In other words, Rover Motors is actually a new company, in 1993 it was just 6 years old, and its predecessor was several other well-known British brand car companies.

In 1966, BMC, the British car holding company that integrated most of the major car manufacturers and brands in the UK, and Leyland Motors formed a consortium called BLMC, and brands such as Austin, MG, Rover, Land Rover, mini, Triumph and Jaguar were merged into the new company.

However, in the 60s, due to the exchange rate, the cars exported from country Y were very expensive in other countries, but they did not have much advantage in terms of performance and quality compared with local brands in European countries, so the British automobile industry entered a continuous downturn.

During this period, BLMC went down the wrong path, abandoning the round, elegant, and noble appearance unique to British cars, and changed to an angular and simple shape to cater to the public, and was completely abandoned by the market.

So in 1975 BLMC collapsed, and then it was nationalized by the British government, and the government also changed the name of the company to British Leyland, abbreviated as BL Motors.

However, even if BLMC was acquired by the British government, it still did not change its increasingly crooked path, and BL's first move after becoming the owner of BLMC Automobile Company was to completely abandon the shape of the British car, and change the body of its brand into a novel five-door fastback model, in a vain attempt to regain the market with a new look.

What is a 5-door fastback type?

On the basis of the normal 4-door car, coupled with the rear door like a van, this change further lowered the style and price of the cars produced by BL Automotive.

At this time, BL Motors lost money, so the company began to look for foreign help.

In 1977, BL Motors began to cooperate with Honda Motors in the island nation, and they used Honda's technology to create affordable family models, and then they launched the Rover 200, Rover 600, and Rover 800, which were basically copies of Honda.

The only difference between the two brands of cars is probably the logo, but the big car company has changed its logo three times in a row in just 10 years, which has led to no impression of the brand among consumers.

A car brand that is not familiar to consumers is doomed to failure!

Of course, since BL Auto is a merger of several automobile companies, it is natural that not all the people in the company are stupid, and there are always one or two people who are smart.

As a result, the off-road vehicle division of BL Motors, which later became known as the Land Rover brand, began to break ties with Rover Motors and tried to operate independently.

I have to say that the Land Rover brand is very smart, so that it at least retains its own brand value and its own style, and the Land Rover SUV is still the top off-road vehicle brand at this time.

It is an off-road vehicle brand personally recognized by Her Majesty the Queen of Country Y!

Unfortunately, Land Rover off-road vehicles are only a small division of the BL car group, it has not received much attention from the board of directors, the company has paid the most attention to the new model in cooperation with Honda, but unfortunately in the past few years they have produced the economy car and the large executive luxury car finally failed.

In 1986, the government had given the government a huge hope that BL Motors had a fiscal deficit of 2.55 billion pounds, and Margaret Thatcher, the ruling Iron Lady at the time, was furious about this, so the overwhelmed British government decided to privatize BL Motors and sell it.

It's a pity that at this time, the British government made another stupid move, they actually sent Sir Graham Day to take charge of BL Motors, and for unknown reasons, this knight actually sold Jaguar, the only profitable car brand of BL Cars at that time, for a high price of 2.5 billion US dollars.

BL Motors barely survived with the money from selling brands, and then the knight became addicted to selling out of control, and he sold BL's truck department, bus department, parts department, and a subsidiary in Spain.

In the end, BL Motors only kept a few factories in the UK, during which time the British government tried to sell BL Motors to Ford and General Motors, but for various reasons, it was not negotiated twice, because the parliament never agreed to the acquisition agreement proposed by the two companies.

Eventually, in 1987, BL Motors was sold to British Airways, a military company, and they took the opportunity to turn the car company from a state-owned company into a private company.

However, British Airways manufactures airplanes and operates routes, and it does not know anything about how to run the automobile industry, and at this time, it happened to change to the British foreign trade opening policy, and cars from all countries have entered the competition in the British domestic automobile market.

The still British-run BL Motors Company was still in a changing business model, and British Airways even merged it with another civilian car brand, MG, and then changed its brand again to form ROVER Rover.

Rover Motors, which has changed its trademark four times in a row, has completely lost the shadow of its original high-end cars, and its products have been completely reduced to civilian models.

During this period, the car company, which had changed its name to Rover, was still not profitable, and was subsidized by the deep-pocketed British Airways.

But British Airways subsidized it for 6 years a year, and finally couldn't subsidize it, so in 1993 British Airways planned to sell Rover Motors to Honda, which had been working with it.

But Honda doesn't want to buy it, and they're in talks at the moment.

"I think we've been working together in a good way, it's mutually beneficial for us, but we're based in an island country and buying a British company is difficult for us to manage. The Honda man said euphemistically.

"The two of us have been cooperating for so long, if it's just a management problem, the original people of our company can help, and your company only needs to send a few high-level personnel from the headquarters. Said the people from Rover Motors.

"Since you yourself said that the two of us have been working together for so long, then I will say it directly if I have something to say. Because the two of us have always worked together, I have a clear understanding of all the problems with Rover Motors.

We don't want to take on hundreds of millions of pounds in debt to our headquarters at Honda, and even if we can't work together in the future, the cost of our cars produced in the island and shipped to the UK for sale is lower than the cost of your company's production.

Why would we spend a lot of money and buy Rover with a lot of debt?" asked the Honda guy.

