Industrial clusters are the organic combination of industry and region. Industrial clusters can generate and release cluster effects, which will help to increase the competitive advantage of the automotive industry. The automobile industry in the developed countries of the world is basically developed through the way of industrial clusters, but the clustering methods in different countries are different. Industrial clustering is also an important way for China's auto industry to cultivate and improve its competitive advantage. First, industrial clusters can foster and enhance the competitive advantages of the automotive industry 1. Characteristics of industrial clusters Industrial clusters are the organic combination of industries and regions. They refer to certain geographically concentrated and interrelated enterprises in specific industries and fields. , Professional suppliers, service providers, manufacturers of related industries, and related organizations (such as universities, standardized organizations, industrial associations, etc.). Industrial clusters have obvious industrial, regional, and network characteristics. It is actually an industry that has settled in a certain place in the form of an internet and thus formed an organic combination of industry and region. 2. Competitive advantages of industrial clusters The competitive advantages of industrial clusters stem from its ability to generate and release cluster effects. An industrial cluster formed by enterprises in an industry can release a cluster effect. This clustering effect is not only the source of the competitiveness of industrial clusters, but also the basis for the existence of industrial clusters. The cluster effect is manifested through collective efficiency. It is embodied in three aspects: first, external economic performance, second, joint action, and third, institutional effect. External economy is also called “agglomeration economic effectâ€. It is a static and passive industrial cluster effect. Once the industrial cluster is formed, this kind of economic effect will spontaneously occur; joint action is the main body of action in the industrial cluster. The conscious and purposeful activity between the two is a dynamic and active clustering effect; the institutional effect is self-evident, which is the effect produced by the constraints and inclinations of the system. 3. Industry clusters contribute to the development of the automotive industry The industrial clusters' industrial characteristics and their centralized forms can indicate that industrial clusters are concentrated in a certain industry through a number of manufacturers, and under the joint efforts of various types of action entities, the cluster effect is used to obtain A certain degree of competitive advantage has enabled this industry to develop rapidly. Therefore, some industries, especially those industries with relatively long industrial chains or those with more devious production methods, can use cluster development to rapidly increase the regional, domestic, or international competitive advantage of the industry. The automobile industry is a typical industry that is suitable for development through industrial clusters. II. Development of the world auto industry through the industrial cluster 1. The development of the world auto industry is characterized by industrial clusters From a global perspective, the development of the world auto industry is also characterized by industrial clusters. There are 58 countries and regions in the world engaged in automobile production and manufacturing, but the United States, Japan, Germany and other 15 countries' automotive production accounts for more than 90% of the world's total production. Among them, the sum of automobile output of the United States, Japan, Germany, China, and France accounts for about 60% of the world's total output. Most of the automotive industries in these countries have clearly demonstrated the characteristics of geographically concentrated industrial clusters, thus forming the top ten automobile cities in the world. Specifically: the United States Detroit automotive industry cluster - General Motors, Ford and Chrysler Motor Company headquarters. The automotive industry cluster in Tokyo, Japan, is home to Nissan, Mitsubishi Motors and Isuzu Motors, and Toyota Motor City, Toyota Motor Corporation. The Stuttgart auto industry cluster in Germany – where Daimler-Benz Motors is located; Wolfsburg’s automotive cluster – where Volkswagen is located; and Rüsselheim Automotive Cluster – where Opel Motors is located. Italy's Turin Automobile Industry Cluster is home to Fiat's corporate headquarters. The French automobile industry cluster in Paris – where the Peugeot and Citroen automobile companies are located; and the BYU Automobile Industry Cluster – where Renault Motors is located. The Birmingham Motor Industry Cluster in the UK is home to the Leland Motor Company. 2. The Industrial Cluster Effect of the U.S. Automobile Industry The U.S. automobile industry leads the world auto industry through mass production-based industrial clusters. On January 29, 1886, the German Mercedes-Benz's three-wheeled vehicle patent was approved, marking the birth of the world automobile. The development of automobile manufacturing into an industry and long-term strong competitiveness is due to the formation and development of the Detroit Automotive Industry Cluster in the United States, which also to some extent dominated the development of the global automotive industry. In 1893, the United States developed the first gasoline engine car; in 1896, Henry Ford developed a two-cylinder four-wheeled vehicle; in 1898, Detroit appeared in the United States, the first car company - Oz Automobile Company, producing the Osmium Beer car. . A fire in 1901 destroyed the Oz automobile factory, and after the restoration of production, the Oz automobile factory adopted the production organization method of processing and assembling the subcontracted parts of each decentralized workshop. These workshops were successively independent, which was to a great extent Promoted Detroit to become a Motor City. In 1902 Henry Leland founded the Cadillac Motor Company in Detroit; Ford Motor Company was founded in Detroit in 1903; the same year David Buick founded Buick Motors in Detroit. By the end of 1903, the United States had hundreds of large and small automobile factories, most of which were concentrated in Detroit. In 1904, William Durant took control of