The legend of the automotive world - Porsche
Beetle-style models, rear-mounted engines and excellent performance, synonymous with lightweight sports cars, when you say this, you will surely think of the world's most famous car brand Porsche.
At the 1963 Frankfurt International Motor Show, the Porsche 911 debuted and gradually developed the Model 928 with rear gearbox chassis and V8 engine, the new technology Type 959, and the classic models such as the 911 Carrera 4 with electronically adjusted four-wheel drive synergy and liftless body, and to this day the 911 series is a must on the wish list of car enthusiasts all over the world.
Very few brands sell luxury goods like Porsche, just like necessities. The Porsche 911 advertisement has such an advertising slogan: "In an era full of superfluity and superficiality, in an era full of frivolity and roughness, only the Porsche 911 is a real necessity, irreplaceable."
The birth of a legend: Ferdinand Porsche
Ferdinand Porsche was born in 1875 to a family of blacksmiths in Maversdorf, north of Simia, Austria, but he showed a high interest in machinery from an early age, and was keen on the emerging electronics, very fond of hands-on experimentation.
In 1896, the 22-year-old founder of the Porsche company, Ferdinand, invented the wheel motor technology and obtained a patent granted by the United Kingdom, which also opened the glorious history of the Porsche brand.
Three years after obtaining the patent for the wheel motor, Ferdinand became acquainted with Ludwig Lonner, then the operator of the Lona body factory in Vienna
With Ferdinand obtaining in-wheel motor technology, at the end of 1899, the first car under the name Porsche and the world's first hybrid model, the Lorna Porsche prototype was finally born. The two-seater was designed by Ludwig Silona in collaboration with Ferdinand Porsche, and in an era when horse-drawn carriages were the main means of transportation, both Ferdinand and Lona were convinced that electric technology would help cars eliminate carriages. The car follows the shape of the horse-drawn carriage at that time, and the two front wheels use in-wheel motors of about 3 horsepower to drive the vehicle forward. The lead-acid battery for the motor power supply is installed under the carriage, the battery energy density at that time is low, and the battery is bulky, so the vehicle's mileage is shorter, fortunately, the power output of the wheel hub motor is direct enough, providing effective power for the vehicle to drive, the car's top speed is only 14 kilometers per hour, and sufficient electricity can only run 50 kilometers.
At the 1900 Paris World's Fair, Lona made its public appearance and caused a sensation, and Ferdinand, at the age of twenty-five, had already shown outstanding talent.
In 1906, Ferdinand entered the Austrian branch of the Daimler Depot as technical director. He became Managing Director at the age of 41 and was promoted to Chief Engineer at Daimler AG in 1923. During this time, he was obsessed with making racing cars, and eventually his design was applied to the Mercedes-Benz SSK, making it the best sports car of the 1920s, writing a brilliant chapter in the history of the German automotive industry.
In 1926, Daimler merged with the Mercedes-Benz Depot to form the current Mercedes-Benz Depot. During this period, Ferdinand proposed to Mercedes-Benz to produce a family car that the public could afford, but it was rejected by the board of directors at the time, and Ferdinand hung up the crown.
On March 6, 1931, Ferdinand, with the help of several investors, established a consulting firm in Stuttgart, specializing in vehicle design and consulting. His son Ferry, daughter Louise, and son-in-law Anton Piesch were all involved in the venture. After that, the father and son began to work on the development plan of the "Volkswagen", and it happened that the wishes of the Porsche father and son coincided with Hitler, and Ferdinand got a big contract, and the "Volkswagen" car was born.
Throughout World War II, with the financial support of Nazi Germany's state, Volkswagen plants grew rapidly, not only producing civilian cars, but also developing military projects for the Nazi government. Ferdinand was involved in the design of a large number of advanced tanks, including Tiger tanks and Elephant tank destroyers; He participated in the observation of the battlefield and provided the Nazi army with many complex war plans; He also designed anti-aircraft guns traditionally powered by hybrid systems as well as V-1 flying bombs, which were extremely lethal. For his contributions, the Nazi government awarded him the Cross of the Order of Merit in Battle.
After the defeat of Germany, he was arrested by the Americans and held for two years despite not being defined as a war criminal, until his family raised 1 million francs before being released in August 1947.
