In recent years, there have been frequent takeover wars on the Xiangjiang stock market, which not only have an impact on shareholders and shareholders, but also have a lot of income, that is, Xiangjiang's business lawyers.

Although Kowloon Motor Bus is small in size, it has a long history, having been listed on the stock exchange for more than 30 years, and the number of shareholders in it is very large.

Evergrande owns 38% of the shares of Kowloon Bus and acquires 40% of the shares in Lui Juekun in a lump sum, which triggers a general takeover offer when it holds more than 51% of the shares of a listed company under Hong Kong law.

This law is aimed at the acquirer, and once triggered, it must take over other shares at the last purchase price, and cannot refuse, otherwise, it must reduce its own stake to 35%.

The share price of Kowloon Bus has been lower than the market for a long time, and at this moment, Evergrande Group bought it at a premium of 40%, and many people were very satisfied and exchanged the shares for cash.

Although a small group of people disagreed, when Evergrande acquired 90% of the shares of Kowloon Bus, according to the Listed Companies Law, it was necessary to be forced to delist, without exchanging cash, and the shares in their hands would become fixed assets in the future, and it would be difficult to sell them.

In the end, with the cooperation of professional lawyers, Evergrande Group finally spent HK$780 million to acquire the entire Kowloon Motor Bus Company, and sold a lot of land under the Kowloon Motor Bus Company to the Lui Juekun family for HK$550 million.

In other words, Evergrande spent a total of 220 million Hong Kong dollars to buy a bus company with 700 buses and nearly 4,000 employees, while taking on 350 million Hong Kong dollars in debt, plus some bus stations in use, and the land under these bus stations is actually a large asset in the future.

In addition to the station, the largest piece of land under the Kowloon Motor Bus Company is a bus repair station with an area of up to 100,000 square feet near the Yuen Long block, which is the most valuable land in the entire Kowloon Bus Company.

In this way, just looking at the acquisition itself, it is very cost-effective.

Moreover, before the acquisition, the capital market was not optimistic about the future of buses, because the Hong Kong MTR Corporation was ready to vigorously build a subway network connecting the entire Xiangjiang, if in any city in other countries, the large-scale construction of the subway would indeed affect other public transportation, but in Xiangjiang it had little impact, because the Hong Kong MTR Corporation is a public company and will not receive a penny of subsidies from the Hong Kong government.

The subway in Xiangjiang is financed by the development of the land next to the subway station, and the capital for the follow-up operation comes from the ticket sales of the subway, which also leads to the fact that the subway price in Xiangjiang has always been the highest in the world, and for many ordinary office workers, it is difficult to bear the high cost of taking the subway every day, as long as it is not in a hurry, the bus is still the first choice of ordinary people.

Therefore, after the completion of the subway, the bus has been affected to a certain extent, but it can still live a very moist life.

After the delisting of Kowloon Motor Bus, Evergrande Group acquired all the shares, but because buses are a public business, they are still monitored by the government, but in fact, as long as the bus prices are not raised casually, under normal circumstances, the government will not care too much.

After half a month of adjustment, the senior management of Kowloon Bus, who originally belonged to Lei Juekun's forces, either resigned automatically or completely lowered his profile, and the senior management dispatched by Evergrande Company successfully took over all the company's business.

On October 15, a month after Evergrande became the owner of Kowloon Bus, Xu Zhi also held a small meeting in the conference room of Hutchison Building.

"Tianfan, how is the ATM arranged?" After everyone was gathered, Xu Zhi asked.

"Chairman, according to your request, the Bank of East Asia has installed 600 ATMs throughout Hong Kong, mainly in large shopping malls, commercial districts and some large residential areas in Hong Kong, covering at least 80% of Hong Kong's wealthy families. Yuan Tianfan replied with a smile.

"Okay, but at present, the citizens of Xiangjiang are not familiar enough with the operation of ATMs, and the teaching work in this area must also be done well. Xu Zhi nodded and said.

Yuan Tianfan said: "I have arranged for employees and some college students to be stationed near each ATM machine for a long time, so that everyone who has doubts can be taught.

At the same time, I have also contacted TVB and asked them to shoot a video commercial that can teach people how to use ATMs through TV. ”

"Okay, you can do this thing, and you must lay out everything before other banks in Xiangjiang react. Xu Zhi said with a smile.

