(Kong Yangfan, Product Engineer, Wanxiang Intelligent Manufacturing Co., Ltd.)

With an intimate grasp of the company’s key R&D technologies and brimming with enthusiasm when discussing project breakthrough initiatives, Kong Yangfan is a quintessential engineer. On the innovative hotbed of Wanxiang, what has enabled him to stand out? It’s his profound sense of responsibility toward his work. Every moment he carries this responsibility on his shoulders, and every step he takes is steady and sure-footed. Through practical action and unwavering persistence, he transforms the ordinary into the extraordinary, accumulating small steps into great strides. Not only has he achieved personal growth, but he has also quickly become a technical backbone, making significant contributions to the company’s development. Over the past year, he has successfully completed the design and development of multiple projects, generating new market opportunities and enhancing the company’s technological prowess. As a result, he was awarded the “Innovation” honor title by Wanxiang Group for 2024.

Responsibility is about putting in the effort every day.

The door to the conference room was suddenly thrown open, and a colleague hurried in, saying, “We just received notice—the project evaluation has been moved up!” The atmosphere instantly turned tense. Kong Yangfan calmly composed himself and said, “No problem. I’ve already completed the preliminary design and development work. Now all we need to do is boost the efficiency of our testing and get the prototype ready as soon as possible.” As a key member of the product development team, Kong Yangfan has taken a steady and methodical approach through every stage—from interpreting supplier requirements and conducting structural design and optimization to building 3D models and preparing technical review documents.

Kong Yangfan’s work routine is always intense yet fulfilling, and situations like this happen frequently. Each time, he handles them with ease and confidence. Whenever a new automaker’s system needs to be integrated, Kong Yangfan proactively heads to the customer’s site to provide a detailed introduction of the company’s products and technical capabilities. To earn the customers’ trust, he repeatedly refines his design proposals. Once, during a test, the customer discovered that a prototype had cracked. Kong Yangfan immediately assembled a problem-analysis team and rushed to the site overnight to address the issue. Relying on his keen insight and profound expertise, he quickly pinpointed the root cause of the problem and came up with a solution, successfully averting a crisis. As he puts it: “Only by taking full responsibility for our work can we create products and services that truly deliver value. My goal has never been merely to complete tasks—it’s always about exceeding our customers’ expectations.”

Responsibility means facing the toughest challenges head-on.

Faced with various challenges during project development, Kong Yangfan demonstrated unwavering perseverance. Once, Wanxiang took on a fixed-point five-link suspension project for a certain model from Company B. The project had stringent user requirements, a tight development schedule, and rapid scaling demands—within just two weeks, the data had to be finalized and developed, presenting an enormous challenge for the company. Kong Yangfan rose to the occasion, updating over 200 versions of data and conducting more than 100 CAE analyses. One night, Kong Yangfan discovered a critical design flaw and immediately convened his colleagues to discuss and implement necessary revisions. As a result, the project’s product achieved a 90% improvement in fatigue performance, reduced weight by more than 25% overall, and generated sales revenue nearing 50 million yuan, earning high praise from the customer.

To seize the market’s first-mover advantage, the development cycle of a certain project was drastically compressed, requiring simultaneous road testing and small-scale trial installations. This development approach—“racing against time while striving for top-notch quality”—places extremely high demands on design, manufacturing, and quality-control capabilities. Kong Yangfan traveled between multiple cities, closely monitoring the status of the test vehicles and maintaining tight communication with users. “Every minute and every second counts—it’s like engaging in a silent race against time, and in this race, we simply must win!” Guided by this belief, Kong Yangfan coordinated across departments to successfully complete the delivery tasks, earning the trust of users, enhancing the company’s capability in modular forward-design development, and strengthening its market competitiveness.

Responsibility is about putting inheritance into concrete action.

When traditional design methods could no longer meet users’ demands for lightweighting and high performance, Kong Yangfan boldly embraced innovation, optimizing materials, processes, and structures. Through repeated experimentation, he successfully completed the design work. The product’s strength was significantly enhanced, meeting the durability requirements of full-vehicle road tests. Moreover, he effectively addressed the issue of stress concentration in the structure, reducing costs by over 50%. This innovation not only brought substantial economic benefits but also set a new benchmark for the company in the field of product development.

Courage to innovate is an essential quality for engineers, and it’s a senior engineer’s inescapable responsibility to mentor and guide younger colleagues—“passing on knowledge, imparting skills, and resolving their doubts.” “Your approach is spot-on; you might want to give this method a try.” “Only by accumulating sufficient quantity can we achieve a qualitative leap.” “Keep up the good work—you’ll surely come up with even better solutions.” Kong Yangfan is eager to share his own experiences and insights on innovation with those around him, actively putting his words into action as he mentors and supports his younger peers. He excels at offering problem-solving ideas, demonstrating standardized procedures, and setting up step-by-step, progressively challenging tasks to help young engineers grow rapidly. He has already mentored three reserve technical personnel, and this year, he hopes to devote even more energy to training additional apprentices. He deeply understands that an individual’s strength is limited; only by raising the overall level of the team can we drive the company forward and ensure continuous progress in product development.

From the frontline battleground of project breakthroughs to the cutting-edge frontier of technological innovation and the crucial stage of talent development, Kong Yangfan has consistently upheld the word “responsibility” throughout his work. With responsibility firmly on his shoulders, he is poised to move forward steadily and sustainably. In the future, he will continue to demonstrate his sense of responsibility through concrete actions, deepening his expertise along the path of product development and contributing even more wisdom and strength to the high-quality growth of Wanxiang Intelligent Manufacturing.