Although Chen Ze had extraordinary trust in Li Mu, he really couldn't believe that Li Mu would actually want to buy the three brands of Ford in one go.
Seeing his dumbfounded look, Li Mu smiled and said, "Old Chen, I'm not joking with you. We didn't fly all the way here to visit the Ford factory."
Chen Ze calmed himself down and asked, "How much would it cost to buy these three brands? It must be an astronomical figure!"
Li Mu smiled and said, "However, the price is only a few billion USD."
A few billion USD …
Chen Ze almost vomited blood after hearing that.
Only Li Mu could say a few billion USD so easily.
However, thinking about it carefully, the total price of these three brands was only a few billion USD, which was indeed not high.
He recalled some data from his memory and said, "It seems that Ford spent at least six to seven billion USD to buy Volvo, right? Together with Jaguar and Land Rover, these three brands were bought for at least ten billion USD. How could they sell them so cheaply? "
Li Mu smiled and said, "Because they lost money!"
Then, Li Mu said as if he was counting his family treasures, "Look, Volvo was bought by Ford and suffered huge losses. Jaguar and Land Rover were bought by them, but they also couldn't escape the fate of huge losses. They spent more than ten billion USD to buy these three brands, which added up to a few billion USD. Ford lost at least ten billion USD."
The losses of large industrial groups were like cutting meat with a blunt knife. Although it wasn't a fatal cut, every cut would cut off a large piece of meat.
For example, when the domestic steel and coal market was not good, private related companies could immediately turn from profit to loss, and then they would be deeply trapped by their own companies. The losses would increase every day. Although the net assets would not be negative at this time, the key was that the net assets were like stocks with a limit down. They couldn't sell them even if they wanted to.
In such a situation, the business owners could only endure the losses and hope that one day the market would pick up. Many times, the richest man in a place would become a listed loser, with a net worth of tens of billions turning into a negative net worth. If it was fast, it would only take two to three years.
Once the trend of the industry becoming trapped, it was indeed terrifying. It was like a cement block falling on the body, pulling people into the abyss, and they couldn't get rid of it even if they wanted to.
The main reason for the Centennial Ford becoming more and more despicable was that it was too big, and the business was not managed well. In the end, it was trapped by its own assets.
When Chen Ze heard this, he was shocked and hurriedly said, "If you buy these three brands now, won't you become a scapegoat for Ford? If you buy these three loss-making companies with billions of USD, won't you have to supply blood to them all the time? "
Li Mu said with a smile, "In the hands of Ford, they are the Five Ghosts of Fortune. In my hands, it might be the Five Ghosts of Fortune. Ford can't make these three brands profitable, but it doesn't mean that I can't."
Chen Ze felt a headache. He rubbed his temples and said, "Old Li, you haven't been in the car business before. This is a big industry with tens of thousands of people. Which car brand doesn't buy and sell globally? Just the supply chain alone is enough, not to mention the sales. "
Li Mu patted him on the shoulder and said with a smile, "Don't worry. I have thought about what I should think about, and I have also thought about what I shouldn't think about. I have great confidence in turning these three brands into profits. Besides, even if it doesn't work, it's just a few billion USD. After losing the capital, I will dissolve the factory and donate all the equipment and technology patents to the country. It is also a good thing. What are you afraid of?"
Chen Ze nodded and said with a smile, "Okay, since you have said so, then I will not be a brother if I don't support you."
After that, he immediately said, "I know a little about cars. As long as you need it, I will listen to you in the future."
Chen Ze was a person obsessed with cars. His feelings for cars and the car industry were much deeper than Li Mu's. Originally, he was only worried that Li Mu would buy these three hot potatoes and end up losing everything. But deep in his heart, he was still looking forward to Li Mu buying these three brands. Now that Li Mu showed strong confidence, he was no longer worried, and all that was left was hot blood.
Three internationally famous car brands were about to be acquired by Hua Xia Corporation and become 100% Hua Xia Corporation. This kind of thing was enough to make people's blood boil.
If these three brands could be done well, it would simply be the glory of the nation.
…
Chen Ze excitedly followed Li Mu to the hotel, where Elon Musk's team members had been waiting for a long time.
In order to get these three brands, Elon Musk brought his senior executives from Tesla. In addition, he also hired several authoritative figures in the car industry through the introduction of his friends to ensure the final success of this acquisition.
As for Elon Musk, he was also looking forward to this acquisition. As Li Mu said, if these three brands were acquired, all the models, platforms, and technologies of these three brands would be open to Tesla.
