Chapter 1281 Burn the fire

   After playing with the crude and outrageous steering wheel on the Model S prototype, Akio Toyoda was full of curiosity and emotion.

   For this rough workmanship and interior, it can sell for $60,000? Are Americans so fooled?

   But when he thought of the $110,000 price of the Roadster that went on sale three years ago, he was relieved.

   As long as the story is told well, there is no need for a fool to pay for it.

   Aside from the interior materials and workmanship, some of the design concepts and performance of the Model S are quite impressive to him.

  Xia Jingxing did not sit in the car, but stood beside the car, silently observing everything in the car.

He noticed that Akio Toyoda was constantly observing the stitching of the car seat, and he was also stroking and measuring the gap between the windows and doors with his hands, so he explained with a smile: "Interior is not the main direction of our products. People who buy our car don't buy it because they value the interior."

   Akio Toyoda raised his head and said with a smile, "Instill a new automotive aesthetic in customers? Simplicity equals technology?"

  Xia Jingxing laughed, "Mr. Toyota, your suggestion is very good, we will try to work in this direction in the future."

   "Daren, I can see that Tesla is still very immature now. You are far from becoming a truly mature car manufacturer, and you still lack a mature factory."

   Akio Toyoda walked out of the car with a smile, closed the car door with a bang, and then leaned his back against the door, folded his arms and looked at Xia Jingxing.

  Xia Jingxing smiled noncommittally and said nothing.

   Akio Toyoda stared at Xia Jingxing and said slowly: "I have a suggestion now that Tesla can quickly become a mature car manufacturer. I wonder if you are interested in listening to it."

   "Okay, I'll never say no to any suggestion that could make us grow stronger."

  Toyoda said with a smile: "If we sell the Fremont factory to Tesla, you won't be able to produce at full capacity for a while.

   If I remember correctly, your Roadster seems to have only sold over 2000 units.

   Even if the Model S is cheaper and more mature than it, it will take a lot of thought and time to sell 20,000 or 200,000 vehicles.

  If there are not enough orders for the factory to operate, Tesla's car manufacturing process will not mature quickly, and the production resources of the factory will also be idle, which is a great waste.

   The Fremont factory can produce 500,000 cars a year at its peak. How long will it take Tesla to reach this sales volume? "

   Seeing that Xia Jingxing didn't answer, Akio Toyoda stopped hiding and finally revealed his true purpose.

   "How about working with us to develop a pure electric version of the next-generation RAV4?"

  Xia Jingxing asked calmly, "How to cooperate in development?"

   "It's very simple, you provide new energy technologies, and we are responsible for providing a mature vehicle development platform."

  Xia Jingxing did not rush to answer, his face showed contemplation.

   This expression fell in the eyes of Akio Toyoda, and he continued to add a heavy weight.

   "If Tesla is willing to cooperate with Toyota to develop a pure electric version of the RAV4, we can make appropriate concessions on the price of your acquisition of the Fremont factory.

   At the same time, Toyota can also invest in Tesla to help you complete the mass production of Model S. "

   Akio Toyoda looked at Xia Jingxing with a smile. Originally, he came to the United States from Japan in a hurry, in order to turn the waste into treasure and kill the newly promoted Asia's richest man.

   But after getting in touch, he found that Xia Jingxing was not easy to fool, the other party could earn such a large family business at such a young age, how could he be mediocre.

   So he quickly changed his strategy and followed Xia Jingxing to visit Tesla.

   After some investigation, he made an assessment in his heart, and Tesla basically met his requirements for partners.

   First of all, the car brand is not big, the reputation is not obvious, and it will not threaten Toyota's dominance.

  Secondly, Tesla's new energy technology is indeed superior, which is what Toyota currently lacks or lacks.

  If they can entrust Tesla to upgrade the RAV4 at a very small price and take it to the market to test the water, it will undoubtedly save Toyota a lot of R&D expenditure.

  If the pure electric RAV4 is a great success after its launch, Toyota can do it by itself and make a big push into the pure electric field.

   If you fail, you will lose a little money.

   In short, in his eyes, Tesla is just a **** of Toyota, an object that can be driven and utilized.

   Finally, he plans to take a stake in Tesla to increase Toyota's influence over the budding automaker.

   He heard that Mercedes-Benz has also invested in Tesla, and that the U.S. Department of Energy has issued a loan to it.

  Xia Jingxing pretended to think for a while before handing it over with a smile, "I don't think we have a reason to refuse such a good proposal."

   Akio Toyoda's mouth twitched slightly, but he was still too young, and he was dismissed with a little profit.

   But then again, Toyota, the world's number one automaker, is willing to cooperate with the fledgling Tesla, not necessarily because Toyota took advantage of it, and the other party may also be secretly having fun.

   The two people, each with their own ingenuity, shook hands with a smile, and both felt that they had not suffered a loss in this transaction.

  …………

  …………

After    got Toyota, the Aoguanhai office did the ideological work on GM.

   GM was so eager to sell the Fremont plant that it was negotiated with little effort.

