In the eve of Geneva Motor Show, Chairman of Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Li Shufu wrote an article, in which he shared his thoughts about economic development in China and the world, global corporate culture building, cooperation progress of Geely and Volvo as well as the transition of consumption concept in China. He believes that the consumption concept in Chinese auto market has come into a rational and mature period and global corporate culture will serve as the guidance for the joint development of Geely and Volvo.

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Global auto giants will gather in the Geneva Motor Show this month and China, as the largest automobile market in the world, will surely become the focus of the event. One of the major concerns is that whether the vigorous growth momentum in the Chinese auto market in the past few years, which benefited plenty of auto makers, can be maintained.

For many auto makers in Europe, Japan and the US, the strong demand in the China to a large extent makes up the unstable domestic needs in their countries. With the development of Chinese economy, Chinese consumers have become more and more particular and the strong purchasing power has made them the most important target group for many auto designers, manufacturing engineers, dealers and market decision-makers.

In order to meet the demands of the Chinese consumers, some auto giants have intensified their efforts and flocked into this competitive market with huge investments to build plants, set up joint ventures and expand sales network.

At the time when foreign auto companies try to conquer the Chinese market, Chinese automakers are learning how to improve quality, make use of new technology and build a practical mode for export. Anyway, it is a two-way learning process.

Each industry plays a role in the course of human civilization with its own mission, so is the auto industry, which is seeking its transition path after the development for more than ten decades. When people enjoy the convenient transportation, the challenges and pressures the car brings cannot be ignored, especially the increasingly severe problems of environment pollution, energy consumption as well as safety. There are more than 20 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions and over 70 million barrels of petroleum consumption everyday in the world and what is worse, more than 3,000 people were killed or injured in car accidents each day. When we produce a car, these questions, such as how to eliminate the negative influence on the environment, bring about some positive effects, and how to benefit people's health instead of causing casualties and accidents, count on the common development opportunity of the whole auto industry in the world and serve as their shared responsibilities. Therefore, all the global automakers and some high-tech enterprises are trying to equip a car with science and technology and striving for a car that is more intelligent, more automotive and more user-friendly. I believe that someday automobiles can absolutely serve as an online communication platform as well as an all-weather good partner and helper in the customers' healthy life and pleasant work. Of course, we can also further tap potential of our rich imagination to bring the auto industry to make greater contribution to global economic recovery and sustainable economic development.

During the last decade, Geely has made constant improvement in industrial chains after several cross-border mergers and acquisitions. The capacities of technical talents have also been improved through the mergers with and acquisitions of London Taxi Company, Australia-based automotive transmission maker DSI, Volvo Car Corporation and Emerald Automotive. And then Geely Holding Group made some adjustments on its global development strategy which got it clear about the relationship between Geely and Volvo and their respective market positions. Geely is a popular-style auto brand while Volvo is a luxurious one, and both of them, as subsidiary corporations, are two brotherly branches of Geely Holding Group. Just like the other automakers, the two companies, on the basis of win-win, shall seek cooperation as much as possible in the fields such as technology research and development and purchasing. On the basis of mutual respect, openness, transparency and fair cooperation, the two brands can share best practices and maintain relatively independent operation according to their own administration frameworks. It has been proved that this strategy forms a good foundation for the improvement of international competitiveness of both sides and what's more, their competitive force is becoming more and more powerful.

Volvo has run for almost four years under the new ownership framework. With the release of a series of new auto models, the first investment of 11 billion dollars for transition is coming out. To gain a ground in the competition in a new historical period, the R&D center in Sweden, established by Geely and Volvo, has begun to work on the basic modular architectures. What is more, to meet the needs of new energy automobiles, Geely and Volvo are discussing to set up the joint research institute and manufacturing company on electric-driving system, and to make large investments on the research and manufacturing of the electric driving system, so as to better embrace the coming of new energy automobile era. Even though we remain unclear about the timetable of the electric vehicle era, the trend is definite. Internal cooperation in an enterprise serves as a main criterion to judge its corporate culture and the ability to develop cooperation. The cooperation between Geely and Volvo is just a typical case of internal cooperation in an enterprise, and the quality of the cooperation, including whether it is sound, yield satisfactory results, offer opportunities or improve the competitiveness for both sides, has a bearing on the future path of Geely and Volvo. So I attach great attention to the cooperation between two automakers under the same Group since it is conducive to promoting the construction of global corporate culture, making full use of local resources, recombining various resources flexibly and creating new values. On such a basis, we would like to cooperate with any enterprise or individual in any form in an open mind to create a better future together for automobile industry.

All the cooperation in the world involves human participation. Each person has his own background and culture, so the cross-cultural subjects, especially the ones related to the cross-border or cross-continent cooperation, deserve our study. The integration level between two different cultures directly determines the future of Geely and Volvo, so I specially established a research center on the global corporate culture in Sanya in 2012 to develop a deep study about the cross-cultural integration.

Up to now, conflicts broke out on and on around the world due to some political, racial, religious, cultural, economic or military causes. It seems that it's too far to achieve the Great Harmony, but there is no doubt that we cannot stop the tide of global economic integration and international trade liberalization in the economic field. As many foreign companies enter the Chinese market, some enterprises in China are going out in turn to integrate with global economy and society. So it has a great and far-reaching significance to research and promote the formation and development of global corporate culture for the sustainable economic development in China and the world at large as well as the cause of world peace and happiness of mankind.

