ZF celebrates 10 years of passenger car axle assembly for Chinese market

Shenyang, November 8, 2013: Ten years ago, ZF inaugurated the Shenyang location, the first plant for passenger car axle assembly in China. Since then, the ZF plant and the passenger car axle business have developed very successfully in China: New production locations have been added and ZF has also further expanded its business in Shenyang.

"China is a good example of ZF's global strategy," said CEO Dr Stefan Sommer on the occasion of the production anniversary in Shenyang. "With 21 production locations in the region, we offer nearly our entire competence portfolio on the local market – from passenger car driveline and chassis technology, construction and agricultural machinery technology, right up to marine drives and wind turbine gearboxes."

Since the end of the 1990s, the just-in-time and just-in-sequence assembly of front and rear axles for passenger car manufacturers has been one of the important international fields of action for the ZF Group. Ten years ago, ZF started passenger car axle assembly in Shenyang for the Chinese market. Volumes have developed so positively since then that further production capacities were established in Shenyang: The two youngest of the three plants at the ZF location in the Northeast of the People's Republic still assemble axle systems for the production of the BMW 3 Series, 5 Series, and X1 model ranges at the same location. At the former ‘parent plant’, ZF produces differentials, shift systems, and electronic modules for the local market. The locations with a total of roughly 700 employees are managed as a Business Park, so all plants use the same infrastructure.

"The successful development of the Shenyang location and our newly opened axle assembly location in Beijing show the high international potential the passenger car axle systems business still bears for ZF," says Dr. Peter Holdmann, responsible for the axle systems business at ZF's Car Chassis Technology Division. ZF produces passenger car axle systems at altogether 15 locations worldwide. The assembly locations are usually no more than 30 kilometres away from the ZF customers in order to enable them to be supplied just in sequence.

Today, ZF generates 12 percent of Group sales in China, making the People's Republic one of the most important individual markets for ZF. The technology company employs more than 5 000 employees at its Chinese locations. The ZF Development Center in China is also becoming increasingly important as a result. After all, products are developed more and more often in China itself or adapted specifically to the requirements of the Chinese market.

Photograph: Dr. Peter Holdmann, responsible for the axle systems business at ZF's Car Chassis Technology Division (right) and Jürgen Bracht, General Manager at the Shenyang facility (left), at the opening of a further production location within the ZF Business Park in Shenyang.