Financial Observation: Behind the Multinational Automotive Parts Giants Going to China to 'Grab Orders'
In the first half of 2026, there was a wave of "executive visits to China" in the global automotive parts industry, with many multinational automotive supply chain companies receiving most of their new orders from Chinese automakers. Behind this collective "order grabbing" reflects the explosive growth of China's new energy vehicle market, which has brought a huge shock to the global automotive industry. According to data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, in the first seven months of this year, the production and sales of new energy vehicles in China reached 9.014 million and 9.007 million respectively, with a year-on-year growth of nearly 10%. On September 3rd, the website of Politico magazine reported that although some industry officials in the European Parliament support the proposal of the Industrial Accelerator Act aimed at "protecting 'Made in Europe', according to data from the European Statistical Office, the total value of cars and car parts imported by the EU from China has still increased from 14.5 billion euros in the first half of 2025 to over 20 billion euros in the same period this year. Supported by their massive scale, Chinese car companies are becoming irreplaceable "super buyers" globally with their rapid technological iteration cycles and huge procurement volumes.
Put the hope of turning over in China
German automotive parts supplier Ebert, which has experienced business contraction and restructuring, is "betting its hopes of turning things around on China." The German newspaper Handelsblatt recently reported that this 160 year old company plans to increase its Asian business share from 8% to 24% in the next three years. We are receiving new orders, "CEO Stein told Business Daily. The company is in talks with Chinese customers to expand its electric vehicle business and has already secured orders for extended range new energy vehicle battery casings and exhaust systems. Ebert has about 100 engineers in China, and the technology developed for Chinese customers may enter Germany in the future or reverse direction. Bosch Group, a globally important automotive parts supplier, is increasingly closely interacting with Chinese enterprises in its automotive business in China. In the previous fiscal year, Bosch's revenue in China increased by about 5%, reaching a total of 15 billion euros, accounting for more than 1/4 of its global automotive business revenue.
This change in supply and demand pattern is profoundly reshaping the global automotive industry landscape. On the one hand, cases such as Bosch's establishment of a new research and development center in Shanghai are showing a clear signal - multinational component giants are accelerating the transfer of core resources to China; On the other hand, "technology spillover overseas" is also forcing China's domestic automotive supply chain to accelerate upgrades. The international market research and consulting firm "Fortune Business Insights" predicts that the size of China's intelligent driving market will be approximately 60.5 billion US dollars by 2026, accounting for 30.9% of the global market revenue.
Hong Kong's South China Morning Post recently reported that in the face of the global automotive industry's transformation wave, China's electric vehicle supply chain is opening up globalization with a new attitude. Chinese suppliers, with their overwhelming technological advantages and excellent quality, attract international automotive giants to compete for cooperation. Recently, similar signals have been frequently heard in the international automotive industry. According to the Wall Street Journal, Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer BYD is in talks with Ford Motor Company to supply batteries for its next-generation hybrid models; Chinese automotive LiDAR manufacturer Hesai Technology has also won multiple orders from top global car companies such as Mercedes Benz since the first half of 2025. Dennis Depp, Global Managing Partner of Roland Berger, an international consulting firm, stated that international car companies' procurement of core components from China is the highest recognition of their product quality and competitiveness.
According to data from the China Passenger Car Market Information Joint Conference, by 2025, China's sales of pure electric and hybrid vehicles will account for approximately 70% of the global total. Xu Bin, head of research at UBS Securities, stated that Chinese automotive supply chain companies have significant advantages in battery efficiency and intelligent driving functions, and have become synonymous with high cost-effectiveness.
Chinese car companies are ahead of German companies in using new technologies
Faced with the rapid technological iteration cycle of Chinese car companies that has caught the world's attention, the original overseas research and development system of traditional multinational component giants has been unprecedentedly impacted and challenged. The linear model of "headquarters research and development, global market replication" in the past has completely failed, replaced by a comprehensive system reconstruction that approaches the "Chinese speed".
The person in charge of French automotive supply chain company Faurecia China told Global Times reporters that in the past five years, Faurecia has invested a total of over 26 billion yuan in tangible assets and research and development in China. Through continuous investment and upgrading of its intelligent manufacturing and R&D level in China, the company has established a strong and resilient local supply chain with Chinese car companies, parts, technology companies, and research institutions, becoming an important part of the Chinese automotive industry ecosystem.
