Chapter 1328: The Achievements and Difficulties of the Hong Kong Economy
After Xia Yu returned to Hong Kong, Fok Kin-ning handed Xia Yu the organisational structure and other plans for the family office he had made for review, and Xia Yu began to implement them according to the plan after making some changes.
As for the candidates for the family office, Xia Yu had long since come up with preliminary candidates, and with an internal intelligence system, he was able to know detailed information about anyone, including family members, interests, personality traits, loyalty levels, and so on.
So after returning to Hong Kong, it only took Xia Yu a dozen days to interview a large number of people and finally set up the skeleton of the family office.
After the family office was up and running, Xia Yu's first small task for Fok Kin-ning was to collect information on luxury yacht manufacturers around the world and analyse each company.
Just the initial call on the resources of the consortium demonstrated its effectiveness.
The task was completed in less than two days.
That day, Xia Yu was having afternoon tea at home when Fok Kin-ning arrived with the results.
'Good afternoon, Chairman, here is the information you asked me to collect, please take a look!'
Before he could even sit down on the sofa, Fok Kin-ning took a document out of his bag and handed it to Xia Yu with both hands.
Xia Yu took it and said with a smile, 'Well, Kin-ning, sit down.'
'Okay,'
said Fok Kin-ning, and after he had been told to sit down, the maid immediately poured him a cup of tea.
Xia Yu then looked at the documents Fok Kin-ning had brought.
RIVA Yachts, Italy; Volanti Yachts, Italy; Beneteau Group, France; Bayliner, USA; Princess Yachts, UK; Pedersen Yachts, Netherlands; Azimut Yachts, Italy; Ferretti Group, Italy; Pershing Yachts, Italy; Sunseeker, UK...
At first glance, Xia Yu was a little surprised. He didn't expect that half of the top ten companies in the luxury yacht industry were Italian.
Then there was a certain degree of influence from the UK, France, the US and the Netherlands.
In the past, the more well-known Chinese company was the British Sunseeker Yacht Company, which was taken over by Wanda for 300 million pounds
but Xia Yu passed on it after looking at the information.
Sunseeker Yacht Company was founded in 1968 and has only developed for more than ten years. Although it has entered the top ten in the world, its yacht-building technology still lags behind century-old companies.
Most importantly, there is definitely a wider gap in building super luxury yachts.
After some final browsing, Xia Yu set his sights on the Italian RIVA yacht company.
This yacht-building company, which originated on the beautiful shores of Lake Como in Italy, was founded in 1842 and has a glorious history of 142 years.
Riva is also one of the oldest, most legendary and most expensive brands in the world yachting industry, and it is recognised worldwide as the 'Rolls-Royce' of yachts.
Coincidentally, more than twenty years ago, Carlo Riva, the third generation of the RIVA yacht company, sold the company to the American Whittaker Company, so the most uncertain emotional barrier no longer exists and it is very suitable for harvesting.
In recent years, due to external factors, not only have large ships been difficult to sell, leading to large shipbuilding companies on the verge of bankruptcy, even yacht-building companies have had a hard time, and the RIVA yacht company's operations have not been doing well.
The analysis team concluded that the difficulty and cost of acquiring RIVA Yachts would not be too high.
Xia Yu immediately instructed Guangming Fund to have Rolls-Royce Motor Cars acquire RIVA Yachts.
He remembered that in 1990, Rolls-Royce Group had also acquired RIVA Yachts in its entirety...
Under the onslaught of a financial attack, the acquisition was completed in just 13 days.
Rolls-Royce Motor Cars invested 42 million US dollars to acquire 100% of the equity of RIVA Yachts.
The first thing to do after the acquisition was to carry out Xia Yu's order and immediately start designing and building a super luxury yacht, as well as a batch of small and medium-sized yachts.
He will need it next year, which is a bit of a rush, but with RIVA's shipbuilding capabilities, it can still be completed.
...
That day, Cindy took the initiative to ask Xia Yu to go to the film studio of Galaxy Studios, and Xia Yu of course wouldn't say no.
However, when Xia Yu met up with Cindy and the others, he noticed that there was an extra person.
The tall and graceful girl standing next to Cindy was none other than Sumitomo Kumiko, whom he had not seen for a long time.
What was interesting was that Sumitomo Kumiko was not wearing a kimono either, but a pale green cheongsam like Cindy.
Cindy was wearing a pale orange cheongsam.
The two girls stood there, attracting a lot of attention and causing many people to stop and stare.
'Xia Yu, long time no see!'
