After agreeing to invest in Elon Musk's aerospace business, Li Mu suddenly had a deeper understanding of this middle-aged man in front of him.
Foresight was a valuable skill for an entrepreneur. The more accurate and far-sighted an entrepreneur was, the more room for development.
Elon Musk had seen the broad prospects of commercial satellite launches before 2002. This was something that most people couldn't imagine. Even now, most people didn't dare to imagine which company would launch their own satellites in the future. In most people's minds, satellites were like missiles; they were super hardware that could only be operated by the state. However, in a few years, a large number of companies in the world's top 500 companies would develop their own satellites and look for the most cost-effective launch services around the world.
What Space-X saw was a future market that was difficult for others to see.
Elon Musk's foresight made Li Mu feel inferior in this aspect.
At this time, Elon Musk didn't expect that his commercial space plan would receive Li Mu's approval. This was really not easy.
He had told this idea to a lot of people, but unfortunately, almost everyone thought that there was something wrong with his mind. No one recognized him, let alone asked them to invest money. But now, Li Mu not only recognized his idea, but also was willing to invest a lot of money to support him, which really touched him like a gentleman dying for his bosom friend.
Elon Musk said emotionally, "Boss, it's really not easy to meet someone like you. I've been looking for investors for Space-X for so long, but other than you, no one was willing to invest a single cent. As a result, I've already decided that when the time comes to cash out my PayPal shares, I'll immediately cash them out and invest my own money …"
Li Mu smiled and said, "The reason why I'm willing to invest is not because I'm optimistic about this project. It's mainly because I'm optimistic about you. I think the smartest investment is not the project investment, but the person investment. I think you have a lot of potential, so I'll invest in you."
Li Mu said, "A few days ago, I invested a few million dollars in a college student at Harvard. He didn't have anything, only a computer and an IDEA. But it doesn't matter, I believe in him. I believe he will succeed, just like I believe in you."
"Thank you, Boss. You have so much trust in me. This is the greatest recognition I've ever received!"
Elon Musk was really touched by this young man who was ten years younger than him. When he heard this, he was stunned for a few seconds, and his eyes unconsciously turned red.
Sometimes, entrepreneurs who were determined to innovate were like a lonely boat in a bitter sea. In this vast sea full of danger, he couldn't see anyone who was going in the same direction as him. He was lonely and afraid. In this case, what he hoped the most was to be able to find like-minded people to travel with to alleviate his loneliness and reduce his fear.
However, on this unique route, it was difficult to meet like-minded people. Even if they occasionally crossed paths, not only were they unwilling to lend a helping hand, but they would also laugh at their own direction, ridiculing their own boat for being so weak that it couldn't even withstand the wind.
Elon Musk felt that he was like a lone traveler driving a small boat, and Li Mu was the owner of a huge fleet. Not only did Li Mu approve of his choice, but he even picked a giant ship from his fleet and gave it to him. He said to himself, "Drive this big ship forward. I believe you can find the new continent you want!"
Seeing that Elon Musk's eyes were red, Li Mu knew that his strategy to attack his heart was somewhat effective. Elon Musk might not be as good as Mark Zuckerberg in terms of earning money, but this person was too unusual. Although he earned his first bucket of gold through the Internet, he was unwilling to continue developing in this industry by following the rules of this industry. He chose two paths that no one had ever taken before, and it turned out that these two paths that were originally not paths were opened up by him. He had to keep such a talent by his side no matter what.
Therefore, Li Mu said to him, "Elon, I admire your unique way of thinking, as well as your way of thinking that is different from others. Right now, my personal cash flow is very abundant. If you have other ideas, even if it's just an idea that you're not sure about, as long as you want to do it, you can tell me. I will not hesitate to invest in you again, and it will be at least a hundred billion US dollars."
Elon Musk was completely stunned. Li Mu's words were too heavy, and it made him feel even more touched by Li Mu.
In fact, the reason why Li Mu said this was because he wanted to get information about the Tesla project from him.
Compared to Space-X, Li Mu wanted his Tesla more.
Space-X was awesome, but it was far less applicable than Tesla. Tesla was awesome because they led a new era. Alternative energy vehicles were a new industry led by Tesla. Not to mention the profits, just the influence alone was not something a normal project could reach.
