Returning wealthy individuals develop their hometowns and become rich in the 1980s

Bai Jianbo hung up the phone cursing. Chen Laisheng's interruption had made him forget what he was supposed to do. Unable to remember, Bai Jianbo simply stopped thinking about it and continued reading the newspaper.

Just as Bai Jianbo was feeling frustrated reading the newspaper, his secretary knocked on the office door. Bai Jianbo called out, "Come in!" and the secretary pushed the door open and said, "Secretary, Volkswagen called to ask if we should continue the negotiations."

"Heh!" Bai Jianbo took off his reading glasses and snorted coldly. "These foreigners, they saw the newspaper and learned that the Xiaochi car was undergoing line testing, and they can't sit still."

Shanghai Automotive and Volkswagen have been discussing a joint venture since 1978. The two sides have been arguing for many years about issues such as investment ratio and import of parts.

At the negotiating table, if neither side is willing to back down, then silence becomes their best "weapon." It's a contest of patience; whoever breaks the deadlock first will find themselves on the defensive.

The public knows that China needs them, and they also need China's huge, untapped market; it's a mutually beneficial relationship.

You want my technology, I want your market!

In fact, Volkswagen has been struggling in the European market for years. It urgently needs a new market to reduce its excess inventory and production. The aftermath of the oil crisis has been so widespread that it has directly caused consumers to tighten their belts.

China is actively embracing the world and urgently needs to introduce new technologies to let international investors see the huge potential of the Chinese market. Initially, Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC) did not actually favor Volkswagen, but instead chose to extend joint venture invitations to automotive groups such as Ford, GM, and Mercedes-Benz. However, these large automotive groups either had harsh conditions or simply ignored the requests and did not respond.

Negotiations began in November 1978 and have dragged on for nearly four years until October 1982. The Volkswagen Group thought it had Shanghai Automotive under its control and knew that no other company wanted to cooperate with Shanghai Automotive, so it made some unreasonable demands with impunity.

For example, Shanghai Automotive Group (SAIC) required Volkswagen Group to invest no less than 1 million marks in the first phase, and SAIC would give 49% of the equity in the joint venture. However, Volkswagen demanded 55% of the equity, which led to a stalemate.

Secondly, Volkswagen did not want to set up a new parts factory in China because it would require a lot of investment. Volkswagen already had mature parts manufacturing plants overseas, and they did not value Shanghai Automotive's own parts. Their requirement was that the parts be imported from overseas to China and then assembled in the factory in Shanghai.

Since it involved using China's precious foreign exchange resources at that time, not to mention Shanghai Automotive, even FAW would not have been able to pass this proposal. The Ministry of Industry directly rejected it.

At that time, China was desperately short of foreign exchange. Anyone who dared to touch China's foreign exchange reserves was asking for trouble!

Bai Jianbo picked up his teacup, took a sip of the now lukewarm tea, spat out the foam, and asked his secretary, "What did Volkswagen say?"

"If you still insist on not building parts factories domestically and can only import components, then there's no point in continuing this discussion!"

Using precious foreign exchange to import these domestically produced car parts is out of the question. Volkswagen probably knew the firm stance of the Chinese government, and with the staff in Beijing having seen the People's Daily's report on the road test of the Xiaochi car, they really couldn't sit still.

Not only could they not sit still, they also sent a telegram to the group headquarters overnight, informing them of the novel and stylish design of the two Xiaochi cars. After learning about Xiaochi's background from various sources, they had to admit that the groundbreaking exterior design of these two Xiaochi cars did indeed threaten Volkswagen.

These damned Yang Ji guys actually managed to produce such a groundbreaking car in just one year after acquiring Saab, which really startled the Volkswagen Group.

It is important to know that America is the world's largest consumer market. Whether it is automobiles or finance, as long as you can enter America's market and gain a foothold, you can make a fortune.

The public is optimistic about the future of the Chinese market, which is why they came here to make their moves early on. They didn't expect that someone else would have even better foresight and would start grabbing market share so quickly.

"Mr. Klenberg said on the phone that they agreed to set up a factory in our country, but they hope to discuss issues such as the investment equity ratio in more detail and reach a cooperation agreement as soon as possible!"

Bai Jianbo smiled, put down his teacup, got up, walked to the sofa, sat down, and said, "Tell Klenburg that we can talk, but our requirements have changed. We need to carefully consider the car model they proposed."

After Xiaochi Auto launched the "Dilu" and "Zhaoyebai" models, Bai Jianbo now feels that Volkswagen's Santana and Sihuan 80B2 models are somewhat outdated.

Although the two models Volkswagen offered were only recently launched, they couldn't compare to the "Dilu" and "Zhaoyebai" in terms of appearance, engine, and interior. Most importantly, Volkswagen lacked all of these safety features, such as airbags and ABS.

Having seen the better models, Bai Jianbo felt a sense of dread when faced with these cars that seemed to be from a completely different era. He wanted to say, "No contact with the ugly ones." Right now, he just wanted to build a good relationship with Xiaochi Motors and see if he could try to discuss cooperation, such as introducing or purchasing engine technologies.

If we were to introduce it, Xiaochi Motors probably wouldn't agree. So, we'll have to discuss the purchase of engines. I've already asked the designers at Shanghai Automotive to redesign the exterior of the new Shanghai license plate 760 based on what I've seen from Xiaochi Motors.

Of course, Bai Jianbo wasn't shameless enough to directly copy the entire exterior design of Xiaochi Motors. Xiaochi Motors had applied for a global patent for its exterior design. But when it comes to exterior designs, as long as you don't draw it exactly, you can argue with anything.

Just like how people have two hands, two legs, and one head, and the head has a nose and eyes, you can't say that if they look alike, they are twins, right?

Design is a very subjective thing. If a designer says they didn't copy, then they didn't copy. How can a designer say it's plagiarism? It's just borrowing!

However, it's not so easy for Shanghai Automotive to imitate Xiaochi Motors. First, you need to have the same equipment as Xiaochi Motors, and the body and chassis must be re-proportioned. Chen Dong obtained the blueprints directly from the system, which had already provided the optimal proportions. These were all patented.

Some cars, once you get the hang of them, just feel awkward to drive, whether it's steering or swaying while driving straight. This is because the overall weight distribution is not well designed, and the suspension and other components are not tuned, so the engine output is naturally poor, making it unpleasant to drive.

Bai Jianbo realized that Shanghai Automotive doesn't need Volkswagen; relying on Snapdragon, they can upgrade their Shanghai license plate 760 on their own!