Rebirth 99 to become a car giant.

Chapter 540: The role of the big brother and the rise of independent brands
Ordinary people have no special feelings about Lai Ping's joining.

I don’t even understand why Cao Yang would post a special Weibo about such a thing. Even the official Weibo accounts of Nanshan Group, Xingchen Motors, and Future Motors also posted this news.

But people in the automotive industry are very aware of the impact of this matter.

With Cao Yang, the most famous design master in China, Xingchen Automobile and Future Automobile are already crushing their peers.

Now that Porsche Automotive Design Director is joining the team, is that okay?
Which car company will be the competitor of Xingchen Motors in the future?

Even if they do not consider Xingchen Automobile as their opponent, many car companies have begun to reflect on what this incident can teach them.

Especially for domestic independent brands, the path they followed before was mostly imitation and reference (plagiarism).

Now the scale is slowly increasing, and the profits are also slowly increasing.

Everyone naturally knows that the path of imitation cannot go on forever.

Independent research and development is definitely needed.

"Lao Zhu, do you think our research center still needs a design director?"

Within Great Wall Motors, Wang Ying retained Zhu Jianbo, director of the research center, after a new model evaluation meeting had just been held.

When she asked, Zhu Jianbo could naturally guess something.

After all, people in China's automotive industry have been discussing Porsche Design Director Lai Ping's joining Xingchen Motors in the past two days.

This is also the first time that a domestic independent brand car company has hired a design director-level figure from an international automobile giant.

To a certain extent, Xingchen Automobile has given everyone a start.

Most people don’t know what kind of person Lai Ping is. How could Zhu Jianbo not know?

He perfectly carried out the exterior design of the fifth-generation Porsche 911 (996), Boxster, Cayman S and other models, and won countless international awards.

In the early 90s, Porsche was in dire straits. In 1991, its annual sales were only more than 1 units, and it was already struggling on the edge of bankruptcy.

In order to reverse this decline, Porsche placed all its hopes on the research and development of the new model 996, and the person responsible for the appearance design of the new car turned out to be a Chinese designer-Lai Ping.

The conservative and arrogant European car companies can choose a Chinese as a designer, which only shows that this man Lai Ping does have something.

At this time, Porsche was already in financial quagmire, could not even afford wages, and was still trying to persuade layoffs. Not only did this not affect Lai Ping, but it strengthened his determination to complete the 996 project.

He took the lead in cutting wages, working overtime until late at night, and using 007's working methods to develop 996. It is this ultimate involution spirit.

In 1996, the heavily modified Porsche 996 hit the market and was an instant success, with nearly 18 units sold.

This is also a rare number today.Porsche also turned the corner and became prosperous.

For China's automobile industry, Lai Ping is definitely as big as a mountain.

Now that this big mountain has come to Xingchen Automobile, it also makes everyone think that they also have the opportunity to poach design masters from other OEMs?
Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Volkswagen, General Motors, Ford, Jaguar Land Rover...

There are a lot of design directors and designers from car companies waiting for you to dig them!
"Mr. Wang, the exterior design of our company's models does need further improvement."

"In fact, domestic car companies, except for Xingchen Automobile, are still relatively weak in this aspect and need some time to accumulate."

"But I think we can consider poaching people from Volkswagen or Audi, or even from Porsche."

"In recent years, the battle between Porsche and Volkswagen must have affected many high-level officials."

"For example, Porsche's former president Weidekind finally left Porsche because of the grievances between the two companies."

"There are now some personnel changes at the top of the Porsche brand, Volkswagen brand, Audi brand and other Volkswagen brands."

"I think if we communicate with the design directors or other designers of these brands, we should have a good chance of recruiting some talents."

Zhu Jianbo did not pretend that he did not understand Wang Ying's words just because poaching people might threaten his position in Great Wall Motors.

Rather than Wang Ying taking the initiative to propose this plan when the time comes, it would be better for Zhu Jianbo to propose it himself.

That way also showed that he was thinking about the development of the company and left a good impression on Wang Ying.

And his analysis is indeed quite reasonable.

There are so many car brands in the world, among which the exterior designs of European car companies are more amazing.

For example, for Japanese car companies and Korean car companies, Zhu Jianbo, who has dealt with them, knows that it is more difficult to recruit their people.

As for the design directors of several major car companies in the United States, Great Wall Motors may not be able to poach them.

