Customer Corner : LiuGong - China's Smooth Talking Heavy-Hitter With a Taste For Trouble

They build machines that make dust and move earth. They parade themselves as a rising global OEM from Guangxi – flashy brochures, gleaming trade-stand smiles, a showroom of yellow metal that looks like the future. But look closer and the story is not just about diggers and dozers. It is a machine built on low-cost advantage, noisy trade fights and a trail of legal scraps that reads like a corporate crime novel without the blood.

This is Guangxi LiuGong Machinery Co. up close – it’s messy, loud and unapologetically corporate.

The friends in high places – Cummins and the JV that got them in the club

LiuGong isn’t a loner. It plays in the big leagues. It signed a joint venture with Cummins to make mid-range engines in Liuzhou – a proper industrial matchmaking that tied LiuGong into the Cummins ecosystem. That JV, and subsequent Guangxi Cummins operations, put LiuGong in a comfortable position to call itself global and sophisticated – while leveraging every advantage that partnership could bring. In plain terms – LiuGong has direct, historic business ties with Cummins – which means this is another company orbiting the Cummins universe that now has friction-prone baggage.

Dumping, subsidies and the trade-shock therapy

Here’s where it gets unsparing. Governments in the US and EU stopped treating Chinese-made mobile access equipment as just cheap imports – and started treating them as a national problem. US agencies found material injury threatening domestic makers. The EU launched and then applied provisional anti-dumping duties on Chinese mobile access equipment after concluding aggressive price undercutting and evidence of subsidised support. Those aren’t whispers – they’re formal, written determinations from regulators that hit imports with big tariffs. The accusation in blunt terms – Chinese producers benefited from state-provided advantages that let them sell at rock-bottom prices and take market share. LiuGong was named in the sweep of those investigations and sits on the roster of firms caught up in it.

That means real cost to exports, reputational damage and a boxed-in sales pitch for a company that built part of its global growth on low-price expansion.

Courts, arbitration and the not-so-friendly world of commercial fights

LiuGong has turned up in international law dockets more than once. There are US litigation entries and cross-border commercial arbitration fights – Brazil’s courts have seen disputes involving LiuGong where arbitral awards and enforcement were contested in national courts. That’s not just paperwork – it’s the kind of messy, expensive, headline-grabbing legal theatre that gnaws at a manufacturer’s credibility with dealers and overseas partners. When you have a stable of international court files and arbitration notes trailing behind you – customers start to ask why.

Buying and selling factories – jobs moved, intellectual property kept

In Europe LiuGong bought Dressta and the Polish HSW dozer business. Then, a few years later, it sold the factory back and moved production to China – keeping the brand and IP but shifting manufacturing. The result – production capacity consolidated in China, jobs and factories in Poland sold off. That’s earned LiuGong some predictable heat in EU industrial press – and a simple truth emerges: LiuGong will buy European goodwill and technology, then re-shore manufacturing where costs are lower. It’s strategic and legal – but for workers and local supply chains it’s brutal.

Still showing up in Russia – a reputational flashpoint

Even after 2022, LiuGong activity in Russia did not evaporate. Dealer conferences and commercial presence have been noted. Whether that’s a pragmatic sales decision or a reputational misstep depends on who you ask – but in the geopolitical age, continued business in contested markets becomes a reputational liability. It’s another blot on the corporate ledger that activists and buyers track. A common issue with Cummins customers, after we revealed combine giant Claas is still operating it’s Russian plant.

What this looks like in practice – not conspiracy, just consequence

Put the pieces together and the pattern is familiar and effective – buy technology, expand capacity, price aggressively, defend commercially in courts when deals break, and shrug off reputational fallout while global sales keep rolling in. Government probes and trade remedies are the inevitable response when a supplier scale and price squeeze the life out of competitors. LiuGong’s response has been to litigate, restructure production and double down on partnerships – including the one with Cummins that keeps it visible and powerful.

Call it tradecraft. Call it sharp practice. Call it survival. All of them land.

Why Cummins watchers should care

Cummins put its engineering cred next to LiuGong through JV ties in Guangxi. That connection is a double-edged sword. On one hand it granted technological legitimacy to LiuGong – and opened markets and know-how. On the other it links Cummins indirectly to the controversies that follow LiuGong – trade duties, litigation, factory moves and sensitive geopolitical activity. When a supplier or JV partner shows up in duty lists and court dockets, the reputational heat can bounce around the ecosystem. This is yet another company within the wider Cummins-related orbit where the idea of “ethical behaviour” and the reality of global competition can be miles apart.

Final act – gritty truth, no softeners

LiuGong makes great machines. They also make enemies – regulators, rival manufacturers, ex-dealers and national agencies that believe the playing field has been tilted. That isn’t glamourous. It’s predictable. And it’s worth saying plainly – the global construction-machinery market is messy and brutal. Firms like LiuGong navigate it with ambition, legal teams and an appetite for expansion. Their success comes at a cost to the West – and Cummins aids it. If you were expecting a neat hero story, forget it. This is corporate muscle in a new world – loud, efficient and not inclined to apologise.

Lee Thompson – The Cummins Accountability Project

Customer Corner : LiuGong – China’s Smooth Talking Heavy-Hitter With a Taste For Trouble