AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)04/29 Report--

Recently, affected by the epidemic in Shanghai, the purchase of some parts has been affected, and the automobile supply chain crisis has also spread to Japan.

It is understood that many Japanese car companies are affected, and the production loss of many car companies is estimated to have exceeded 100000. On April 26, Subaru announced that the company's Gunma production plant, Yashima factory and Daquan factory will stop work from 28 to 29 and will resume work on May 9 after the end of the Golden week. It said that the shutdown of the plant was mainly due to the impact on the purchase of some spare parts due to the closure measures of the epidemic in Shanghai. Although Subaru did not say how much impact the shutdown would have, it used to produce about 2500 vehicles a day, while Subaru suspended production for two days or lost 5000. It is worth noting that this is not the first time a Japanese car factory has stopped production due to the impact of the epidemic. As early as January this year, Subaru announced the suspension of production for six days at three factories in Gunma Prefecture, Japan, due to the impact of the epidemic and a shortage of semiconductors.

Subaru is not the only Japanese car company affected by the Shanghai epidemic. Mitsubishi Okazaki also suspended production for five days from April 11 to April 15 due to a delay in the supply of spare parts. The reason for the suspension is that Mitsubishi Motors' parts suppliers in Shanghai are under closure management, resulting in a shortage of new car parts. The Mitsubishi factory mainly produces Orlande, Yige and other models. According to media estimates, the Mitsubishi Okazaki plant shutdown or cause Mitsubishi to lose about 5000 vehicles. On April 15, Mazda also announced that production at Mazda's headquarters factory in Hiroshima and Fangfu factory in Yamaguchi prefecture was suspended from April 21 to 26, after deducting the weekend shutdown for four days, due to the COVID-19 epidemic in Shanghai, which made it impossible to purchase Denso parts and other components. It is worth noting that this is the third time that Mazda has stopped production. On April 12, Mazda said that due to the closure of the epidemic and other controls, some parts could not be purchased, and Mazda's Hiroshima headquarters factory and Fangfu factory in Japan would stop production for two days from April 14 to 15. On March 24, also due to the impact of the epidemic, Mazda Hiroshima and Fangfu factories stopped production for two days on April 4 and April 5. Overall, Mazda suspended production for eight days in April due to the impact of the epidemic. Referring to the output of the previous two factories, the Mazda plant suspended production for the 8th day in April, losing about 26000 vehicles.

On April 18, Toyota announced that 10 production lines at nine Takaoka plants and Takahara plants in Japan would be suspended for six days in May. It is understood that the shutdown may affect the production of Corolla, C-HR, RAV4 and Lexus models. As a result, Toyota also said it would cut global production by 10 per cent to 750000 vehicles in May, with production falling to 200000 in Japan and 550000 in overseas markets. Toyota said the drop in production was mainly due to the COVID-19 epidemic and semiconductor shortages. On April 21, Honda also said that the Suzuki factory, which makes light cars such as the "N-BOX" and so on, reduced its production in April by 50% compared with the original plan, and the reduction may continue until early May. It is understood that the reason for the reduction in production in the factory is related to the stagnation of the transportation of parts and components caused by the epidemic in Shanghai. In addition, a Honda plant in Saitama prefecture cut production by 1/3 in April and plans to resume normal operations in early may. The production of the two plants was stopped, resulting in a loss of capacity of about 39000 vehicles.

From the epidemic in Shanghai, caused a number of overseas car companies to stop production, it is not difficult to see the importance of Shanghai in the global automobile industry chain. In addition, since 2021, a number of Japanese car companies have limited their production capacity due to spare parts supply problems, chip shortage, epidemic and other factors, resulting in poor sales performance. According to relevant data, new car sales in Japan have experienced negative year-on-year growth for three consecutive years. In response, Japan's National Federation of Light Automobile Associations said that in addition to the shortage of semiconductors, the epidemic in Southeast Asia has led to stagnant procurement of parts, manufacturers' factories have to stop production or reduce production, but also affected the sales of new cars. It also said: "with the shortage of semiconductors and the continued stagnation in the procurement of components from overseas, it is difficult to predict how long the impact on new car sales will last." In response to the epidemic in Shanghai, many people in the industry also said that from upstream to downstream, and then to the sales terminal, the impact of this epidemic on the automobile industry will exceed that of Wuhan in 2020. From April 1 to 10, retail sales of passenger cars were 246000, down 32 per cent from a year earlier, while wholesale passenger cars were 242000, down 39 per cent from a year earlier, according to the Federation of passengers.

Welcome to subscribe to the WeChat public account "Automotive Industry Focus" to get the first-hand insider information on the automotive industry and talk about things in the automotive circle. Welcome to break the news! WeChat ID autoWechat