2003: Starting with Foreign Trade

Chapter 791 "Do you want to build cars?"

Yu Liguo went to Europe to establish sales channels for the Weilai ES6 in Europe.

Tesla has performed well in North America, which has officially opened up the European and American understanding of electric vehicles. Wei Lai originally had plans to enter the European market this year, which can be considered as taking advantage of Tesla's popularity.

The first stop is naturally Germany, which is considered a major base for Weilai in Europe. In addition to Germany, it is also planned to launch sales in Norway, Sweden, and the Netherlands.

For the time being, Weilai does not yet have the capability to expand throughout Europe, and it is unknown how many vehicles it can sell; it is just a trial run.

The company plans to open eight stores in four European countries, including four in Germany. Yu Liguo's first stop was Frankfurt, the city where Weilai's German branch is located.

Yu Liguo, weary from his journey, had traveled back and forth between these four countries countless times to investigate the location of his store. Fortunately, Europe is not such a big place.

"For Germany, let's go with Frankfurt, Berlin, Munich, and Düsseldorf."

"As for the other countries, let's set them in their largest cities. Let's try it out first. Our initial goal is to raise brand awareness."

Yu Liguo confirmed the final location city with Tan Jincheng via video conference.

Whether now or in the future, the core market for new energy vehicles will ultimately be in China. Foreigners also drive them, but they are still lagging behind us.

However, this does not affect exports. Just like the electric scooters from Shanchi, the international market is certainly not as important as the domestic market, but exports are indeed thriving.

The planned mid-to-high-end brand, Weilai, will primarily target the European market. As for the Aion brand, the future export route is planned to include Africa and Southeast Asia, but that's not in a rush.

Tan Jincheng has neither the interest nor the ability to help these areas improve their infrastructure. For an electric car to be on the road, it's not as simple as just buying it; road conditions, charging stations, and a whole host of other infrastructure need to be improved.

The Weilai model is only available in two versions in Europe, priced at 5.99 euros and 6.89 euros respectively, which is equivalent to about 50 yuan.

It's a bit cheaper than the Edamame S, which starts at over 8 euros in Europe.

There's no way around it. It's not a difference in brands. Foreigners seem to have a greater love for sedans than SUVs. It seems that only we have a special admiration for SUVs and their spaciousness.

If the price is the same as Maodou S, it will affect the promotion.

"Okay, I'll start setting it up now. Should we buy the shop?"

Flash and Wei Lai have always been known for their extravagant spending. When opening offline stores in China, they would buy rather than rent, which is why Yu Liguo made that comment. In fact, when he first arrived at Wei Lai, he didn't quite understand this behavior.

This practice undoubtedly increases the burden and costs on enterprises, as Wei Lai is not powerful enough to be financially powerful.

"Forget it, let's just rent it there, so people won't think we're transferring assets. Besides, properties in Europe are quite expensive, and the appreciation potential is limited, so there's no need for that."

Yu Liguo smiled. He came from within the system and had been a lieutenant for almost two years, though not a very long time.

Over the past year, the young business owner has made rapid progress in his eyes, especially in terms of his sense of smell. In the past, this young business owner was somewhat impulsive and reckless.

To be honest, this kind of personality is only suitable for port cities. If it were in the north, he would have been lucky if he had ended up at the Flash stage.

High emotional intelligence is described as acting spontaneously, while low emotional intelligence is described as being bad at handling situations. However, the boss has indeed made rapid progress in the past year or so. For example, at the beginning of this year, he immediately announced an increase in investment in new energy vehicles, investing 30 billion yuan, which is a very clear political signal.

The same applies to venturing into the semiconductor industry. In addition, the company recently secured a $40 billion order, gradually establishing the boss's advantages in certain areas.

As someone who came from within the system, Yu Liguo was quite happy to see this change in his boss. It's hard to define whether it's good or bad for the boss, but it certainly benefits the company's expansion.

The fact that the boss was able to think of these things immediately shows that he truly understands political economics.

