After the failure of testing Ssangyong Korea, SAIC's overseas expansion did not stop. In addition to the joint development of the Indian market with GM, as early as July and August of this year, SAIC is preparing another overseas acquisition plan. This time, it aims to be a British commercial vehicle manufacturer LDV. The middleman of the bridge is Zeng Weinan. The acquisition of Rover Motors has made a lot of contribution to Li Qu.
Acquired with Li Qu curve
According to informed sources, the legal owner of LDV, the British manufacturer of light commercial vehicles, is Eco Concept, and the company's master is British Chinese Li Qu.
It is understood that Eco Concept Co., Ltd. was established shortly this year. The purpose of the establishment of the company was to exclusively purchase British LDV. SAIC then passed the company's curve acquisition of LDV. Recently, Li Qu confirmed to the media that SAIC was discussing with her about the acquisition of LDV. However, the specific purchase price and the time of the final announcement were rejected by Li Qu because the parties signed a confidentiality agreement.
So what exactly is Li Qu? Why does SAIC acquire the British LDV through her curve?
In the British media "Eye", Li Qu is currently the most well-known Chinese woman in the business community in the United Kingdom. Because she used to buy Rover for SAIC, she has become a target pursued by the British media.
Li Qu lived in the United Kingdom for 20 years. He is familiar with the cultural life habits and styles of the British and has a wealth of personal connections. Li Qu's father is an important veteran of Nanjing Automobile. Because of this relationship, she has links with several major Chinese auto companies. Those who once worked with Li Qu commented that her work was like an advisory service company, helping both China and the United Kingdom to allocate resources rationally, and she had to communicate and communicate in the middle. Some seemingly complicated things would go smoothly.
In 2005, Li Qu was an investment advisor to the British Phoenix Group. When Phoenix Holdings’ Rover Motors faced a bankruptcy takeover, under her matchmaking, Nanhua and Brilliance had joined the ranks of buying this foreign-owned company, and finally South. Steam successfully acquired Rover Motors. The British media believe that in the process of Nanjing Auto's acquisition of Rover, Li Qu's role may be far more important than it seems.
In addition to helping Nanqi and SAIC, Li Qu had previously worked with other Chinese auto companies on overseas acquisitions. “Now Li Qu's job is to play the role of an investment consultant,†a person who knew Li Qu told Sina Automotive.
Using LDV to make up for the short body and wide passenger board
LDV Group is a manufacturer of light commercial vehicles in Birmingham, England, with an annual production capacity of 13,000 units. The main products are the Maxus series of vans and minibuses. In recent years due to losses, it was acquired by the Russian Gorky Automobile Group in July 2006, and injected 10 million pounds. However, the unexpected global financial crisis failed to allow Gorky to rejuvenate LDV. Before Christmas in December 2008, Gorky Group announced the suspension of LDV production.
In October this year, SAW had news of SAIC's acquisition of LDV. SAIC has been avoiding this issue. Until the November 23 Guangzhou Auto Show, SAIC President Chen Hongcai formally admitted to the media that SAIC Motor has participated in the acquisition of LDV. "Shangqi mainly bought its intellectual property rights and corresponding tooling molds. The UK factory also retained part of its production. Our parts will be exported to the United Kingdom and assembled locally, which will solve our wide-body bus in light buses. Whitespace."
Commercial vehicles have always been the weakness of SAIC, and light commercial vehicles are its shortcomings. Currently, in terms of commercial vehicles, SAIC has not only Huihui Automotive, but also a Chongqing Hongyan heavy truck project, which is jointly with Fiat. However, compared with FAW and Dongfeng, SAIC's commercial vehicle sales are far behind.
LDV mainly manufactures vans, light trucks and minibuses. Among them, Maxus is the latest series of LDVs. It was officially launched in 2005. The technology is advanced and it is equipped with a high pressure common rail fuel injection engine. The acquisition of LDV this time, SAIC is also looking at its technology in the field of light commercial vehicles.
There have been media reports that prior to the UK’s acquisition, SAIC had already communicated with Fiat. In order not to conflict with its joint venture project, the negotiating acquisition company will produce a commercial vehicle that is smaller than the current Iveco model in the Chinese market. Moved to Wuxi and merged with the original Xinyatu (a former light commercial vehicle brand owned by Nanjing Auto), and the purchase price was about RMB 200 million.
Opening up overseas
Due to the failure of the Ssangyong acquisition case, the outside world once believed that SAIC will not test the water overseas again in the near future. However, near the end of the year, SAIC acquired a 1% stake in Shanghai General Motors and joined forces with General Motors to develop an emerging Asian market led by India. The curve of the acquisition of British LDV, SAIC through Li Qu to operate independently. In the development of overseas markets, SAIC did not give up because of failure. Instead, SAIC became more and more courageous and the pace of “going out†was growing.
As SAIC President Chen Hong said: “After eating a long-winded wisdom, we will do a deeper understanding of overseas markets. Of course, SAIC will not give up its attempts to explore overseas operations. Although it is now more difficult, there are new ones. After the product, we will still try and we will not give up easily."