Stronger Together - Walking With The Sogefi Group

Another client this month is the Sogefi Group, based in Mantua, Italy, one of Europe's leading developers and manufacturers of automotive components. The group operates in two areas: automotive and industrial filters and precision springs and suspension components. Today, the group has 50 production plants, six R&D centers, and 6,200 employees worldwide and, with sales of 100 million Euros as early as 2006, has grown into a mega-company. And for a long time, the Sogefi Group's customers have been the high-end groups like Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz and BMW. With its good quality and stable supply, Sogefi has established long-term and stable relationships with many high-end car brands.

Ltd. was established in 1996 as a joint venture between Allevard Rejina Automotive Suspension, a Sogefi Group company, and Dongfeng Suspension Spring Co. to produce coil springs, torsion bars, and stabilizer bars, and composite leaf springs for passenger cars and light trucks. In order to further develop the Sogefi Group's business in Asia, on May 29, 2006, the Group signed a contract with Zhejiang Global Filter Liability Company Limited in China for a joint venture to manufacture filters and filtration systems in China. With some of the best products and manufacturing processes, Sogefi is recognized by the international automotive industry as a key partner. The automotive market demands more efficient and cleaner engines. Sogefi intake modules achieve more than just distributing an equal amount of air by the cylinder. They can be equipped with additional dynamic air distribution units, swirl and tumble control to improve combustion efficiency, and exhaust gas recirculation nozzles to reduce emission levels.

Based on the growing production needs and the quest for higher precision, Sogefi Group decided to purchase a number of new machines, mainly large hydraulic presses, as well as many other tooling and spare parts, with an order value of several million RMB. After finalizing the purchase list, Sogefi Group approached HK, DH, KLS, and our company, HARSLE. Since the machines required precision machining and additional customization and the order amount was high, the customer chose to see the factory on-site and Sogefi Group sent their technical staff from their China branch to our company for an in-depth discussion and finalized the order. During the communication process, we listed the features of each company to the customer in detail to assist them in their choice, and we also hope it will be helpful for everyone reading the article.

First of all, HK CNC Machine Tool Manufacturing Co., Ltd, as a long-established machine tool company in the area of Maanshan, the annual turnover and customer base are very large, in terms of machine quality is of course also recognized as good. But good quality and reputation also means high pricing, the same type of machine with the same configuration, the HK company's pricing is much higher than other brands. This is like a first-line brand of caravans, we certainly can not deny their quality, but we do pay part of the money to the advertising and brand effect, rather than all for the machine itself and the corresponding after-sales service to pay for, in short, is not cost-effective. In addition, another problem that cannot be ignored is that when the number of orders in a factory is too large, there is no way to guarantee delivery time and the timely response after sales, which is a very fatal problem for manufacturers who need the machine urgently or for new factories who are not good at using the machine for first time. The Sogefi Group is one such factory that is in urgent need of machines, and they need to control delivery time strictly in order to ensure the subsequent production schedule, so they have to be extremely careful when choosing a manufacturer.

Then there is the large factory DH company, which has a very large factory area and a large number of workers, similar to an assembly line production process, which greatly improves the production efficiency of the machine and makes delivery time more secure. However, such a production model is more suitable for standard model machines, when the machine needs to be customized individually or replaced to add additional options, the same impact on production cycle time will occur to see, more importantly, the production accuracy and machine quality are difficult to guarantee in the case of insufficient experience in customization. Sogefi Group as production of automotive parts, workpiece precision, bending difficult, the machine of course also needs to customize, in the system, control axis, back gear material, and even control system, there are additional requirements. In addition, the number of operating workers does not mean a strong technical team. To ensure machine quality and after-sales service, professional engineers are still needed to assist in production and use.

Compared with the first two companies, KLS CNC Machinery Co., Ltd. does not have any advantage to speak of, most of their machines are labeled machines produced by other companies and then labeled with their company logo, neither have their own factories, not to mention the lack of a professional enough technical team. Although the price quoted by KLS is very low and there is even a lot of room for negotiation, the actual source of the machine is not reliable because the company does not produce the machine itself, so there is a high possibility that the goods are not right and no one is responsible for the situation after the sale. Here we also strongly recommend that you must choose a factory supplier to ensure quality of the machine on the basis of after-sales service but also to get the most appropriate price. The conditions must go to the field to see the factory to see the machine, and even visit the production trial process.

Finally, HARSLE although our company is not a large international company in scale, but more than ten years since the establishment of the transaction, the number of orders from customers is also considerable. More importantly, compared with various marketing methods, we are more willing to invest money in the machine itself to strengthen quality of the machine, refine the precision of the machine, or improve the expertise of our internal sales staff or engineers, so as to better help customers choose the right machine and solve after-sales problems faster and more accurately.

HARSLE always insists on the business principle of "making better machines and providing first-class service", and keeps increasing the adjustment of product structure. This cooperation with Sogefi Group has a profound impact on us, not only proving once again that our company has the strength to produce high quality large machines but also helping us to open the door to cooperation with large enterprises. We believe that in future development, we will go further and make better machines, provide better services and work hand in hand with more enterprises.