On April 20, Repair Association of CAAM hosted its 2017 annual conference in Wuxi. Audatex, as the leading global provider of automobile aftermarket data and solutions, was invited to deliver a keynote speech on how digital solutions can help advance the repair industry in China.

Over 300 attendees from all regions across the country joint the event, including representatives from OEM, dealer group, insurance company, repair shop and key industry media as well as local government. Over the years, Repair Association of CAAM has dedicated to gather resources to connect all parties, help improve their profitability, make the repair industry more standard and robust. The theme of the annual conference was “Advance, Together, Win-Win”. Audatex shared the vision of advancing the development of repair industry through digital solutions. As digitalization is the trend of future automobile aftermarket development, forward-thinkers from repair shops should build their digital capability in advance to stay ahead of the competition and capture more market.

By the end of 2016, China Car Parc was 155 million, this number is expected to grow to 226 million in 2020. The year-on-year increase of vehicles brings great opportunities for automobile aftermarket. However, on the other hand, better road condition, vehicle safety improvement and better driving behavior have led to less service needs. The competition gets more intense when non-traditional players such as E-commerce, retailers, insurance companies, and other investors starts to enter the market, this change together with the internal challenges the industry is facing -higher operational cost every year, losing top talents, lack of expertise are reshaping the competitive landscape of the industry significantly.

With the maturity of automobile aftermarket, leaders of the industry have realized the importance of informatization and digitalization. The participation of several IT providers in this year's annual conference signals the transformation that is happening within the industry. People should have more confidence to believe that while Internet+ deepening its impact to the market, repair will head toward a high-quality, high-efficiency and high-standard future through the digitalization process.