On May 10, Eastern time, Zeekr Automobile in Ningbo, Zhejiang Province was officially listed on the New York Stock Exchange, raising a total of about $507 million. At the issue price, the market value of ZEEKR reached $5.2 billion, making it the largest IPO project by a Chinese company in the U.S. market since 2021.
Founded in April 2021, ZEEKR is a pure electric vehicle brand under Geely Group. Since its establishment three years ago, the cumulative delivery volume of ZEEKR has exceeded 240,000 units, ranking first among more than 200,000 domestic pure electric brands. The safety performance of ZEEKR cars has a good reputation, and in real accident cases, the life safety of ZEEKR drivers and passengers has been well protected, and the battery has also achieved "zero spontaneous combustion".
According to 2023 data, Zeekr's gross profit margin is 15%, second only to Ideal (21%) and Tesla (19%) in the domestic new energy vehicle field. The significance of gross profit margin to consumers and car companies is very different, and I will not explain it here, but there is never a win-win situation in this world, and readers can think about it for themselves.
At present, Li Shufu has 9 listed companies, which can be roughly divided into three types: entrepreneurship from scratch, post-acquisition packaging development and direct acquisition of listed companies.
Geely has the largest number of entrepreneurial listed companies from scratch, with a total of four, namely Geely Automobile, ECARX, Polestar Auto and the newly listed Zeekr.
Geely Automobile is Li Shufu's first listed company, listed on the Hong Kong stock market in 2005, and its current market capitalization is about HK$100 billion. Polestar is a joint venture electric vehicle brand between Geely and Volvo that went public on the NASDAQ in June 2022 and has a market capitalization of about $2.9 billion. ECARX is a supplier of intelligent automotive systems, listed on the NASDAQ in December 2022 with a market capitalization of approximately US$550 million. Finally, ZEEKR, which was listed on the 10th of this month, has a market capitalization of $5.2 billion.
There are two companies that have been relisted after Geely's acquisition, namely Volvo and Lotus. Among such companies, Geely has made huge profits, earning at least ten times more.
In 2010, Geely acquired Volvo for $1.8 billion, and in 2021, Volvo went public in Stockholm, Sweden, with a market capitalization of about $22 billion. In ten years, Geely's investment in Volvo has appreciated by more than 12 times.
In 2017, Geely acquired a 51% stake in Lotus for £51 million. In February 2024, Lotus will land on the NASDAQ with a market capitalization of about $4.8 billion. In 7 years, Geely's income has exceeded 38 times.
The listed companies directly purchased by Geely are Qianjiang Motorcycle, Hanma Technology and Lifan Technology, and on the whole, the income of such companies is average, far less than the above two types.
In 2016, Geely acquired a 30% stake in Qianjiang Motorcycle for 1 billion yuan (becoming the controlling shareholder), and the company's market value is about 9 billion yuan. In 2020, Geely acquired a 28% stake in Valin Xingma (the controlling shareholder) for 1 billion yuan, and later changed its name to Hanma Technology, with a current market value of about 3 billion yuan. In 2020, Geely acquired Lifan Automobile (Lifan Technology), and the purchase price is different in the market, and the company's market value is about 14 billion yuan.
At the same time, Geely's Cao Cao Travel has submitted an application for listing on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, which will be Li Shufu's 10th listed company this year, and if everything goes well, Cao Cao Travel will be listed on the Hong Kong stock market within this year.
In addition, Geely has a 49.9% stake in Malaysia's Proton Motors, which is expanding into the Southeast Asian market. If Proton cars develop as rapidly as Volvo and Lotus, it is likely that they will also land in the capital market in the next few years and become Geely's eleventh listed company.