Chapter 347: The Weird Fortune 500 and Entering NASDAQ
After the reform and opening up, mainland China is currently undergoing a wave of investment promotion.
The year before last, in 1994, Singapore's Hong Leong Group took a stake in the local Xinfei Electric Co., Ltd. at the warm invitation of the local government in Henan.
In the current Xinfei Electric joint venture, Singapore Group's Hong Leong Electric and Singapore Yuxin Electric hold 51% of the shares and control Xinfei Electric. After the joint venture, Xinfei Company once developed very brilliantly...
Li Xiaofan said: "President Guo, I have seen an article in China about your investment in the Xinfei Electrical Appliances project in mainland China, so I probably know a little about it..."
Guo Lingyu smiled and said:
"The Xinfei Electric joint venture project that our Hong Leong Group invested in the Mainland is currently developing quite well. In the year of the joint venture, we invested in a new fluorine-free refrigerator production line, and the refrigerator production increased from 360,000 units to 1 million units. Last year The net profit after tax of the joint venture exceeded RMB 300 million, far exceeding our expectations!”
"Currently, Xinfei Electric has become one of the top three refrigerators in mainland China, and its business is very booming. I heard from Mr. Liu, the head of the joint venture, that our Xinfei fluorine-free green concept refrigerator products were snapped up by the people as soon as they were launched. It is said that a purchase ticket for a Xinfei fluorine-free refrigerator has been sold for 500 yuan, which is unimaginable!”
Li Xiaofan praised: "Well, the total population of mainland China has exceeded 1.2 billion, and the people have great demand for electrical products. Your Hong Leong Group has a very strategic vision!"
"These were all investment decisions made by my father when he was still alive. He had great affection for the mainland! It's a pity that he left us last year..." At this point, President Guo Lingyu took off his glasses and sighed.
Sitting in Guo Lingyu's office, Li Xiaofan suddenly thought of his Singaporean friend from his previous life.
Li Xiaofan’s Singaporean friend is called Ruan Jianping. He was once the Asia-Pacific president of Honeywell Group, a Fortune 500 company in the United States.
Currently, Ruan Jianping is still in Beijing, serving as the vice president of AlliedSignal China in the United States. Later, he served as the chairman of Xinfei Electric Co., Ltd. by accident for two years...
United States AlliedSignal is a very strange company. It was founded in the early 19th century by five American chemical companies. Then in 1983, it acquired Bendix, an aerospace and automotive company. In 1985, it acquired the American Signal Companies signal company, and later acquired and merged Ga
ett Los Angeles Aerospace Company, the company name has also become AlliedSignal United States.
After acquiring Los Angeles Aerospace Company, aerospace became the largest business department of AlliedSignal at this time.
Ruan Jianping was an elite pilot and senior commander of the Singapore Air Force back then, and received a Singapore Armed Forces scholarship to further his studies in the United States.
Therefore, after retiring, Ruan Jianping, who was proficient in Chinese, English and aviation business, was spotted by the American company AlliedSignal and sent to China to take charge of mainland business.
In the previous life, in the spring of 1999, the American company AlliedSignal merged with the American company Honeywell.
But the weirdest thing happened at this time: The board of directors of AlliedSignal in the United States felt that the name Honeywell was more pleasant, so they simply abandoned their AlliedSignal name, and the new company after the merger and reorganization was called Honeywell in the United States. Nivel Group.
For those who don’t know, Honeywell of the United States acquired AlliedSignal.
In a previous life, in 2003, the American Honeywell Group moved its entire Asia-Pacific headquarters from Singapore to Shanghai. Ruan Jianping, then president of Honeywell Asia Pacific Region, also moved from Beijing to Shanghai to work.
At that time, Li Xiaofan's Singapore boss and Ruan Jianping were middle school classmates. So for a while, Ruan Jianping, who had just arrived in Shanghai, followed Li Xiaofan in the nightlife of the Demon City. As the boss of Fortune 500 China, Ruan Jianping will not play with his own company’s employees...
Back then, after the joint venture, Xinfei Electrical Appliances was really brilliant at the beginning.
However, due to cultural differences, various contradictions gradually became apparent. Various strategic operations and diversified development strategies of the Chinese team of Xinfei Electric were successively rejected by the board of directors of Singapore Hong Leong Group.
In the previous life, in 1997 and 2000, Xinfei Electric proposed to acquire domestic air-conditioning companies twice, but was rejected by Hong Leong Asia. Xinfei Electric lost a great opportunity to enter the air-conditioning industry at that time.
In 2005, the local government of Xinxiang once again sold 39% of Xinfei's shares to Singapore's Hong Leong. At this point, Singapore's Hong Leong Group's shareholding in Xinfei Electric jumped to 90%. China's management rights were completely lost, and Xinfei was completely transformed from a state-owned enterprise into a foreign-funded enterprise.
In 2011, Hong Leong Group invited Ruan Jianping, who had served as the Asia Pacific president of Honeywell, a Fortune 500 company in the United States, to serve as director of Hong Leong Group and chairman of Xinfei Electric.
However, the arrival of Ruan Jianping still could not solve Xinfei Electric's internal conflicts and external difficulties, and it still suffered losses year after year.
Two years later, Ruan Jianping left Xinfei Electric sadly.
In 2017, Xinfei Electric submitted a reorganization application to the local government due to poor management and was on the verge of bankruptcy.
On the way back to the office from the headquarters of Hong Leong Group, Li Xiaofan recalled the companies in his previous life that were once glorious but soon became short-lived, and his mind was full of thoughts.
Thinking of his old friend Ruan Jianping who was still in Beijing and was in charge of the Chinese business of AlliedSignal in the United States, he had to visit him next time he returned to China...
After returning to the company, Li Xiaofan called Pan Zhanlong and Gu Qijun, the two technical leaders, to listen to the recent progress of some project research and development.
Recently, Li Xiaofan assigned them the task of developing an instant messaging software similar to ICQ and a webmail webmail service software similar to Hotmail.
However, what Dr. Pan Zhanlong and his team brought out made Li Xiaofan a little disappointed.
There is no way, innovation comes from practice, and it is really difficult for them to develop successful original products based on some memories of their previous lives.
What makes Li Xiaofan happy is that Gu Qijun, who is in charge of the online bookstore business, and Zhou Xiaoqing, the financial director, report to him that the Pacific Online Bookstore has been doing more and more business recently.
The most surprising thing is the bestseller ranking of the online bookstore. In addition to some popular novels and business books, a large part of the sales actually come from various subject tutoring books and extracurricular readings bought by Singaporean parents for their children.
In addition to books, the Pacific Online Bookstore has a very good business development momentum in various stationery, music CDs, videotapes and DVDs, software similar to the win95 window system, and electronic game products.
Recently, the Pacific Online Bookstore's single-day sales in Singapore exceeded 150,000 Singapore dollars. Johor Bahru is a little worse, about 30,000 Singapore dollars per day. But Malaysia has a population of more than 20 million, and the potential for growth is huge.
At present, the combined turnover of the two places is 180,000 Singapore dollars a day. If it continues, the annual turnover of the Pacific Online Bookstore can exceed 60 million Singapore dollars, and the after-tax profit is expected to exceed 15 million Singapore dollars.
"Mr. Li, if we continue to develop at this pace, our Pacific Online Bookstore project will be able to apply for listing on the Singapore Main Board next year!" Zhou Xiaoqing said happily.
Li Xiaofan laughed and said, "Xiaoqing, maybe you can look further ahead. Can we enter the Nasdaq capital market in the United States across the Pacific?"