The Birth of Shanghai's First Conglomerate

Late May, Shanghai.

When the first rays of sunlight on the horizon shine through the window and refract into the room.

Chen Pingsheng stretched and got up from the large room.

Unlike living in a traditional courtyard house in Beijing, there is also a sense of tranquility and peace there.

A nostalgic flavor.

But Shanghai is different. Skyscrapers, luxury cars, yachts, and mesmerizing neon lights all exude an air of extravagance and decadence.

After completing the IPO of Teng Hui Department Store in Hong Kong, he rushed back from there.

After washing up, I picked out a white Michaud Miller worth 1200 million from my watch cabinet.

Wear it on your wrist.

Then fasten the Hermès belt with the H buckle, and you have to wear this black suit that costs over 600,000 yuan a month.

Add to that a white shirt worth 50,000 that I never wash at home.

Look in the mirror.

The middle-aged man, who was already somewhat handsome, became even more so with his immense wealth.

He has also become a truly charming middle-aged man.

His wife, Song Yanxi, had already gotten up. Their family has always lived in this 120 million yuan, 500-square-meter mansion in Shanghai.

Of course, it has now risen to around 1.8 million.

This gives a glimpse into the insane rise in housing prices.

A house in this location with an unbeatable night view is already a luxury.

The only thing missing is a family swimming pool.

Chen Pingsheng himself had 116 billion, and his wife had another 38 billion from the proceeds of selling shares.

Whenever the money in her account surges, she pulls out her family heirloom computer.

Then I kept dialing.

You think she's doing accounting, but actually she's figuring out how to spend the money.

The group has reached this point today, and apart from new projects, they don't need to subsidize any further investments with their own money.

This is also the main reason why Chen Pingsheng dares to invest over 10 billion yuan in new energy.

"Honey, what do you think is the best way to make my billions of dollars generate more money?"

"Stop making money from money. Just give me another 28 billion from your side, and you can spend the remaining 1 billion however you want!"

"Oh." Song Yanxi swiped away a large number, then asked curiously, "Are you really going to work in new energy?"

"We absolutely have to go. Didn't we already discuss this?"

Chen Pingsheng gave her a kiss; his fragrant wife still smelled wonderful when he kissed her.

He transferred another 28 billion from his wife's account, bringing the total to 145 billion.

He's ready to start work now.

Unlike those internet founders who are financially independent and start their own new energy businesses but are unwilling to invest too much capital.

If Chen Pingsheng is going to do this, he will definitely provide sufficient funds to ensure that the project will far surpass that of ordinary new energy startups in the early stages.

Only when the money is in place will everything else fall into place naturally.

Among the four super-first-tier cities, Shanghai has the richest land resources.

It is also one of the world's top ten mega-cities.

Another Chinese city on the list is Hong Kong.

"Even though you've already discussed this with me, I still think the risk is too high."

In traditional industries, with their existing group resources, they could simply crush everything else.

New energy is different; it's a completely unfamiliar field.

It also brings together the best entrepreneurs in the country, making the competition undoubtedly world-class.

This is destined to be an extremely brutal elimination round.

Chen Pingsheng was full of confidence.

Whether for the future of the group or for his own sake, he has to do this.

2016 years.

With strong government support, nearly two hundred teams have emerged in the new energy sector in just one year.

How many of them are opportunists trying to exploit the name of new energy to swindle local government resources?

No one can tell.

No one can say for sure how many people genuinely want to build good cars.

May 24th.

Tong Zhelan and Shen Nanpeng introduced him to three people.

They are Yan Minghui, the former president of the Sany Heavy Industry Research Institute.

This is the leading enterprise in their southern province, and the boss of Sany was once the richest man in China.

It is also a world-class heavy industry group.

The other two are the vice presidents of Huawei's consumer business unit and BMW's Greater China automotive business unit. If all three of them joined his team, the original senior management team would be complete.

It's not easy to poach top talent with an annual salary of over ten million.

Fortunately, Tencent Pictures has always had a good reputation.

