Chapter 1707 Cooperation in the Automotive Field

Li Mu's efforts have made traveling to China the most popular choice for international tourism.

Since the panda became popular all over the world, the number of overseas tourists to China has increased by more than 200% compared with the same period last year, and the immigration management department even speculated that in the near future, the number of overseas tourists to China will still be at the current level. based on multiplication.

The reason why we have such great confidence is that the number of tourists applying for China tourist visas is very large, and the number of visa applications received by embassies around the world is several times higher than before.

For overseas tourists, if they want to travel to China, applying for a visa is the first step. They may not be ready to travel, or they may not have planned the travel time and route, but they already have this idea, so they all want to. Apply for a visa first.

The embassy has been relaxing and speeding up the approval of tourist visas, not only because these overseas tourists can bring huge income to the domestic tourism industry, but also because these overseas tourists can correct the inherent cognition of China overseas and pass it on overseas. Chinese landscape and culture.

In the UK, the Windsor family is also actively promoting cooperation with Makino Technology.

Although the Windsor family is not in power, their influence in the UK is still very strong, and the Windsor family's own industries also spread across all walks of life. It can be said to be one of the most powerful families in Europe, so they immediately began to help Li Mu. All kinds of tourism resources needed throughout the UK.

Davidson Goldberg, the current manager of the Goldberg family who has a certain friendship with Li Mu, also received the message that Li Mu was going to develop European exports, and immediately called Li Mu and brought good news to Li Mu.

Davidson told Li Mu: "Mr. Li, our Goldberg family has a stake in several European airlines. If necessary, I can match these airlines to cooperate with Makino Technology in depth, and cooperate with Makino Technology in the future of Europe to China. travel itinerary.”

Li Mu said in surprise: "Thank you very much, Mr. Goldberg. I didn't expect your Goldberg family to be involved in such a wide range of business, not only banking, finance and investment banking, but also airlines."

Davidson said with a smile: "In fact, the situation in Europe is not the same as that in North America and China. There are many new industries and rich people in North America and China, especially Internet rich people like Mr. Li, but the overall situation in Europe is still supported by Old-Money. , and most of the funds are in traditional industries such as finance, industry, and energy, which are also industries that our family has been deeply cultivating.”

Having said that, Davidson added: "Actually, we also have some shares in Daimler. This time I contact you, Mr. Li, there is still a small matter that I would like to cooperate with you."

Li Mu asked curiously, "Is Daimler the parent company of Mercedes-Benz?"

"Yes," Davidson said. "Daimler has several car brands, and Mercedes-Benz is one of them."

Li Mu asked again, "Then what do you want to cooperate with me on?"

Davidson said with a smile: "Daimler has been promoting a sub-brand since 1998. This brand Huaxia may not be listed yet. It is called smart. It is a small car brand that Mercedes-Benz and Swatch cooperated earlier. Ultra-miniature cars, have you heard of Mr. Li?"

"Smart?" Li Mu frowned. Of course, he had heard of the Mercedes-Benz smart. Not only had he heard of it, he had also driven this car in his previous life.

To tell the truth, this Smart car is not suitable for a big man like Li Mu. Even if the car is small, the power is just average, it can't run very fast, it is not noisy when driving, and the driving experience is not worth ten times. The price is tens of thousands, but the winning is in the brand, shape and the concept of ultra-miniature.

Open Smart, don't worry about parking, it's no problem to park it in the air.

Driving it in a big city is much more convenient than driving a big car. In addition, it is also very convenient to plug in, and the fuel consumption is also very low. It still has some unique advantages.

So Li Mu asked, "I know Smart, but what do you want to do with us with Smart?"

Davidson smiled and said: "I am also entrusted by others. Didn't you authorize the image of the panda bear to BMW. BMW just released the concept map yesterday, and will launch a limited edition panda bear in the next one or two months. Mini-Cooper, the entire front face of the car is in the shape of a panda bear and pull flowers. As soon as this concept map came out, European dealers received many intentional orders. It is expected that the sales in the future will be very good. They are all small cars. It is suitable for cartoon shape, so I also hope to get the authorization of Panda Bear to produce a limited edition Smart of Panda Bear."

Li Mu smiled and said, "You still need to make a phone call for this trivial matter? I'll arrange the marketing department to send the authorization letter to Smart."

Davidson smiled and said, "That's great, thank you, Mr. Li, Smart has been trying to find a suitable opportunity to launch it, and it seems that this good opportunity has come."

"You're welcome." Li Mu said with a smile, "For us, this is a matter of hand."

Speaking, Li Mu suddenly thought that he had to lay out the production line in advance before Tesla could mass-produce it, so he asked Davidson: "By the way, Davidson, if I want to acquire a car manufacturing company, do you have any questions? Good recommendation?"

"Car company?" Davidson asked in surprise, "Mr. Li wants to get involved in the auto industry?"

Li Mu smiled and said, "I want to come in and try the water."

