Chapter 547: Annoying Topic

Fan Wubing has a purpose in keeping a close eye on Kodak's development in the Chinese market.

Although the decline of traditional photosensitive equipment is inevitable, Kodak's color printing system will be popular, especially after the popularity of convenient photography products such as digital cameras. These printing systems will gradually become popular, especially when major wedding photography studios begin to use professional printing systems to complete the final results. The output in this regard is quite amazing.

Of course, he did not show excessive concern for the printing system now. What he asked was just to share Kodak's achievements in digital camera technology. Kodak could still accept this point because Fan Wubing promised to solve the remaining employees in the factories acquired by Kodak.

However, Fan Wubing also proposed a solution, that is, these people can be dispersed to various places, and set up Kodak color printing equipment franchise stores in various places in the name of regional agents. The funds needed will be solved by themselves, and the equipment will be completely purchased from Kodak.

After hearing this news, Kodak was very surprised. They have always taken the path of monopolizing the market by technology. At this time, they spent a lot of money to monopolize the Chinese market for three years, just to make Chinese people only use Kodak's film. Once they are used to it, other brands will not be challenging. It should be noted that the formation of human habits is very terrible. If the main competitors enter the Chinese market at that time, it will be very difficult to make a comeback.

Kodak also hopes to establish franchise stores using its own printing equipment in various places. This will widely adopt its own equipment, which will be of great benefit to its own marketing, but at the same time they also want to eat this big cake alone. After all, the idea of ​​establishing a franchise store in various parts of the country is essentially the same as the effect of opening a store in a prosperous commercial district.

These stores occupying the most advantageous geographical locations in large, medium and small cities, even if they are somewhat insufficient in their own turnover, will be greatly compensated by the transfer fees of the stores with the rapid development of Chinese society. It can be said that this is also a practice of the drunkard's intention.

However, there is also a very embarrassing situation now. Kodak has to invest billions of dollars in the Chinese market to build a production base to compensate Chinese companies that cannot form joint ventures with other foreign companies due to the agreement. The expenses in this regard are also very large. For Kodak, which is currently operating poorly and is heavily in debt, the burden is very heavy. If it wants to build thousands of photo processing stores across China, the investment is also very large. It is really willing but unable to do so.

Facing Fan Wubing's idea of ​​entering the photo processing market, Kodak seems to have some complicated feelings. It hopes that Fan Wubing will enter the photo processing market as soon as possible, and it also hopes that it can occupy the Chinese photo processing market. This contradiction cannot be resolved.

The reason why Kodak hopes that Fan Wubing will enter the photo processing market as soon as possible is mainly because Kodak itself is facing great profit pressure.

It is eager to promote this process by occupying the market. Only when the solution of the terminal market is realized can its own film sell well. If Fan Wubing can simultaneously open up the demand of the bottom market, then Kodak will save money and energy, and can concentrate on expanding the photosensitive material production line.

But they also knew that if Fan Wubing succeeded in this matter, once the terminal market was established, Fan Wubing would have too many resources at his disposal. He would be too big to be eliminated in the future, and he could get rid of Kodak at any time, set up his own business, or cooperate with other foreign companies.

However, in the current situation, Kodak is obviously unable to stop Fan Wubing's idea of ​​entering the terminal market.

"Since there is no way to stop it, then we can only cooperate well." Ye Ying said to his executives, "Anyway, from the current point of view, even if Fan's Investment Group wants to get involved in the photo processing market, the equipment it needs must be solved from us. This is the best opportunity for Kodak to make money."

Ye Ying thought very clearly that Kodak was unable to stop Fan's Investment Group from entering the photo processing market for the time being, and there was no reason to stop it. After all, what they agreed to monopolize now is the film industry, not the photo processing market. Monopolizing a market is very dangerous. Even if it monopolizes the market of a developing country in a short period of time, Kodak's practice itself has caused a lot of controversy. But now Kodak itself is facing the problem of survival, not just the problem of development, so it can't care so much.

