KUALA LUMPUR: All eyes are now on Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co., Ltd, better known as Geely, following the Chinese company’s 49.9 per cent stake acquisition of Malaysian carmaker Proton Holdings Bhd.
To those unfamiliar with the inner workings of the automotive industry and its players, the Chinese carmaker remains an enigma and an unknown commodity to some.
NST Online attempts to shed some light on the company, its history and its future direction.
WHO ARE THEY?
Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Ltd is a global automotive player, a Fortune 500 company which aims to turn its subsidiary, Geely Auto Group into one of the world’s top 10 automotive groups by 2020, with sales of two million cars per year.
The global automotive group - founded in 1986 and headquartered in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, began life as a refrigerator parts manufacturer. Following its evolution, it now produces automobiles, taxis, motorcycles, delivery vans, engines, and transmissions.
Its operations span the automotive value chain from research, development and design to production, sales and servicing.
WHO IS LI SHUFU?
Li Shufu, 54, is the chairman of both Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co. Ltd. and Volvo Cars. Born in 1963, in Taizhou, Zhejiang, he currently resides in Hangzhou, the capital city of the Zhejiang province.
He is credited with transforming Geely into the automotive entity it is today.
As of 2013, Li was ranked as the 63rd richest person in mainland China, with a net worth of US$2.6 billion.
WHAT BRANDS DO GEELY OWN?
Geely Holding produces automobiles under five key brands via three subsidiary companies including Geely Auto Group (Geely Auto and LYNK & CO), Volvo Cars Group (Volvo Car and Polestar) as well as Geely Commercial Vehicles Company. The latter also produces vehicles under the famed British taxi-maker London Taxi.
It acquired Sweden-based Volvo Cars from the Ford Motor Company in August 2010. The deal, worth US$ 1.8 billion, marked the largest foreign purchase by a Chinese car manufacturer.
Volvo Cars has since made it its mission that by 2020, no one will be killed or seriously injured by any of its new vehicles.
FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE
The company registered a revenue of over 2.63 billion USD with assets of 2.48 billion USD in 2016. In the first four months of this year, the Geely Auto Group alone sold over 365,000 vehicles, an increase of more than 94 per cent over the same period in 2016. This represented 37 per cent of Geely Auto Group’s annual sales goal of one million units in 2017.
Geely Auto’s listed company has a market cap of 98.974 billion Hong Kong Dollars.
Geely Auto currently has four research and development (R&D) centres in China, Sweden and the UK. The R&D center in Sweden is a joint R&D center for Geely Auto Group and Volvo Cars Company established by Geely Holding.