehensive solutions
for professional farmers feeding the world and to promote the
agricultural mechanization progress of
China
and the whole world.”
“Changzhou is a strategic location for our long-term development. The
geographical advantage and the policy support and incentives to the
industry, led to its advantages for establishing manufacturing
facilities and the supply chain,” said Fred Yang,
AGCO
Vice President
and Managing Director of
China
, “The Changzhou site will not only serve
the domestic market, but also become a major global hub of AGCO’s brand
new product series - 'Global Series' 70 to 130 hp tractor range. It will
provide more opportunities for
AGCO
to increase its production capacity
and develop lean production efficiencies.”
There is a keen demand for high-end agricultural machinery products in
China
but with insufficient supply,
AGCO
has invested strategically in
China
and aims to become the premium international agricultural
equipment supplier that leads the agricultural equipment market trends
of the country. The company now operates four key brands in
China
,
Massey Ferguson, Valtra, Dafeng King, and GSI, and continuously
introduces and manufactures premium medium and high end products, in
order to provide more mature and feasible solutions for users.
In terms of products, the MF2204 (formerly known as MF7624) is a star
tractor series from the Massey Ferguson product line, which features
consistently stable and highly efficient performance. Now, the 220 hp
and 240 hp better-configured products will launch into the market to
provide a more efficient working performance and better driving comfort.
Massey Ferguson proudly provides hay and forage harvester products
highly prized in
China
. Its stable and highly efficient product lines,
including the MF-WR9700 series self-propelled windrowers, the MF1800
series small square balers, and the MF2200 series large square balers,
guarantee high quality harvesting operations for customers. MF-T7 and
4YZ-3A are star products of our fleet of Combine and Harvesters of
Massey Ferguson and Dafeng King. The new
Changzhou
factory will build
the newly developed “Global Series” 70 to 130 hp tractor range which
targets the global market. The series is based on the 168 years’ of
Massey Ferguson production experience and adopts the modular new design
concept and global strategy of parts purchasing, aiming to meet the
Chinese users’ needs with stronger power, higher fuel economy, richer
product configuration and a more comfortable operator environment. The
‘Global Series’ will become an important part of AGCO’s Chinese product
lineup to showcase its promise to provide all-around high tech solutions
continuously.
AGCO
is gradually implementing the upgrade and tests for a full set of
agricultural machinery products targeting the
China
market, to ensure
the products comply with the Chinese emission standards at Phase III for
non-road motor machinery.
In addition,
AGCO
is making sustained efforts to further strengthen its
dealer performance management. Besides its new development initiatives
on brand image, the channel strategy this year will focus more on the
’quality’ of sales and service standard of dealers, and
AGCO
will
implement stricter qualification requirements, supervision and more
comprehensive training to further promote the integrated capability of
dealers to better serve the end users.
As a key aspect of total solutions, AGCO Finance has developed steadily
since launching in
China
early last year, and has already penetrated
more than 10% percent of AGCO’s sales in
China
. As one of the world’s
leaders in precision agriculture technology,
AGCO
unveiled “Fuse
Technologies” in 2013, which is a total solution of precision
agriculture for a new generation. Utilizing Fuse Technologies solutions,
farmers can realize the optimization of operational efficiency and
logistics management in the whole crop production cycle and be able to
tightly integrate farm assets, achieve higher output, less cost and
generate greater farm income.
When talking about the development strategy in
China
, Fred Yang stated,
”AGCO’s
China
strategy includes growing domestic sales and market share
by providing full solutions, leveraging global technology and resources
to produce high quality and competitive machines for global
distribution, sourcing competitively for global operations, and building
one team with strong ownership, energy, transparency and a lean culture.
Our vision is to become a leading global agricultural machinery
manufacturer in
China
with the best technology, quality and innovative
solutions.” So far, AGCO’s business in
China
is growing steadily, from a
provider with product sales and after-sales services only to a total
solution provider, to better serve the Chinese farmers and promote the
modernization of agricultural machinery in
China
.
China
, as an agricultural country, has not only a tremendous
agricultural machinery market, but also the supportive government
policies and labor force resources, which are beneficial to the brands
in the industry. In response to the “new normal” period characterized by
a slower growth rate and restructuring in the agricultural machinery
industry, the central government issued several new policies to boost
the development of agriculture and improve the security of grain
production earlier this year. According to the ‘Made in
China
2025’
initiative, the agricultural machinery industry, in addition to eight
others, will come under the scope of support as part of the “intelligent
manufacturing” program which involves a total intelligent approach to
the design, processing, testing and assembly of agricultural machines.
Also, according to the document No. 1 of the Central Government issued
in 2015, the government has made it clear that it will prioritize the
investment in agriculture and rural areas, develop the pilot financing
and rental projects for large-sized agricultural machinery, strongly
encourage agricultural machinery leasing, and press forward with the
reforms of the rural financing systems.
About
AGCO
AGCO
(NYSE: AGCO) is a global leader in the design, manufacture and
distribution of agricultural equipment. AGCO supports more productive
farming through a full line of tractors, combines, hay tools, sprayers,
forage equipment, grain storage and protein production systems, seeding
and tillage implements and replacement parts. AGCO products are sold
through five core equipment brands, Challenger®, Fendt®, GSI®, Massey
Ferguson® and Valtra® and are distributed globally through a combination
of approximately 3,100 independent dealers and distributors in more than
140 countries. Founded in 1990, AGCO is headquartered in Duluth,
GA,
USA
. In 2014,
AGCO
had net sales of
$9.7 billion
. For more information,
visit http://www.AGCOcorp.com.
AGCO
: 25 years of identity, centuries of history
View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20150909006149/en/
Source:
AGCO
AGCO China
Susan Fan, +86 (10) 5706 2928
susan.fan@agcocorp.com
or
Instinctif
Partners
Sandra Sun, +86 (21) 6441 6701
sandra.sun@instinctif.com