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Engine factory inaugurated in China-Belarus industrial park Great Stone
Sergei Rumas said: “Belarus has been cooperating with Weichai Company for 20 years already. Since 2014 MAZ has been making a lineup of popular trucks with Weichai engines compliant with Euro-4 and Euro-5 standards. A city bus has been made as well as hundreds of modifications of vehicles with gearboxes made by Shaanxi Company, which is part of Weichai Group. A new stage of our cooperation was formalized when the memorandum to start making diesel engines in Belarus was signed.”
The project is estimated at $20 million, including $14 million invested by the Chinese side. At present the localization rate is close to 30%. It is now necessary to raise the figure to at least 50%. “The people’s government of Shandong Province pays a lot of attention to the project’s implementation. Thanks to our joint efforts we can guarantee high quality of joint products and an increase in the localization rate of up to 50% and beyond,” Shandong Province Vice Governor Ling Weng said.
Valery Ivankovich, Director General of OAO Minsk Automobile Plant (MAZ trademark), the managing company of the holding company BelavtoMAZ, noted that MAZ increased the usage of Weichai engines in its products while building the factory in the China-Belarus industrial park Great Stone. “We hope that our joint efforts will allow bolstering MAZ’s positions on traditional markets and penetrating new and promising markets. We have a lot of work ahead of us to develop sales and aftersales service in CIS and non-CIS states. It will allow diversifying export,” he added.
OOO MAZ-Weichai is a joint venture established by the Belarusian automobile engineering company MAZ and Weichai Group. The construction of the engine factory began in April 2018. A trial run to manufacture internal combustion engines took place in November 2018. The factory has made an industrial test batch of engines since then.
The factory is supposed to use completely knocked down kits to make Euro-5 and Euro-6 engines for trucks, utility vehicles, and buses. It will be able to make 10,000 engines per year if it employs one shift of workers and up to 20,000 engines per year if two shifts are employed. There are plans to make and sell 1,300 engines by the end of 2019. In addition to satisfying needs of the Belarusian automobile engineering industry the factory will be able to ship merchandise to CIS and non-CIS states.
Apart from that, the construction of a Belarusian-Chinese factory to make mechanical gearboxes began in the China-Belarus industrial park Great Stone in July 2019. The joint venture OOO Fast-MAZ was established to manage the construction process and the future enterprise later on. It was founded by the Belarusian automobile engineering company MAZ and Shaanxi Fast Gear Company, which is part of Weichai Group. The project is estimated at $17 million. The Chinese side will cover 70% of the cost while the Belarusian side will take care of the remaining 30%. The future factory will occupy 3.3ha. The enterprise will be able to make over 10,000 gearboxes per annum while employing one shift of workers. If the demand is high, it will be able to double the output. “It is the next stage of our cooperation. We have no doubt the new project will be a success either,” Sergei Rumas added. “I am very pleased that our Chinese partners don’t stop at that. A number of ideas are being discussed to expand cooperation in the sphere of production of individual parts and components.”
Weichai is one of China’s largest mechanical engineering corporations. It is headquartered in the city of Weifang in Shandong Province and has manufacturing sites and branches in China, Southeast Asia, Europe, and North America. Weichai ranks 84th among China’s 500 top companies and is one of the world’s recognized leaders in the production of engines, power generators, wheeled vehicles, and automotive components.
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