Stop blaming the Chinese and learn from them, says top Siemens Gamesa exec

The wind industry should stop blaming the Chinese for its problems and start to understand its current situation as a challenge over how to become more productive, Siemens Gamesa chief operating officer Carina Brehm said.

Working for Siemens Gamesa “I know what crisis is and how it feels, and we know how to deal with that,” Brehm said.

But knowing how to deal with the crisis is “also why I really believe that there is also good in the bad,” Brehm said.

“That's a challenge, and there's also a wake-up call in all of what we read every day in the press, and it's super important to also understand the current situation as a challenge we want to take up as a company.

“I ask myself, we ask ourselves as a team every day, how can we be more productive in Europe? How can we really work hard on our output in our factories in Europe? It's not always about blaming the Chinese.”

But European players should also see that “it's impressive what they did, and it's impressive what they do,” Brehm marvelled.

“If you go to a Chinese factory, it's impressive how fast they learn, how fast they pushed for process excellence. It's impressive how they sell. If you ever have the chance go to China and experience a sales and marketing presentation, fantastic.”

Siemens Gamesa, as well as factories in Europe and the US, operates a giant wind turbine manufacturing hub in Tianjin, China, its largest globally.

Chinese companies have “learned their lesson” and Europeans should take that as a fact and now look what they can do with that, Brehm said.

The wind industry should learn from more established industries “to look left and right”.

“Let us not be sleepy and be in very uncomfortable situations, like the colleagues in the big automotive companies on our continent. Let's continue.”