“Acquisition of Weigel is a continuation of BAIC’s acquisition of Saab assets and is an important step for BAIC to innovate itself and enhance its core competitiveness.” Recently, Beijing Daqi’s general manager Wang Da revealed to reporters that BAIC had successfully acquired approximately EUR 31 million. The entire equipment and technical documentation of the Swedish Weigel transmission plant means that Beiqi’s gearbox production capacity will achieve a “zero breakthrough”. This will not only ensure the support of Beiqi’s own brands, but also lay the foundation for the production of DCT gearboxes. Foundation.

It is understood that the Swedish Wei Geer transmission plant belongs to the German Wiggle Group, its predecessor is Saab transmission plant, mainly for Saab, Chevrolet and Buick Regal supporting, in the European manual gearbox production enterprises in a leading position. Over the years, Weigel Transmission Factory has zero product scrap rate and received the Supplier Quality Award from General Motors Corporation almost every year.

The BAIC Group attached great importance to this acquisition and formed a special joint project team to hold several conference calls with the German Wiger Group. Beiqi Powertrain also sent two technical teams to conduct inspections. The company's equipment, production, supply, procurement, technology, management and other conditions are fully understood. Wang Dafang also personally led a team to visit the Weigel Transmission Plant and held a high-level dialogue with the Weigel Group Chairman in Sweden. The entire acquisition began with negotiations between the parties, and it took four months to formally sign a contract in Munich, Germany.

“Because of historical reasons, BAIC has not had the production capacity of passenger car gearboxes for a long period of time, especially the production capacity of mid-to-high-end car transmissions.” Deputy General Manager of Beijing Automotive Group, Ma Tong, General Manager of Beijing Automobile Powertrain Co., Ltd. Li Li stated that although companies can temporarily solve the problems associated with self-owned brand vehicles by ordering overseas companies, in the long run, establishing and improving their own engine and gearbox production capabilities, and having their own “hearts”, is an entire vehicle company. One of the key points in the development of self-owned brand passenger cars.

The Weigel Transmission Plant equipment is mainly from the best equipment manufacturers in Europe such as Germany, Switzerland, Sweden and France. According to the preliminary estimation of the technical team, a new production line similar to a manual gearbox was used, and only a part of the production line machinery and equipment (excluding process equipment and molds and technical documents) was roughly estimated to have reached 680 million yuan. This is another value-for-money acquisition activity after BAIC took over Saab’s core intellectual property.

The “exceeding value” part does not stop there. The acquisition not only significantly reduces the purchase cost of equipment and process equipment for Beiqi’s self-construction gearbox plant, but more importantly it obtains various manufacturing process documentation, quality control documents and products. Information, as well as management support and production training, are of great significance to BAIC's gearbox production capacity and gearbox production management talents, and it is also the most “value for money” part of this transaction.

“The overall development concept of Beiqi transmission is to take the acquisition of Weigel Transmission as a starting point, first to achieve a breakthrough in Beiqi’s transmission capacity, and on this basis, to achieve automatic landing gearbox production and production through transformation and upgrading. "Ma Tongli said that this acquisition is an important part of the development plan of BAIC Group and an important starting point for a low-cost, low-cost realization of the development strategy of BAIC Transmission. The acquisition of Weigel is not only the first step in the production capacity of Beiqi transmission, but also the most critical and basic step.

According to the Beijing Automotive Group’s plan, an important technical goal of BAIC during the “12th Five-Year Plan” period is to enhance the design, development, and manufacturing capabilities of advanced manual transmissions, DCT dual-clutch transmissions, and CVT continuously variable transmissions through digestion and absorption. As early as more than a year ago, BAIC and the German Bosch Group signed the CVT gearbox technology licensing and prototype development agreement. At present, Chinese technicians have formed an independent development capability. This is the domestic first after Chery announced the development of the CVT gearbox. Two CVT development projects. The step-by-step follow-up of the research and development of the autonomous powertrain indicates that Beiqi’s determination to enter the autonomous first tier.