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After returning to Beijing from Sichuan, Suning did not rest, but immediately instructed the company's legal department to begin registering an automobile company.

Mingju Real Estate's legal team has acquired over a hundred land parcels in the past two years, making them very adept at handling contract terms.

However, registering an automobile company and registering a real estate project company are two completely different things, involving entirely different business scopes and qualification procedures.

The legal department worked overtime for more than half a month and finally got all the paperwork done.

The new company is named "Tianchao Shangguo Automobile Technology Co., Ltd."

The name was naturally chosen by Suning himself.

When the legal department staff first heard the name in the conference room, the lawyers exchanged glances. One of the bolder ones spoke up, saying, "President Su, isn't 'Celestial Empire' a bit too grandiose? Won't the business registration authorities think the name is too ostentatious and refuse to approve it?"

"Submit it first, and we'll see if it gets approved."

If a business isn't assertive and assertive, how can it possibly gain the trust of consumers?

As it turned out, the business registration office actually approved it. The lady at the window read the company name on the application form twice, pushed up her glasses and said that the name sounded impressive, and then stamped it with a "snap".

"I heard your boss is the owner of Mingju Real Estate?"

"Uh? Yes! Mingju Real Estate is preparing to operate as a group, and the automobile manufacturing industry is our new direction."

"I am a homeowner in your Mingju Real Estate Jingcheng No. 2. The houses you develop are so good, I believe your cars will not disappoint the Chinese people either."

"Don't worry, elder sister! We will not let down the name of the Celestial Empire."

After registering the company, Suning immediately did the second thing – register a sub-brand.

Suning had four brand trademarks registered in one go: Azure Dragon, White Tiger, Vermilion Bird, and Black Tortoise.

The origin of these four names is not from a business plan, but from the oldest set of star-gazing and astronomical worship practices in China, belonging to the "Four Symbols" in the Taoist system.

Azure Dragon Town is in the east, White Tiger Town is in the west, Vermilion Bird Town is in the south, and Black Tortoise Town is in the north; each of the four directions is guarded by a different deity.

Suning's idea was simple: the name of a car brand must be recognizable, unique, and have cultural roots, so that you could immediately tell it's a Chinese car brand.

The names of the four symbols correspond precisely to four different vehicle positioning.

The Qinglong is positioned as a sedan, drawing inspiration from the image of a dragon traveling the world, and is primarily targeted at the executive and family car markets.

The White Tiger is positioned as a rugged SUV, and its name, White, signifies its ability to conquer mountains and rivers.

The Zhuque is positioned as an urban SUV. Zhuque belongs to the fire element, which is agile and dynamic, giving it a sense of lightness and speed when driving on city roads.

The Xuanwu is positioned as an MPV multi-purpose vehicle. The Xuanwu is a combination of a tortoise and a snake, which is solid and stable. It is a multi-functional family car that can carry people and cargo, and it is safe and stable.

After registering four sub-brands, Suning felt it wasn't enough.

Suning extended the plan a step further, adding four auspicious beasts—Qilin, Pixiu, Bai Ze, and Chongming Bird—in addition to the four symbols.

In traditional culture, the four auspicious beasts are regarded as omens of "a virtuous ruler and a peaceful world," symbolizing good fortune and happiness.

In traditional culture, the Qilin is a benevolent beast, symbolizing auspiciousness and virtue, corresponding to a sports car; the Pixiu attracts and protects wealth, corresponding to a pickup truck, which is used to haul goods and make money, making it perfect for attracting wealth and treasures; the Bai Ze can communicate with all things through speech, corresponding to a bus, which carries people and is bustling with noise, also reflecting the Bai Ze's eloquent nature; the Chongming bird wards off evil and brings peace, corresponding to a truck, which travels long distances and carries heavy loads, with safety being the top priority.

Eight brands, eight models, from auspicious beasts in the sky to deities from all directions, covering sedans, rugged SUVs, urban SUVs, MPVs, sports cars, pickup trucks, buses and trucks.

Looking at the long list of sub-brands, Xiao Zhao, the assistant in charge of trademark registration in the legal department, couldn't help but say, "President Su, we haven't even built a single car yet, but we've already assembled a whole mahjong table of brands."

Suning said, "Before the car is even released, you have to secure the brand first. Trademarks are like land; there are only a few good spots, and if you're late, someone else will take them."

"Understood! Can our car company really offer all eight models?"

"Xiao Zhao, if you don't even dare to think about it, what are you going to do next?"

"Understood! It seems there's still a big difference between you and President Su."

