Going Global, Strengthening the Foundation: Examining SAIC's Global Automotive Industry System Layout

In the first 8 months of this year, SAIC Group's cumulative overseas sales reached 1.016 million units, a year-on-year increase of 52.9%. Among them, the MG brand cumulatively sold 241,000 units in Europe, a year-on-year increase of 22.3%.

When overseas business enters the million-unit scale, the standards for measuring a car company's globalization capability also begin to change. In the past, exporting cars focused more on whether products could be sold and whether sales volume could be built up; but when a regional market grows from tens of thousands of units to hundreds of thousands, what a car company truly faces is a complete set of overseas operating problems: Is transportation stable? Can the product adapt to the local market? Is production and supply chain close enough to users? Can the sales, after-sales, and financial systems support a larger scale? These capabilities do not appear naturally with sales volume; they require long-term investment and advance planning.

Currently, SAIC's subsidiary Angie Logistics owns 42 self-operated RoRo ships, has laid out three innovative R&D centers and three design centers overseas, three complete vehicle manufacturing bases in Thailand, Indonesia, and India, and a KD factory in Pakistan, as well as over 100 parts production and R&D bases and over 3,000 marketing service outlets.

These layouts dispersed across different business sectors such as R&D, manufacturing, logistics, and sales constitute the "Major Foundation" that SAIC is continuously consolidating for globalization. It is not just a factory or a fleet, but a comprehensive foundation that extends R&D, manufacturing, parts, logistics, sales, service, and even financial capabilities around a car to the global market, eventually forming a self-sufficient overseas system. After overseas cumulative sales exceeded 7 million units, SAIC's globalization is transitioning from expansion centered on products and sales volume to a stage more reliant on system capabilities.

Behind the Million-Unit Business

Logistics Is No Longer Simple Transportation

Among SAIC's globalization "Major Foundation", the most concrete part is the expanding RoRo fleet. Starting in 2022, Angie Logistics invested nearly 10 billion yuan to build 12 large RoRo ships with 7,600 vehicle capacity and above. Currently, Angie Logistics has 42 RoRo ships of various types, including 21 foreign trade and 21 domestic trade RoRo ships, with an overseas ocean transport capacity of 600,000 units per year operated independently and a capacity of 1 million units for overseas landing. From relying on external capacity to building its own large RoRo fleet, behind this change is the increasingly high demand for logistics stability and autonomy after SAIC's overseas business scale continuously expanded.

For car companies with annual overseas sales reaching the million-unit level, logistics is no longer just purchasing a transportation service. Whether capacity is sufficient, whether ship schedules are stable, and whether key markets can quickly replenish inventory will directly affect local sales rhythm. When the fleet expands to dozens of ships, what truly determines logistics efficiency is no longer just how many cars a single ship can load, but whether a stable route network covering core markets can be formed.

Currently, Angie Logistics' 8 international routes cover major export directions such as Southeast Asia, Gulf Region, Mediterranean, UK, Mexico-West US, US East, South America West, and Australia and New Zealand. The 42 RoRo ships and 8 international routes allow SAIC to arrange vehicle flow between global markets more proactively. When to depart, which areas need increased capacity, and how to connect storage and distribution after vehicles arrive at ports are all becoming a system that can be independently scheduled.

This is also the meaning of "Strong Foundation". It solves not just a single export, but how to keep million-unit overseas business running long-term and stably.

From Shipping Cars Out

To Placing R&D and Manufacturing Capabilities Locally

The logistics system solves how cars connect efficiently to global markets, but as a regional market gradually grows, relying solely on the model of producing in China and selling overseas will also approach its limit. SAIC started laying out manufacturing bases overseas very early.

In 2012, SAIC signed a cooperation agreement with Thailand's CP Group, subsequently building complete vehicle manufacturing and sales systems locally; in 2019, the India complete vehicle base was built and put into production. Since then, SAIC gradually formed three overseas complete vehicle manufacturing bases in Thailand, Indonesia, and India, and laid out a KD factory in Pakistan.