ATMs were invented in 1969, but it wasn't until 1978 that Citibank began to use them on a large scale for the first time, and it attracted the attention of other banks in the United States and began to invest in other banks in the United States because of its convenience.

In Asia, even in Japan, where ATMs have not appeared on a large scale, Xu Zhi's first task for BEA was to introduce ATMs from the United States, and then proliferate them throughout the wealthy areas of Hong Kong.

In this era, the ATM machine costs as much as $10,000 per device, and the technology is not mature, and the follow-up maintenance cost is also very high.

However, banks are also service industries, and only by providing the best service and convenience can they obtain intangible returns, as long as ATMs are located on Hong Kong Island and most of Kowloon, they will naturally attract a large number of people to open accounts with home banks.

Xu Zhi continued: "At present, we have successfully acquired the Kowloon Motor Bus Company and have fully privatized it, although the main purpose of the acquisition was to prepare for the future development of Tin Shui Wai, but some time ago I suddenly had an idea and wanted to discuss it with you. ”

He Guoyuan smiled: "What new business ideas does the chairman have?"

"At present, most banks in Xiangjiang have begun to use magnetic stripe cards, and the Xiangjiang Telephone Company has also launched a card that can use public telephones, so do you think you can also use magnetic stripe cards when taking buses, so that as long as people form a habit, we can completely save a labor on each car. Xu Zhi said with a smile.

He Guoyuan nodded and said: "Technically speaking, this is not a problem, but it is not easy to promote, banking business is needed by everyone, and there are many people who use the calling cards issued by Xiangjiang Telephone."

Although most people in Hong Kong take the bus, not many people are willing to apply for such a card, only those who commute by bus and have a discount are likely to be willing to apply for such a card. ”

"Of course you can't just use the bus. Xu Zhi smiled: "But we can add our own other companies, such as Watsons, Parknshop, and the shopping malls of our companies, if this kind of card can be used, plus certain discounts and publicity, what do you think the effect will be?"

He Guoyuan said: "It's okay to do this, but from the perspective of income, there may not be much return, and the chairman should have a follow-up move, right?"

"Yes, my idea is that this kind of card can connect the whole of Hong Kong's public utilities, such as all supermarkets, subways, telephones, buses and other industries. Xu Zhi said: "If it is successful, it will mean that most of the people in Hong Kong will become customers of our Bank of East Asia, as well as our entire business system." ”

Wang Liming frowned and said: "Chairman, your idea is indeed very creative, but if this project wants to achieve the effect you said, it must cooperate with the Hong Kong government, and this kind of project involves people's livelihood. ”

"I've considered the possibility you mentioned. Xu Zhi nodded and said: "Once this project is successful, it is equivalent to adding a grand master to the heads of most of the public utilities and retail industries in Hong Kong, and it will inevitably be coveted by some people in the British government in Hong Kong."

And even if the Hong Kong government is really fair, the MTR company and other organizations may not listen to us, and if I were them, they would definitely not cooperate with this idea, but build this system, which is also a normal behavior. ”

Wang Liming asked: "Then what should we do? If we want to spread out the whole situation, the subway company and the Hong Kong government can't get around it." ”

"Let's take it one step at a time, let's start with some of our own industries and don't attract the attention of others. Xu Zhi smiled and said, "Tianfan, where did you buy the Bank of East Asia's card, and how much does it cost?"

"For a company in Japan, the cost of a bank card is about two yuan. Yuan Tianfan replied.

"Two bucks. Xu Zhi nodded, this is also an acceptable range, so he said: "You talk to this company again, we are ready to buy a large number of them, see if we can get a little more discount." ”

Yuan Tianfan nodded, and asked again: "Chairman, I don't know if we need a password for this kind of card we launched this time?"

"No, what's wrong?" Xu Zhi replied.

Yuan Tianfan said with a smile: "If the card doesn't need a password, the cost will be much lower." ”

"That's fine, but I don't want that kind of city shopping card, and the card we issue must be tied to the person's identity information. Xu Zhi reminded that although it has not yet entered the Internet era and is still far from big data analysis, with this kind of information and supercomputing, it can also analyze people's consumption preferences.

In particular, the rise of Wal-Mart supermarkets is actually the use of data analysis results to make all-round adjustments, in the headquarters of Wal-Mart, with the second largest computer analysis system in the United States, second only to the Pentagon in the United States.

Yuan Tianfan nodded and said, "No problem, then I don't know what the name of our card is?"

Xu Zhi smiled and said, "It's called Octopus!"