Foreign chemical giants grab a beach in China's auto refinish market

On December 11, chemical giant BASF and Shilihe jointly established a high-end automotive refinish skills center in Foshan to provide one-stop services for different needs in the entire automotive refinish value chain.
The Chinese market has become BASF's third largest market in the world.
Global automotive coatings brands have all settled in China Global automotive coatings automotive coatings brands have all settled in China.
Chineseautomotive coatings are a variety of industrial coatings with relatively high technical content and added value, representing the technical level of a coating industry.
With the rapid development of my country's automotive market, the automotive coatings market is also showing vigorous vitality, which naturally attracts the wide attention of foreign chemical giants, who also enter the Chinese market through various forms of cooperation.
Up to now, all global automotive coatings brands have settled in China, which has had a strong impact on the domestic automotive coatings industry.
The world's largest coating companies such as PP G, Axalta, Akzo Nobel, BASF, Sherwin-Williams, Nippon Paint, Kansai Paint, etc.
have established production bases in China.
In recent years, "coating giants" have even targeted the Chinese automotive refinish market and entered the Chinese market through various forms of cooperation.
For example, on March 28 this year, Kansai Paint Waterborne Automotive Refinish Co.
, Ltd.
held a strategic partnership signing ceremony for automotive refinish paint in Shanghai, and released AI artificial intelligence toning and water-based automotive refinish paint products representing automotive refinish* technology.
In November of this year, DuPont of France and FAW Mazda Automobile Sales Co.
, Ltd.
held a signing ceremony in Changchun for the cooperation project of automotive refinish paint.
According to the contract, DuPont will become FAW-Mazda's designated supplier of automotive refinish coatings-that is, the 102 specialized repair shops authorized by FAW-Mazda in China will all use the American DuPont automotive refinish paint CENTARI series products.
Of course, as a global chemical giant, BASF is not idle.
As BASF, which has nearly 80 automotive refinish skill centers around the world, it has already deployed seven automotive refinish skill centers across China.
This time, the cooperation with Guangdong Shilihe Automobile Industry Group Co.
, Ltd.
(Shilihe) to establish the BASF-Shilihe Automotive Refinish Skills Center is sufficient to demonstrate its determination to accelerate its presence in the Chinese automotive refinish market.
In response, Peter Fischer, vice president of BASF Coating Systems Asia Pacific, said: "The new skill center confirms BASF's determination to continue to invest in production bases, training facilities and training capabilities in this growing market in China.
Innovation and training for customers Driving high-performance growth is BASF’s two strategic principles, and this is the purpose of our cooperation with Shilihe to set up a skill center in Foshan.
" To promote the rapid development of "oil-to-water" and to promote the rapid development of "oil-to-water"As we all know, environmental protection It is the eternal theme of China's auto industry.
As a major country in global auto production and sales, the low-carbon, environmentally friendly and sustainable development of China's auto industry has become an important part of the sustainable development of China's economy.
Based on this, all links of the auto industry are in the same place.
Increasing R&D and upgrading efforts has attracted more attention in the automotive coatings industry.
When it comes to the environmental protection and sustainable development of the automotive coating industry, water-based paint is an inevitable part.
In recent years, and local governments are vigorously promoting environmental protection reform, continuing to adopt environmental policies, improve paint VOC (VolatileOrganicCompounds, volatile organic compounds) limit standard , advance painting pollution control industry.
The solution to reduce VOC emissions from coatings is the application of water-based paints.
      It is understood that BASF is bringing its environmentally friendly products to the show this time.
The reporter learned at the scene that the center showcased BASF's high-end automotive refinish series product brands, including Parrot, RM automotive refinish paint, and RODIM spray paint auxiliary tools.
In addition, BASF also develops* water-based basecoats for China and other regions in Asia.
In 2017, more than 60% of BASF's automotive refinish paints sold in China were water-based paint products.
   It is worth mentioning that in April 2018, the "White Paper on China Water-based Refinish Technology and Application" was released, which pointed out that the average annual growth rate of China's water-based refinish paint will reach 20% after 2018.
In the long run, water-based paint is expected Realize 30%* of refinish paint consumption.
It can be seen that water-based paint will be the focus of the future automotive refinish market.
However, the domestic water-based automotive refinish market is more complicated.
The introduction of water-based paint is expensive and the requirements of the domestic logistics, warehousing, equipment, construction environment and other full-value industrial chains are relatively strict, resulting in the application of water-based automotive refinish paints in China is still not widespread.
In recent years, the water-based refinish paint market has developed rapidly, but the market is still concentrated in the 4S shops of mid-to-high-end automobile brands and areas where the government's environmental protection policies have been strongly promoted.
In the high-end market, under the coordinated promotion of OEMs and international paint companies, 4S stores of high-end automobile brands represented by Mercedes-Benz and BMW actively promote the use of high-end water-based automotive refinish systems that have been certified by global products.
In the mid-end market (mid-end car brand 4S shops, comprehensive repair shops, etc.
, as well as areas with strict requirements for VOC emissions), "oil-to-water" is also imperative.
At this time, foreign coating companies with advanced experience entering China are bound to promote the rapid development of "oil-to-water".