In recent years, this localization has continued to extend from the manufacturing link to R&D, engineering, and supply chain. This year, SAIC's European Engineering Center in Frankfurt, Germany was commissioned, the European production base is advancing steadily, and subsidiary sales companies in Belgium and Luxembourg were established successively, with Central Asia localization production also launched. Currently, SAIC also owns three innovative R&D centers, three design centers, and over 100 parts production and R&D bases overseas.

Behind this layout is the gradual shift in automotive globalization from "product market fit" to "capability localization". Different countries have obvious differences in regulations, road environments, climate, and consumer usage habits. The deeper the overseas market goes, the harder it is for a single model to cover all needs relying on simple global unified configurations.

For example, SAIC developed a local voice assistant for the Indian market usage habits; the Brazil version MG ZS EV optimized the battery thermal management system for the local tropical climate. These seemingly small changes actually reflect a shortening distance between the R&D system and the market.

In the past, automotive globalization was more "developed in China, manufactured in China, then sold worldwide"; as overseas R&D centers, factories, and parts bases continue to increase, part of the engineering, manufacturing, and supply chain capabilities begin to enter the target market directly. This is also a deeper layer of SAIC's globalization "Major Foundation": not just sending products out, but sending out the capabilities that support continuous product iteration and production.

The True "Major Foundation"

It Is a Global Operating System

If looking at single projects, 42 RoRo ships are a logistics investment, the European Engineering Center belongs to the R&D system, Thailand, Indonesia, and India factories belong to manufacturing layout, and over 3,000 marketing service outlets belong to the sales system. But the true competitiveness of globalization comes precisely from whether these capabilities can be connected.

The automotive industry itself is a long-chain industry. From product development to parts procurement, from complete vehicle manufacturing to logistics transport, to sales, maintenance, finance, and user services, for a brand to truly enter the local market, any link is difficult to be absent for a long time. Currently, SAIC has over 3,000 overseas marketing service outlets and established an overseas financial service company in Indonesia, with products and services entering over 170 countries and regions globally.

Returning to look at the overseas system SAIC has already spread out, its outline becomes clearer. Overseas R&D and design centers undertake product development and local adaptation, complete vehicle factories, KD factories, and parts bases provide manufacturing and supply chain support, 42 RoRo ships and 8 international routes undertake global transport, and over 3,000 marketing service outlets and financial service systems serve local users.

What these capabilities together form is no longer an export link from Chinese factories to overseas dealers, but an increasingly complete global automotive industry network. This also explains why, the further automotive exports go, the "heavier" the enterprise investment becomes.

Simple exports can be completed with the help of large amounts of external resources, but the larger the market scale, the more enterprises need to master more key links. Once a regional market reaches 100,000, 200,000, or even 300,000 units, transport capacity, supply chain, after-sales, and R&D response speed may become new bottlenecks restricting growth.

Currently, SAIC has formed one "300,000-unit level" market in Europe, and 5 overseas regional markets of "50,000-unit level" in the Americas, Middle East, Australia and New Zealand, ASEAN, and South Asia, with products and services covering over 170 countries and regions globally, and overseas cumulative sales breaking 7 million units. At such a scale, the next stage of growth is increasingly difficult to complete solely by increasing export numbers. In the end, overseas business competition is about whether a global foundation matching the sales volume can be established and sustained.

Therefore, 42 RoRo ships may be the most visible part of SAIC's globalization "Major Foundation", but what is truly important is the entire system gradually forming behind these ships: R&D, manufacturing, supply chain, logistics, sales, and services continuously extending from China to global markets and finally connecting.

In the past decade, the most obvious change in Chinese automotive exports has been export numbers continuously breaking records. As more and more Chinese car companies enter the deep waters of the overseas market, the factors determining the upper limit of globalization are also changing—from whether a single product has competitiveness, gradually expanding to whether an enterprise has the ability to rebuild a complete automotive industry system globally.

From this perspective, SAIC's continuously strengthening globalization "Major Foundation" is not just to support today's million-unit overseas sales volume. What it truly aims to solve is a longer-term problem: when Chinese cars move from "selling to the world" to "operating globally", what allows them to truly take root in different markets?