"Rover has a lot of car patents and brands, and we can sell them to you in a package. Said the people from Rover Motors.

"No, we at Honda have the most advanced technology and patents in the world, so we don't need your company's patented technology.

As for the brand, I'm afraid that our Honda name is much more well-known internationally than Louvre, and we don't need your brand. "The people at Honda arrogantly said that at this time, people only focused on brand innovation and did not pay attention to the long history of the brand.

"Can we talk about it a little bit more, but we still have a lot of good models that complement Honda. Said the people from Rover Motors.

"If you're willing to sell us the Land Rover brand like you would a Jaguar, we're willing to buy it. Said the Honda guys.

"This is impossible, Land Rover is already the only bargaining chip we have now, we will never sell it separately, and the government will definitely not approve of this proposal.

A few years ago, Ford had proposed to buy the Austin brand separately, but the head office rejected it, and we will not sell the Land Rover brand now. The Rover Motors man shook his head and said.

"Not only does your company have a huge debt problem right now, but workers are often on strike, your factories are inefficient, your management is chaotic, your administration is bloated and inefficient, and your employees are often demanding higher benefits.

This is completely different from the business model of our island companies, and we are not going to be able to take a large amount of money every year to subsidize these workers like your government.

So we only want to buy one of your car brands, not your entire company. Said the Honda guys.

"Then I also want to tell you that our car company will never sell its car brands anymore, and if you want our brand and technology, you have to buy the whole company. Said the people from Rover Motors.

"I think you guys should think again, we can give Land Rover a good price. Said the Honda guys.

......We don't have to think about it, if it weren't for the fact that your company has been working with us for more than ten years, we would never be allowed to sell our own country's car brand to a foreign company.

If you only want benefits and don't want baggage, that's absolutely impossible, and if you want to buy them, you have to buy them all!" finally said an airline director who had been sitting and listening.

"Since you insist on this, then we don't have to talk about it, I'll take my leave! If you change your mind at any time, let's talk again. After saying that, the Honda people stood up and took their leave, thinking that sooner or later the people from Rover would come back to him

But the people at Honda Motor Company were wrong, and by this time a new company had already begun to brand Rover's idea.

After the merger of the two Germanys, BMW AG in Germany has become a well-developed premium car company, and they are considering a transformation.

In the 90s, when Japanese car companies were expanding overseas at their worst, car brands such as Honda and Mitsubishi had begun to set foot in the European market, and they not only produced cheap and practical models but also set foot in high-end models, which caused a lot of pressure on the German BMW company.

At the time, most of BMW's high-end cars were under $100,000, but they accounted for only 20% of global premium car sales, and BMW's sportsmanship was not popular with the wealthy and entrepreneurs of the time, who preferred a calm and restrained style.

Therefore, when many rich people want to buy a car, the first consideration is not BMW but those ancient European brands, at this time, major car companies are in transition, and even Mercedes-Benz has begun to try to produce low-end commercial cars.

However, BMW did not want to give up its position and value in the high-end car market, so they set their sights on the long-established luxury car brands in the hands of other car companies, and the chairman of BMW AG chose four targets at that time.

The first target was Porsche, which had cash flow problems.

The second target is the Wickers Group, which owns two luxury brands, Rolls-Royce and Bentley, which also found itself in the midst of the country's poor automotive industry.

The third target was the Land Rover SUV SUV that Honda had always coveted, after all, it was one of the best off-road vehicle brands at the time.

It is worth mentioning that the fourth goal of the chairman of BMW is also the mini brand that belongs to the Rover Group, this car is popular in the low-end market because it is convenient and fuel-efficient, and the appearance of this car is very delicate and beautiful, which makes it popular with a large group of female customers.

As long as BMW can win this brand, it will be able to enter the Asian market and the women's consumer market in various countries around the world without hindrance.

BMW's first contact was Porsche, and they asked Piëch and the Porsche family for an offer from Porsche.

Porsche's offer was 1 billion Deutsche marks, which in 1991 was equivalent to $600 million, and it had a research burden of nearly $500 million.

"Ridiculous! Their company is about to go bankrupt, and they dare to ask for so much money! I have at most $35 million for his broken company, and I have to help him deal with the burden of $500 million.

He was embarrassed to ask us for $600 million, and if he paid off the $500 million debt, I could consider the price.

It's crazy that they want me to pay nearly $1.2 billion for their broken car!" After saying that, the chairman of BMW completely gave up the Porsche option and turned to the Rolls-Royce brand that he had always loved.

****

Then the chairman of BMW sent his promising successor, Reitzler, to contact Rolls-Royce's Vickers, at a time when the British automobile industry was in a downturn, so Wickers was willing to sell the Rolls-Royce and Bentley brands to BMW.

Soon Reitzler returned to Munich with Vickers' offer, and BMW could buy Rolls-Royce for only 350 million Deutsche marks, or 20 million US dollars.

It's a pity that the sky is not an adult's wish, at this time, the BMW 3 series has just been mass-produced There are serious quality problems, and the BMW company can only temporarily put aside the plan to acquire Rolls-Royce and concentrate on dealing with its own internal problems.

As the saying goes, where there are people, there is a fight, Reitzler was originally the most optimistic successor to the chairman of BMW, but this time the accident happened to the BMW 3 series was led by him, and now as soon as he has a problem, a competitor has run out and fallen into the ground.

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