Therefore, it is a relatively good choice to consider suitable candidates from European car companies.

Among European car companies, no one can compare with the popularity of Volkswagen and Porsche, two auto giants that have just merged into one company.

Xingchen Motors has already set an example for everyone and poached Porsche's design director.

Then Great Wall Motors can definitely follow behind and dig other designers from Volkswagen.

"You are thinking of working with me, but if Xingchen Automobile can poach a director-level figure, it may be difficult for us."

"The company can look at some of the chief designers of Volkswagen models."

"These people can be responsible for the exterior design of a certain model, and their abilities are not necessarily much different from those of a design director."

"When we go to poach people, if the positions are in place and the salaries are in place, there should still be hope of attracting them to join Great Wall Motors."

I have to say that Wang Ying's opinion is very reasonable.

For Great Wall Motors, if it needs to improve its R&D center's capabilities in car exterior design, it is not necessarily necessary to poach Volkswagen's design director. It is enough to directly poach the design director of one of the following models.

Regardless of the high wages in Europe, the salary of any engineer can reach [-] to [-] euros a year. .

But the average car design director only costs more than [-] euros.

For Chinese people, this salary is quite high.

After all, this is 2009.

But it is still affordable to spend 100 million euros or even 200 million euros in annual salary to recruit such a person in charge of model design to become the design director.

The premise is that this person really has a high level of design.

"Indeed, we can even ask Mr. Cao for help and ask him to communicate with Lai Ping to see if there is anyone he can recommend."

"I believe that Lai Ping's departure from Porsche this time is also related to the grievances between Porsche and Volkswagen."

"There must be others within Volkswagen who have been similarly affected."

"Great Wall Motors has a better platform and better treatment for them. Someone will definitely be tempted."

Zhu Jianbo put himself into the opponent's situation and felt that as long as there was a suitable opportunity, he would definitely choose to change jobs.

As the design director of a car company, even if Great Wall Motors is far from being comparable in size to international car giants, he is still attractive to many people in China, the world's largest car market.

I would rather be a chicken head than a phoenix tail.

This principle is also recognized by many people abroad.

"Then I'll make a call to Cao Yang, and I'll leave it to you to take charge later."

"The best thing is to have results within this year."

Wang Ying feels that the development of the domestic automobile industry will accelerate in the next few years.

This is a good opportunity for Great Wall Motors to develop and grow.

If you miss it, it will be a bit difficult for Great Wall Motors to stand out among its own brands.

Great Wall Motors can feel the impact of this incident, and other car companies are naturally no exception.

"Mr. Li, our negotiations with Ford are about to come to a conclusion."

"I think it is most appropriate to recruit people like Volvo's design director or deputy director to the company now."

"Otherwise, after Volvo is actually acquired in the future, poaching people will easily cause a backlash within Volvo."

"Especially there have been forces within Volvo Cars that were not supportive of a sale to Ford."

Gao Songlin boldly made a suggestion to Li Su.

Of course, he would bring it up at this time, which was somewhat stimulated by Xingchen Car.

Even the design director of Porsche can join Xingchen Automobile, so it is not impossible for the design director of Volvo to join Geely Automobile.

If that doesn't work, the deputy director of design or the person in charge of the design of a specific car can just jump over.

Gao Songlin still approves of Volvo's appearance level.

At least he doesn't think the Geely Automobile Research Institute currently has exterior designers whose level can match that of Volvo.

“Do you think it’s better to poach people now than after the acquisition?”

Li Su quickly weighed Gao Songlin's proposal.

He is also a very ambitious person and hopes to make Geely Automobile bigger and stronger.

Otherwise, he would not have gone to Ford to negotiate the acquisition of Volvo Cars.

It's just that now Geely Automobile's focus is on the negotiation to acquire Volvo, and he is afraid of causing complications.

"Yes, I think now is the best time."

"Every company is in a relatively turbulent stage during the process of being sold and acquired."

"Porsche's design director will switch to Xingchen Motors. It is said that it is related to the outcome of the acquisition and counter-acquisition of Volkswagen and Porsche."

"Porsche's acquisition of Volkswagen was handled by former president Wedekind, but in the end the acquisition failed and it was acquired by Volkswagen instead."

"As a result, Weidekin was immediately dismissed from get out of class."

"That design director is probably also from Weidejin. The new president doesn't want to see him."

