Nanzhi Carbide’s Debut with Aurora Colorful Series (2018)
At the end of 2018, the first generation of two product series, the colorfully coated Aurora Colorful Milling NZ6530 and Turning NZ3080, made their debut, attracting users’ attention. Dongguan Nanzhi Carbide co., ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Nanzhi Tools”), as the first tool manufacturer in China’s tool industry to launch such products, thus officially entered the vision of Chinese tool users. From scratch, expanding from a single point to a broad range, struggling hard when unknown, creating brilliant auroras in the midst of forging ahead, facing difficulties head-on and catering to customers’ needs. Following General Manager He, we approach Nanzhi to appreciate the era’s struggle of Chinese aspirants reflected in a small carbide insert.
Early Struggles in a Market Dominated by Foreign Brands
Nanzhi Carbide was established in 2017, a time when domestic CNC indexable inserts were developing rapidly. “From the very beginning, Nanzhi established the concept of brand management, applied for the Nanzhi logo as a trademark, and all products were sold under the Nanzhi brand. However, during that period, most application manufacturers still mainly chose tool brands from Japan, South Korea, Europe and the United States, and had a resistant attitude towards small and new Chinese brands. For a carbide tool manufacturer in the initial stage, the difficulty of promotion can be imagined, resulting in mediocre sales performance. And this situation lasted for more than a year,” said General Manager He.
Breakthrough Strategy: Creating a Unique Product Label
How can users see Nanzhi Carbide’s products the fastest? First of all, customers need to clearly identify the unique characteristics of Nanzhi among many products, that is, to put a unique label on Nanzhi, and then it is possible to try to use it and take the first step. “At that time, what we urgently needed was to find a direction to break through the bottleneck of product sales!”
Launch of Aurora Colorful Milling and Turning Series (End of 2018)
By the end of 2018, through the unremitting efforts of its coating technology R&D team, Nanzhi Carbide became the first company to launch the PVD “Aurora Colorful” series products – the first generation of “Aurora Colorful Milling NZ6530 and Turning NZ3080 series”. “These two series of products are mainly aimed at the processing of stainless steel materials. Due to the beautiful appearance of the aurora colors, they aroused customers’ interest as soon as they were launched. After trial use, their excellent quality won more users’ favor. Now, more than 5 years have passed, the sales performance of NZ6530 and NZ3080 series products has maintained an annual growth trend, delivering a perfect answer to the market and forming a unique behavioral label for Nanzhi. Now it has become a wind vane leading the industry, with colorful products being popular and as brilliant as the aurora. Whether it is the production end, distribution end or user end, they all love the colorful CNC inserts, gladly embracing their striking looks and valuing even more the exceptional performance within. In our view, Nanzhi may not be the only choice for users at present, but it must be a good partner that will not let customers down and can help them.”
Navigating Market Involution with Differentiation Thinking (2023)
In 2023, after the three-year epidemic ended, market order fully recovered, allowing enterprises to return to a normalized market where they can play freely, but it also marked the beginning of involution in various industries. In General Manager He’s opinion, involution is inevitable in homogeneous competition. If enterprises want to develop sustainably, they must often think about issues such as “how to create differentiation” and “how to stand out among many peers with strength”. More thinking will surely lead to gains.
Launch of NZ-T50 General-Purpose Milling Insert
On November 9, 2023, during the Huaji Exhibition in Houjie, Dongguan, Nanzhi Carbide launched the NZ-T50 general-purpose self-developed groove type milling insert for the first time. The T50 series products are suitable for general processing of materials within HRC50 degrees, covering working conditions such as carbon steel, alloy steel, stainless steel, plastic molds, die-casting molds before and after quenching, etc. Due to its versatility, wear resistance and excellent stability, it can completely replace similar products from Japan and South Korea, with better performance and lower price, helping users reduce costs and increase efficiency.
NZ-T50 Coating Technology Advantages
Super smooth coating surface: Adopting droplet-free coating technology to reduce the surface roughness of the coating, improve chip removal performance, reduce cutting heat, thereby increasing tool life.
Super coating wear resistance: Ultra-dense coating, combined with a film thickness of up to 12um and a hardness of 38GPa, achieves unparalleled coating wear resistance.
Super film-substrate bonding force: Ultra-tough coating structure design significantly reduces coating stress, and the coating bonding force reaches more than 120N.
General Manager He’s In-depth Explanation of NZ-T50’s Strength
Then, General Manager He deeply analyzed the mystery of NZ-T50 coating technology: “T50 applies a very smooth and dense film on the substrate surface through the latest ultra-nano coating process. This super smooth coating can reduce the friction and wear of the tool, improve cutting performance and work efficiency. It can also effectively prevent chip adhesion and extend the service life of the tool. At the same time, the ultra-denseness of the latest ultra-nano coating makes it have a very good combination with the tool substrate, not easy to peel off, and can maintain stability under heavy load and high temperature environments, with excellent red hardness and wear resistance. Whether it is high-strength cutting or long-time work, T50 can maintain excellent performance. We firmly believe that good quality speaks for itself!”
Future Outlook: New Products for “Made in China 2025”
General Manager He also revealed to us that in order to meet the arrival of “Made in China 2025”, Nanzhi Carbide will launch more characteristic inserts with core competitiveness next. Such as new products applied in high-hardness turning/milling processing fields, and the first PVD coating new grade applied in cast iron milling fields that can replace CVD coating performance. “PVD replacing CVD can not only have the performance advantages of CVD coating, but also show better bonding force and better versatility, with a wider range of applications, which will be a major breakthrough in Chinese tools. Please look forward to more performance advantages in the future.”
Conclusion: Nanzhi Carbide’s Product-Driven Growth Philosophy
“Products are the premise of everything. Personally, I think that with the continuous upgrading of products and the accumulation of highlights, both market development and customer development will come naturally.” There is no best, only better. Adhering to the concept of “focus, simplicity, and service first”, Nanzhi Carbide will always provide users with more reliable support with better products.
