I texted this story to my friend who’s dad is a finance exec at Saleen. I’ll wait till he gets a chance to speak to him for details now that this is public info.

quote:

Originally posted by Edmond:

quote:

Originally posted by FN in MT:
I'd love to see this happen to "woke" NIKE! LOL

I wish it would too but I think most of their products are made in Vietnam.

China has largely gotten out of the apparel market save for select categories. Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia is where most apparel, footwear, bags, and home goods are finally assembled. China has moved much of their manufacturing towards technology and further up the supply-side chain. Many of the raw materials and mills to support manufacturers come out of China: textiles/fabrics, zippers, Velcro, snaps/buttons, steel, aluminum, glass, principal pharmaceutical ingredients and petroleum based products: plastic, rubber, fertilizers, etc.

In short, manufacturing/assembly may be outside of China but, China is still the lynchpin in the supply chain. Meanwhile, their technology, steel/shipbuilding, cement, and automotive sectors continue to grow.

Frog: You promised you wouldn 't sting me.

Scorpion: Sorry, its just my nature.

[QUOTE]


The deal “offered, I thought, from my standpoint, a great opportunity to Make an obscene amount of money using foreign capitol while also screwing legitimate Americans who could have used the jobs. I would like to have been able to make that much money in America but apparently I'm too greedy and stupid to figure out how...


Yes, ridiculous editorial sarcasm all mine.

Given the past history of China, one would have thought he was smart enough to see the writing in the wall before he even made his deal.

Tough shit that he got screwed but he asked for it

Importing cars into China doubles the price. Chinese are willing to pay the premium for Italian exotics, Bentleys, and even Wrangler Unlimited's, but most cars would not sell at double the price.

The only way to get into the market at a decent price is to form a joint venture with a Chinese company, build a factory, and make cars there. Then they can sell at prices that are comparable to US prices for the same model. I have seen almost every major manufacturer's made-in-China cars on the road, even stuff we don't have in the US.

JV's are almost always 50/50 between the non-Chinese and Chinese company. I have not seen an arrangement like the one described for Saleen, nor one having a local government as a major shareholder. Saleen's IP was valued at $800M but the article does not say he actually contributed that amount. The $500M from the local government is the only actual capital specifically stated.

So yeah, too good to be true, and likely an intentional scam. Saleen and Wang were removed as a directors, but the article also does not state if they still retain their shares, in which case they still have a claim to the future profits and/or assets.

Anyone remember the Yugo and how it came to be?

A similar tale...

Anyone remember the Fiat 128?

Man this story was really confusing me because I swore Charles Wang died a couple years ago.

He did... a different Chinese/American millionaire businessman Charles Wang.

quote:

Originally posted by ibanda:
Companies should not be suprised their tech gets stolen anymore. This has happened hundreds of times. Their culture doesn't recognize it as being a problem.

Absolutely, my understanding of Chinese culture is they are more or less ruthless in pursuing their goals, their own citizens are very long suffering out of respect for their imperfect communist leaders, and at least for the older generation, wouldn't desire any change away from the current state of affairs. I work with a Chinese born and raised engineer, a talented and good colleage and friend, and he explained to me why he doesn't like to move forward as fast as I often would prefer, that it's because his roots in the culture require him to avoid "rocking the boat", even if doing so could or would be better for everyone. In fact, this is often a point of technical disagreement between us, even when he agrees with me from a technical and organizational perspective, but still does not often agree with me for exactly this reason. I do not think less of him for it, because there's a lot to be said for following his opinion on things like that, because there's no way I could possibly always be right when 1.4 billion souls would mostly disagree with me. BTW he gave up his Chinese citizenzip some time after he finished up graduate engineering school and started a family, became a US Citizen, and though he's not a hard core conservative, based on our informal conversations about these kinds of topics over the years, he leans more on the conservative side of things when he evaluates the current state of affairs regarding the moral failure and consistent organized corruption in deomcratic party ranks. We are still far apart culturally, but it's fun because he knows he will never be a bona fide southern redneck, and that I will never immerse myself in Chinese philosopy, beliefs, and culture etc., though I believe ancient Chinese philosopy and medicine has a LOT to offer even in these more "modern" times.