Buick Motors and started a series of acquisitions of automakers and parts manufacturers. In 1908, General Motors was established. In 1908, Ford invented the T model which has a long history. In the same year, it produced 6181 T models, which was only 8487 lower than that of Buick and ranked second in the world. In 1909, Cadillac was acquired by General Motors, and Henry Leyland established the Lincoln Motor Company in Detroit. In 1911, the three brothers Louis Chevrolet founded the Chevrolet Automotive Company in Detroit with the support of Durant. In 1913, Ford Motor Company invented the automobile assembly line and achieved large-scale production of automobiles. In the same year, it produced 182,809 T-type cars, and in 1905 produced 1 million cars and became the world's largest car company. The creation of mass production methods has changed the American automobile industry previously based on single-piece production methods, marking the start of a new era. In 1913, the original auto parts supplier Dodge Brothers opened a large factory near Detroit, began production of "Dodge" cars, and in 1915 jumped to become the fourth largest automotive company in the United States. In 1916, Durant acquired a number of major auto parts companies and formed a joint car company in Detroit, mainly producing auto parts, and moved several parts and components companies including Boston-based Hart Bearing to Detroit. . In 1919, Chrysler disagreed with Durant and left General Motors. Later he was hired by Detroit's Maxwell Company to start production of cars. In 1924, he launched the very famous "Chrysler 6" car and in 1925 Max. Will company changed its name to Chrysler Automotive. In 1923, Alfred Sloan was named general manager of General Motors. Sloan subsequently implemented organizational changes in General Motors Corp.'s organizational structure, rapidly increased the efficiency of General Motors, and broke production in 1927. With 1.5 million vehicles, it has surpassed the annual output of Ford Motor Company and once again became the world’s largest auto company and has been maintained to this day. In 1928, Chrysler acquired Dodge Brothers and Shunfeng, becoming the third largest automotive company in the United States. At this point, the Michigan automobile industry cluster centered on Detroit was fully formed as the world's first automotive industry cluster, and maintained a strong competitive advantage, making the American automotive industry ahead of the world auto industry. In 1929, the U.S. automobile production accounted for 95% of the world's automobile production, while 80% of the U.S. automobile production was produced by the Detroit Auto Group. In the same year, the U.S. auto industry’s labor productivity was 23.6 cars/person. This high labor productivity was the European automotive industry at the time. It cannot be compared at all. Ford Motor Co., in 1925, set the amazing efficiency of producing a T model car every 10 seconds. From 1910 to 1929, the United States increased its automobile production from 187,000 vehicles to 5.337 million vehicles. In 19 years, the automobile output increased by 27.5 times, and the average annual growth rate reached 19%. At present, the Detroit Auto Industry Cluster (automobile city) is still the "world car capital," and one-fourth of US vehicle production comes from the Detroit auto cluster. As the fifth largest city in the United States, about 90% of the 4.4 million people in the city are employed in the automotive industry. 3. The Industrial Cluster Effect of Japan's Automobile Industry The Japanese automobile industry has taken the lead in the automotive industry in the world based on lean production-based industrial clusters. In 1901, Japan produced the first gasoline engine car. However, by 1953, Japan’s car production was less than 50,000, which was a disparity with the United Kingdom (830,000), France, and the former West Germany (490,000) during the same period. Big. However, since the late 1950s, the Japanese auto industry has developed rapidly. It surpassed Italy in 1961, crossed over to France in 1964, caught up with Britain in 1966, and overtook the former West Germany in 1970, leaping to second place in the world. In 1980, Japan’s auto production exceeded 10 million, reaching 11.042 million, surpassing the United States for the first time (801 million), making it the world’s number one automobile production kingdom. Since the 1960s, Japan’s car production has almost grown in a linear trend. During the period from 1960 to 1970, Japan’s total automobile output increased by about 10 times, and the average annual growth rate was 27%. In 2002, Japan’s total production of cars was 10.258 million units, second only to the United States, which was about 1 times higher than that of Germany, which was ranked third. Japan’s auto industry has been able to develop rapidly and form an internationally recognized strong competitive advantage in a very short period of time. The secret of this is that Japan’s Toyota Motor Corporation has created a lean manufacturing method, and on this basis has implemented cluster development. The development of the automotive industry cluster based on lean production means that the development of the world automobile industry has entered another new era. Toyota Motor Corporation was established in 1937. In 1933, the Toyota Automatic Weaving Machine Factory established the Automotive Department and in September 1934, it produced the first Toyota Motor. By 1950, Toyota Motor Corporation had produced a total of 2,685 cars. At the time, the Ford Lurgi plant would produce 7,000 cars a day. In 1950, Toyoda Toyoda’s engineer Tokio Indy took a three-month inspection of Ford’s Luqi plant. At the time, the Ruggie plant was the world’s largest and most efficient manufacturing plant. Toyota Eiji made a cautious examination of every nuance of this large company and came to the conclusion that “there is still room for improvement in the production system there.†, and that "mass production methods do not apply to Japan." As a result, Toyota's investigators began to innovate in automobile production methods based on the automotive characteristics of the Japanese market that require “multiple varieties, small batches, and low cost.