As an essential part of motor vehicle, the demand for wheels is bound up with the development of automotive sector. Chinese automobile industry was on the wane in 2018 and 2019, showing negative growth in production and sales. In 2019, 25.721 million automobiles were produced and 25.769 million ones sold in China, a year-on-year decrease of 7.5% and 8.2% respectively, and the demand for wheels reached 260 million units, up 5.43% on an annualized basis, according to the data from Chinese Association of Automobile Manufacturers. It is forecasted that China’s demand for wheels will present an upward mobility in the next few years and be ahead to 284 million units in 2025, a CAGR of about 1.5% between 2019 and 2025.

By material, automotive wheels can be bifurcated into steel wheel and aluminum wheel, of which the former gets used mainly for commercial vehicle and cross passenger car, while the latter is found in passenger car and some light commercial vehicle. In 2019, China’s demand for steel wheel edged down 0.34% from a year ago to 64.31 million units (including 38.12 million units for OEM, 14.42 million units for aftermarket, and 11.70 million units for export); and that for aluminum wheel stood at 196 million units (96.01 million units for OEM, 23.02 million units for aftermarket, and 76.71 million units for export) and took a tumble of 6.99% year on year. With changes in the Chinese automobile market, the wheel OEM market will see weak growth whilst the aftermarket and the export market are becoming the niches.

The OEM demand sweeps the largest share and only a few competitive wheel manufacturers rule the roost. For instance, the eight players like CITIC Dicastal, Lizhong Wheel, Zhejiang Jinfei Kaida Wheel and Zhejiang Wanfeng Auto Wheel hold a combined 60.2% share of the aluminum wheel industry. Constrained by such factors as production scale, technical strength and brand recognition, the majority of Chinese auto wheel producers with cost advantage are scrambling to supply for some low-end vehicles and the aftermarket (incl. export market) and they are in the dry tree.

Global and China Automotive Wheel Industry Report, 2020-2025 highlights the following:

  • Automotive wheel industry (definition, classification, development tendencies, policies, etc.);
  • Global and China automobile industry (production and sales, automobile ownership, etc.);
  • Global and China automotive wheel industry (demand, regional analysis, supply relation, import & export, etc.);
  • Global and China automotive wheel market segments (steel wheel, aluminum wheel), involving market size, competitive landscape, development tendencies, etc.);
  • Six foreign giants (Iochpe-Maxion, CHUO SEIKI, ENKEI, SII, Borbet, RONAL), nine Chinese aluminum wheel manufacturers (such as CITIC Dicastal, Lizhong Wheel, Zhejiang Jinfei Kaida Wheel, Zhejiang Wanfeng Auto Wheel, Zhejiang Yueling, Shanghai MingQi Aluminium Industry, Lioho Group, Donlinks Group) and five Chinese steel wheel producers (Dongfeng Motor Wheel, Zhengxing Wheel, Changchun Faway Automobile Components, Xingmin Intelligent Transportation Systems, Zhejiang Jingu), covering profile, financials, hit products, R&D, technical characteristics, the distribution of production bases, among others.