China's very name is The Middle Kingdom.

The government and the people believe they are indeed the Middle Kingdom of the World. They believe that they are and should be the number 1 country in the world.

They will stop at nothing to be the biggest and best superpower in the world.

They are building out Africa like crazy, they are investing to build power distribution, railroads, bridges, highways, any infrastructure they can. In so doing it is their plan to dominate and control the continent.

It is in their culture to steal, clone, copy everything they can. You can see it in the architecture of their cities. Often they go overseas finding something they like and come home and build a replica. As the general knowledge of the outside world is pretty low, everyone thinks it is new, cool, and an awesome Chinese invention.

Listening to music there, they have stolen thousands of songs, added their own lyrics and the people think it is a new song.

I lived there for 6 months, I directly saw this stuff all the time.

The Chinese are masters of stealing technology. They'll do it any way they can. Espionage, purchase in foreign countries and reverse engineering, or lure you in and take take it quietly. They have no need to develop anything, they just take it.

Modern Chinese culture is very hard to describe. It is interesting because it is a collection of old customs and superstitions along with hyper modernism, and an obsession with being rich or pretending to be. In general it's a mixed bag of self contradictions.

Mao and his cultural revolution mostly succeeded in destroying religion. I know more Chinese people that self identify as atheists than any other ethnicity. Couple this with massive changes over the past 40 years where they have gone from everyone being poor, to a striated two-class system with a huge gap between the common people and the rich. What you get is a money and status obsessed culture that lacks any absolute moral grounding.

I've seen more Lamborghinis, Ferraris and other high end exotics driving on the road or parked in front of restaurants and hotels than anywhere else I've been. Famous Brand Mall in Shanghai near the Pearl Tower is a huge 7 story atrium mall with nothing but high end boutiques. Name a luxury brand of clothes, bags, makeup, shoes, or whatever and they have it. It puts the Beverly Center Mall to shame. The rich show off their money like it's going out of style, and everyone else wants to be like them.

That's why you get all the corner cutting and cheating on everything, to save a buck and pocket it. Business dealings are pretty cutthroat. If you let yourself be taken advantage of, that's your fault for being gullible. It's quicker and easier to copy, bootleg, knockoff, or steal than to create original things so that's what many do. Everyone watches first run movies on the internet for free and no one cares.

The not rocking the boat or having original ideas is true. Chinese often want to be told what to do, or follow the rules/procedure regardless of efficiency or result, so they can say they did what they were supposed to do and the outcome is not their fault. They don't ask questions to avoid appearing to be ignorant or incompetent and sometimes just pick a direction if they don't know which way to go on something. Then you have the deference to authority - if the misinformed boss says they're doing something a certain way, then that's what they do, even if it's wrong.

A translator on a $20M project I was working on said they will try to do something I asked but if they can't get it done it's not their fault and it couldn't be helped. I told him the US didn't win two world wars by avoiding responsibility. We won because men committed to getting things done no matter what it takes.

"Saving Face" is a very difficult concept for westerners to understand, but China is mild compared to Japan in that regard.

Here's a story from an expat coworker:

American Chinese kid is visiting family in China and the other kids ask if he wants to go to someplace you have to pay to get in. They tell him how much it costs so he can pay them and they can get the ticket for him because he doesn't speak Chinese very well. They told him a much higher price and pocketed the difference. Even primary school kids are willing to screw each other over to make a buck, and if the mark doesn't know better, too bad it's on him.

Now, this stuff isn't universal for everyone. I know plenty of honest people in China that don't try to take advantage of others. But it is the current in the river, so to speak.

A girl I used to know explained to me many years ago about Chinese business ethics. She said that when it is boiled down, they defend their actions by saying that yes, they do cheat you, or try. That when it happens, it is your fault because you should have expected it.

I always found this useful and true information to live by.