The return on investment in the automotive industry is certainly not comparable to that of the electronics industry and the future Internet industry, but as his dream, even if the income is a little lower, it is worth his large amount of heavy asset investment in Southeast Asia, and in terms of influence, with the automobile industry, it is even more powerful.

Although the scale of AMC is much smaller than the three giants of American automobiles, the annual sales volume is also four or five hundred thousand, but most of them are small models, and the value of a single car may be lower, this kind of car is fuel-efficient, perhaps not as good as the Japanese, but the safety of American cars is still a little stronger than the Japanese, and it will also have its own advantages, as long as they take advantage of the opportunity for the Japanese to conquer the European and American markets, the layout in Southeast Asia first, the brand is promoted first, and the preconceived ideas are enough to win part of the market here.

Of course, the same is true in the mainland, but there is no way to directly invest in the terminal market, which is also a pity, in the 80s, you can't invest, and you don't need to invest, because the car is not sold at all, and after the 90s, the country will also promulgate a law, and car factories are not allowed to invest in terminal sales, that is, 4S stores. In the future, he can only honestly build cars in China.

The next day, Guo Henian took Chen Zhiwen to a parallel import car mall in the southern part of Kuala Lumpur city center, which covers an area of thousands of square meters, which was Guo Henian's first target.

Guo Henian is relatively famous, as soon as he came here, the owner of the store immediately recognized it, and hurriedly greeted him politely, and Chen Zhiwen walked around to take a look.

As expected, although Malaysia is very poor per capita, there are still a lot of rich people, and the automobile city is full of imported cars, the common one is Japanese, after all, it is relatively close to Japan, the transportation cost will definitely be lower, and Japan's influence will be greater, the United States General Motors, Ford, European Volkswagen, Fiat, Citroen also have some here, the number is a little less.

The interior of the store is a luxury car, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Lincoln, Audi, Cadillac, etc., and the most central exhibition area is a Rolls-Royce, but it is surrounded by railings.

An hour later, several people left the auto trade shop.

"Chen Sheng, I arranged for someone to investigate last night, in every big city in Malaysia, there are such auto trade shops, some large and some small, the scale is different, and the bosses behind them are also independent, which will lead to no right to speak when importing cars, if we unify the acquisition and unified operation, in procurement, maybe we can talk to those cross-border transportation car traders." Guo Henian said with a smile.

"Yes, as long as we get bigger, they need to rely on us." Chen Zhiwen nodded and said: "These auto trade stores are independent, which is convenient for us to acquire, but how to unify them and operate them still needs to work hard Guo Sheng." ”

Doing business in Southeast Asia is the retail industry that he is good at, plus he has the low-cost procurement chain of Galaxy Trading, and he is not sure that he will be able to make a profit by eating alone here, let alone the inexperienced auto trade industry.

It's one thing to recruit professionals, but if you don't have the resources in the local area, or don't understand the local culture, etc., you will definitely suffer a big loss, so the business of auto trade stores also needs to rely absolutely on Guo Henian.

Of course, as long as the business itself is done well, it will not lose, even if it doesn't make much, but Chen Zhiwen can also compensate Guo Henian in other places, if there are countless investment opportunities in the mainland, Chen Zhiwen can take Guo Henian with him, and ensure that the income is stronger than his own.

This is the benefit of mutual benefit, in the field you are good at, you can bring others to make money, and in the field you need but are not good at, others can use their resources to help you succeed.

"Chen Sheng is polite, in the future, my group, the business in Hong Kong or the mainland, Chen Sheng will take care of it more." Guo Henian said with a smile.

"No problem." Chen Zhiwen nodded and said, "Did Guo Sheng go to Shanghai to invest in Shangri-La Hotel?" ”

"No, I haven't contacted the mainland yet, but I just sent someone to take a look, and I'm going to build one in Puxi, but I heard that some large-scale hotel projects in eastern Guangdong Province are not going well, which makes me a little worried." Guo Henian said with some hesitation.

"That's because it involves foreign exchange, so there will always be problems, which is actually normal, including the hotels of Taishan Club may also encounter such problems, let the subordinates solve it slowly." Chen Zhiwen shook his head with a smile and said.

At present, except for Shekou or the projects specially approved by the central government, all of them need joint ventures, and the hotel is important, but it is not enough to let the central government approve it, and it is natural that the mainland municipal government and foreign capital cooperate.

In this case, if many things in the hotel are from overseas, it will cause a tight situation of foreign exchange, which is the current reverse scale of investment in China, that is, the investment in the country's heavy automobile industry, and the balance of foreign exchange must be guaranteed.

