Renault SA (RENA.PA) clinched full access to China’s auto market on Monday by sealing a joint venture agreement with state-owned Dongfeng Motor Group (0489.HK) in Wuhan, a city fast shaping up as China’s own Detroit.
But after the initial haul, Apple will find itself in a familiar, expensive battle with its main smartphone rival, South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, to win over customers, one wallet at a time.
China Mobile, which says it already has 45 million iPhone users, could gain 17 million new activations and the deal should generate at least $3 billion in revenue for Apple in 2014, according to Forrester Research.
Thanks to its central position and its rail, road and waterway networks it is better-positioned than other cities to become China’s Detroit – minus the bankruptcy, shop nike said Peng Zhimin, a regional economics researcher at the Hubei office of ChineseAcademy of Social Sciences who advises the provincial government.
Peng sees Wuhan as a combination of Detroit, home of the U.S. auto industry, and Chicago, North America’s transportation hub.
While analysts and commentators sharpened their knives, Boucher – the bank’s burly chief executive, described by one MP as “a hard bastard with a hide like a rhino” – started setting up meetings.
China is Apple’s second-largest market after the United States. Net sales in China for the fiscal year ended September 2013 rose 13 percent to $25.4 billion, free run on clearance accounting for about 15 percent of Apple’s $170.9 billion in total net sales.
RIVAL AUTO CITIES
Wuhan has already successfully attracted General Motors Co (GM.N) and its Chinese partner SAIC Motor Group (600104.SS). Earlier this year, the companies started building an assembly plant in the city capable of producing 300,000 cars a year when production starts in 2015. They are also building an engine plant.
“He’s one of those really great leaders,” McMorrow told Reuters. “There are only a handful of bank CEOs in the world that could have pulled off what he did… I don’t think the longevity of his employment ever crossed his mind.”
Despite his feat, 55 year-old Boucher still attracts more brickbats than bouquets. Along the road to making Bank of Ireland the country’s “least-worst bank” – as he puts it – its CEO has been mauled in parliament, nike shoes pilloried by a TV sketch show and had an egg flung at him by an irate shareholder.
BIG PLANS FOR WUHAN
In addition to Renault, Wuhan is also home to the headquarters of Dongfeng’s joint ventures with Nissan, Honda Motor Co.(7267.T) and PSA Peugeot Citroen. Honda, Dongfeng and Peugeot also assemble cars in or around Wuhan.
The city, which currently has the capacity to produce roughly 1 million vehicles a year, is aiming to boost that to 3 million by 2016. Much of that planned capacity boost will come from Renault’s joint venture with Dongfeng and other global automakers such as Peugeot, which is close to getting a sizeable capital injection from Dongfeng.
Bank of Ireland had its investment thanks to the billionaire investors’ input and their participation in a rights issue, that ran alongside a debt-for-equity swap. shop nike free The state’s stake fell to 15 percent from 36 percent and Boucher’s bank gained the status of being the only Irish lender to stay out of state control.
Now, thanks to Zambian-born Boucher, Bank of Ireland is on the verge of becoming the first in the country to return fully to private hands after repaying 1.9 billion euros to the state earlier this month ahead of the government’s exit from the EU/IMF bailout program on Sunday.
Wuhan government officials say GM’s long-term blueprint for its Wuhan assembly plant includes an option of adding another assembly line to double its overall annual capacity to 600,000 cars.
“I am a pretty seasoned manufacturing guy, right? free run I’ve never seen anything like this before,” GM China Chairman Tim Lee, who has overseen GM’s manufacturing operations around the world throughout his career, said earlier this year in an interview, referring to the booming auto towns in China including Wuhan.
Other cities, such as Chengdu and Shenyang, are also competing to become auto hubs. That worries China’s industrial policymakers, as well as industry insiders and experts, over the possibility of a glut in auto manufacturing capacity.
“It’s a big cause for concern,” said Peng, of the ChineseAcademy of Social Sciences. “Too many cities are competing to become auto capitals.”
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