Rebirth of England.

Chapter 862 CATL
After all, what Ashley talked about with them when she came to Germany this time was not just about Natixis' acquisition of Commerzbank.

In other words, through this incident, the two parties exchanged some interests behind the scenes.

Germany is not only concerned about the ownership of Deutsche Bank - this is not a priority. At present, the most urgent need for them is to ensure the stability of the euro and resolve the European debt crisis.

Obviously, as the third largest bank in France, Natixis's intention to acquire Commerzbank has attracted much attention.

Especially now that Germany and France have differences on how to deal with the European debt crisis, to be honest, Germany does not want to create obstacles in its acquisition of Natixis Bank, which would have a negative impact on the cooperation between the two sides.

If Natixis can guarantee that the acquisition will not have any impact on Germany's supervision of its domestic business, they are not prepared to prevent it from acquiring the shares it holds.

After all, this would also allow the government to recover some funds while maintaining the business of the German commercial banks without affecting Germany's financial security.

Another issue that the two sides discussed was the debt problem of Commerzbank. After the subprime mortgage crisis broke out, the German government injected funds into Commerzbank, including nearly 200 billion euros in debt.

If Natixis were to go ahead with its takeover bid for Commerzbank, Germany would have reason to demand a timetable for the repayment of the debts.

At least the requirement put forward by its Minister of Economy that Deutsche Bank repay government debt within three years is worth discussing.

In this regard, Ashley Weber said that if Natixis Bank can complete the acquisition of Commerzbank, it can naturally give guarantees, but she cannot give a specific timetable for debt repayment now. Instead, it requires Natixis Bank President Lagarde to evaluate the situation of Commerzbank before it can be determined.

However, at least through this meeting between the two parties, many consensuses were reached, which greatly advanced the process of Natixis' acquisition of Commerzbank.

……

Just as the world's attention is on the ongoing London Olympics...

On August 8, Li Lu, on behalf of Tianhe Capital, signed an agreement with ATL, a subsidiary of Japan's TDK Corporation, to purchase the other party's 6% stake in Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd.

Speaking of CATL, it became very well-known in Barron's previous life and was called "King Ning". However, this company has just been spun off from its parent company ATL.

When talking about the development history of CATL, we must first talk about the experience of one of its founders, Zeng Yuqun.

In 1968, Zeng Yuqun was born in a small village in Ningde, Hujian. At that time, Ningde was one of the top 18 poorest areas in the country, and many families could not even afford food and clothing.

After graduating from the Department of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, 20-year-old Zeng Yuqun was assigned to a state-owned enterprise under Hu Jiansheng.

However, working within the system could not inspire Zeng Yuqun's enthusiasm.

After less than three months of planning, Zeng Yuqun made the first gamble in his life, to the bewilderment of his family - he quit his golden rice bowl and went to work in Guangdong province!

After entering a US-funded OEM factory, Xinke Magnetics and Electrics Factory, he met his immediate superior, Dr. Chen Tanghua.

Zeng Yuqun, who works diligently and has outstanding abilities, is highly appreciated by Chen Tanghua.

With Chen Tanghua's promotion, Zeng Yuqun was quickly promoted from a grassroots employee to a manager.

During his 10 years at Xinke, Zeng Yuqun became the youngest engineering director and the first mainland director due to his outstanding professional ability. At that time, Zeng Yuqun was only 31 years old. In 1999, the company's leaders Liang Shaokang and Chen Tanghua took Zeng Yuqun to start a business together, and ATL was officially established.

At the beginning of its business, ATL had almost no core technology and could only purchase patents.

In order to quickly seize the market, Zeng Yuqun flew to America with more than 700 million and bought a lithium battery technology from Bell Labs.

He was delighted and thought that with this technology, the company would be able to make a lot of money!

But after returning home, he found that this type of battery was particularly prone to bulging after repeated charging and discharging, and would become scrapped after a short period of use!
He was unwilling to accept the result and flew back to America to argue, but the other party refused to admit it.

Seeing that more than 700 million yuan was wasted, Zeng Yuqun thought: There is no regret in making this move. Since I have done it, I might as well do it to the end!
So he plunged into the laboratory.

Zeng Yuqun's team started with the research on electrolytes and, through testing and optimization solutions, ultimately solved the problem of polymer batteries being prone to bulging due to repeated charging and discharging.

Zeng Yuqun managed to solve the technical problem that even Bell Labs couldn't overcome!

After the battery bulge problem was solved, in 2002, an American customer came to us and specifically asked for Zeng Yuqun's batteries. This customer is the well-known Apple.

With Apple's endorsement, ATL became an instant hit. Big companies like Samsung favored it and it received many orders!

It is worth mentioning that Honor Electronics is also one of ATL’s major customers, and some of their high-end mobile phones also use ATL’s batteries.

However, in 2005, due to lack of funds, TDK Corporation invested US$1 million to acquire 100% of ATL's shares, and ATL became a wholly-owned subsidiary of TDK.

TDK was founded in 1935. This old Japanese company mainly develops the magnetic material "ferrite" - the magnetic tapes used in tape recorders, video recorders, etc. were basically monopolized by TDK.

Shortly after being acquired by TDK, ATL management including Zeng Yuqun decided to set up a power battery team to promote the research and development of automotive power batteries and power battery management systems.

However, Zeng Yuqun's team encountered bottlenecks in making automotive batteries at ATL.

When the BMW Group was looking for a battery supplier for its new energy vehicles, it noticed Apple's largest battery supplier in the world, ATL, and extended an olive branch to Zeng Yuqun.

However, the parent company, Japan's TDK, was not enterprising and unwilling to expand production and invest in power batteries, and rejected BMW's request for cooperation. This is one reason.

At the same time, due to national regulatory restrictions, wholly foreign-owned enterprises cannot produce power batteries, and ATL is a 100% foreign-owned enterprise, so it is impossible for it to produce power batteries.

Therefore, Zeng Yuqun and another founder of CATL, Huang Shilin, decided to go a step further and completely separate the power battery team from ATL and set up a new company.

However, although CATL has separated from ATL, ATL still holds a 15% stake in it.

This time, Tianhe Capital invested to buy shares of CATL from ATL. Zeng Yuqun naturally knew about this and welcomed the joining of Tianhe Capital.

The reason is that in addition to the fact that this share transfer will enable CATL's Japanese shares to be converted into mainland capital (Tianhe Capital), Tianhe Capital also promised to help CATL expand their user base.

(End of this chapter)