†After several years of research, it has created a "lean manufacturing method" that is unique to Toyota. The two quintessences of lean production methods are automation and punctuality. Automation is the conversion of human intelligence into automatic machinery, which allows the machine to probe individual defects that occur in production and automatically shuts down when requested for help. In the lean production method, the "action" of automation must be "movement" including human beings, that is, giving human intelligence to machines. Just-in-time (JIT), also known as "three-times," means that at the right time, in the right quantity, production and delivery are in demand. Just-in-time approaching “is catching up†means that upstream activities happen just a few minutes or seconds before downstream activities occur. The basic element of JIT is flow. , pulling, standardization work (as well as standard work-in-process inventory) and takt time. In 1962, Toyota Motor Corporation also launched a "kanban" operation method based on this. Kanban is a management tool used to implement JIT. The implementation of lean production methods led to a rapid increase in Toyota’s production efficiency. In 1968, Toyota’s annual production reached 1 million. In 1973 Toyota Motor Corporation's “Lean Production Method†was promoted throughout Japan, and then it attracted worldwide attention. The lean production method combines the best features of the single-piece production method with the mass production methods, that is, it can reduce the single-piece cost, significantly improve the quality, provide a wider range of products and more challenging work. Compared with mass production methods, lean production methods have obvious competitive advantages in terms of assembly, component supply and product development. Although the lean production method does not clearly stipulate the geographical concentration between the parts companies and the vehicle companies in the automobile production process, under the principle of “three timelyâ€, the lean production adopts a module-based production method, which will be independent in the past. The parts are integrated into semi-independent modules, and the supply of "drawing drawings" parts in mass production is changed to the supply of "approved drawings" parts. This change reduces the number of direct suppliers. For example, in 1988, Toyota produced a total of 3.969 million domestically-produced cars, and its direct parts suppliers had only 340; Ford Motor Company's car production was 3,982,000, and 1,800 direct suppliers provided parts and components for them. . Based on a modular production approach, not only does a parts supplier need to be able to do "three timely", but it also requires that it participate in the design and production of the car. This is also the extent to which the supplier's participation in the lean manufacturing process is far higher for the vehicle manufacturer. The reason for the degree of participation in mass production methods. A large number of participating activities require close communication between the assembly plant and the direct suppliers, direct suppliers, and suppliers at other levels, thus deciding that the lean production method has a strong need for geographical concentration. That is, when all production activities, from design to assembly, are carried out at the same location, the lean production method can achieve the highest benefits, the best quality, and the greatest flexibility. One of the key reasons why Toyota Motor Corporation uses lean production methods more efficiently than any other auto company is that Toyota's auto manufacturing process is highly concentrated—based on the automotive industry cluster. For example, in 2001, Toyota’s total automobile production was 5.135 million, of which domestic production totaled 3.354 million. Except that less than 10% of products were produced by the Jiuzhou assembly plant, other products were all produced in Toyota City. And the surrounding area. Formerly known as Aichi Prefecture, Toyota City is famous for Toyota's construction and is known as "Toyo Detroit." All employees in the city serve Toyota Motor Corporation. Nagoya, Toyota's export port, has the world's first Toyota Motor Terminal with a maximum capacity of 50,000 cars. Today, Toyota Motor Corporation has been considered by most industrial observers as the most efficient and highest quality automotive manufacturer in the world. 4. The Industrial Cluster Effect of the Spanish Automobile Industry Spain is a representative of the country behind the automobile industry with the help of foreign-invested industrial clusters. The Spanish automobile industry began in the 1950s. In 1960, Spain produced less than 60,000 cars. In the 1980s, the only state-owned car company in Spain, SEAT Automotive, and Germany Volkswagen AG had technology cooperation and equity transfer. Later, international car companies such as Renault, Peugeot-Citroen, Mercedes, Fiat, GM, Ford and Nissan all settled in Spain. By the early 1990s, the Spanish automobile industry had been basically controlled by international multinational car companies. However, Spain has thus entered the world’s largest automobile production country. In 1998, Spain produced 2.83 million cars; it became the world’s fifth largest automobile producer after the United States, Japan, Germany and France. In 2002, Spain’s car production was 2.855 million, ranking seventh in the world. Today, the automotive industry has become a pillar industry in Spain, with exports of automobiles and components accounting for more than 25% of Spain’s total exports, making it Spain’s largest export product. The Spanish automobile industry has a certain degree of international competitiveness. At present, the six major automobile groups in the world have a total of 11 automobile manufacturing plants in Spain and are distributed in seven regions, forming the seven major automobile production bases in Spain: including the Barcelona base of Volkswagen and the Valencia of the Ford Motor Company. Base, General Motors Zaganang Base, Peugeot-Citroen Motors Viagra Base. Barcelona’s ACICAE car cluster is Spain’s largest automotive production base and one of the two institutionalized automobile industry clusters in Spain. The ACICAE Automotive Industry Cluster was established in June 1993 and was initiated by 12 companies. By January 2001, the cluster had reached 250 companies with nearly 40,000 employees, and its output value accounted for 1/3 of the total output value of the Spanish automobile industry. Automobile industry clusters are of great significance to the competitiveness of the Spanish auto industry. According to surveys, the reasons why auto suppliers in the