On the morning of February 11, 2014, Musk’s Dassault-900 private plane landed in Shanghai.
After taking a shower at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Hudong New District, he immediately got ready and ran to meet his old friend Gu Yun.
Musk has the typical advantages of a white CEO: self-discipline and confidence, full of energy, and a strong desire for control and ambition.
He was born in a middle-class family in South Africa. After graduating from high school, he traveled to North America with $2,000 in his pocket.
The experiences of Gu Yun and Musk are actually very similar.
Musk started from nothing and became a billionaire at the age of 31. With his name hidden, just looking at the development process, he even looks like a reborn person.
But he was still not satisfied, and his control over his two wives was so strict that his hair had to be dyed blonde all year round.
His tyrant character is deeply rooted in Tesla: Once a new car arrived at the Belgian port, he immediately sent a text message requesting the delivery of 300 units that day.
As a result, the team worked hard and only delivered 3 vehicles that day. Musk immediately scolded and questioned him - in his eyes, customs and laws are all trash.
He even urinates at combat speed, finishing the job in three seconds.
"Nonono, I think this condition is too harsh."
Musk's trip is his first trip to China in his life.
This time he not only has to personally host the delivery ceremony of the Model S, but he also has a more important thing on his mind - building a factory in China.
Although he had communicated with Gu Yun immediately about the domestic official attitude and conditions when he was in the United States, he still felt that it was not acceptable after the meeting.
In order to protect local enterprises, foreign automobile manufacturers are not allowed to build wholly-owned factories in China.
Before the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology released the "Medium and Long-term Development Plan for the Automobile Industry", 50% had always been an insurmountable bottom line.
Gu Yun smiled and didn't explain much.
Even in the face of huge mass production pressure, Musk has turned his attention to China more than once.
It has a complete supporting infrastructure, abundant labor dividends, and an efficient government order system.
But, rules are rules.
When you come here, you must abide by the rules here.
...
As the founder of Tesla, Musk has a full schedule.
Although the cost of personally visiting the country is high, the profit prospects are sufficient to match the strategic cooperative relationship established between the policy level and the supply chain.
These are all suggestions from Gu Yun.
On the morning of the 13th, Tesla officially released the product at Investor Day in Shanghai.
The delivery ceremony and press conference were packed with people, including big names.
In order to ensure the effect, we even coordinated with the TV station and arranged for the "Dialogue" column team to arrive at the scene.
Musk will hold discussions with Yang Yuanqing, Zhou Hongyi, Gu Yun and other domestic technology entrepreneurs, and then intensively arrange exclusive interviews, which will be recorded simultaneously in a small area.
Reporter Lu Haizhou: "The upcoming "Dialogue" program has a history of 13 years in China. Today, we have invited the most famous business elites in the country to the show.
Today is the first public event of Mr. Musk’s first visit to China, and we are particularly grateful to him for putting his first show on the platform of "Dialogue"."
Musk: "Thank you for your support. What we hope to do is to change the world and launch a brand new electric vehicle that is not only a means of transportation."
Reporter Lu Haizhou: “When I walked to today’s scene, many friends asked me, do you know what kind of car Mr. Musk came in today?
Another question to ask is that he must have come here in a Tesla, which is the most popular car in the world.
How special is this car? Many friends online have also summarized what they think is the most special thing about it.
They say the special features of this car include that it automatically pops up whenever the owner approaches the door handle, that it has no engine or gearbox, and that it can be fully charged as quickly as a mobile phone, and for free.
There are too many, I want to ask Musk, which feature are you most satisfied with just now?"
Musk: "There is no unique one. Many of its functions are highly recommended."
Reporter Lu Haizhou: “Many people think you have redefined cars.
Because before you, almost no one could imagine that cars could join our lives in this way."
Musk: "We created Tesla because of this fact.
We hope to break the rules and change people's existing understanding of electric vehicles, and we prove to them that our electric vehicles can be much better than gasoline vehicles."