The photofinishing market can only be given to Fan Investment Group. Fortunately, they have also invested 200 million US dollars in the photographic material production base. They can be regarded as partners in the same trench. I believe that they will not demolish the foundation during the cooperation period? When Kodak's production base is established and Kodak color film occupies the national market, the terminal photofinishing market will still serve the majority of customers, and will not have any negative impact on Kodak's China strategy.

"Let's go and toast with him." After thinking clearly, Ye Ying raised her glass and walked towards Fan Wubing.

Fan Wubing was talking with Boss Zhu there with a smile. He was not familiar with the CEOs of several other companies and had no contacts before. Moreover, the scale of these companies was relatively small and he could not put them in his eyes at all, so he did not talk much with them.

Fan Wubing and Boss Zhu were exchanging views on some current things.

"I heard from Comrade Fan Heng that Jiangnan Province is preparing to launch a family car project? Are you the one pushing this behind the scenes?" Boss Zhu asked.

"It's not me who's pushing it, but it's determined by the economic development laws of Jiangnan Province." Fan Wubing answered seriously.

"Why do you think this idea is more bizarre as you get older?" Boss Zhu said with a smile.

Fan Wubing touched his nose and explained, "It's not wrong for me to say that. Jiangnan Province's economy has developed and has funds, and the metallurgical industry is also the underlying support for the automobile manufacturing industry. In addition, I can provide them with some technical authorizations, so there is no problem in producing some relatively extensive family cars. The main development direction I recommend to them is also for the overseas market."

"Oh, models with relatively high fuel consumption are indeed suitable for use in some overseas countries." Boss Zhu had been paying attention to SAIC's development for a long time before, so when he heard Fan Wubing mention the overseas market, he immediately understood that the extensive cars that Fan Wubing was talking about must be the kind that are not fuel-efficient.

But the models with high fuel consumption generally have strong horsepower and strong off-road capabilities, which are indeed suitable for users in some overseas countries.

When the fuel consumption issue was mentioned, Boss Zhu remembered something and frowned, saying, "Domestic oil prices, um..."

"Domestic oil prices should be relatively cheap now." Fan Wubing nodded.

The current domestic oil price is about 1.38 yuan per liter. This year, due to the impact of the financial crisis in Southeast Asia, global demand for oil once fell, and oil prices fell. As the economy will slowly recover, the demand for oil will continue to rise, especially in developing countries, where oil consumption is growing faster. Developed countries have higher energy efficiency and are committed to developing oil substitutes, so their demand for oil is growing slower.

But overall, since the middle of this year, there has been a situation where demand for oil exceeds supply. Even if the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries agrees to increase production, due to the limited increase in production, refining and transportation are difficult to keep up, international oil prices have been hovering at a low level for a long time and have failed to stimulate production increases, and the winter is coming, the demand for heating fuel in the United States, Japan and other countries has increased, all of which make it difficult for oil prices to fall in the next one or two quarters.

However, domestic oil prices are still running at a low level. The main reason is that the smuggling of refined oil is very serious, and there are also a large number of private gas stations in China. After the two cooperate with each other, low oil prices have emerged.

In July this year, the National Anti-Smuggling Work Conference was held in Beijing. The No. 1 Director met with the conference representatives and made important instructions. He emphasized that severely cracking down on smuggling crimes is an important deployment to ensure the healthy development of the economy, maintain social stability and national security interests. Serious smuggling crimes must be resolutely cracked down and must not be lenient.

At this national anti-smuggling work conference, Boss Zhu also made an important speech, and then a massive anti-smuggling struggle was launched across the country.

The reason why Boss Zhu began to frown when Fan Wubing mentioned low oil prices was that the anti-smuggling struggle had been carried out for more than two months, but the problem of refined oil smuggling in China was already serious, which made Boss Zhu very unhappy.

"The problem of refined oil smuggling is now very serious, causing the country to lose hundreds of billions of tax revenue every year. PetroChina and Sinopec have suffered losses for years, and the situation is very embarrassing. Now we call for fighting smuggling every day, but we can't hit the key points, which makes people very angry." Boss Zhu said angrily.

Last month, the Zhanjiang smuggling case was exposed, shocking the whole country.