automotive cluster participate in the corporate network include: communication and proximity to new technologies, strengthening customer relationships, utilization of comparative advantages, proximity to new markets, and the need for benchmarking. The survey also showed that automotive suppliers participate in the corporate network and believe that the importance of the automotive industry cluster to promote technology exchanges and technology diffusion between parts and components companies reached 93%; the importance of strengthening customer relationships reached 78%; The importance of the new market reached 90%. The importance of agglomeration to form a common brand has made it 80% more important for companies in the cluster to generate comparative advantages, and the importance of competition due to proximity has also reached 90%. Among these factors, the exchange of the embarrassment is a kind of joint action effect of the industrial clusters, while the others are the effective manifestation of the clustering effect of the industrial clusters. This shows that in the institutionalized ACICAE automobile industry cluster, the clustering effect is more significant, that is, there is a strong clustering effect in the automobile base that has not been institutionalized in the industrial cluster because of production concentration. It can be said that it is precisely because of the relative concentration of automobile production that the Spanish automobile industry can be promoted to be among the world's major automobile producers in a relatively short period of time. However, the formation of this concentration is due to the localized production of multinational automobile companies, which is different from the automotive industry clusters in Detroit and the automobile industry cluster in Toyota City. 3. Conclusions 1. The development of the automobile industry requires industrial clusters The automobile was born in Germany, but the automobile industry is formed and grown in Detroit in the United States. This development history shows that the automobile industry is constantly developing on the basis of industrial clusters through the formation and release of industrial cluster effects. As a catch-up country for the development of the automotive industry, Japan has created lean production methods. The effective implementation of lean production methods is also based on industrial clusters. As a latecomer country for the development of the automobile industry, Spain has realized the formation of industrial clusters through the localization of multinational automobile groups. All this shows that industrial clusters are an important way to cultivate and enhance the competitive advantages of the auto industry. The development of the auto industry must be based on industrial clusters. 2. The formation of automotive industry clusters is diverse. Although Detroit, Toyota City, and Barcelona are all automotive clusters, their formation methods are not the same. Detroit and Toyota City’s auto industry clusters are formed by local entrepreneurs through entrepreneurship; Barcelona’s auto industry clusters are driven by the localization of multinational companies. The Detroit Auto Industry Cluster is a spontaneously formed state that fully reflects the characteristics of the industrial cluster, such as fission (Oz Motor Company's many parts and components workshops are successively independent), derivative (Chrysler left General Motors to create a Chrysler automobile Companies, imitations, transplants (Hart Company moved from Boston to Detroit) and extensions (Dodge Brothers has become an auto manufacturer by extending the industry chain from parts suppliers). Toyota City and Barcelona, ​​on the other hand, are formed by assembly factories that gather parts suppliers. Therefore, the industrial clusters of various countries' auto industries are different due to their differences in national conditions. 3. Greater effect of joint action in automotive industry clusters As the two largest automotive industry clusters in the world, Detroit and Toyota City have different automotive production efficiency, and the latter is significantly higher than the former. Although lean production methods have higher efficiency than mass production methods, the deeper reason lies in the fact that companies in the Detroit industry clusters compete more than cooperation, and all companies obtain only the aggregation effect of industrial clusters; Toyota City In the automobile industry cluster, there are more cooperations between companies than in competition. Each company enjoys a stronger joint action effect while enjoying the aggregation effect. This shows that the clustering effect of joint operations in the automotive industry cluster is stronger. This is also reflected in relevant data in the Spanish institutional automobile cluster. 4. The transformation of auto industry clusters into a “module-intensive†place With the development of the times, the “multi-variety, low-volume, low-cost†lean production method has increasingly become the dominant method of auto production. There is an important difference between the lean manufacturing method and the mass production method in the relationship between the assembly plant and the supplier. The former is the “drawing approval type†and the latter is the “providing drawing typeâ€. This means that the lean production method creates favorable conditions for component suppliers to implement modular production, and also requires that component suppliers must implement modular production. To this end, Delphi Corporation, the world’s largest supplier of automotive parts, announced in 1997 that it will develop seven module technologies for the 21st century: vehicle media networks, integrated automotive electrical/electronic systems, and high-efficiency Automotive energy systems, smart collision avoidance systems, electronic servo systems, optimized car interior systems, and engine control management systems. Ford’s Visteon Automotive Systems subsequently announced that it will undergo large-scale modular transformations in five areas: environmental control, electronic products, electrical and fuel processing, plastics and accessories, and automotive safety glass. Modularization requires frequent F2F (face-to-face) communication, which will promote the automotive industry to become more clustered, and the automotive industry cluster will increasingly become a “module intensiveâ€.