Reporter Lu Haizhou: "Do you like this car yourself? If the full score is 100 points, how many points would you give this car?"
Musk: “I’m very strict in my grading, very harsh, and I don’t know.
Let’s give it 80 points.”
Reporter Lu Haizhou: “Actually, I think such an 80-point score is hard-earned.
When the first Tesla was launched in 2008, it encountered great difficulties, including relatively high costs, broken capital chains, etc.
At that time, you thought that if you failed, all the money would be wasted. Have you ever thought about problems like this?"
Musk: "I thought that all the money would be lost. I thought that was the case, but I was actually prepared at the time."
Reporter Lu Haizhou: "But these days passed quickly. We saw that in 2012, your career development ushered in spring.
Do you still remember what was the thing that made you most proud of that year?"
Musk: "Of course, this is very important. The IPO went very smoothly and we received financing from the park investment."
Reporter Lu Haizhou: "Now we leave the question to Mr. Gu of Paradise Group. There was nothing special about Tesla in 2012. What factors made you decide to invest in this company?"
Gu Yun picked up the phone: I don't mind taking risks.
For me, what I want to do is do more meaningful things and do my best to make the world a better place.
Elon and I can easily reach a consensus on this point. We want to change the world and make it easier for people to enjoy life. This is my original intention of investing.
Reporter Lu Haizhou: "Mr. Gu said it very well. In fact, many people are paying attention to Tesla today.
So, give the scene some time, see if there are any curious friends there, and let’s talk together.”
At this time, a middle-aged man in the audience asked a question.
"Hello Musk, I brought you a gift. It is a very simple gift. It looks very simple, but it is a calligraphy work written by a master, given to you.
I am very excited to have close contact with you, but maybe you may not know how to read it."
Gu Yun raised his head, hey, this guy is also a celebrity.
Among the new domestic car-making forces, in addition to BYD, there is also a wave of Internet car-making factions that cannot be underestimated.
This group of people, represented by Weilai, Xiaopeng, Ideal, etc., concentrated in 2014-2015 and began to gradually try to deliver within a few years.
Many people here are "Tesla fans" and want to ambitiously build another Tesla.
Li Xiang, the ideal founder of "Chehejia" in the future, is one of the first Chinese users delivered by Tesla.
The middle-aged man who asked the question at this moment was the first car owner to take the key from Musk.
Li Xiang cleared his throat: ""The Normal Heart".
I am from Shanghai, and I asked a calligraphy master to write this calligraphy. No matter you are a billionaire, an idol admired by the world, or a beggar, you are still you. Keep a normal heart.
Give this to you.
The question I want to ask is, as an innovator, the environment for innovation may be better in the United States, but what should I do in China?
For example, we also know that Tesla is not as powerful as the world's giants, but you can do your own thing.
Big companies may look down on small companies, but at the same time, big companies are also worried that you will steal their limelight and earn the money they could have earned, which is equivalent to you robbing money from their big companies.
Maybe they will do something to hurt you, how will you deal with it?"
Musk: "Thank you so much for the gift, cool gift. Thank you.
In the automobile industry, I think one thing is good. The big automobile companies are a little worried about us. They are worried that they may be more willing to make electric vehicles themselves in the future. I think this is a good thing.
Why do I think big companies are like this?
It's because, if we can make great electric cars, why can't they?
Those traditional car manufacturing companies are very powerful. They can influence the government's rules and make the rules and regulations very loose and easy to achieve.
So for these companies to start taking electric cars seriously, they have to come to the conclusion that if they don't, all the electric car customers are going to be owned by one of us.
This can force them, or in other words, force them to pay attention to the electric vehicle market.
If they don't want to compete with me, and they think that if they don't compete with Tesla, the future market situation will not be good, then our goal has been achieved.
In fact, Tesla's influence is to attract other companies to produce electric vehicles with us.
In the end, we may only account for a small part of the market share, but we lead the entire industry, and I think this is a good thing for the entire industry."