At this time, Volkswagen has been taken over by the British government, Ferdinand in a pair of sons and daughters, based on the "Beetle", jointly embarked on the research and development of Porsche cars, because the father and son have an indescribable enthusiasm for performance, so the first self-developed Porsche car is naturally a sports car known for its performance, which is the Porsche 356 launched in 1948. Flexible maneuverability and air-cooled engine. These characteristics set it apart and Porsche began its glory as a car brand.
In November 1950, Ferdinand returned to the Volkswagen factory for the first time after the war to witness the mass production of the Volkswagen Beetle designed by him, which had become an important symbol of the economic prosperity of West Germany. A few weeks later, Ferdinand suffered a stroke that did not heal and died on 30 January 1951 at the age of 75.
Continue to write brilliantly
In 1946, after the end of World War II, the design company of Porsche moved to Austria, and Ferry and his sister Louise Piëch officially joined the management lineup. Louise had become the daughter-in-law of the Piesch family, and the two families were closely bound ever since.
Before his death, Ferdinand divided the family estate into two parts, one of which was Porsche Automobile, inherited by his son Ferry Porsche, and this line naturally retained Porsche's surname. The second is the Volkswagen Group-related industries owned by his family, mainly Volkswagen's distribution rights in Austria and the franchise production rights for the Volkswagen Beetle, inherited by daughter Louise.
After his father's death, Ferry took on the responsibility of running Porsche.
In 1963, the most important model in the history of Porsche, the 911, was unveiled at the Frankfurt Motor Show.
In 1971, in order to maintain and improve the quality of Porsche, Porsche built a modern research and development center and a large test site in Weissach, near the main plant.
Although the quality of Porsche is obvious to all, in the mid-1980s it suffered the worst operational crisis in the history of the plant, with car production plummeting by half, and it was not until the release of the Boxster concept car in 1993 that Porsche saw the dawn of a renaissance again.
In 1996, when the roadster was launched, it ushered in a global rush to buy it. The legacy of "launching a high-quality, low-priced popular sports car" was finally realized more than forty years after Ferdinand's death. In 1998, Porsche took advantage of the victory and unveiled the all-new 911 Convertible at the Geneva Motor Show.
With its unique technology and design, the Porsche brand has countless fans around the world, and the Porsche family still owns most of the shares in the manufacturing plant, operated by a team of professional managers, and the brand has been valued at 60 billion to 85 billion euros.
However, where there is sunshine, there will be shadows, and while this great brand named after the family name has created brilliance time and again, Louise and Ferry after the separation of the family are sisters and brothers due to the different ways of obtaining family resources and their own education for their children, and the contradictions between the third generation of family members are gradually brewing until they break out.
Family strife
The intolerable dispute between the Porsche and the Piesch family stems from two ambitious "rich three generations"
Sister Louise's son Ferdinand Piech Jr., cousin of Wolfgang and grandson of Ferdinand the Elder. From an early age, he was sent to boarding school, subjected to strict management and fierce competition. When he recalled his youthful experience, "elite, Spartan, rigorous" became his deepest memory of boarding school, and it was precisely because of this experience that it was difficult for him to develop trust in others and preferred to solve problems on his own.
As an adult, Ferdinand Jr. was admitted to the University of Zurich and received a master's degree in mechanical engineering in 1962. After graduating, he joined his uncle Ferry Porsche and started his automotive career. During his time at Porsche, Ferdinand Jr. gradually revealed his talents and abilities in the automotive industry. After just one year of work, he successfully solved the difficulties encountered in the development of the 904 racing engine and was promoted to director of the technical department two years later. In the following years, Ferdinand Jr. led the team to develop the Porsche 906, 910, 907 and 908 cars. Among them, in 1968, the Porsche 917 project he led helped Porsche win the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the first time, and Ferdinand Jr. became famous.
Feri's son Wolfgang Porsche, grandson of Ferdinand Porsche, founder of the Porsche car brand, heir to the Porsche family. From an early age, he received an "education of love", which was based on the principle of the ethnographic spirit of the Austrian thinker Rudolf Steiner, "to accept the child with reverence, to educate the child with love, and to let the child move forward in freedom." But this kind of education seemed useless to the children of the Piesch family, and it was nothing more than a learning of "craftsmanship, crochet, and choral chants." Two very different educations put the third generation of the Porsche Pişi family in a-for-tat match.