"Now Ford wants to sell Volvo cars, and this is no secret within Volvo."

"At least Volvo's top management must know about this."

"So it's normal for there to be some internal turmoil."

"If we don't poach people at this time, other car companies may also poach people."

"And after Volvo is acquired by us in the future, there will definitely be people inside them who are worried about Geely Cars stealing Volvo's technology and patents, so the company will definitely become more sensitive to poaching people from Volvo Cars."

Gao Songlin's analysis was recognized by Li Su.

The human heart is indeed like this.Besides, when I acquired Volvo Cars, I really wanted Geely Automobile to learn from the other party’s technology.

Otherwise, why spend such a huge price to acquire it?
Don’t you think you have too much money to spend?

After thinking clearly, Li Su quickly had the answer and said: "Then act as soon as possible. During the negotiation process, you can also disclose the progress of the company's acquisition of Volvo Cars to the other party, so that the other party will not have any concerns."

"It is not impossible that they will even return to Volvo Cars as senior executives in the future."

Li Su is very smart and knows how to relieve other people's concerns to the greatest extent, and at the same time draw a big cake for them.

No one may eat the pie that is drawn casually.

But many people find it difficult to refuse the pie drawn by Li Su.

After all, if Volvo is really acquired by Geely, then the possibility of those who are now poached by Geely Automobile to return to Volvo as senior executives in the future is still very high.

No matter what happens, there will be no problem in taking a good position at Volvo China in the future.

If Great Wall Motors and Geely Automobile's actions are relatively subtle, then BYD's Wang Fu is more direct.

He moves quickly.

"Mr. Cao, let me ask you a favor first. Can you ask your company's new design director, Mr. Lai, to introduce Wolfgang Egger, the design director of Audi?"

Obviously, Wang Fu has directly targeted the target of poaching.

As the leader of Audi Q7, Wolfgang Egger’s abilities are highly recognized by Wang Fu.

In China's auto market in the future, the prospects for SUVs are certainly worth looking forward to.

Wang Fu still remembers Cao Yang saying that China's SUV market will be on par with cars in the future.

Although SUVs have grown rapidly in recent years, there is still a big gap between them and sedans.

So Wang Fu quickly chose Audi's design director Egger, who has an amazing SUV design.

Of course, he also knew that it was not that easy for BYD to recruit people.

It might be much better if there is a recommended person in the middle.

Although Lai Ping is the chief designer of Porsche, the circle of the automobile industry is actually very small.

There is a high probability that he knows the design director of Audi.

Even if you don't know him, you definitely know this person and can provide BYD with some experience in poaching people.

BYD Auto's model positioning determines that there is no competition between it and Xingchen Auto.

The other party is even the main customer of Nanshan Group.

In this case, Cao Yang naturally had no reason to refuse.

"No problem, I'll ask Mr. Lai for help with a recommendation!"

"Now is indeed the best time to poach people from Volkswagen."

"Their company should also hope that a group of personnel can resign on their own. After all, there is an emperor and a courtier."

BYD will set its sights on Audi cars, and Cao Yang can naturally think clearly about the reasons.

Many people believe that the relationship between Volkswagen and Porsche is like the relationship between a tree and a vine. No matter which party takes the initiative in mergers and acquisitions, it will not have any impact on the main business because they both have rich experience in international operations.The main solution is to solve the internal problems of the brand family.

There is nothing wrong with this statement.

There will definitely be no problem running both Porsche and Volkswagen, no matter who is in charge.

But the person in charge is different, and the positions of the executives below will definitely be affected.

Cao Yang was very sure of this.

Just look at how the new emperor of the feudal dynasty made personnel adjustments after he ascended the throne.

"Thank you so much!"

"To be honest, we don't want the appearance of a new model to be controversial every time. It was just in its infancy in the past."

"Now we are slowly getting on the right track, and we are paying more and more attention to technology research and development."

Although the main purpose of today's call was to ask Cao Yang to say hello, it would be a little too unkind to hang up the phone immediately after talking about business.

So Wang Fu and Cao Yang chatted for a while about the development of the domestic automobile industry.

Then he hung up the phone.

However, Cao Yang had no way to relax.

Xia Qingqing and Zhang Jing have made an appointment with him to report on the latest situation of Honor mobile phones.

Since the official release of HONOR 6G on June 19 this year, after two months of preparation, large-scale delivery can finally begin.