Industrial clusters promote the development of the automotive industry
Industrial clusters are the organic combination of industry and region. Industrial clusters can generate and release cluster effects, which will help to increase the competitive advantage of the automotive industry. The automobile industry in the developed countries of the world is basically developed through the way of industrial clusters, but the clustering methods in different countries are different. Industrial clustering is also an important way for China's auto industry to cultivate and improve its competitive advantage. First, industrial clusters can foster and enhance the competitive advantages of the automotive industry 1. Characteristics of industrial clusters Industrial clusters are the organic combination of industries and regions. They refer to certain geographically concentrated and interrelated enterprises in specific industries and fields. , Professional suppliers, service providers, manufacturers of related industries, and related organizations (such as universities, standardized organizations, industrial associations, etc.). Industrial clusters have obvious industrial, regional, and network characteristics. It is actually an industry that has settled in a certain place in the form of an internet and thus formed an organic combination of industry and region. 2. Competitive advantages of industrial clusters The competitive advantages of industrial clusters stem from its ability to generate and release cluster effects. An industrial cluster formed by enterprises in an industry can release a cluster effect. This clustering effect is not only the source of the competitiveness of industrial clusters, but also the basis for the existence of industrial clusters. The cluster effect is manifested through collective efficiency. It is embodied in three aspects: first, external economic performance, second, joint action, and third, institutional effect. External economy is also called “agglomeration economic effectâ€. It is a static and passive industrial cluster effect. Once the industrial cluster is formed, this kind of economic effect will spontaneously occur; joint action is the main body of action in the industrial cluster. The conscious and purposeful activity between the two is a dynamic and active clustering effect; the institutional effect is self-evident, which is the effect produced by the constraints and inclinations of the system. 3. Industry clusters contribute to the development of the automotive industry The industrial clusters' industrial characteristics and their centralized forms can indicate that industrial clusters are concentrated in a certain industry through a number of manufacturers, and under the joint efforts of various types of action entities, the cluster effect is used to obtain A certain degree of competitive advantage has enabled this industry to develop rapidly. Therefore, some industries, especially those industries with relatively long industrial chains or those with more devious production methods, can use cluster development to rapidly increase the regional, domestic, or international competitive advantage of the industry. The automobile industry is a typical industry that is suitable for development through industrial clusters. II. Development of the world auto industry through the industrial cluster 1. The development of the world auto industry is characterized by industrial clusters From a global perspective, the development of the world auto industry is also characterized by industrial clusters. There are 58 countries and regions in the world engaged in automobile production and manufacturing, but the United States, Japan, Germany and other 15 countries' automotive production accounts for more than 90% of the world's total production. Among them, the sum of automobile output of the United States, Japan, Germany, China, and France accounts for about 60% of the world's total output. Most of the automotive industries in these countries have clearly demonstrated the characteristics of geographically concentrated industrial clusters, thus forming the top ten automobile cities in the world. Specifically: the United States Detroit automotive industry cluster - General Motors, Ford and Chrysler Motor Company headquarters. The automotive industry cluster in Tokyo, Japan, is home to Nissan, Mitsubishi Motors and Isuzu Motors, and Toyota Motor City, Toyota Motor Corporation. The Stuttgart auto industry cluster in Germany – where Daimler-Benz Motors is located; Wolfsburg’s automotive cluster – where Volkswagen is located; and Rüsselheim Automotive Cluster – where Opel Motors is located. Italy's Turin Automobile Industry Cluster is home to Fiat's corporate headquarters. The French automobile industry cluster in Paris – where the Peugeot and Citroen automobile companies are located; and the BYU Automobile Industry Cluster – where Renault Motors is located. The Birmingham Motor Industry Cluster in the UK is home to the Leland Motor Company. 2. The Industrial Cluster Effect of the U.S. Automobile Industry The U.S. automobile industry leads the world auto industry through mass production-based industrial clusters. On January 29, 1886, the German Mercedes-Benz's three-wheeled vehicle patent was approved, marking the birth of the world automobile. The development of automobile manufacturing into an industry and long-term strong competitiveness is due to the formation and development of the Detroit Automotive Industry Cluster in the United States, which also to some extent dominated the development of the global automotive industry. In 1893, the United States developed the first gasoline engine car; in 1896, Henry Ford developed a two-cylinder four-wheeled vehicle; in 1898, Detroit appeared in the United States, the first car company - Oz Automobile Company, producing the Osmium Beer car. . A fire in 1901 destroyed the Oz automobile factory, and after the restoration of production, the Oz automobile factory adopted the production organization method of processing and assembling the subcontracted parts of each decentralized workshop. These workshops were successively independent, which was to a great extent Promoted Detroit to become a Motor City. In 1902 Henry Leland founded the Cadillac Motor Company in Detroit; Ford Motor Company was founded in Detroit in 1903; the same year David Buick founded Buick Motors in Detroit. By the end of 1903, the United States had hundreds of large and small automobile factories, most of which were concentrated in Detroit. In 