Davidson asked: "I wonder what types of cars are you interested in? Do you want to buy a supercar brand to play with?"

Li Mu said: "No no no, I'm not interested in supercars, ordinary civilian cars are fine, such as ordinary sedans, luxury cars, or SUVs."

Davidson thought for a while and said, "There are two car brands in the UK, one is called Jaguar and the other is called Land Rover. I wonder if Mr. Li has heard of it?"

Li Mu snorted: "I heard, which company owns these two brands?"

"It's in Ford's hands, and it's not doing very well," Davidson said.

Having said that, Davidson added: "Ford acquired Jaguar more than ten years ago, and bought Land Rover from BMW four years ago, and then integrated the two brands together, but the overall performance is relatively poor, Jaguar Land Rover is now a One of the burdens in Ford's hands, Ford has the intention of selling, but there seems to be no interested buyers in the industry, and everyone thinks it is difficult for these two brands to do well."

Li Mu frowned.

Jaguar Land Rover sold very well in China in the past life, Jaguar was a bit inferior, but Land Rover is really hanging up the sky, and a "Dwelling" made Land Rover's fire in China out of control.

However, what seems to be worse for Ford is that they sold Jaguar Land Rover to Tata India in a package before the Land Rover fire.

This operation is very showy, it is equivalent to cutting the meat at the lowest point, and then letting Tata buy it and skyrocketing all the way.

If there is a chance to buy Jaguar Land Rover now, it is also a very cost-effective thing.

Although Li Mu doesn't know much about the specifics of car manufacturing, he talked to Elon Musk that Tesla and traditional gasoline vehicles have several common large-scale technologies, and the chassis is the most important one.

Chassis, to put it bluntly, is a set of platforms. It is a complete set of solutions from wheelbase to engine gearbox layout, to suspension, to tuning, to various electronic control systems, stability systems and so on.

Even if Tesla is a pure electric car, it is inseparable from a set of mature and reliable chassis technology. Except for the earliest Roadster, Tesla has the chassis technology from Lotus, and the subsequent main models, from the X to the Cheap 3, are based on their own developed platform.

If there is an existing traditional gasoline vehicle platform, then Tesla's development and production will be easier.

For example, to use Jaguar's XJ platform to produce Tesla's Model-S, you only need to lighten the chassis, put the battery compartment in, and replace the engine, gearbox and transmission components on the basis of the XJ. The front and rear suspension and electronic control system are reserved, and a medium and large luxury Tesla is basically complete.

Jaguar also has a sports car model XKR. Building a Roadster based on this platform is not necessarily worse than Lotus's site.

As for Land Rover, in the future, SUVs and hard-core off-road vehicles will become popular. This brand will make money properly. Even if it cannot be used to produce pure electric hard-core off-road vehicles with Tesla, at least it can be used to make money.

What's more, buying Jaguar Land Rover now should be an absolute bargain price.

After Ford entered 2000, its operation was in a mess, and its losses became more and more serious. In the next few years, it sold its own industries one after another. Jaguar Land Rover was sold to India's Tata, and Volvo was sold to domestic Ji. force……

Oh yes, and Volvo!

To say that it is mixed with Tesla, Volvo is actually more suitable than Jaguar Land Rover!

Volvo's models are more comprehensive, from small cars to large cars, luxury cars, and then to SUVs. The product line is very complete. Although it is a little ugly, it has done a good job in safety.

Volvo now has three main models of S series, V series, and XC series. The subdivision product line of 80 and 80 is very complete, and it also covers two medium-sized SUVs and large SUVs, and the XC series is not a hard-core off-road. The concept of Model-X was ported to the XC series.

More importantly, Volvo has many patented technologies in the field of safety, which are packaged together and integrated into Tesla, which can save a lot of basic work for Tesla's future autonomous driving.

In the simplest terms, semi-autonomous driving can be achieved with a set of adaptive cruise, pre-collision system, pedestrian protection system and lane departure system. On the basis of this system, more intelligent navigation, safety, The recognition function can basically touch the threshold of automatic driving.

If you take down Volvo yourself, Tesla will be too worry-free in the future, and can build its own product system and technical barriers directly on the basis of Volvo.

Moreover, Tesla can also feed its technology back to Volvo, Jaguar and Land Rover.

For example, Tesla can take out its own intelligent driving function to improve the intelligence of the three brands of models, and can also help the three brands' own models based on Tesla's own motor and battery technology. Hybrid expansion.

Put a low-power motor, a small-capacity battery pack, a mains charging module, and an energy recovery module into the gasoline-powered vehicle, and then perform overall tuning, which becomes a plug-in hybrid vehicle.

Plug in a smaller motor, a smaller-capacity battery pack, an on-board charging module, and an energy recovery module, and it becomes an ordinary hybrid car.

And Tesla itself has its own motor technology, battery pack technology, charging and discharging technology, and energy recovery technology. Isn't this already alive?

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