Ranked 10th in Asia and 2nd in China! How did Xiangjiang Paint improve its ranking?

Some say Xiangjiang Paint, located on the banks of the Xiangjiang River, is writing a new chapter in the history of private enterprises.

This rarely publicized company, however, is setting new records with its impressive strength. By 2024, Xiangjiang Paint will be the only Chinese company to rank among the top 20 global industrial coatings companies and the world's largest OEM automotive coatings manufacturer, with sales exceeding 4 billion yuan, 10% of which is sold within the province and 90% is sold outside the province. (Data source: Hunan Daily, February 28, 2025, p. 4)

The steady growth in sales is driven by the technological support of four major production bases and three R&D centers. Facing an increasingly competitive and inward-looking coatings market, Xiangjiang Paint is committed to high-end, intelligent, and green development, accurately understanding actual user needs and leveraging its strong technological R&D and innovation capabilities to deliver industry-leading products and services. Xiangjiang Paint's technical staff accounts for over 20% of the group's total employees, with nearly 200 million yuan invested annually in R&D. The company holds hundreds of national patents and core technologies. Xiangjiang Paint also actively cooperates with key universities and research institutions at home and abroad, establishes product development laboratories in conjunction with leading companies in multiple fields, and actively explores major technological breakthroughs.

It is precisely this proactive commitment that has enabled Xiangjiang Paint to possess both a rich history and a spirit of continuous innovation. Its achievements are reflected not only in its impact on the development of the coatings industry, but also in its commitment to building the city's "iron backbone."

1. Dedicated to Infrastructure, a Major Project

In July 2024, Changsha's Xiangluzhou Bridge officially opened to traffic. It is the largest single-tower cable-stayed bridge across the Xiangjiang River. Coincidentally, Xiangjiang Paint was the company responsible for coating the bridge. Changsha enjoys abundant rainfall, and steel bridges are exposed to the elements for extended periods, making them susceptible to corrosion from rain, air, and pollutants. This can impact their aesthetics at best, and threaten their safety and durability at worst. Xiangjiang Paint shouldered this responsibility by dedicating itself to the bridge's construction, conducting in-depth product research and development and formulation for this major project. They provided two protective coating systems for the Xiangluzhou Bridge. The exterior coating, with its corrosion-resistant and weather-resistant properties, significantly reduces maintenance times and costs; the interior coating is hard and wear-resistant, providing long-term protection against wind, sand, and moisture.

It is worth mentioning that Xiangjiang Paint is not only the paint supplier for Xiangluzhou Bridge, but also participated in the design process, tailor-made coating design plans and professional coating construction guidance services to ensure that the bridge can withstand wind, sun and river erosion.

In addition to participating in the Changsha-Zhuzhou-Xiangtan Intercity Railway, Xinglian Road Bridge, and Changsha Airport expansion and renovation projects, Xiangjiang Paint has also made significant progress in the petrochemical anti-corrosion field. In the first half of 2025, Xiangjiang Paint achieved significant success, winning bids for several major petrochemical anti-corrosion coatings projects, including the Shaanxi Yanchang Petroleum (Group) Co., Ltd. paint and coatings storage framework agreement joint procurement project, the Sinopec Jiujiang Branch's 1.5 million tons of aromatics anti-corrosion coatings project, and the Huizhou Lituo New Materials Co., Ltd.'s 300,000 tons/year polyolefin anti-corrosion coatings project. With its extensive product portfolio, strong technical capabilities, and superior after-sales service, Xiangjiang Paint stood out among numerous bidding companies, demonstrating its exceptional competitiveness in the petrochemical anti-corrosion coatings field.

2. 10th in Asia, 2nd in China

On July 7th, Paint & Coatings officially released its "2025 Global Top 100 Coatings Companies" ranking (abbreviated as the "Global Coatings Top 100" or "Global Coatings TOP100"), with revenue of US$550 million in the previous year. Xiangjiang Paint ranked 27th on the list, entering the top 10 in Asia for the first time and ranking second among Chinese domestic coatings companies.