1904, William Durant took control of Buick Motors and started a series of acquisitions of automakers and parts manufacturers. In 1908, General Motors was established. In 1908, Ford invented the T model which has a long history. In the same year, it produced 6181 T models, which was only 8487 lower than that of Buick and ranked second in the world. In 1909, Cadillac was acquired by General Motors, and Henry Leyland established the Lincoln Motor Company in Detroit. In 1911, the three brothers Louis Chevrolet founded the Chevrolet Automotive Company in Detroit with the support of Durant. In 1913, Ford Motor Company invented the automobile assembly line and achieved large-scale production of automobiles. In the same year, it produced 182,809 T-type cars, and in 1905 produced 1 million cars and became the world's largest car company. The creation of mass production methods has changed the American automobile industry previously based on single-piece production methods, marking the start of a new era. In 1913, the original auto parts supplier Dodge Brothers opened a large factory near Detroit, began production of "Dodge" cars, and in 1915 jumped to become the fourth largest automotive company in the United States. In 1916, Durant acquired a number of major auto parts companies and formed a joint car company in Detroit, mainly producing auto parts, and moved several parts and components companies including Boston-based Hart Bearing to Detroit. . In 1919, Chrysler disagreed with Durant and left General Motors. Later he was hired by Detroit's Maxwell Company to start production of cars. In 1924, he launched the very famous "Chrysler 6" car and in 1925 Max. Will company changed its name to Chrysler Automotive. In 1923, Alfred Sloan was named general manager of General Motors. Sloan subsequently implemented organizational changes in General Motors Corp.'s organizational structure, rapidly increased the efficiency of General Motors, and broke production in 1927. With 1.5 million vehicles, it has surpassed the annual output of Ford Motor Company and once again became the world’s largest auto company and has been maintained to this day. In 1928, Chrysler acquired Dodge Brothers and Shunfeng, becoming the third largest automotive company in the United States. At this point, the Michigan automobile industry cluster centered on Detroit was fully formed as the world's first automotive industry cluster, and maintained a strong competitive advantage, making the American automotive industry ahead of the world auto industry. In 1929, the U.S. automobile production accounted for 95% of the world's automobile production, while 80% of the U.S. automobile production was produced by the Detroit Auto Group. In the same year, the U.S. auto industry’s labor productivity was 23.6 cars/person. This high labor productivity was the European automotive industry at the time. It cannot be compared at all. Ford Motor Co., in 1925, set the amazing efficiency of producing a T model car every 10 seconds. From 1910 to 1929, the United States increased its automobile production from 187,000 vehicles to 5.337 million vehicles. In 19 years, the automobile output increased by 27.5 times, and the average annual growth rate reached 19%. At present, the Detroit Auto Industry Cluster (automobile city) is still the "world car capital," and one-fourth of US vehicle production comes from the Detroit auto cluster. As the fifth largest city in the United States, about 90% of the 4.4 million people in the city are employed in the automotive industry. 3. The Industrial Cluster Effect of Japan's Automobile Industry The Japanese automobile industry has taken the lead in the automotive industry in the world based on lean production-based industrial clusters. In 1901, Japan produced the first gasoline engine car. However, by 1953, Japan’s car production was less than 50,000, which was a disparity with the United Kingdom (830,000), France, and the former West Germany (490,000) during the same period. Big. However, since the late 1950s, the Japanese auto industry has developed rapidly. It surpassed Italy in 1961, crossed over to France in 1964, caught up with Britain in 1966, and overtook the former West Germany in 1970, leaping to second place in the world. In 1980, Japan’s auto production exceeded 10 million, reaching 11.042 million, surpassing the United States for the first time (801 million), making it the world’s number one automobile production kingdom. Since the 1960s, Japan’s car production has almost grown in a linear trend. During the period from 1960 to 1970, Japan’s total automobile output increased by about 10 times, and the average annual growth rate was 27%. In 2002, Japan’s total production of cars was 10.258 million units, second only to the United States, which was about 1 times higher than that of Germany, which was ranked third. Japan’s auto industry has been able to develop rapidly and form an internationally recognized strong competitive advantage in a very short period of time. The secret of this is that Japan’s Toyota Motor Corporation has created a lean manufacturing method, and on this basis has implemented cluster development. The development of the automotive industry cluster based on lean production means that the development of the world automobile industry has entered another new era. Toyota Motor Corporation was established in 1937. In 1933, the Toyota Automatic Weaving Machine Factory established the Automotive Department and in September 1934, it produced the first Toyota Motor. By 1950, Toyota Motor Corporation had produced a total of 2,685 cars. At the time, the Ford Lurgi plant would produce 7,000 cars a day. In 1950, Toyoda Toyoda’s engineer Tokio Indy took a three-month inspection of Ford’s Luqi plant. At the time, the Ruggie plant was the world’s largest and most efficient manufacturing plant. Toyota Eiji made a cautious examination of every nuance of this large company and came to the conclusion that “there is still room for improvement in the production system there.†, and that "mass production methods do not apply to Japan." As a result, Toyota's investigators began to innovate in automobile production methods based on the automotive characteristics of the Japanese market that require “multiple varieties, small batches, and low cost.