"Haha, alright! Stop flattering me, get down to work."

……

While the brand and company registration were underway, the issue of choosing a location to build the factory came to the forefront.

Building cars is different from building houses; you can't just find any piece of land and start construction.

There are too many things to consider when building a car factory—the land area needs to be large enough, there need to be four major workshops for stamping, welding, painting and final assembly, there need to be a test track, and there need to be a parts storage and logistics area.

Convenient transportation is essential, ideally near a dedicated railway freight line or highway hub, as the logistics costs after the vehicles roll off the production line are directly linked to the factory's location.

To ensure a stable power supply, many places still experienced power outages and rationing in the 1990s.

Another unavoidable issue is industrial support. The automotive industry chain has hundreds of suppliers in the upstream and downstream. If a factory is built in a place where there are no supporting facilities within a radius of hundreds of kilometers, the logistics costs of transporting parts can eat up a large part of the profits.

The initial idea was naturally to place it in Beijing.

Beijing's advantages are obvious—the capital is both a political and economic center, its business environment ranks among the best in the country, and various approval procedures and policy support are available faster than in other places.

Mingju Real Estate's roots are also in Beijing. Government relations, banking relations, and media relations are all located here. All the resources that need to be coordinated during the factory construction process are most easily handled in Beijing.

However, Beijing also has its own problems. Land costs are high, with industrial land prices and labor costs in first-tier cities being a given. Moreover, by 1996, Beijing's industrial structure had already shifted towards high technology and finance, and its interest in large-scale manufacturing projects was not as great as it had been in previous years.

The investment promotion staff in Beijing were also very proactive.

They sat down in Suning's office and got straight to the point, saying that Beijing welcomes the Chinese automakers to set up their factories in Shunyi or Yizhuang. They offered to sell the land at the most favorable price for industrial land, and to tax the minimum standard of three years of tax exemption and two years of tax reduction. They also said that the city would coordinate and guarantee the water and electricity supply.

They also emphasized that Beijing has the best business environment in the entire northern region, with stable policies, standardized procedures, and transparent approval processes. In terms of transportation and logistics, it is a national transportation hub with extensive highway and railway freight networks. The automotive industry chain is complete, with no shortage of parts suppliers or R&D personnel. After the complete vehicle rolls off the production line, it is very convenient to distribute it to various northern provinces or export it through Tianjin Port.

Just as Suning was having its team look for suitable land in Beijing, news of Tianchao Auto also spread.

The way the news spread was quite simple – the news of the acquisition of Deyang Automobile Factory was published in local Sichuan newspapers for a few days, and then reprinted by several national financial media outlets.

The report mentioned that the acquiring party was an affiliated company of Mingju Real Estate, and also mentioned that the newly registered "Tianchao Shangguo Automobile Technology Co., Ltd." planned to invest in the construction of a large-scale vehicle production base.

These reports, once published, were like a signal flare to investment promotion departments across the country.

Dalian was the first to take action.

Dalian held a unique position in the economic landscape of the 1990s. It was the gateway to the sea for Northeast China, had a natural deep-water port, a strong industrial base, and retained the foundation of an old industrial base.

In the mid-1990s, Dalian was desperately seeking investment and undergoing transformation, and its desire for large-scale manufacturing projects was much stronger than that of Beijing.

Dalian sent an investment promotion team directly to Beijing, carrying a thick stack of preferential policies for attracting investment, to meet with representatives from Mingju Real Estate.

When the Dalian investment promotion team arrived, Suning was in a meeting.

As he came out of the conference room, he saw several people dressed in dark suits and ties, each with a briefcase, sitting in the reception area in the corridor. They were sitting very upright, with only a third of the sofa occupied. They were obviously from the government.

The team was led by a deputy director of the Dalian Investment Promotion Bureau, surnamed Ma, who was in his forties and spoke with a strong local accent. He was efficient and got straight to the point after shaking hands with the team.

Deputy Director Ma pulled a document from his briefcase and spread it on the coffee table. “President Su, all of Dalian’s policies are in here. Industrial land prices are among the lowest in the country. Companies that settle in Dalian will enjoy a full exemption from corporate income tax for the first three years, and a 50% reduction for the following two years. We already have the approval documents for that. Moreover, we have something that Beijing doesn’t have—a port. Dalian Port is a natural ice-free port. Once your cars are manufactured, you can export them by sea, directly loading them onto ships in Dalian and shipping them to Japan, South Korea, and Southeast Asia. The shipping costs are much lower than transporting them by train from Beijing to Dalian and then loading them onto ships. In addition, Dalian itself is a heavy industrial base with a strong foundation in steel, machinery processing, and parts manufacturing. If you build a car factory, you won’t need to start cultivating supporting enterprises from scratch; the entire industrial chain is already in place.”

