The Rate of SAIC Pure Electric Buses in Good Working Condition Hit 99.7% Thanks to the Round-the-Clock Service by a Support Team of 500 People

Clear clouds hanging high above the sky and flowers blooming in the summer days. When the new energy vehicles drive through the Expo Site carrying the passengers to and fro, the busily shuttling buses appear to be beautiful mobile scenery lines. Thereby visitors experience the successful, wonderful and unforgettable Shanghai Expo, while enjoying the sincere dedications of the SAIC employees.
The SAIC statistical data suggest that during the 4-month period starting from the opening of the Expo Site till the end of August, the 120 pure electric buses have completed up to 490,000 vehicle trips carrying 57 million passengers, or 467,000 passengers per day on average and driven an accumulative mileage of up to 2.6 million kilometers, with the rate of vehicles in good working condition having attained 99.7%. In contrast, the super-capacitor buses have completed up to 190,000 vehicle trips carrying 20.33 million passengers, or 167,000 passengers per day on average and driven an accumulative mileage of up to 660,000 kilometers, with the rate of vehicles in good working condition having attained 99.6%.
Of the fleet of pure electric pavilion shuttle buses, pure electric sight-seeing buses and fuel cell sight-seeing buses, the total number have increased from 240 in the beginning of the opening of the Expo Site up to 370 in June, which contribute to a mobile scenery line in the Expo Site and become the hotly pursued and hardly earned vehicle types. The 6 fuel cell buses and 150 hybrid buses tend to run under the increasingly stable conditions.
 
Complete and Powerful Organization for Comprehensive Operation Support

Ever since the opening of the Expo Site, the Expo calendar has passed for over 120 days. The new energy buses experienced such difficult stages of manufacturing and commissioning day and night by the end of April and experienced for many times the challenging huge passenger flow of over half a million people and also experienced multiple challenging days of higher temperature of over 40 degrees centigrade and powerful thunderstorms, with performances having been approved and recognized by the various circles. “The Expo Site utilizes 1% of the bus fleet available in Shanghai to carry 10% passenger flow in this cosmopolitan city,” a leader of the Bus Group was quoted as saying. Thanks to the dedications of the SAIC leadership and the Expo Service Support Team, who have turned the smooth operations of the Expo new energy buses into reality.
To better serve the Expo and guarantee the safe and well-ordered operations of the new energy vehicles, SAIC particularly set up an Expo New Energy Vehicle Service Support Team, which is comprised of multiple organizations, including the SAIC New Energy Division, SAIC Commercial Vehicle Technology Center, the Sun-Win Passenger Vehicle, Shanghai Huizhong, NAC Special Purpose Vehicle, Shanghai Diesel Engine and SAIC Fiat Powertrain Hongyan etc., with a staff of over 500 people stay working inside the Expo Site. Leading and working teams have been set up from the top SAIC management to the support of a variety of vehicle types, with scopes of responsibilities clarified and sufficient staffs allocated. The service support team of each and every vehicle type (pure electric vehicle, super capacitor vehicle, sight-seeing vehicle, fuel cell vehicle and hybrid vehicle) has developed detailed three-shift round-the-clock support schedule. The SAIC leaders have paid multiple visits to both the Expo new energy commercial vehicle manufacturing base and vehicle service support base located in the Expo Site delivering the on-site working instructions and sincere solicitude for the front-line workers. Chen Hong, the SAIC President, has convened multiple meetings for hearing of the work report of Expo support teams. Xiao Guopu, the Vice President of SAIC, convenes the regular meeting on a biweekly basis. Those service support teams even hold regular meeting at least once everyday. The regular meeting practice has been kept going on starting from last August till now.
 
Continual Dedications for Ensured Safety

The SAIC people make great dedications to the successful, wonderful and unforgettable Shanghai Expo. Since April, the key backbone personnel dispatched in the Expo Site have been insisting on working at least 10 hours a day and 7 days a week, sacrificing their weekends and public holidays to work. Those working personnel from Nanjing, in particular, have to overcome many a difficulty staying far away from their families. The SAIC leadership of various levels and Labor Union keep delivering continuous solicitudes and encouragements for those who have been working day and night. The cold drinks and sweet mung bean soup are offered additionally to the workers during the periods of extremely high temperature and heaviest workload.
As the Expo calendar has gone by half, the new energy vehicles have been encountered with the extremely high temperature of over 40 degrees centigrade, which is believed to occur once every century. Nevertheless, more challenges are yet to come. The Expo Support Team are expected to be well prepared to face even larger passenger flow that would emerge in September and October as forecasted and to carry out the performance, technological and quality maintenance services for the vehicles, which have been running for 4 months, in terms of manufacturing, steering, electric elements, and particularly the key components parts.
Zhang Lichun, Deputy Commander of the Expo New Energy Commercial Vehicles Support Team said that they would continue to work dedicatedly without taking any self-satisfaction, relaxation and negligence. Rather, they would continue to find out gaps, problems, hidden troubles and carry out the set measures, fulfill the set responsibilities, meet the set time limit and continue to work even harder with all their efforts to faithfully serve the new energy support for Expo in each and every day and make contributions to the 184-day successful, wonderful and unforgettable Shanghai Expo as the SAIC employees.
 
——Excerpts from the Shanghai Automotive News  September 5, 2010