†After several years of research, it has created a "lean manufacturing method" that is unique to Toyota. The two quintessences of lean production methods are automation and punctuality. Automation is the conversion of human intelligence into automatic machinery, which allows the machine to probe individual defects that occur in production and automatically shuts down when requested for help. In the lean production method, the "action" of automation must be "movement" including human beings, that is, giving human intelligence to machines. Just-in-time (JIT), also known as "three-times," means that at the right time, in the right quantity, production and delivery are in demand. Just-in-time approaching “is catching up†means that upstream activities happen just a few minutes or seconds before downstream activities occur. The basic element of JIT is flow. , pulling, standardization work (as well as standard work-in-process inventory) and takt time. In 1962, Toyota Motor Corporation also launched a "kanban" operation method based on this. Kanban is a management tool used to implement JIT. The implementation of lean production methods led to a rapid increase in Toyota’s production efficiency. In 1968, Toyota’s annual production reached 1 million. In 1973 Toyota Motor Corporation's “Lean Production Method†was promoted throughout Japan, and then it attracted worldwide attention. The lean production method combines the best features of the single-piece production method with the mass production methods, that is, it can reduce the single-piece cost, significantly improve the quality, provide a wider range of products and more challenging work. Compared with mass production methods, lean production methods have obvious competitive advantages in terms of assembly, component supply and product development. Although the lean production method does not clearly stipulate the geographical concentration between the parts companies and the vehicle companies in the automobile production process, under the principle of “three timelyâ€, the lean production adopts a module-based production method, which will be independent in the past. The parts are integrated into semi-independent modules, and the supply of "drawing drawings" parts in mass production is changed to the supply of "approved drawings" parts. This change reduces the number of direct suppliers. For example, in 1988, Toyota produced a total of 3.969 million domestically-produced cars, and its direct parts suppliers had only 340; Ford Motor Company's car production was 3,982,000, and 1,800 direct suppliers provided parts and components for them. . Based on a modular production approach, not only does a parts supplier need to be able to do "three timely", but it also requires that it participate in the design and production of the car. This is also the extent to which the supplier's participation in the lean manufacturing process is far higher for the vehicle manufacturer. The reason for the degree of participation in mass production methods. A large number of participating activities require close communication between the assembly plant and the direct suppliers, direct suppliers, and suppliers at other levels, thus deciding that the lean production method has a strong need for geographical concentration. That is, when all production activities, from design to assembly, are carried out at the same location, the lean production method can achieve the highest benefits, the best quality, and the greatest flexibility. One of the key reasons why Toyota Motor Corporation uses lean production methods more efficiently than any other auto company is that Toyota's auto manufacturing process is highly concentrated—based on the automotive industry cluster. For example, in 2001, Toyota’s total automobile production was 5.135 million, of which domestic production totaled 3.354 million. Except that less than 10% of products were produced by the Jiuzhou assembly plant, other products were all produced in Toyota City. And the surrounding area. Formerly known as Aichi Prefecture, Toyota City is famous for Toyota's construction and is known as "Toyo Detroit." All employees in the city serve Toyota Motor Corporation. Nagoya, Toyota's export port, has the world's first Toyota Motor Terminal with a maximum capacity of 50,000 cars. Today, Toyota Motor Corporation has been considered by most industrial observers as the most efficient and highest quality automotive manufacturer in the world. 4. The Industrial Cluster Effect of the Spanish Automobile Industry Spain is a representative of the country behind the automobile industry with the help of foreign-invested industrial clusters. The Spanish automobile industry began in the 1950s. In 1960, Spain produced less than 60,000 cars. In the 1980s, the only state-owned car company in Spain, SEAT Automotive, and Germany Volkswagen AG had technology cooperation and equity transfer. Later, international car companies such as Renault, Peugeot-Citroen, Mercedes, Fiat, GM, Ford and Nissan all settled in Spain. By the early 1990s, the Spanish automobile industry had been basically controlled by international multinational car companies. However, Spain has thus entered the world’s largest automobile production country. In 1998, Spain produced 2.83 million cars; it became the world’s fifth largest automobile producer after the United States, Japan, Germany and France. In 2002, Spain’s car production was 2.855 million, ranking seventh in the world. Today, the automotive industry has become a pillar industry in Spain, with exports of automobiles and components accounting for more than 25% of Spain’s total exports, making it Spain’s largest export product. The Spanish automobile industry has a certain degree of international competitiveness. At present, the six major automobile groups in the world have a total of 11 automobile manufacturing plants in Spain and are distributed in seven regions, forming the seven major automobile production bases in Spain: including the Barcelona base of Volkswagen and the Valencia of the Ford Motor Company. Base, General Motors Zaganang Base, Peugeot-Citroen Motors Viagra Base. Barcelona’s ACICAE car cluster is Spain’s largest automotive production base and one of the two institutionalized automobile industry clusters in Spain. The ACICAE Automotive Industry Cluster was established in June 1993 and was initiated by 12 companies. By January 2001, the cluster had reached 250 companies with nearly 40,000 employees, and its output value accounted for 1/3 of the total output value of the Spanish automobile industry. Automobile industry clusters are of great significance to the competitiveness of the Spanish auto industry. According to surveys, the