Why are car headlights so expensive?

Why are car headlights so expensive?

 

Car headlights are necessary for every car. Their direct function is lighting. However, it seems that the price of headlights composed of several bulbs and plastic shells is not cheap. Changing a headlamp assembly costs at least thousands of yuan. Why is such a simple thing so expensive?

 

Start with the automobile manufacturing industry chain

 

The automobile industry is a huge industrial chain. If it were not for this huge industrial chain, you would never see mass-produced cars running everywhere on the road. The lamp is one of the complex parts of the automobile. It is not only an appearance part, but also a functional part and a decorative part.

 

For different cars of the same brand, some of the three parts will be common, but the high-low configuration, size change and lights of the same model will change. From project approval, development to production, numerous vibration experiments, temperature experiments, sealing experiments, aging experiments and lighting experiments should be done. From light source, materials to components, they should meet the design requirements.

 

The market share of the global lamp industry is highly concentrated

 

Most people know that the automobile related words are mainly the main engine plants, such as Volkswagen, Toyota, GM, etc., but behind the main engine plants are the first-class suppliers: Bosch, Magna, Japan electric equipment, mainland Germany, etc. naturally, there are first-class suppliers and second-class and third-class suppliers.

 

There are not many first-class suppliers involved in automobile lighting system headlamp assembly: Haila, Valeo, OSRAM, Al, Xiaosi, etc. The market share of the global lamp industry is highly concentrated. The top three enterprises (Valeo, Xiaosi and Al) account for about 58% of the global lamp market, and the top five enterprises account for about 80% of the whole industry.

 

The common primary suppliers of automotive lighting are Valeo, Xiaosi, Al, Haila and OSRAM from left to right

 

For ordinary riders, if you have heard of the lamp manufacturer, I believe it is Haila, Germany. The industry jokingly calls Audi a lamp factory, and the headlamp assembly of Audi is mainly from Haila.

 

The lamp manufacturing technology is difficult and the evolution speed is fast

 

The above said a lot of seemingly irrelevant information. Compared with hundreds of thousands of supplier brands in the automotive industry around the world, the lamp technology requirements are high, the technical threshold is high and the technical difficulty is great. The three lamp factories have strong competitiveness, and the suppliers other than the three are far from cost control, technical ability and market development ability.

 

Moreover, the evolution speed of lighting technology is too fast, and the follow-up steering has not been popularized. Audi has been integrating laser lighting. In recent years, LED technology is also a hot topic.

 

The automobile supply chain is directly related to the lamp price

 

Many people will think that the automobile supply chain has nothing to do with themselves. This connection is very large. The wool comes from the sheep. Specific reasons:

 

1. The car is out of production, and the parts can't be out of production yet, because the parts have a maintenance demand that lags behind the supply.

 

2. It's hard to sell a single part, so the lamp mask is smashed. Generally, the assembly is replaced, and a single mask is not sold.

 

3. The lights are symmetrical from left to right, but the actual repair must face the problem of changing only one side. Cost sharing must be considered. The lamp factory will not only sell one-sided assemblies.

 

4. The lamp technology is difficult to manufacture, and the manufacturing cost must be shared.

 

5. Because of technology monopoly, high concentration of market share and insufficient fierce market competition, the profits of lamps are much higher than those of other auto parts, which will be passed on to the car owners. it is also partly due to the malicious price increase of 4S stores. In order to earn high profits, some 4S stores may pay much higher prices than the original factory.