After listening, Suning did not immediately respond. While flipping through the compilation of preferential policies, he asked, "Where exactly is the industrial land located?"

Deputy Director Ma was clearly prepared. He pulled out a map from his briefcase, spread it on the coffee table, and circled an area with his finger: "South of Jinzhou, near the port. We've already done the preliminary leveling of this land, and connected the water, electricity, and roads. Once the company moves in, construction can begin immediately."

Suning looked at the location on the map, nodded, and said that having a port was indeed a big plus, and instructed his people to follow up and coordinate.

The investment promotion team from Dalian had just left when the team from Qingdao arrived.

Qingdao and Dalian are somewhat similar; both are coastal port cities with a strong industrial base, and both have a hundred reasons to prove that they are more suitable than the other for building a car factory.

The person from Qingdao was also an investment promotion manager, surnamed Hou. He was a capable middle-aged man who spoke frankly and directly: "Mr. Su, compared to Dalian, I won't say much else, but I'll just mention three points. First, Qingdao Port's throughput is no less than Dalian Port's, and its shipping routes to South Korea and Japan are closer than Dalian's. Second, the automotive parts supporting industry around Qingdao has already taken shape, with many Korean automakers having joint venture factories in Shandong, making the supply chain more mature than Dalian's. Third, Shandong is a populous province with abundant and stable labor resources, and labor costs are much lower than in Beijing, giving it an advantage over Dalian. In addition, our land policy..."

He pulled a photocopy of an official document from his briefcase and placed it on the table. “It was just approved by the province. Key investment projects can implement ‘zero land price’ for industrial land. Enterprises only need to bear the costs of demolition and basic infrastructure.”

Suning took the document and looked at it. It was indeed an official document approved by the provincial government. "What are the restrictions on zero land price?"

Director Hou said, "The threshold is that the investment scale reaches a certain standard, and at the same time, a certain number of jobs and tax contributions are created locally. Your whole vehicle project meets any of these criteria."

Suning leaned back on the sofa and mentally reviewed the conditions in Dalian and Qingdao.

Both cities played their cards very well. Dalian's advantages are its port and heavy industry base, while Qingdao's advantages are its supply chain, labor force, and greater land incentives.

Both are good cards, each with its own strengths.

After the people from Qingdao left, Suning called the team into his office and laid out the situations in the three cities for comparison.

Beijing's advantages lie in its close relationship with government and its business environment, while its disadvantages are land costs and the degree of matching between its industrial structure and its economic structure.

Dalian's advantages lie in its port and heavy industry infrastructure, while its disadvantages are that the overall economic environment in Northeast China has begun to decline, raising doubts about its future market reach.

Qingdao's advantages lie in its supply chain, labor force, and land policy strength. Its disadvantage is that its government relations are not as strong as those in Beijing, and some things may not be as smooth to coordinate as they are in Beijing.

Assistant Xiao Zhao compiled a comparison table of data from the three cities and posted it on the whiteboard.

Su Ning stood in front of the whiteboard, holding a cup of tea, staring at the table for a long time.

It's 1996 now, not the era before I traveled back in time, when there were charging stations and green-plated cars everywhere.

Currently, the only option for making cars is to produce gasoline-powered vehicles, which are also the easiest to be accepted by the market.

Moreover, their own space world possesses a complete set of fuel vehicle technology and production lines.

The Deyang automobile factory's qualification catalog lists gasoline vehicles, and its supply chain is also based on the gasoline vehicle system. Its battery and motor technologies are not yet mature enough to support large-scale mass production.

It's not that we couldn't have developed new energy vehicles in 1996, but doing so would have been a disaster—there was zero charging infrastructure, we were held back by the three core technologies (battery, motor, and electronic control), and consumers didn't even know what new energy was. Even if we had built them, no one would have bought them.

Even in later generations, there are still many fools who stubbornly believe that gasoline-powered cars have been developed for a century and are more technologically mature than new energy vehicles, and are unwilling to accept this.

Therefore, what Suning needs to do is first establish its brand, build its technical team, and expand its market channels in the gasoline-powered vehicle market.

By the time the new energy era truly arrives, he will have accumulated enough capital and technology to switch tracks.

Now, Suning only needs to make one choice—Beijing, Dalian, or Qingdao.

...(End of this chapter)