Recently, the automotive aftermarket service platform Baturu announced the completion of its new C+ round of financing, with investors being Zhongjin Zhide under Zhongjin Capital and Guoshou Taihe Phase I Fund under Shandong Tonghui Capital. Reports indicate that this is the fifth consecutive year Baturu has received capital injection, highlighting once again the value of the service-oriented platform.

Regarding the use of this round of financing and the company's future development, Baturu founder and chairman Zeng Wan'gui stated in an interview, "In the past five years, Baturu has initially completed the construction of infrastructure for the aftermarket industry; in the next five years, we will shift our strategic focus to improving industry service quality, based on the infrastructure we have built, to continuously provide high-quality services to the industry."

Five years of dedicated polishing, initial results in aftermarket infrastructure construction

The traditional automotive aftermarket, especially in the parts distribution sector, is extremely fragmented upstream and downstream, with numerous intermediate links, no standards or rules, and heavy reliance on manual labor, resulting in very primitive and backward services at every stage, low circulation efficiency, and poor service experience.

"The root cause is that the supply chain infrastructure is too weak and the standardization level is too low." Zeng Wan'gui feels this deeply and summarized, "Therefore, in the first five years, what Baturu focused on was to connect the upstream and downstream of the supply chain in the form of a full-vehicle parts trading platform, using internet technology to build a closed-loop system of online order automatic processing and offline logistics delivery—this is a set of basic service infrastructure for the aftermarket supply chain, including data, systems, warehousing and distribution, and channels."

According to the introduction, in terms of data, as of March 2019, Baturu has organized data for over 100 car brands and more than 200,000 mainstream models, achieving over 500 million parts matching relationships, covering 98% of models. In terms of systems, Baturu has meticulously built a series of efficient informatization system platforms, including business platform, trading platform, merchant platform, and data platform, truly achieving standardized and automated full-process operation of auto parts from transaction to delivery.

In terms of warehousing and distribution, Baturu has established four major smart warehousing and distribution centers: South China Guangzhou Warehouse, East China Hangzhou Warehouse, Central China Wuhan Warehouse, and North China Tianjin Warehouse, providing deep market coverage with a 700 km radius. Around these major central warehouses, Baturu has built city-to-city dedicated line logistics and trunk line logistics, while leveraging a service network of city partners sinking to cities, counties, and towns. It is expected that in 2019, the national layout of 7 major regions will be completed, developing a total of 2000 city partners and over 8000 ground service personnel.

Next five years, focus on aftermarket service quality construction

Influenced by factors such as upstream supplier channel integration, sharp reduction in downstream repair enterprises, and rising value experience demands from end customers, the key to future aftermarket competition will lie in improving overall supply chain efficiency and industry service quality. Automotive aftermarket media veteran Hu Junbo has mentioned in multiple speeches in recent years that behind various price wars and value battles in the automotive aftermarket, efficiency and service quality are the keys to future market competition.

Reports indicate that at the Shanghai Frankfurt Auto Parts Exhibition at the end of 2018, Mr. Zeng Wan'gui officially announced the launch of the service quality strategy, collaborating with the industry to build aftermarket supply chain service quality standards. In his view, "2019 is the starting point for the 3.0 empowerment phase of China's automotive aftermarket parts supply chain, and also the first year of opening up aftermarket supply chain service quality."

"We have determined service quality construction as an important strategy for Baturu in the next five years. On one hand, we will sort out clear processes and establish corresponding service standards in every link from product organization, quoting, order receiving, shipping, delivery, to after-sales, and strictly operate and execute according to standards in each service link to ensure that every service quality meets customer requirements." Zeng Wan'gui introduced, "The implementation of these service quality standards also involves various links in the industry, so on the other hand, we will also synchronously link upstream and downstream of the industry and horizontal partners, through industry joint guarantees, parts certification, repair shop certification, technician certification, etc., to work together to establish service quality standards for the automotive aftermarket supply chain!"

Eight major supports ensure high-quality service, good service is what truly matters

"Why hasn't China's massive automotive aftermarket given birth to a truly scaled benchmark enterprise?" Zeng Wan'gui has thought deeply about this issue, "I believe the most fundamental reason is the absence of industry service quality standards, chaotic management, and the numbness, indifference, and inaction of the group towards service quality management."

Automotive aftermarket senior media person Zhang Jie has also written articles discussing this topic, believing that future aftermarket business models will inevitably be customer-centered, with the most valuable being continuous optimized precise services provided to customers.

Zeng Wan'gui agrees, "Baturu's positioning is very clear: to provide an infrastructure platform for high-quality services to the aftermarket. The greatest value we provide to customers and partners is our service, involving data, systems, warehousing and distribution, trading, logistics, after-sales, supply chain finance, brand promotion, and other links." Zeng Wan'gui explained, "The standard for evaluating Baturu is also very simple and clear—good service is what truly matters."

As for how to ensure high-quality services, Zeng Wan'gui summarizes Baturu's capability supports into eight aspects: full category coverage, full brand expansion, full quality combination, full chain service, full system support, full process control, full channel layout, full regional linkage.

"Because of achieving the above eight points, for repair shops, Baturu's high-quality service can be summed up in one sentence—parts are complete and reliable, service is on call!" Zeng Wan'gui concluded.