  In the end, Tesla won the closing car factory for $50 million.

   And, Tesla doesn’t have to pay for the money, because Toyota agreed to invest $50 million in Tesla at a pre-money valuation of $1.5 billion.

  Tesla is equivalent to taking over the Fremont factory at the cost of paying 3.23% of the shares, without using the funds on the account.

   Xia Jingxing also communicated with Zetsche about Toyota's investment in Tesla.

   Zetsche did not contradict this matter, but only emphasized that it should not affect the technical cooperation between Tesla and Daimler.

   At this point, all the obstacles in front of Tesla's mass production plan have been swept away.

   Immediately afterwards, Tesla convened a board of directors to solicit the opinions of various directors on the next big action.

   "After this period of unremitting efforts, Tesla has accumulated one debt financing and two equity financings, totaling $625 million.

   After deducting the $50 million spent on the acquisition of factories, there are still nearly $600 million in the account.

  The money will be mainly used for the mass production of Model S, including purchasing and installing car production lines, recruiting production workers, supply chain management, research and development software, etc. "

  As soon as Straubel finished speaking, Tim Draper, a partner of De Fengjie, frowned and asked, "I still need to buy production lines and recruit workers. Has the Fremont factory become an empty factory?"

   Looking at the suspicious eyes cast by the surrounding directors, Straubel nodded and said, "That's right, otherwise we wouldn't be able to buy this factory at such a cheap price.

   For example, what we bought now is just an empty house, and the furniture and decoration in it need to be done by ourselves. "

  Draper shook his head, "This news doesn't sound good, it won't affect Tesla's mass production and launch, right?"

   As soon as these words came out, all the other directors looked at Straubel worriedly.

   It's not that they don't trust Straubel, but that Tesla has created countless "surprises" for everyone over the years.

  Xia Jingxing asked tentatively: "How about we, the old shareholders, put together another sum of money to join the investment? Tesla has more funds and can do things more calmly."

   As soon as these words came out, the scene was a little embarrassing, because no one picked up on it at all.

   Even Draper, who has always been the most supportive and optimistic about Tesla, has remained silent.

   Seeing that Tesla is developing better and better, and the amount of financing is getting bigger and bigger, everyone is happy, but they also feel that they can’t play this money-burning game.

  Xia Jing acted to resolve the embarrassment and changed the subject: "I have contacted with the executives of Chinese Bank, and they are willing to provide Tesla with a loan of no more than 200 million US dollars."

  Draper's eyes suddenly lit up, "China Bank? Is it the East West Bank that was privatized by you, Darren?"

   "Yes, they are now adjusting their business strategy and are happy to establish a long-term partnership with Tesla.

  For future users to buy Tesla, Chinese Bank can also provide auto installment loans. "

   After hearing this, everyone still didn’t understand that this was because the Bank of China was looking at Xia Jingxing’s face and opened the door for Tesla.

  Chinese Bank was wholly-owned by Xia Jingxing, but Tesla is not wholly-owned by Xia Jingxing alone. They have no reason to object to this kind of contribution from major shareholders and benefits for minor shareholders.

   Of course, Xia Jingxing also pointed out one thing, the Chinese Bank's "human investment" in Tesla now, and Tesla will use the seat of the auto finance partner to pay it back in the future.

   In this regard, everyone has no opinion. It is a matter of mutual benefit, and Tesla will benefit first.

   Straubel added: "If you add the $200 million loan from the Chinese bank, Tesla has a total of nearly $800 million in funds.

  If the Model S will receive a deposit of $200 million through pre-sale within the next year.

  Then we have US$1 billion in hand, and there will be no problem with mass production. We are confident that we will deliver the first batch of cars in the first half of next year, and at the same time we will start the IPO listing plan. "

   The directors who attended the meeting were all happy. Is the dawn finally coming?

   Among them, those who have invested in Tesla for a long time have been investing for five or six years. The waiting period is quite difficult, for fear that Tesla will fail.

  Fortunately, it did not hang up, and it has become more and more successful, and the listing is just around the corner.

  Draper was calm when everyone around was in ecstasy.

   He noticed a problem and couldn't help asking: "How much is the deposit for a car? It's impossible to charge the full deposit like before, right?"

"of course not!"

  Xia Jingxing smiled and shook his head, "What do you think of twenty thousand dollars?"

  Draper frowned, "That means you have to pre-sell 10,000 cars? Is it possible to increase the sales by four times compared to the Roadster?"

   "If you don't force yourself, you will definitely not be able to do it, but now the listing of things has been put on the agenda, I believe everyone is looking forward to this day as soon as possible.

  I think everyone should set a small goal together and sell 10,000 of them first! "

  Draper nodded lightly, "I understand, you want to mobilize the power of the whole company, sprint together, and strive to create a higher IPO price and market value."

   "Yes, a good IPO result is a huge encouragement to shareholders, employees, partners, customers, and the market.

  We want to let the fire of the new energy vehicle track burn. Only when the fire is on can the industry truly bloom with its dazzling light. "

   (end of this chapter)