In other words, in the future, Tesla only needed to develop new energy for these three brands. There was no need to redesign the chassis and build a platform. In the future, Tesla could even be directly responsible for the production of these three brands.
Elon Musk introduced his team members to Li Mu at the banquet. After lunch, everyone immediately went to the 400-square-meter presidential suite that Li Mu had reserved.
In the presidential suite, Elon Musk gave a brief report to Li Mu.
So far, everything was going smoothly. Other than Ford's slightly higher demand for money, everything else was very cooperative. They were very sincere.
However, there were also problems. For example, Volvo's production line was still in Sweden. After the brand change, Makino Technology had to send people to Sweden to solve the follow-up issues such as the change of the company and the transfer of employees. This was not a problem for Makino Technology. The real problem was that Land Rover still had a production line in the US.
Jaguar Land Rover's main production line was in the UK, but there was also a production line in the US. According to the requirements of the automobile industry union, if Ford sold this production line, the buyer must guarantee that this production line would continue to run for at least five years, and they must not take the initiative to lay off employees or stop production.
Elon Musk said, "The automobile union in the US is very influential. Even General Motors and Ford can't do anything to them. If we can't meet the union's requirements, the automobile union will prohibit Ford from selling this production line."
Li Mu nodded gently.
He had already experienced the power of the American labor union.
In fact, sometimes it was more appropriate to say that they were stupid.
The American automobile union was very powerful. Not only could they form an absolute suppression on the automobile industry, but they could also influence the overall policy of the country in the automobile industry.
In order to resist the impact of the Japanese automobile industry, the American labor union asked the government to put pressure on the Japanese automobile industry. Therefore, the US government asked Japan to sign a "voluntary binding agreement" to only export 1.68 million cars to the US market every year.
In the end, the Japanese could only run to the US to build factories. Although this benefited the American automobile union and solved a large number of jobs, for the three major US automobile companies, they were simply sh * tty teammates.
American cars were originally not competitive. Fortunately, they could rely on their advantage in the domestic market to make a living in the US. In the end, the union forced the Japanese automobile companies to build factories in the US. For Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler, this was simply inviting a wolf into the house.
The labor costs in the US were very high, which itself made the three major automobile companies miserable. However, the Japanese knew better than them about cost control, so their advantage was very obvious, making the life of the US automobile companies even worse.
The automobile union's oppression of the US automobile companies was everywhere. Ford once tried to close one of their assembly plants in the US, but the union demanded that even if the assembly plant was closed, more than 3,000 workers in the assembly plant must be paid in full, as well as social and medical insurance.
The automobile union even proposed a ridiculous proposal, asking the US automobile companies to pay 95% of the wages of the unemployed workers of the automobile union. This was simply shameless.
What was even more frightening was that the automobile union, in order to protect their own interests, did everything possible to prevent the automobile companies from optimizing the industrial structure.
For example, they did everything possible to prevent the US automobile companies from building factories overseas.
For example, they did everything possible to prevent the US automobile companies from building factories overseas.
Because of this arrogance, Detroit had gradually become a dead city. The golden years of America's top three automakers had been just like Detroit.
However, the Japanese automobile companies were very sneaky. They came to the US to build factories, but refused to sign any agreement with the automobile union. As a result, the automobile union could only pile on the US automobile companies like a leech, unable to do anything to the Japanese companies.
This further weakened the competitiveness of the US automobile companies with the Japanese cars in the US. Therefore, in the North American family car sales chart, Honda, Toyota, and Nissan occupied three of the top five automobile companies by sales volume.
Li Mu also didn't want to deal with the automobile union. If he opened a factory in the US, even if the automobile union came knocking on his door, he wouldn't sign any agreement with them. However, the current problem was that Ford itself was within the sphere of influence of the automobile union. He could ignore the automobile union, but Ford couldn't.
Then, Li Mu said to Elon Musk, "It will be difficult for us to solve the problem of the automobile union in a short time. The most important thing right now is to complete the acquisition as soon as possible. So, as long as the automobile union's request is not too excessive, we will agree for the time being. After the acquisition is completed, we will slowly negotiate with them."
Elon Musk nodded and said, "I will talk to Ford about this."
Li Mu smiled and said, "Ford should also be troubled by the automobile union, right?"
Elon Musk shrugged and said, "Everyone says that the purpose of the automobile union's existence is to destroy the US automobile industry. If it weren't for them, the Japanese automobile companies wouldn't be so successful in North America."
Then, Elon Musk reminded him, "But in the afternoon, you can use this problem to lower the price with Ford and make them make some concessions."
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