While the European market was making small-scale moves, the domestic market was making great strides. Tesla's battery team was dispatched to Ningbo just three days after Tan Jincheng returned, along with a senior vice president of Tesla.

This senior vice president was sent by Masla to find suppliers globally, and his first stop was China.

"Is it a component of a cooling system inside the battery?"

When Lü Ruifeng explained the vice president's demands to Tan Jincheng, Tan Jincheng was somewhat surprised, not expecting that this person would want to improve this component as soon as he arrived.

"How about this, you show the drawings to our current supplier and see if they can make it."

Tan Jincheng vaguely remembered the supplier of this order, which was Xushen Machinery in the same district. They had taken the initiative to approach them through connections. Xushen Machinery is not a large company now. The boss graduated from junior high school and started as a mold apprentice, gradually building his own parts company.

Wei's requirements are quite high, and the order for this part is not large; to be honest, this order is not profitable.

Having spent so many years in Beicang in his previous life, Tan Jincheng certainly knew about Xushen. A few years ago, Xushen had some scale, but its strength was not particularly strong. They also took some orders for gasoline vehicles, but Tan Jincheng still didn't quite trust them in the field of new energy vehicles.

At the time, this order was just a trial, and not many companies wanted to take it, but Xushen still accepted it.

Since that incident, Xushen has been included in the supplier list of Weilai New Energy Vehicles. Currently, together with a series of companies including Beicang, it provides parts to Weilai. Tan Jincheng plans to check the performance of these suppliers after he finishes his work this year and see who he supports for integrated die casting.

I just didn't expect that it still didn't meet Tesla's requirements.

Lu Ruifeng said with some emotion, "Yes, their requirements are very high. I really didn't expect them to be even higher than ours."

"Are you trying to say that a small temple has a lot of evil influence? Haha, you go and take charge of cooperating with them. Do what they ask for. If their standards are higher than ours, then raise our standards and make the suppliers improve. That's the attitude of running a business."

In terms of company size and output value, Tesla is nothing now. There are plenty of car companies of Tesla's size in China, but companies with the same strict requirements for each component as Tesla are rare.

If Wei Lai hadn't been so strict with Tan Jincheng, he might have ended up like this company, since he could sell cars at a lower cost.

The adage "bad money drives out good" doesn't mean Tesla's cars are without flaws, but their rigorous standards from the very beginning of their manufacturing process justify their leading position in the new energy vehicle industry.

"Okay, I'll listen to the boss and learn from them."

Lü Ruifeng understood what his boss meant: since the other party had already come to him, he should learn from them.

He is currently in charge of the overall management of Tesla's power batteries, mainly battery research and development and technical communication with customers. He was in charge of the Tesla expert team's visit to China.

Saturday, October 4.

At eight o'clock in the morning, Tan Jincheng, who hadn't gotten out of bed yet, was urgently woken up.

"What's going on? Version 7.0?"

Tan Jincheng was still a little confused. He didn't remember this, or was his memory confused?
"Yes, it seems a bit serious. Boss, should we postpone your trip?"

Tan Jincheng pondered for a moment and said, "Forget it, the itinerary remains unchanged, but the company can take action. Have the company's public relations department and logistics department prepare contingency plans, and donate what needs to be donated and send what needs to be sent."

The Fangcaodi flagship store was originally scheduled to officially open tomorrow, but no one expected to encounter such a sudden event, which is still in Sichuan Province, this time in Ya'an.

7.0 isn't small, but Tan Jincheng seems to have no memory of his past life? What was he busy with back then?

However, regardless of the circumstances, the necessary donations are still required. Large enterprises sometimes need to shoulder some social responsibility. But now, companies like Flash are already large conglomerates with their own operating mechanisms, so it doesn't matter whether I'm in Ningbo or not.

However, given this incident, it seems the opening of Tesla's new store will have to be conducted discreetly.