A five-star hotel in eastern Guangdong Province is also invested by a wealthy man in Hong Kong, who intends to build an ultra-luxury hotel in Yuezhou City, so he invited European designers to design, according to European and American rules, the cost of this design team may need to be about 5% of the budget, that is, 4 million US dollars, and this in the domestic view, this is simply outrageous, and the contradiction appears.

It was not easy to solve it later, but many of the materials in the hotel were imported, which caused contradictions, in short, there were many problems, and no one could predict if they did not appear.

Therefore, Chen Zhiwen is too lazy to invest in hotels now, but handed it over to Hu Yingxiang and asked him to come forward, anyway, hotels are not his main business, even if he will be involved in this industry in the future, it should be after 1986, at that time, the state allowed wholly foreign-owned enterprises, and if you want to invest in chain hotels in China, you can invest money directly, all of which are your own funds, and the efficiency will be much higher.

Anyway, the country is so big, it is a Shanghai market, and it can accommodate hundreds of five-star hotels, and there is no capital to monopolize it, and there is no hurry for this meeting.

"I know, so I'm arranging for someone to gather other people's experience and get ready." Guo Henian said with a laugh.

"If you are not in a hurry in Shanghai, you can consider being in Shenhai City, where the service outside is much better, the cooperation is also high, and there is more internal foreign exchange, which is convenient to do, my father's Hengyi Group is ready to build two five-star hotels in Shenhai City, Guo Sheng can also go to see." Chen Zhiwen said again.

Hengyi is currently preparing to gradually fade out of the Hong Kong real estate market, and the funds in hand will be at least 2 billion + after listing, and it is just pediatrics to take out a small part of the investment in the deep sea city.

"Shenhai City, it's okay, next time I go to Hong Kong, I'll take a look." Guo Henian nodded and said.

"Next time you go to Hong Kong, tell me in advance, and I'll arrange for my plane to pick you up." Chen Zhiwen said with a smile.

"That's good, I haven't been on such a luxurious plane yet." Guo Henian said with a smile that although he is known as the sugar king of the world, he also has his own private jets, which are all small, which are a little far from Chen Zhiwen's Boeing 747.

In the following days, Chen Zhiwen also went to inspect the situation of PARKnSHOP and RT-Mart Supermarket in Kuala Lumpur, and the business was better than he expected.

According to Guo Henian, if it weren't for the fact that it was too urgent to cause many small local mom-and-pop supermarkets to go bankrupt, the prices of the two supermarkets would have dropped even harder, but in this way, the gross profit margin of the supermarket was also much higher, which can be regarded as killing two birds with one stone.

Guo Henian also invited Chen Zhiwen to invest in real estate projects in Southeast Asia, but Chen Zhiwen declined, after all, he knew a lot of high-quality investment projects, and there was no need to take risks in a place like Southeast Asia.

Although the trip to Malaysia was only a few days, it also gave Chen Zhiwen a general understanding of the development of the retail here, as well as the preliminary preparations for the future development of AMC cars in the Asian market, which can be regarded as a success.

On November 12, Chen Zhiwen returned to Hong Kong on his own private jet.

During this period of absence, Hong Kong's real estate prices are still on the rise, especially in the auction of land on Hong Kong Island or Tsim Sha Tsui Causeway Bay, many Chinese-funded real estate giants and British-funded foreign firms are willing to participate, and the same is true for the auctions held by the MTR.

Hutchison and Wharf, although not participating in various auctions, are still fully developing their own land and properties in preparation for more cash.

After a little understanding, Chen Zhiwen no longer paid too much attention, after all, it is still easy to cash out his own land at such a high land price, and as for his father, he is preparing to go public.

The only thing that Chen Zhiwen is more concerned about is the research and development of the first generation of computers in the United States, various details are still being optimized, some games specially adapted to computers have also been developed, connected to some software, and have begun to take shape, and at the request of the Ministry of Justice, all patents have been registered worldwide.

Just wait a few more months for testing before you're ready to launch.

While Chen Zhiwen was paying attention to the computer, thousands of miles away in Yanjing City, in an administrative office building, the senior management of the First Computer Department was preparing to start a high-level meeting.

In December in Yanjing City, under a Siberian cold snap, it was already unusually cold, although there was heating in the conference room, but a group of people who had just been outside for a long time were still a little cold and shivering.

The meeting quickly gathered, and after a leader in his early 60s with gray temples and a temperamental temperament walked in, everyone quieted down.