'Li Qian, Zhaoying, long time no see!'
'Kumiko, when did you come to Hong Kong, and why didn't you tell me in advance?'
'This is really a surprise.'
Xia Yu and the other two enthusiastically chatted with Sumitomo Kumiko, who seemed to be infected, her face full of a happy smile.
After chatting for a while, Xia Yu learned that Sumitomo Kumiko had arrived the previous day and, at Cindy's kind invitation, would be staying in the same villa as her in the future, so they would have some company and it would be more lively.
Xia Yu also learned that Cindy had contacted Sumitomo Kumiko after returning to Hong Kong from the Maldives.
The reason why Sumitomo Kumiko only met with Cindy now was because the Sumitomo family had spent more than half a month making a decision.
The Sumitomo family understood the development strategy of Xiangjiang and was preparing to establish a Sumitomo Chemical branch company in Xiangjiang, so that Sumitomo Kumiko could gain experience by working in the company.
When Sumitomo Kumiko said this, Xia Yu clearly felt Li Qian and He's eyes flicker a few times.
And after careful observation, Xia Yu noticed that Sumitomo Kumiko's gaze on him was also a little different.
This made him feel a little overwhelmed.
He had obviously become a hot commodity. It was fine that the old Mellon's intentions were obvious, and even the Sumitomo family had let go of their concerns. This was a plan to continue using the beauty strategy on him.
But he was indeed friends with Sumitomo Kumiko and they got along well, so he could only take things one step at a time.
After a brief chat, the group got into the car and headed to the film and television city of Milky Way Film Company.
Compared to the film studios of Shaw Brothers and the Song Dynasty City built by Deacon Chiu, the film studio built by Galaxy Studios has invested heavily. The various antique buildings are built in a wonderful way, deeply restoring the characteristics of ancient architecture.
Everything in the film studio was very novel to the women, and their laughter could be heard everywhere. These scenes were permanently recorded on film by the photographer who followed them, and will be developed later as a souvenir.
The arrival of Sumito Kumiko made Xia Yu's life a little different, but soon everyone got used to it.
Life after work became more interesting, and work didn't suffer.
...
That day, Xia Yu was discussing the improvement of the home office with Huo Jianning when Governor of Hong Kong Su Xingjian came to visit Xia Yu again. As a token of his courtesy, he also bought some fruit.
After becoming the head of Xia Yu's family office, Xia Yu's vast business empire gradually revealed its mysteries to Huo Jianning. The first thing he learned was about the Xiangjiang Jiuding consortium.
And it was also through this that he learned that the fundamental reason why Governor So Hang-kin had joined Xia Yu's united front was that he had been helped up by Xia Yu.
Putting aside his official capacity, So Hang-kin's identity was actually the same as his, and in fact, he could be considered Xia Yu's subordinate.
However, because of the official status conferred on him by the British government, he still had to do some face-saving.
After a few polite exchanges, he saw that Xia Yu had not told Fok Kin-ning to leave, and that Xia Yu had introduced Fok Kin-ning as the head of his family office, so naturally, Su Xingjian understood.
So he did not avoid the issue and took the initiative to inform him of the purpose of his visit: 'Mr Xia, the main reason for my visit is to talk to you about the current development situation in Hong Kong and the difficulties encountered.'
This was official business.
Xia Yue was slightly surprised, but with a faint smile on his lips, he said, 'Please go on.'
Su Xingjian then continued, 'Let's start with the several livelihood projects proposed in January this year.'
'The construction of several public universities is progressing quickly. The main teaching buildings have already been built, and most of the frameworks are up. Next year, they will definitely be able to start enrolling students.'
'In terms of public rental housing, the plan to launch 100,000 units is already more than half complete. 67,000 units have already been launched, and it will not be a problem to launch 100,000 units in the next three months.'
'Medical care and hygiene...'
As Su Xingjian gave a detailed account, Xia Yu got a clear impression in his mind of the current development of people's livelihood in Xiangjiang.
Overall, the development was very good.
In particular, after the subway company was taken over by Xia Yu again, the financial pressure on the Hong Kong government in terms of transportation construction has been greatly reduced, and the funds recovered have also been tilted towards the field of people's livelihood.
This is the main reason why the construction of people's livelihood and well-being in Xiangjiang has been significantly more effective this year than in previous years.
After talking about people's livelihood and well-being, Su Xingjian turned the topic to economic development, which is the cornerstone of all developments in Xiangjiang.
The core content is Xiangjiang's long-term development strategy—one core and six pillars.