The reason Tan Jincheng had Zeng Jixiang notify the public relations department was that he was afraid people would bring up the old issues again. Tan Jincheng, who has been concerned about education for many years, continued to build schools in various places after 2008, and the quality was the same as before.

The donation was made, and the construction was completed, but Tan Jincheng no longer needs such a reputation to protect him. The foundation rarely publicizes the matter anymore. However, in this internet age, even trivial matters can be posted online.

Netizens with nothing better to do are more likely to bring up old issues.

The itinerary remained unchanged, but Tan Jincheng still postponed one flight, went to the company to give instructions, and reminded everyone to do more and speak less. He explained that in major emergencies, sometimes how much money you donate doesn't necessarily have a positive effect.

Jumping too much can have the opposite effect.

Musk also arrived in Beijing today, though his flight was slightly delayed. Tan Jincheng's delay meant he arrived in Beijing around the same time as Musk.

Today, most of the people who went to the Tesla direct sales store to show their support were celebrities, including Lei Jun, who is very interested in cars, the son of a certain Fan, and the three giants of the new energy vehicle industry from the previous life.

Li Xiang of Autohome, Li Bing of Yidao, and Yu Yongfu, an investor in Xiaopeng, are now customers and will be competitors in the future. It's just unknown whether these people will still be in the car manufacturing industry in their lifetime.

Following historical trends, these individuals will likely continue to establish new energy vehicle brands, as they have already achieved considerable success and should have some new aspirations.

I wonder what brand name Li Bing will use this time?

Haha, just thinking about it is funny.

Upon arriving in the capital, Tan Jincheng discreetly went to the newly established Weilai Capital Office. Lei Jun, who had heard the news, walked into Tan Jincheng's office with a smile.

"How come you have time to come here?"

On the 9th of this month, Xiaomi released a new mobile operating system, the Xiaomi 2 Enhanced Edition 2S, the Youth Edition 2A, and the Xiaomi Box all at once. I wonder what Mr. Chen of Shengda felt when he saw the release of the Xiaomi Box. Did he feel like he was born at the wrong time?

They were the first to come up with this thing; back then, Mr. Chen wanted to create an internet-based Disney. "I heard you came to Beijing for Tesla's opening ceremony, so I inquired about your schedule and came to check it out."

"Oh, you're one of the first Tesla users, right? Dude, that's not fair. Our ES6 was a free gift to you, but you spent nearly a million to buy a Tesla. That's unfair."

"Have you no shame? I bought hundreds of cars from your company in one go, and you're still fussing over this?"

Haha, are you going tomorrow?

Tan Jincheng was invited as a strategic partner, and he couldn't very well break his promise since Tesla hadn't canceled tomorrow's event. Lei Jun and the others, on the other hand, hadn't promised Tesla anything; they had only bought a car.

Lei Jun smiled and said, "I wasn't planning on going, but since you have to go tomorrow, I'll go with you."

"Justice!"

Tan Jincheng gave Lei Jun a thumbs up and didn't say anything more.

Then, as if remembering something, he said, "Do you want to build cars? Build new energy vehicles."

When he was reborn, Xiaomi had already been committed to making cars for two years. Although the models had not yet been launched, they brought Xiaomi a huge amount of traffic, but also brought Lei Jun a lot of doubt.

Because Apple, which preceded him, also announced its entry into the automotive industry, investing hundreds of millions of dollars before abandoning the project and announcing its withdrawal from car manufacturing.

In the past two years, Tan Jincheng has had a lot of contact with Lei Jun. Lei Jun has a deep interest in cars, and his desire to build cars is probably not due to temporary pressure, but rather after careful consideration.

Lei Jun was somewhat surprised: "Huh? Why are you asking this? Why would I have the idea of ​​building cars? I would ask you if you have the idea of ​​building mobile phones."

Tan Jincheng smiled and said, "Just asking. I can tell you with certainty that I have no intention of manufacturing mobile phones. Perhaps I will continue to produce a batch of mobile phones for future car-machine interaction, but I will definitely find a contract manufacturer instead of manufacturing them myself."