Ferdinand Jr. even insulted them in front of his cousins of the same age, saying, "I am a wild boar, and you are all domestic pigs." Wolfgang also repeatedly expressed his dislike for Ferdinand Jr., whose surname was Pierch, and who often humiliated Ferdinand Jr. with the term "nameless." This disgust stemmed from Ferdinand Jr.'s blatant departure from the family business and from his bad influence on family relations.
By the 1970s, several third generations of Porsche had kept the company tightly under control, and Piesch had little say. Ferdinand Jr. chose to leave the family business and briefly employed Mercedes-Benz, and in 1972 Ferdinand Jr. joined Audi Automotive, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group, and three years later, was promoted to head of the Audi technical department, responsible for developing the Audi 80 and Audi 100 models. In 1977, he presided over the development of Audi's four-wheel drive technology Quattro for the World Rally Championship, which elevated the Audi brand image to a position on a par with Mercedes-Benz BMW.
In 1993, Ferdinand joined Volkswagen and became CEO and chairman. Under his leadership, Volkswagen began to adopt Toyota's lean production management model, which solved the problem of automobile quality and cost, and gradually turned losses into profits. Since then, he has led the Volkswagen Group to acquire Bugatti, Lamborghini and Bentley, increasing the number of brands under the Volkswagen Group from 4 to 12, becoming the "godfather of the public".
While Ferdinand Jr. showed his talents to the world, he was accompanied by a chaotic private life.
During college, he got married once and had 5 children. At the age of 35, he had an affair with his cousin Gold's Porsche's wife, Marlene, and they lived together openly for 12 years and had two children. But that wasn't the end of it, and he had two more marriages and had 5 children. Because of his unrequited love affair with his cousin, the balance within the Porsche Piesi family was broken, and the members of the Piesi line tried to sell the shares to outsiders, and the Porsche line could only continue to spend money to buy back. The relationship between the two sides is getting worse and worse.
The rivalry between the families culminated in Wolfgang's attempt to get Porsche to acquire the Volkswagen Group.
In 2005, Wolfgang officially took charge of Porsche, where he founded Porsche Holding and hired professional manager Wei Dejin as CEO. Wei Dejin pays attention to efficiency in everything, and once he takes office, he draws on Toyota's experience and "reduces costs and increases efficiency", and after some operations, Porsche's sales have increased greatly and cash is abundant.
So Wei Dejin put the crazy plan of "acquiring the Volkswagen Group" in front of Wolfgang. Even though the Volkswagen Group was 14 times the size of Porsche at the time, Wolfgang still pressed the start button.
Wei Dejin plans to use the borrowed funds to buy enough shares to hold the Volkswagen Group, and then use the cash flow of more than 10 billion euros on the latter's accounts to repay the loan, and even sell Skoda, Bentley, Lamborghini and other brands, and finally achieve "snake swallowing elephant". The seemingly crazy and simple plan to borrow money and suck shares was quickly implemented, but in the event of the 2008 financial crisis, the debt-ridden Porsche desperately needed cash flow to get the company out of the quagmire, when the media exposed the loan agreement between Porsche Auto and the bank: "Porsche must return its 3.3 billion euros of debt by the end of May 2009 and repay another 6.7 billion euros by the end of May 2010." But Porsche is already insolvent and bankruptcy is imminent. But the acquisition plan was stuck at the last step – the negotiations with Volkswagen Group.
At that time, the chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Volkswagen Group was Wolfgang's cousin and nemesis Ferdinand Jr. He was keenly aware of the "external strength" of the Porsche car.
Ferdinand Jr. slowed down the acquisition process by coaxing the Volkswagen Group union to boycott the acquisition at the Supervisory Board and deliberately absentee at important negotiation meetings. As the repayment cycle approached, he proposed an anti-takeover proposal on behalf of the Volkswagen Group. In the end, the board of directors of the Volkswagen Group was persuaded to use sufficient cash flow to propose an acquisition to Porsche. In December 2009, the Volkswagen Group acquired a 49.9% stake in Porsche Automotive for 3.9 billion euros, and in 2012, the Volkswagen Group acquired the remaining 50.1% stake in Porsche Motors for 4.46 billion euros in cash plus common stock.