Although this long-term development strategy was developed during the MacLehose era, Su Xingjian knew very well that Xia Yu was the one behind the scenes.
Therefore, this long-term development strategy is the development framework that Xia Yu has created for Xiangjiang.
Since he was sucking up to Xia Yu, Su Xingjian naturally didn't come up with anything new, and took over the entire political legacy of Murray MacLehose, fully promoting the development of this strategy.
'Mr Xia, this is the internal data on the economic development of Hong Kong, mainly analysing the seven industries of one core and six pillars.'
With that, Su Xingjian took out an economic development report from his bag and handed it to Xia Yu.
'Okay, I'll take a look first,'
Xia Yu responded, took the report, spread it out on the table, and said to Fok Kin-ning, 'Let's read it together,' before browsing through it.
In the first half of the year, Hong Kong's gross domestic product was 198.494 billion Hong Kong dollars, equivalent to 32.54 billion US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 42.1% compared to the first half of last year.
Among the seven major industries, namely the financial services industry, the trade and logistics industry, the electronics and high-tech industry, the heavy machinery manufacturing industry, the petrochemical industry, the healthcare industry, and the tourism and entertainment industry, the contributions to the Hong Kong economy are as follows:
The industry that contributed the most was still the trade and logistics industry, with a contribution of 27.9% and an industry added value of 55.38 billion Hong Kong dollars.
In second place is the heavy machinery manufacturing industry, which contributes 22.3% and has an industry added value of 44.264 billion Hong Kong dollars.
In third place is the electronics and high-tech industry, which contributes 19.5% and has an industry added value of 38.706 billion Hong Kong dollars.
In fourth place is the financial services industry, which contributes 17.7% and has an industry added value of 35.133 billion Hong Kong dollars.
These four pillar industries together contribute as much as 87.4%, more than four-fifths.
They are the first-tier industries.
The other three of the six pillars, although they have grown significantly compared to before, are developing more slowly.
In fifth place is the tourism and entertainment industry, contributing 2.4% and adding HK$4.763 billion to the industry.
In sixth place is the big health industry, contributing 1.7% and adding HK$3.374 billion to the industry.
In seventh place is the petrochemical industry, which contributes 0.9% and has an industry added value of HK$1.786 billion.
These seven industries together contribute 92.4% of the entire Hong Kong economy, which is not insignificant.
It can be seen that Xia Yu's strategy of 'one core, six pillars' proposed a few years ago has been very effective.
Although the tourism and entertainment industry, the healthcare industry and the petrochemical industry seem to be dragging their feet, the financial services industry, the electronics and high-tech industry and the heavy machinery manufacturing industry have developed by leaps and bounds!
You have to know that a few years ago, Hong Kong's trade and logistics industry contributed as much as 50-60%.
Now?
It has been halved in just a few years, to only 27.9%.
This shows that Hong Kong's development has evolved from being extremely dependent on the trade and logistics industry to having multiple pillar industries.
This means that Hong Kong's economic development is more balanced and stable, which is conducive to social development.
The reason for such achievements can also be seen as the credit of Xia Yu.
For example, the electronics and high-tech industries and the heavy machinery manufacturing industry both rely on the Tiangong Group.
The main contributions come from the Tiangong Electronics Group and the Tiangong Automobile Group, followed by the industrial chains around them.
It can be said that it is a Tiangong Group that supports almost half of Hong Kong's economy!
This is the contribution of a super-large manufacturing company to the economy of a region!
If Xiangjiang did not have Tiangong Group and the industrial chain it drove, then the contribution of Xiangjiang's trade and logistics industry would reach more than 50%!
This was the normal level of Xiangjiang's economy before!
The financial services industry has also increased significantly in recent years. Although its contribution does not seem to be as high as the other three major industries, it is because the economy of Xiangjiang is larger that its contribution is small.
If you want to see the real development of the financial services industry, you shouldn't look at this, but analyse the industry separately. You can see from the line chart that the development is progressing rapidly.
Xia Yu is both satisfied and dissatisfied with the current economic development.
In his opinion, the best industry contribution ratio is for all seven industries to be in the mid-teens!
The only way to achieve this goal is to fill in the gaps!
The petrochemical industry, the big health industry and the tourism and entertainment industry!
What Xia Yu didn't expect was that the difficulty that Su Xingjian was referring to was that he didn't know how to develop these three industries and had come to Xia Yu for help!
This made Xia Yu feel deeply gratified.
Su Xingjian had done a good job as governor!