Lei Jun glanced at Tan Jincheng again. He felt that Tan Jincheng's question was not just a casual one, but he didn't know what the deeper meaning was.

After thinking for a moment, he replied seriously, "It's hard to say what the future holds, but Xiaomi certainly doesn't have that plan right now. With the current popularity of new energy vehicles like Tesla and Xiaomi, the new energy vehicle sector should be a sure thing."

After saying that, Lei Jun looked at Tan Jincheng seriously and said, "If Xiaomi chooses to enter the new energy vehicle market in the future, I wonder what Mr. Tan will think of us?"

"Haha, how can I view it? If Xiaomi wants to manufacture cars in the future, I'm still happy to invest and cooperate. I just don't know if Mr. Lei will welcome it then."

True competitors, even in fierce market competition, should support and help each other succeed. Whether Xiaomi can succeed in making cars is unknown to Tan Jincheng, but it would be beneficial to him anyway.

"Haha, if we're ever short of money, we'll definitely turn to President Tan first."

Lei Jun didn't think much about it. He just wanted to build cars, but he didn't have the capability yet; it was still a long way off.

In the evening, Musk also arrived in the capital. Tan Jincheng hosted a banquet for him as usual, this time with Lei Jun accompanying him. Lei Jun happily chatted with Musk in his heavily accented English.

Both of them were programmers before becoming bosses, so they had a lot in common.

"Given today's unfortunate situation, my advice is to keep a low profile at tomorrow's event and try to delay media coverage for a few days."

Tesla's marketing director was poached from Apple. Tesla's ability to rise from an automaker with no foundation to the world's leading electric vehicle manufacturer in just over a decade is not simply due to its technology.

His marketing model can be said to be in line with Apple's, and Lei Jun is also a marketing master, so his advice is definitely worth considering.

Musk nodded in agreement: "I feel sorry that this happened. Ray, your opinion was very helpful. Thank you very much."

The best solution would actually be to postpone it for a few days, but the itinerary, dates, and everything else are already set, and changing the dates would be very inconvenient. Otherwise, he wouldn't mind postponing it for a few days.

What are you laughing at? Do you have a problem with that?

While Lei Jun was talking to Musk, Tan Jincheng maintained a strange smile on his face, making Lei Jun feel uneasy. When Musk lowered his head to think, he couldn't help but ask in a low voice.

"Oh, it's nothing, really nothing. I just thought your accent was funny."

To paraphrase a movie line: "We're all professionally trained; we absolutely don't laugh unless we can't help it."

Because right now, all he could think about was "Are you okay!"

Lei Jun's English is actually quite good. As a top student from Wuhan University and a top programmer in that era, English is definitely not a problem for him. It's just that his accent is really funny. I don't know how Musk can stand it.

Lei Jun was stunned for a while, not expecting that Tan Jincheng was making fun of his accent. He couldn't help but roll his eyes at him: "Your accent isn't much better."

Tan Jincheng smiled and didn't say anything. He also had an accent, but you really couldn't tell unless you listened carefully. After all, his experiences in his two lifetimes had almost worn away his accent.

The event was held as scheduled the next day, but the atmosphere was noticeably more low-key.

When Tan Jincheng and Lei Jun entered the store together, there were already quite a few people inside. Some reporters saw Tan Jincheng and Lei Jun enter the store together and raised their cameras.

"Hey, I see someone I know. I'll go say hello."

Li Bing was also present at the vehicle handover ceremony. Last night, Musk said that there would be about 15 well-known people present today, but Tan Jincheng didn't know who they were.

Lei Jun laughed and said, "What a coincidence, I also saw someone I know. I'll go say hello too."

Li Bing had obviously seen Tan Jincheng as well. He whispered a few words to Li Xiang beside him, and when he saw Tan Jincheng walking towards him, he quickly stepped forward. Li Xiang thought for a moment and followed.