Ferdinand, Jr., who took the Porsche brand from the Porsche family, did not laugh to the end. Losing to another executive in an intra-VW group battle that soon followed, he eventually stepped down and transferred all of his shares in Porsche to his brother, no longer willing to have anything to do with Porsche.
The struggle between one family and two "rich three generations" ended with the indirect "loss" of the family heirloom Porsche brand.
The legend continues
At the beginning of 2022, the finance officer of the Volkswagen Group publicly stated that Porsche may complete the IPO as soon as the fourth quarter of this year. If Porsche is successful, it will be one of the largest IPOs ever made in the world and the largest ever IPO ever made in Europe. September is only the first month of the fourth quarter, so Porsche is flying to market with the speed of its iconic sports car.
Oliver Blume, CEO of Porsche and CEO of the Volkswagen Group, said: "This is a historic moment for Porsche. The IPO will open a new chapter for us and allow us to have greater independence. We will have the opportunity to continue to implement our strategy. ”
According to Reuters, the valuation of the Porsche brand is between 60 billion and 85 billion euros, or about 419.7 billion yuan to 584.6 billion yuan. Volkswagen hopes to secure between 15 billion and 20 billion euros of fresh funding through the IPO, half of which will be used for special dividends to return to shareholders – especially the Porsche Piesch family, the group's largest shareholder.
Porsche's market acceptance is unquestionable. Among many traditional car manufacturers, there are not no sports car brands with the same price or even higher prices as Porsche, but the sales, quality and profit margin can be top-notch, and there are only a few. Because of this, Porsche has always been regarded as the trump card in the hands of the Volkswagen Group.
At present, the global capital market is cold, and many people do not understand why the Volkswagen Group is so anxious to let Porsche go public.
Simply put, there are two reasons: money and power.
The global auto market is surging, the new energy vehicle forces represented by Tesla are pressing step by step, the Volkswagen Group is in a hurry to transform, it needs a lot of cash, and the Porsche listing can not only grow the momentum, but also suck gold and feed back, killing two birds with one stone.
At the same time, Volkswagen Group is also betting on the Matthew effect of the capital market. In the first half of this year, only 57 companies in Europe IPOed, down 75% from the same period last year, and the capital market was deserted, and a lot of hot money had nowhere to go. At this point, Porsche is likely to absorb more money than ever before.
More crucially, Volkswagen Group can take this opportunity to clarify internal equity entanglements.
Since 2012, the Porsche Piesch family has held 31.4% of the shares and 53.3% of the voting rights of the Volkswagen Group, and the Volkswagen Group directly controls Porsche Cars 100%, but even so, the Porsche Piesch family cannot directly control Porsche.
Porsche is a "cash cow" that performs well, with the Volkswagen Group selling about 9 million cars a year, Porsche delivering one-thirtieth of the former (about 300,000 units), but accounting for a quarter of the group's overall profits.
Because of a mistaken acquisition war, the Porsche Piesch family has "lost" the Porsche car brand that has been passed down from generation to generation and cannot really control the Volkswagen Group, resulting in a lot of mountains within the group and serious internal attrition. For many years, the Volkswagen Group has been seeking to solve this dilemma, Porsche spun off from the Volkswagen Group for an independent IPO, the Porsche Pişi family will sell part of the Volkswagen Group in order to regain control of Porsche, if it goes well, the group infighting will be alleviated.
Therefore, even if the world is experiencing a cold winter in the capital market, the Volkswagen Group can't wait to get Porsche listed quickly.
No matter how bloody this fight between the cousins is, it cannot hide the fact that the Porsche Piesch family has left a deep mark on the modern automobile industry.
epilogue
Now that this hundreds of billions of dollars worth of capital is about to be presented to this legendary family, is it the end of the two families 'this end', or the clarion call to regain the Porsche car step by step?
The story of this family begins with a genius, a new chapter is about to begin, and at this moment, the entanglements of power games, brotherly walls and even unrequited love are just tidbits of music. The essence of the story is nothing more than another closed-loop transmission of wealth among these family members.