reasons why auto suppliers in the automotive cluster participate in the corporate network include: communication and proximity to new technologies, strengthening customer relationships, utilization of comparative advantages, proximity to new markets, and the need for benchmarking. The survey also showed that automotive suppliers participate in the corporate network and believe that the importance of the automotive industry cluster to promote technology exchanges and technology diffusion between parts and components companies reached 93%; the importance of strengthening customer relationships reached 78%; The importance of the new market reached 90%. The importance of agglomeration to form a common brand has made it 80% more important for companies in the cluster to generate comparative advantages, and the importance of competition due to proximity has also reached 90%. Among these factors, the exchange of the embarrassment is a kind of joint action effect of the industrial clusters, while the others are the effective manifestation of the clustering effect of the industrial clusters. This shows that in the institutionalized ACICAE automobile industry cluster, the clustering effect is more significant, that is, there is a strong clustering effect in the automobile base that has not been institutionalized in the industrial cluster because of production concentration. It can be said that it is precisely because of the relative concentration of automobile production that the Spanish automobile industry can be promoted to be among the world's major automobile producers in a relatively short period of time. However, the formation of this concentration is due to the localized production of multinational automobile companies, which is different from the automotive industry clusters in Detroit and the automobile industry cluster in Toyota City. 3. Conclusions 1. The development of the automobile industry requires industrial clusters The automobile was born in Germany, but the automobile industry is formed and grown in Detroit in the United States. This development history shows that the automobile industry is constantly developing on the basis of industrial clusters through the formation and release of industrial cluster effects. As a catch-up country for the development of the automotive industry, Japan has created lean production methods. The effective implementation of lean production methods is also based on industrial clusters. As a latecomer country for the development of the automobile industry, Spain has realized the formation of industrial clusters through the localization of multinational automobile groups. All this shows that industrial clusters are an important way to cultivate and enhance the competitive advantages of the auto industry. The development of the auto industry must be based on industrial clusters. 2. The formation of automotive industry clusters is diverse. Although Detroit, Toyota City, and Barcelona are all automotive clusters, their formation methods are not the same. Detroit and Toyota City’s auto industry clusters are formed by local entrepreneurs through entrepreneurship; Barcelona’s auto industry clusters are driven by the localization of multinational companies. The Detroit Auto Industry Cluster is a spontaneously formed state that fully reflects the characteristics of the industrial cluster, such as fission (Oz Motor Company's many parts and components workshops are successively independent), derivative (Chrysler left General Motors to create a Chrysler automobile Companies, imitations, transplants (Hart Company moved from Boston to Detroit) and extensions (Dodge Brothers has become an auto manufacturer by extending the industry chain from parts suppliers). Toyota City and Barcelona, ​​on the other hand, are formed by assembly factories that gather parts suppliers. Therefore, the industrial clusters of various countries' auto industries are different due to their differences in national conditions. 3. Greater effect of joint action in automotive industry clusters As the two largest automotive industry clusters in the world, Detroit and Toyota City have different automotive production efficiency, and the latter is significantly higher than the former. Although lean production methods have higher efficiency than mass production methods, the deeper reason lies in the fact that companies in the Detroit industry clusters compete more than cooperation, and all companies obtain only the aggregation effect of industrial clusters; Toyota City In the automobile industry cluster, there are more cooperations between companies than in competition. Each company enjoys a stronger joint action effect while enjoying the aggregation effect. This shows that the clustering effect of joint operations in the automotive industry cluster is stronger. This is also reflected in relevant data in the Spanish institutional automobile cluster. 4. The transformation of auto industry clusters into a “module-intensive†place With the development of the times, the “multi-variety, low-volume, low-cost†lean production method has increasingly become the dominant method of auto production. There is an important difference between the lean manufacturing method and the mass production method in the relationship between the assembly plant and the supplier. The former is the “drawing approval type†and the latter is the “providing drawing typeâ€. This means that the lean production method creates favorable conditions for component suppliers to implement modular production, and also requires that component suppliers must implement modular production. To this end, Delphi Corporation, the world’s largest supplier of automotive parts, announced in 1997 that it will develop seven module technologies for the 21st century: vehicle media networks, integrated automotive electrical/electronic systems, and high-efficiency Automotive energy systems, smart collision avoidance systems, electronic servo systems, optimized car interior systems, and engine control management systems. Ford’s Visteon Automotive Systems subsequently announced that it will undergo large-scale modular transformations in five areas: environmental control, electronic products, electrical and fuel processing, plastics and accessories, and automotive safety glass. Modularization requires frequent F2F (face-to-face) communication, which will promote the automotive industry to become more clustered, and the automotive industry cluster will increasingly become a “module intensiveâ€.