"Mr. Li, I never expected to meet you in this kind of setting. What a coincidence!"

Li Bing is someone I meet frequently. This CEO of a listed company claims to be worth over 100 million yuan, but in terms of personal assets, he doesn't actually have much money. Teslas can't get green license plates yet, and the on-road price of over one million yuan is quite an expense for him.

"General Bing, you're really willing to trade in your secondhand Audi?"

While greeting Li Bing, Tan Jincheng sized up Li Xiang, as this was the first time he had met Li Xiang.

Li Xiang, who is four years older than Tan Jincheng, comes from a similar family background. Tan Jincheng did not go to university after graduating from high school due to an accident, while Li Xiang chose not to go.

Li Xiang developed a deep interest in computers during high school. When he told his father that he wanted to give up the college entrance examination and start his own business, his parents did not scold him or stop him, but chose to support him.

This is quite similar to Tan Lihua. Although Tan Lihua has taken good care of his hometown, he has never stopped Tan Jincheng from starting his own business and has always secretly supported him, using his abilities to help Tan Jincheng solve his worries.

Back when Flash was just starting to gain some fame and was still very weak, the city had no shortage of designs on it, so it was no easy feat for Tan Lihua to withstand the pressure.

In 1999, Li Xiang was able to earn 8000 yuan a month through website advertising, while his parents' combined monthly income was only 2000 yuan. By 2005, at the age of 24, Li Xiang had already become a billionaire.

"Hello, Mr. Tan, I've heard a lot about you from Brother Bing."

The man in front of me, Li Xiang, wore a simple black shirt and had a buzz cut. He looked rather young and didn't seem like a 32-year-old. If you didn't know more about him, you would never associate him with a billionaire.

Speaking of which, this entrepreneur had a much smoother journey than Li Bing. He didn't experience any setbacks, and no one misled him. Before Tan Jincheng, he was the first post-80s entrepreneur to emerge.

Autohome's startup went very smoothly, and Autohome itself was also very successful, including its later ventures into new energy vehicles. While Li Bing was suffering huge losses year after year, he had already made his brand a big seller.

Although range extenders have been criticized by competitors as a technological regression, they are not afraid to follow suit. Especially the big names, who criticized range extenders before they started making cars, but immediately took the lead after they started making cars.

"Oh, not at all, I've long admired Mr. Li's reputation. You're an entrepreneurial idol for us post-80s generation. How about we have dinner together tonight?"

Although this person, like myself, has a low level of education and is constantly controversial, he is actually a very capable product manager. He truly understands user pain points. Let them criticize Lifan, refrigerators, TVs, and big sofas all they want, as long as users buy my car.

Yiche is currently in merger negotiations with Autohome, and Tan Jincheng is trying his best to facilitate the merger. If possible, Tan Jincheng would like to have Li Xiang come to Weilai as the product manager.

Of course, it's difficult to recruit someone with such ideas. If he wants to build cars, I wouldn't mind, and I could even invest.

As for that unlucky guy Li Bing, now that Wei Lai is mine, you should just stick to being the president of Yiche and stop harming investors.

In terms of presence and wealth, Tan Jincheng may have started his business later than Li Xiang and Li Bing, but he is definitely stronger than them.

It would be somewhat impolite to ask someone to have dinner with you on your first meeting without prior arrangement, but they wouldn't dare think that way. It's no exaggeration to say that the line of people who want to have dinner with Tan Jincheng could stretch from here to beyond the Great Wall.

Li Xiang glanced at Li Bing, who wasn't familiar with Tan Jincheng and didn't know how to answer.

Li Bing laughed and asked, "Is there a share for me?"

"Of course, but if you come, it'll be my treat and you'll have to pay the bill. I wonder if either of you has the time?"

Li Bing nodded to Li Xiang, then smiled and said, "We spent over a million today, so I don't mind spending an extra dinner."

"Okay, I'll have my assistant make a reservation right now."

Asking Li Bing to pay the bill is obviously a joke.

(End of this chapter)