Looking at the sales that are increasing every day and the endless orders on the official website, Xia Qingqing and Zhang Jing both have new ideas.

"Mr. Cao, our current daily sales of HONOR 3G can reach 1 units, and we are still far from being able to meet the market demand."

"BYD has contacted us before and said it hopes to cooperate in the OEM business of Honor mobile phones."

"I think we can consider officially launching the foundry agreement, and we will also prepare for the next generation of HONOR 4G."

Xia Qingqing can be said to be in high spirits now.

Although there is still a huge gap between the scale of Honor mobile phones and giants such as Nokia.

But the development momentum is very good.

High-priced mobile phones priced at 3999 yuan and 4999 yuan can actually be sold in short supply.

This situation is very rare whether at home or abroad.

According to this development trend, the turnover of Honor mobile phones next year is expected to reach more than 200 billion yuan, and it is even possible to double on this basis if the production capacity can keep up.

This is really awesome.

Honor mobile phone is a real industry, not a financial one.

As long as it is engaged in the physical industry and can achieve sales of more than 100 billion, it is considered a big company.

"I just had a phone call with Mr. Wang from BYD to talk about cars. Since their head of OEM business has contacted us about the mobile phone OEM business before, let's leave it to them."

"However, we have to keep our own factories. Even if [-]% of our business is ultimately handed over to OEMs, we still need to maintain [-]% or [-]% of our own production capabilities."

"Otherwise, it is likely to become a bottleneck for our development in the future, or something that will get stuck."

Although BYD has no reason to break up with Nanshan Group, it must not have the intention of harming others and must have the intention of guarding against others.

Cao Yang felt that it was best to follow the rules to avoid getting stuck.

"No problem, I will arrange the formal signing later."

"At the same time, Nanshan Equipment can also start preparing some of the equipment needed for the mobile phone production line."

Seeing that Cao Yang agreed to his proposal without any hesitation, Xia Qingqing was in a very good mood.

Zhang Jing added something beside him, saying: "Mr. Cao, many of the chips used in our current HONOR 3G are imported, even the screen and camera are imported."

"Next step, we are going to work with domestic manufacturers to review the localization of some components."

"Like screens, we are communicating with BOE to see if they can produce screens that meet our needs."

"As for cameras, we hope that Nanshan Auto Parts can participate."

"They already have relevant technology accumulation in car cameras. It would be best if they could transform the technology into mobile phones."

"I think cameras will also be one of the core competitiveness of mobile phones in the future. It would be best if the group could master this technology itself."

"Otherwise, all this money will have been made by Sony."

"And the cameras of Apple mobile phones are also produced by Sony. Apple's annual output can reach about 2000 million units. One day, the other party may ask Sony to cut off our supply."

"The other party is completely capable of doing this kind of thing."

"After all, there is a big gap between our number of units and Apple's."

When Zhang Jing said this, Cao Yang's expression became serious.

When engaging in automobiles and equipment, Cao Yang has always pursued 100% localization.

Although it has not yet been truly achieved, Xingchen Automobile's localization rate is definitely the highest among all car companies.

Now that he is producing mobile phones, he naturally hopes to eventually achieve 100% localization.

The so-called international division of labor and cooperation has become very popular and marketable in the past ten years.

Cao Yang's approach is a bit against the times.

However, the Nanshan Group has become accustomed to Cao Yang's style.

Therefore, no special reminder from Cao Yang is needed, everyone knows to promote the in-depth localization of parts and components.

"This really needs to be taken seriously. Although there may not be any supply problems in the short term, there will definitely be problems in the long run."

"Domestic mobile phone parts companies have also continued to grow in recent years. We can appropriately choose a few for cooperation and support to give people more opportunities to try."

"We can even consider investing in some companies to support them."

The importance of the industrial chain is beyond doubt.

Cao Yang is fully willing to pay more in the early stage to support the development of the domestic supply chain.

Otherwise, it would be unrealistic to rely on Nanshan Group to produce everything on its own.

Industrial division of labor still needs to be discussed, but it is not an international industrial division of labor, but a domestic division of labor.

"Then I will compile a report as soon as possible and report to you at another time later."

The general direction has been recognized, and Zhang Jing is more confident in doing things.

Soon, Honor mobile phones started to take action.

However, at this time, another big event suddenly happened in the automobile industry.

(End of this chapter)