"For Bosch, China is far more than a market." Stefan Hartone, chairman of the board of directors of the German Bosch Group, said recently that about 70% of Bosch's smart travel business in China now comes from cooperation with Chinese local car enterprises, which fully reflects the importance of local innovation and reflects the deepening trend of industrial collaboration. The technological iteration speed of Chinese enterprises is changing Bosch's research and development pace. Bosch has collaborated with a Chinese car company to develop an automatic evasive steering system. From project initiation to mass production, it only took 6 months, and China has become an important testing ground for the company's technological innovation to accelerate and feedback to the world.
Many German automotive supply chain executives also lamented that Chinese customers often adopt their new technologies earlier than German car companies. German automotive supply chain giant ZF, known for its transmission technology, is collaborating with Chinese companies to develop L3 level advanced driving assistance systems. In 2026, a Chinese car company will become its first customer for its new technology. Previously, ZF's steer by wire system also saw its first global application in China. ZF executives stated that China is both a global innovation center and the company's most important market, and both parties are working together to create a new industrial ecosystem. Arnd Franz, CEO of German automotive supply chain company Mahler, told Business Daily that the new technology developed by the company in cooperation with Chinese electric vehicle companies can take as little as one year from project proposal to mass production, and Chinese customers and partners are playing an increasingly important role.
According to a German television station, the German automotive parts industry is undergoing a "disruptive change": Chinese car companies are rapidly increasing their market share, and Chinese suppliers are also accelerating their entry into software and complete systems from the battery and semiconductor fields. German suppliers have to accelerate their transformation to find new technologies and business models.
Created in China, serving the world
With the completion of the highly localized "China R&D Center" matrix by the leading international automobile supply chain enterprises, a new core strategic proposition emerges: How can multinational automobile supply chain enterprises achieve a balance between local innovation and global technology standardization? How are Chinese R&D achievements reverse exported and empowered to overseas headquarters?
Christophe Pereira, CEO of Faurecia Group, recently visited China and stated in an interview with Chinese media that in China, the R&D cycle for some of the group's products has been significantly shortened to 6 to 9 months to match the development pace of 18 to 24 months at the vehicle level. The relevant person in charge of the group in China told Global Times reporters that the company has established a complete local decision-making system in China, and the team directly defines products based on local needs. The Chinese vehicle market has a fast iteration and rich scenarios, and many demands for electrification and intelligent networking have exploded in China. The company regards the Chinese market as one of the most important sources of innovation in the world and promotes solutions validated in the Chinese market to the global market. Realize 'Created in China, Serving the World'. In the future, research and development centers around the world will be nodes of innovation networks, and China is a very important source of innovation among them.
Several German automotive industry experts have told Global Times reporters that in the face of the speed at which Chinese car companies can iterate every few months, traditional component giants can no longer cling to the past model of "German headquarters research and development, global market replication". The key words for the future are 'in China, for the world'. German companies are turning their Chinese research and development centers into part of a global innovation network. As one of the technical experts said, "The problem solved by Chinese engineers today may be the answer that European customers need tomorrow
Associate Professor Liu Chunsheng from the School of International Economics and Trade at the Central University of Finance and Economics analyzed in an interview with Global Times that the concentration of global automotive parts giants in China to compete for orders is a microcosm of the reversal of the supply and demand pattern of the Chinese new energy vehicle market, and also injects the power of integration into the current trend of regionalization and fragmentation of the global industrial chain.
Liu Chunsheng analyzed that the current global industrial trade protection is on the rise, and many industrial chains are shrinking towards regionalization and stratification, highlighting the trend of supply chain "outsourcing". The large-scale layout of multinational component companies in China and the docking of orders with domestic car companies have formed a realistic sample of deep integration of domestic and foreign supply chains, offsetting the pressure of decoupling and fragmentation of the industrial chain. As the world's largest consumer and procurement market for new energy vehicles, China has attracted foreign companies to tilt their R&D and capital towards China due to its large order volume and rapidly iterating technological demand. The continuous increase in two-way flow of capital and technology proves that open cooperation is a rational choice for industry cost reduction and efficiency improvement.
This integration is not a one-way foreign investment entry, but rather a manifestation of China's active integration into the global economy. Liu Chunsheng believes that China's huge market demand has become a link to maintain global industrial cooperation, opening up a market-oriented cooperation path and providing important support for the stable operation of the global automotive industry.