The middle-aged man Li Xiang showed an expression of enlightenment and kept nodding in the corner.
In the following time, the middle-aged people led a wave of questions. Everyone kept asking questions, and the technology giants present patiently answered them one by one.
Finally, it was reporter Lu Haizhou who spoke and concluded.
"Thank you, Mr. Musk, for coming to our "Conversation" program today.
Everyone may remember some of these time points.
In 1879, Edison created the world's first light bulb after more than 1,600 experiments.
In 2007, after two years of continuous failures, Jobs released the first iPhone to the world.
In 2010, Mr. Musk spent all his money and finally succeeded in sending a manned spacecraft into space through a private company.
It can be seen that from ancient times to the present, there has never been a shortage of fanatics in our world, but those who can truly promote the progress of mankind should be those who dare to dream and practice regardless of all costs. We hope that such people will become more and more successful.
Come more and more.
Thank you all for paying attention to this issue of "Dialogue", and thank you Musk for coming to our site.
See you next time.”
Amid a tsunami of admiration from the audience, Musk left the scene in a car, and he would then undergo intensive interviews.
"Have you made an appointment with those people I mentioned before?"
After the press conference, Gu Yun arranged for his secretary to organize a dinner early.
"We've got an appointment, Minister Gu. If you hadn't appeared on this interview show in person, these people wouldn't have been so easy to make appointments with."
He Xuan nodded and answered with a smile.
...
Shanghai City, Jade 36 Restaurant.
"You are all well-known entrepreneurs and the first users of Tesla. I am honored to have the opportunity to bring you all together."
In the box, Gu Yun raised his wine glass with a smile.
Several bosses from the new car-making force in the future were all invited to this French restaurant by Gu Yun.
"I just drove the whole trip here in my new car, and I have to say, it was really fun!"
Being able to single-handedly pull together a team to develop new energy vehicles is absolutely impossible without faith.
Several of the people present happened to be loyal believers in new energy vehicles, and the guests and hosts enjoyed themselves and chatted happily.
“I predict that the domestic policy direction on new energy vehicles can be divided into two major stages.
The first stage: top-level design of the industry, strong subsidies, set direction, real money to create a new track.
The second stage: eliminate backward production capacity and focus on supporting core technologies."
In the middle of the banquet, the praise of electric cars came to an end, and Gu Yun finally began to express his intentions.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! "Mr. Gu, you mean that new energy has great potential?"
He Xiaopeng took over Gu Yun's words and asked.
At this time, he was not the leader of the new car-making forces, but was still struggling in the Internet industry. The words of a big shot in the industry like Gu Yun held great weight in his eyes.
"I won't hide it from you. Next, I plan to start my own business and produce our country's own new energy vehicles."
Gu Yun raised his wine glass again.
"Mr. Gu, let me tell the truth."
Among the guests, there are many who are experts in the automobile industry.
Li Dabin is this kind of person.
His subsidiary Bitauto is the first automotive Internet company to be listed overseas. After more than ten years of development, Bitauto has nearly 3,000 employees and its business covers 341 cities across the country. It is the largest automotive Internet company in China.
As the founder, chairman and CEO of Bitauto, Li Dabin has carried out many forward-looking practices in the fields of user demand insight, Internet marketing, and automotive e-commerce.
“In the automotive industry, whether we master the core technology, whether we have an excellent production and management model, whether we have the right to speak in the market, and whether we can win the trust of users.
These indicators were obtained bit by bit by century-old giants such as Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Toyota, and General Motors after they have stepped on countless pitfalls, paid countless tuition fees, and worked hard for generations."
Li Dabin's eyes flickered and he toasted Gu Yun with a glass of wine from afar, all his words turning into one sentence.
"The same logic applies to new energy. If you want to overtake in a corner and become a world-class car company from scratch, it is destined to be a difficult road."
Gu Yun smiled and replied.
"What if I say that I can push Tesla to publish all its technology patents?"