Among the leaders of the Zhanjiang smuggling case criminal gang that shocked the whole country, Chen Lisheng, known as the smuggling car king, was the most involved and had the most background, because his father was Chen Tongqing, the secretary of the Zhanjiang Municipal Party Committee at that time.

Chen Lisheng smuggled crazily and made hundreds of millions of wealth in a few years. At the beginning of 1996, Chen Lisheng and Deng Chong'an conspired with Li Shen and others to smuggle cars in Hong Kong and make profits from it. Deng Chongan was responsible for organizing the source of goods and disassembling, coding and packing the whole vehicle. Chen Lisheng was responsible for customs declaration and export in Hong Kong, transportation and receiving the smuggled goods at Zhanjiang Port, and handing them over to Deng Chongan or other smugglers. Li Shen and Zhang Yi were responsible for clearing the relationship and customs declaration, charging customs clearance fees of 70,000 to 100,000 Hong Kong dollars per container.

In two years, Deng Chongan participated in the smuggling of 3,000 car bodies and evaded more than 200 million yuan in taxes. Chen Lisheng participated in the smuggling of 2,000 car bodies and smuggled more than 10,000 tons of diesel, evading a total of nearly 200 million yuan in taxes.

In the anti-smuggling work in Zhanjiang City, Chen Tongqing has always been unable to stand up because his son Chen Lisheng is a well-known smuggling car king. Chen Tongqing also played the role of a protective umbrella for Chen Lisheng's smuggling activities. In order to find a market for Chen Lisheng's smuggled goods, he did not hesitate to make calls and build relationships everywhere. In order to ensure that his son had sufficient funds for smuggling, he exerted influence and asked the Zhanjiang Municipal Government to guarantee a loan of tens of millions of Hong Kong dollars to Chen Lisheng's company from an overseas bank.

Not only that, it is said that on the first day of his transfer to Zhanjiang, Chen Tongqing took his son to visit local leaders. People said that on the surface, it seemed that his son sent Chen Tongqing to Zhanjiang, but in fact, the new secretary was paving the way for his son to rely on Zhanjiang's wealth in the future.

"The ancients said that if you don't pay attention to small things, you will eventually harm your great virtue. If this corrupt father and son could realize this and stop early, they would never end up drowning in wine, burning in smoke, and crushed by ill-gotten gains like today." Boss Zhu mentioned the Zhanjiang case and said to Fan Wubing, "Compared with you father and son, Chen Tongqing and his son are really worlds apart. They are also father and son, but their consciences are obviously eaten by dogs."

Smuggling has seriously impacted the economic foundation of Zhanjiang. Take the city's pillar industry, the sugar industry, as an example. In 1995, the city made a profit of 150 million yuan, but a year later, under the impact of smuggled sugar, the city lost 400 million yuan.

At that time, Zhanjiang was even called a paradise for smugglers.

Speaking of smuggling, it is simply open import. Ship after ship of goods were openly taken away from the dock. Customs did not check, border defense was not set up, and the anti-smuggling office became a smuggling office. The supervision of the entire Zhanjiang port was a vacuum.

Some local state-owned enterprises are also linked to smuggling groups. Guangdong Samsung Enterprise Group, known as the horse of western Guangdong, uses smuggled auto parts to assemble complete vehicles, and the agricultural vehicles it produces are extremely popular in the local area.

Ordinary people, although subconsciously know that smuggling is illegal, know little about its harm. Ordinary people prefer to fill their cars with cheap smuggled oil, use smuggled gas for cooking, and eat smuggled candy.

"People don't realize that this is drinking poison to quench thirst." Boss Zhu said, "There are four peaks of smuggling in the country, three of which were in the 1950s and 1960s. The scale was not large, like hills emerging from the plains. Now, smuggling is like Mount Everest rising from the plains, very rampant! Smuggling colludes with both domestic and foreign parties, colludes between officials and businessmen, and is large-scale, which has seriously undermined the national economic order. New economic crimes have reached the point where they must be cracked down. If smuggling continues to spread, it will not only seriously affect the smooth progress of reform and opening up and modernization, but will also bring down our economy and our regime!"