"Everyone, I'm sorry, because there is an urgent matter, I have to urgently recall you from all over Yanjing City." The person who came said with a smile, there was no leadership at all.

"Minister Rao, I don't know what's the urgency to get all of us together in such a hurry?" A 50-year-old man asked.

"We are now at an impasse in our negotiations with Volkswagen, and we all know that. But in the automotive industry in the United States, a big thing happened, AMC, the fourth largest car company in the United States, was acquired by Chen Zhiwen, a Chinese in Hong Kong. Minister Rao didn't say much nonsense and went straight to the topic.

“AMC？ Haven't heard of it? "There are a few officials present began to whisper to each other, they really don't know this company, but Chen Zhiwen, now in Yanjing City has a bit of status officials know, after all, the Beijing-Tianjin-Tang Expressway such a large project, benefiting Yanjing City, TJ City is tens of millions of people, and maybe their automobile industry has a lot to do with it, the road is good, the requirements for the car will be much better, and it is not easy to damage the car.

"Xiao Wang, a brief introduction." Minister Rao said to the young assistant beside him.

"Okay, Minister Rao." Secretary Xiao Wang said: "Everyone, everyone must know the three major automobile giants in the United States, but in addition to General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, there are also many small and medium-sized automobile companies in the United States.

AMC is the company in the whole of the United States, second only to the Big Three, its main models are small cars, but also some SUV models, and their total sales in the United States last year were 457,000 units. ”

"450,000 units, that's a lot?" After listening to the introduction, the people in the conference room were shocked, compared with the largest automobile company in the mainland, Shanghu Automobile, the annual production capacity is only more than 20,000 vehicles.

"Such a big company, the group of capitalists in Hong Kong can afford to buy it? As far as I know, don't most of them just build houses in Hong Kong and sell them? Can you make so much money building a house? Buying a car company this big? An elderly man in a gray tunics said a little incredulously, for some rich people in Hong Kong, they also know that many people rely on selling houses, but Hong Kong is only so many, how many houses can be sold? But can you make so much money to buy a car company? You must know that a domestic car, not to mention imported, is made in China, and it can be exchanged for two sets of small courtyard houses in Yanjing.

"This Mr. Chen does not rely on selling houses, his industry is mainly electronic products, that is, Yanjing No. 1 Electronics Factory, but the scale is much larger, it is said that the products sell well in Europe and the United States, and can earn hundreds of millions of dollars a year, so he has the ability to buy the fourth largest automobile company in the United States." Rao Bing explained that although he didn't pay much attention to the situation of the foreign non-automotive industry, since he was ready to cooperate with Chen Zhiwen, he naturally checked some information in advance and learned some about it.

To be honest, it is unbelievable that a Hong Kong Chinese can develop to such a point, and he was also shocked when he first learned about it. And the acquisition of a small car giant in the United States by such a person is a great thing for the country.

"What does Minister Rao mean is that he wants to cooperate with AMC and introduce AMC models?" Another middle-aged man asked.

Minister Rao nodded and said: "Yes, after I heard the news, I had this idea, but because there is no contact channel, so I am not in a hurry, but a friend of mine in the United States, she works at General Motors, and I happened to hear that Mr. Chen in Hong Kong intends to build a factory in Asia after acquiring AMC, most likely in the Wanwan area, so I think we need to take action as well, at least communicate with the other party first."

If AMC decides to set up a factory in Wanwan, then we have no chance, although AMC is not as good as Volkswagen in terms of technology or reputation, but now the board of directors of Volkswagen has a lot of opinions on whether to invest in China, and this Mr. Chen is at least willing to invest in China. ”

At the beginning of 78 years, the country sent several teams to visit the international auto giants, in order to cooperate, it is really because of the domestic car, the quality is too poor, the normal speed is easy to stall, fuel consumption is also high, plus the domestic road itself is not very good, I don't know how many cars will often spread on the road, although the importance of the car is not as important as the truck, but there is always a strong demand, the quality and quantity can not keep up, has seriously affected the efficiency of economic operation.

But in negotiations with so many large companies, only GM and Volkswagen are interested in cooperating, and the others are basically disdainful, and GM can only stop negotiating because of the veto of the board of directors, leaving only Volkswagen.

It's just that in the past two years, the two sides have gone through more than 30 negotiations, involving many problems that many domestic people can't think of, and then solve them one by one, but many aspects still can't meet the requirements of the public, and the public is not monolithic about this investment, and many people also oppose it, resulting in an impasse in the negotiations.

The automobile industry is a large industry that the central government has named and paid attention to, which also makes the officials of the First Machinery Department feel pressure.

(End of chapter)