Initially, the conversation wasn't about changing the world.

No one comes in just to listen to you sell your dreams; that kind of thing is only good for fooling young people.

It's impossible to fool such top talent.

Chen Pingsheng first stated his conditions, as long as they were willing to join his team.

First, each person will be given a 500-square-meter apartment in Tomson Riviera.

They can choose any luxury house they want, with a land price of around 100 million yuan.

In addition, he will also allocate 15% of the stock options in the new energy vehicle sector.

Five years later, you can cash it out freely.

Each person will receive 5% stock options.

You think this is a small amount of money?
It should be noted that he himself was genuinely planning to invest 20 billion yuan in new energy, without even considering the subsequent appreciation.

These are all original shares worth over 3 billion, but it will take five years to cash them out.

Given these conditions, any investor with access to the capital market would certainly not agree to them.

After all, nothing has even been done yet, and he's already spending over 3 billion to poach three people.

Who could stand that?
This was also the main reason why Chen Pingsheng only used his own money in the early stages; to put it bluntly, he was still a novice in the automotive market.

They only invested in Guazi.com, a website that sells used cars, and it's doing quite well.

But compared to the scale of new energy, it's not even in the same league.

"Mr. Chen, I'd like to know what your future plans are for working in the new energy industry?"

The vice president of Huawei's consumer business unit asked him.

At a time like this, talking about being among the top three in the country or the top five in the world is basically nonsense.

Chen Pingsheng stated frankly, "My only future plan is to build good cars and sell them at low prices. This is very much in line with my group's business philosophy. Regardless of what I can achieve in the future, I will personally invest at least 20 billion yuan in the field of new energy vehicles within five years."

"I don't care how high the initial investment costs are. I only care whether I can really build a car that satisfies customers and makes them feel that it is worth more than its price."

"Your idea sounds simple, but it's very difficult to implement."

Yan Minghui, former president of Sany Heavy Industry Research Institute, said: "The starting price of new energy vehicles is now 300,000 to 400,000 yuan. In order to achieve widespread adoption and compete with fuel vehicles in terms of market share, the price must be lowered to the level of 100,000 to 200,000 yuan."

"To reach this level, let alone the raw materials for batteries, you need to have your own super factory. Without your own factory, it will be difficult to control costs and other factors."

One interesting aspect of current new energy vehicles is that most of them are manufactured by traditional automakers.

Can you call a car manufactured by a traditional automaker a new energy vehicle?

Isn't it just converting fuel to battery power, or hybrid technology?

From a technical standpoint, it's not that difficult at all.

"If we need a super factory, we can build it ourselves," Chen Pingsheng said calmly.

"Mr. Chen, do you know how much it would cost to build such a super factory?"

"How many?"

"Starting with 8 billion."

This is no small sum, especially considering you haven't even gotten your car yet.

They spent 8 billion to build such a super factory without even knowing whether it would sell well.

This will undoubtedly increase the risks of starting a business significantly.

Chen Pingsheng nodded. "Eight billion is nothing. Since I'm going to do this, I'm naturally prepared to make a huge investment. I plan to spend 120 billion to build my own super factory in Shanghai."

Without a factory, the cars are manufactured by other companies, which makes it difficult to control costs.

Secondly, product quality is also difficult to control.

Cars are not like cell phones; if they are not made well, they can really kill people.

He insisted on keeping costs and future quality under his control.

Even if it means spending over 10 billion to build our own factory.

That's something I'd be willing to do.

In the long run, he has always believed that whoever can control costs to the greatest extent possible.

Whoever is qualified to go all the way in this race.

As for those car companies that can't even control their costs, elimination is absolutely inevitable.

In any industry, if you start a business in China, the competition will eventually come down to a naked price war.

Unless you're dealing with high-end or luxury goods.

He's a newcomer to the automotive industry, and he's risking his life to work on high-end products.

First, use large amounts of capital to control the cost of car manufacturing; that's what it truly means to take a real lead.

(End of this chapter)