Also, according to Elon Musk's previous technical chain, Tesla's technical chain was more mature, and it was more applicable. In Li Mu's impression, Tesla had very strong technical accumulation in several major areas such as electric motors, battery management, and autonomous driving. Toyota, the originator of hybrid cars, also purchased batteries and motors from Tesla for a long time.
Li Mu especially wanted to directly persuade Tesla's start-up team at the very beginning, so that he could buy the majority of their shares with a large sum of money. Then, they could take the money and start up quickly. They could research and develop while building the production line. With the rapid development of the technical foundation and the industrial foundation, Tesla's development speed would definitely be much faster than its previous life.
In Li Mu's previous life, Tesla's biggest bottleneck was its lack of production capacity, production lines, and product lines. In the end, it was because internet companies did not have a physical industry.
Take Tesla as an example. This company was not a car manufacturer. It was a research project started by a few geeks. When they were doing R&D, they did not have a lot of funds. Almost all of their funds were spent on R&D. That's why they did not have a foundation in the industrial industry. When they had a full set of patents, they still had to look for investors to build a factory and production line.
After more than 10 years of development, Tesla's number of mass-produced cars could be counted with one hand. Also, the production capacity was very limited, and orders were queued up for many years. In this situation, it was very difficult to speed up. Every production line had to be built from scratch, and the production capacity had to be increased bit by bit. It was impossible to achieve everything in one go.
On the other hand, a physical company like BYD was much more efficient in producing electric cars than Tesla. BYD was one of the world's top battery manufacturers, and it had been manufacturing cars for 10 years. Not only did it have battery technology and automobile technology, but it also had a battery production line and automobile production line. When BYD started producing electric cars, it had produced a lot of electric cars, including pure electric cars, gasoline-electric hybrid cars, and even electric buses, electric forklifts, and trucks.
If Elon Musk wanted to upgrade Tesla's product line to BYD's scale, he would need at least 10 years to achieve it. But anyone with a certain level of thinking would know how much he had missed out on the market during these 10 years.
It was just like Huaxia and the Soviet Union during World War II. Back then, Huaxia did not have much of an industrial base. Faced with a strong enemy, they could not produce weapons even if they wanted to. Even if they gave the complete technology of the 99 main battle tank to the Huaxia military factories of that era, they still could not produce a tank that could run. Using Tesla's purely manual development method, when the first tank was tested, World War II was probably already over.
But the Soviet Union was completely different from Hua Xia. They had a very strong industrial base. During the war, they could transport the turrets to the tractor factory that produced heavy tracked tractors, and they could immediately produce tanks that could be used in war. This was the importance of an industrial base.
Therefore, in Li Mu's view, the industrial base was the most important issue in Tesla's development. If he could get the Tesla project, he must invest a lot of money in the early stages to build up Tesla's industrial base, or he might as well directly acquire a manufacturing company in the world. If he could merge Tesla and BYD together, with enough financial support, Li Mu believed that the electric car industry could come in advance during the 2008 Olympics!
At this time, Li Mu tentatively asked Elon Musk, "Elon, if there are any good experimental projects in Silicon Valley, you can learn more about them. I'm quite interested in this area and can make some investments."
Li Mu had always regarded Silicon Valley as a holy land in his previous life. He knew Silicon Valley very well. Not only were there a lot of Internet companies in Silicon Valley, but there were also a lot of new technology companies that focused on the future. Cisco was a mega company born from Silicon Valley, and so was Tesla.
But when these companies were first established, most of them had to struggle for a long time to survive. Because they were too experimental, most of them could not even be considered a company. They were just a few geeks coming together to do some research. This was how Apple started.
Many similar small groups had very interesting technologies in their hands, but they could not even get a valuation of a few million USD. It was extremely difficult to raise a few hundred thousand USD. They could only move forward with difficulty, and many of them even died on the road of entrepreneurship.
If they could dig out a few good projects at this time and invest in them, they would definitely have a bright future.
When Elon Musk heard Li Mu's question, he smiled and casually said, "Some time ago, a friend came to me. He wants me to invest in a project. He said that they used a lot of laptop batteries to build an electric car, and the overall performance of the car is quite good. It sounds interesting, but I haven't arranged a meeting with them yet …"
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