The surge in demand for automobiles and industrial machinery promotes the continued expansion of the global bearing market

Bearing is an important component in contemporary mechanical equipment and is called the "joint of machinery". The working principle of bearings is to use rolling elements to roll between the inner and outer rings to reduce friction between mechanical parts. The contact point between the rolling element and the inner and outer rings is called the contact line. The pressure on the contact line is the key to the load the bearing can withstand. The design and manufacturing of bearings need to take into account factors such as the shape, material, and accuracy of the rolling elements, inner and outer rings, and cages.

According to the friction properties between the shaft and the bearing seat when the bearing is working, it can be mainly divided into two categories: rolling bearings and sliding bearings. Due to their small friction coefficient, small starting resistance, sensitivity, high efficiency, and standardized rolling bearings, rolling bearings have excellent interchangeability and versatility, and are very convenient to use, lubricate, and maintain. They are generally given priority when selecting, so they are used in general machines. widely used.

1. Development status and market size

Bearings are one of the most important mechanical components in mechanical equipment. They can support the rotating parts of the equipment, limit the axial movement of the equipment, provide lubrication and cooling, and protect the equipment from damage. In modern industry, bearings are widely used in many fields such as transportation machinery, engineering machinery, precision machine tools, instruments and meters. As the application fields of rolling bearings continue to expand, in addition to traditional automobiles, machinery manufacturing, aerospace and other fields, they are also gradually Applied to emerging fields such as intelligent manufacturing, robotics, etc.

As the world's largest bearing producer and consumer, China occupies about a quarter of the global bearing market. With the continuous innovation of science and technology and the rapid development of the machinery industry, the application environment of bearings has become more and more complex, which has put forward higher requirements on the speed, load, life and design of bearings. Although my country's bearing industry started relatively late, with the country's strong support for the machinery manufacturing industry, it has developed an independent and complete industrial system. At present, my country has become the third largest country in bearing production in the world, showing strong development potential and market competitiveness. The growth of the global bearing market mainly benefits from the growth in demand from downstream industries such as automobiles, industrial machinery, and aerospace, as well as the application and innovation of new technologies, such as smart bearings, lightweight bearings, etc.

According to data from Shangpu Consulting, China's bearing manufacturing industry will achieve operating income of 193 billion yuan in 2020, a year-on-year increase of 9.04%; in 2022, China's bearing manufacturing industry will achieve operating income of 254.8 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 11.9%. At present, the demand for high-quality development, transformation and upgrading of the manufacturing industry is getting stronger and stronger. Market upgrading will also increase the quality demand for the bearing industry. In addition, the country has successively introduced policies to encourage the development of high-end manufacturing, which is bound to jointly promote the upstream related manufacturing industry. With the transformation and upgrading of the industry, the demand for high-precision mid-to-high-end bearing products will usher in rapid growth.

2. Upstream and downstream industrial chain of bearing manufacturing industry

From the perspective of the industrial chain, the upstream of the bearing manufacturing industry includes the supply of raw materials and equipment. Bearing manufacturing materials are divided into steel, metal materials, etc.; the midstream includes the production of different types of bearings; the downstream application areas include the automotive industry, engineering machinery industry, home appliances and motors. industry, wind power industry, etc.

The upstream of the bearing manufacturing industry mainly includes raw materials such as bearing steel, modified plastics, and industrial ceramics, as well as major bearing components such as bearing rings, rolling elements, seals, etc. Bearing steel is an important raw material for bearings, and its cost accounts for more than 50% of the total cost of bearings. The quality of bearing steel directly affects key quality indicators such as strength, corrosion resistance and fatigue life of bearings. With the improvement of smelting equipment and production technology, the quality of bearing steel in my country has been greatly improved, and some technical indicators have gradually reached or approached the international advanced level.

The upstream and downstream sectors of the bearing manufacturing industry cover a wide range of fields. Among them, automobile manufacturing is the most important downstream application field in the bearing industry, and automobile bearings account for nearly half of the downstream demand for bearings. From the perspective of market regional distribution, the Asia-Pacific region is one of the largest consumer regions in the global automotive bearing market, mainly due to the region's huge automotive consumer market and government support for the automotive industry. Data released by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers shows that in 2023, my country's automobile production and sales will complete 30.161 million units and 30.094 million units respectively, a year-on-year increase of 11.6% and 12% respectively. Production and sales have ranked first in the world for 15 consecutive years; among them, production and sales in December were respectively 3.079 million and 3.156 million vehicles were completed, a year-on-year increase of 29.2% and 23.5% respectively.

3. Future development direction of digital intelligence

In recent years, my country's bearing industry has maintained a trend of steady and rapid growth, but there is still a large gap compared with developed countries in terms of processing accuracy and production efficiency. Currently, most of my country's high-end rolling bearings in aerospace, machinery manufacturing and other fields rely on imports. High-speed railway bearing technology is monopolized by foreign manufacturers. Core bearings such as high-end machine tools and wind turbines also mainly rely on imports, which seriously restricts the independence of my country's high-end equipment manufacturing industry. develop.

Faced with this situation, my country's bearing industry urgently needs to increase innovation, improve technology, and change the traditional production management model, so as to better achieve standardized production, flexible production, and transparent production to meet the needs of market customers. It also actively adopts cutting-edge technologies such as digitalization, intelligence and greening to make the bearing manufacturing process more precise and controllable, improving production efficiency and product quality. Through the introduction of intelligent equipment, intelligent monitoring and automatic adjustment of the bearing manufacturing process are realized, improving the performance and reliability of the bearings. Implementing the concept of green production effectively controls energy consumption and emissions during the bearing manufacturing process, laying a solid foundation for the sustainable development of the industry. These innovative measures will jointly promote the transformation and upgrading of the domestic bearing manufacturing industry.

With the continuous application of digital and intelligent innovative technologies, the domestic bearing manufacturing industry will achieve a higher level of development and contribute more to the independent development of my country's high-end equipment manufacturing industry. The trend of digitalization is accelerating, and more companies are beginning to adopt digital procurement to improve efficiency and reduce costs. The Intelligent Electrical Industry Brain helps companies quickly understand the digital and intelligent services that small and medium-sized enterprises need during their transformation process.