It's worth noting that Xiangjiang Paint's position in China's industrial coatings market is unrivaled. Beyond sales and rankings, its strength lies in its R&D capabilities and product reach. As one of the companies with the most comprehensive product lines across various coatings applications in China, Xiangjiang Paint offers a wide range of products, including automotive coatings, industrial coatings, heavy-duty anti-corrosion coatings, water-based coatings, architectural coatings, and specialty coatings. These products provide solutions for automotive, equipment, rail transit, aircraft, ships, petrochemical and power generation, bridges, home appliances, facilities, interior and exterior walls, and flooring, encompassing every sector of the national economy.

Xiangjiang Paint is also one of the first companies in the Chinese coatings industry to pursue independent sales, a pioneer in providing painting services. Self-operated stores have always been the foundation of Xiangjiang Paint's product sales and the "Great Wall" of its online channels. From the outset, a series of management measures were established and continuously refined throughout its development. These management measures can be summarized as "help, support, promote, compel, withdraw, and replace."

Based on this foundation, Xiangjiang Paint was the first to establish offices within major automobile manufacturers, creatively offering integrated painting services to its customers and gaining a leading position in the market. "Its approach is to provide products directly to users while also offering painting services, meaning it is responsible for the entire vehicle painting process. This approach of both product and painting services transformed its relationship with its customers from a purely buyer-seller relationship into a strategic partnership, achieving win-win development with its customers and laying the groundwork for its future as the world's largest OEM automotive coatings manufacturer.

2025 Shanghai International Auto Show body color trends, from Xiangjiang Paint

3. Management Lays the Foundation, Reform Empowers

For over seventy years, Xiangjiang Paint has consistently prioritized refined management as the enduring cornerstone of its development and resolute reform as the core engine driving its progress. Throughout its history, the pace of reform has never ceased, but has continued to accelerate. From the optimized personnel structure that broke the "iron rice bowl" system in the 1980s, to the universal labor contract system that established modern employment relations in the 1990s, to the enterprise restructuring and employee competition in 2000 to ignite internal vitality, each reform addressed key areas of concern and delivered increasing force.

Of particular importance is the fundamental transformation of its corporate structure: Xiangjiang Paint has successfully achieved a triple leap from a factory-based, state-owned enterprise to a wholly state-owned company adapted to the market economy, and finally to its current vibrant, diversified limited liability company. This series of transformative institutional reforms not only clarified property rights and optimized governance structures, but also significantly unleashed the company's development potential, accelerating its pace of reform and laying a solid institutional foundation for its subsequent rapid growth.

Entering a new era, in order to actively respond to the country's strategic call for "improving quality and increasing efficiency", Xiangjiang Paint has proactively turned its attention to the field of intelligent manufacturing, using "digitalization" transformation as a key tool to seize the commanding heights of future development. In May 2024, this strategic concept ushered in a milestone achievement - the new intelligent production control center located in the Wangcheng base in Changsha City was officially put into operation. This is not a simple equipment upgrade, but it marks that Xiangjiang Paint has achieved a revolutionary new leap in production mode and management efficiency. The control center is like the "smart brain" of the enterprise operation. Through data interconnection and intelligent decision-making, it realizes the visualization, controllability and optimization of the entire production process. It is a bright banner for Xiangjiang Paint to climb to new heights in the field of intelligent manufacturing.

The power of intelligent systems is rapidly becoming apparent in practice. Data since its launch shows that the company has not only maintained an exceptional record of zero accidents in production safety, but has also achieved 100% precise delivery of production plans. Particularly notable is the significant cost reduction and efficiency gains achieved by digitalization at some production bases: overall energy consumption has dropped by 30%, effectively implementing green and low-carbon development. At the same time, personnel efficiency has jumped by 45%, fully unleashing the potential of human resources and injecting strong momentum into the company's continued healthy development.

"Innovation is the key to lasting excellence"—this is the truest footnote to Xiangjiang Paint's 75 years of remarkable achievements. From the groundbreaking reforms to the transformation of its systems, and now to the upgrade of intelligent manufacturing, each successive self-renewal has propelled the company to greater heights. Standing at the new starting point of its 75th anniversary, Xiangjiang Paint, with the grand vision of "building a century-old foundation," is striding forward with greater confidence and a more steady pace on the vast journey of the new era, continuing its glorious chapter.