In the past, transnational corporation is regarded as the company who conducts business in several countries and global company is the one that business is developed in the majority of countries all over the world. But both of them have distinct national characteristics. And now the cultural conflict and integration faced by the companies have come to a new stage and both transnational corporations and global companies have realized the great significance of cultural guidance and construction. In order to fit and support the development of global segment markets and to allocate and integrate global resources, some companies begin to highlight the segmentation and cooperation between localization and globalization and enhance the coordination between the two. The new form of enterprise organization is called "global corporation", which performs well in local development and global coordination with the guidance of advanced concept. Original nationality, religion, belief, language and culture are all played down or broken, and new enterprise culture and value gradually take shape. With the core features of respect, adaptation, inclusiveness and integration, it will achieve win-win cooperation and great success in global market.

The global corporate culture I mentioned refers to the enterprise model that transcends the borders, nationalities and religions, which is conducive to the advancement of human civilization, people's happy life as well as enterprises' innovation and global adaptability. These advantages can be seen in customers' satisfaction, sense of pride among employees and achievability in management, flexible culture and comprehensive and sustainable development of the company. Under the guidance of this culture, featured by openness, inclusiveness, foresight and sagacity, an enterprise will actively undertake responsibility, have the courage to challenge the peak of science and technology, be brave in the exploration of commercial civilization, and be endowed with an administration concept of legitimacy, fairness, transparency and mutual respect.

The development of global enterprises cannot be separated from the local ones, and a better promotion of the development of local companies, to some extent, is to better develop the global enterprises. Market is just like the battlefield and organic coordination between local execution and remote management must be achieved. Different markets need different authorizations and strategies. A closer access to the market provides the enterprises with a better understanding of the frontline and finally a flexible market strategy. So the flexible coordination between localization and globalization in research, talents, purchasing and market is the key to sit on the throne in the competition.

With such a goal, Geely established a "Global Corporate Culture Research Center" in Sanya. Geely wants to promote the formation and development of global corporate culture in this way, bring this concept to take deep roots in people's mind, and make the center an independent think-tank. The missions of this center are to guide and establish global corporate culture, to make researches, practices and explorations on this new cross-cultural corporate culture and to help more transnational enterprises to accept and develop this culture. I am pleased that the idea of establishing "Global Corporate Culture Research Center" has got positive responses from all over the world and more than twenty well-known professors have joined us.

From establishment to survival and then to the development, an enterprise shall pursue not only a considerable economic benefit but also the achievement of its vision, mission, aims and core value. The economic benefit of a corporation acts as its blood, without which it will go bankrupt, while the latter serves as its original driving force and development direction. Both of them are indispensable and can ensure the company to develop along a right track. The tenet of Volvo is to treat everyone with respect and its brand connotations are safety, health and northern European style, which are completely in line with the mankind's desire for peace, happiness and progress in civilization. Geely's corporate vision, which is to let Geely cars go all over the world, contains not only the best wishes for the future of the mankind, but also the direction the staff strives for. Taking "Happy Life, Geely Drive" as its core value, Geely understands that only with customers' satisfaction, trust and preference, can Geely have a brighter future. Geely and Volvo are two brothers rather than father and child. I have confidence for their pleasant cooperation, mutual support and common progress. It's certain that they will make a great contribution for the formation and development of global corporate culture.

"The world will be a harmonious place if people appreciate their own beauty and that of others, and work together to create beauty in the world", the world famous anthropologist Fei Xiaotong put forwards this lofty ideal where people coexist in harmony and progress together, which is also the purpose of the establishment of "Sanya Global Corporate Culture Research Center". I believe that as long as we recognize and flow the views, harmonious cooperation mechanism between companies will naturally come into being and global corporate culture will be carried forward constantly.

We will continue to consolidate the global leading position of Volvo in safety and environmental protection and to support its efforts to achieve the great blueprint of "zero casualty, zero emission". The number of people who dying from the car accidents is no less than that in the war, so a realization of "zero casualty" through technological innovation constitutes a great contribution to human peace.

The sales of automobiles in China have increased from 377, 000 vehicles in 1996 to 21.98 million vehicles in 2013 as the Chinese economy has undergone rapid development over the past 30 years. In 2013, there were 71.42 cars per 1000 people in China, which was below the world average (140 cars per 1000 people) and lagged far behind the number in developed countries (US: 800 cars per 1000 people, Europe: 600 cars per 1000 people, Japan and Russia: 224 cars per 1000 people). Despite of the great development room, as the rebalance of world economic pattern, the Chinese economy is confronted with pressure during its transition period and its sustainability is severely constrained by the problems of energy, environment, resources, innovation capacity, distribution system and other factors. Cars in China are no longer in short supply and car buyers, who used to crazy for the luxurious cars to distinguish their status, have now become more mature and rational in their consumption. They now concern more about the cars' performance, configuration, safety, soundness and environmental protection and have set off a wave of rational consumption.

Just like people in other regions where the car markets is highly developed, Chinese users begin to pursue and be loyal to the brands that suit themselves most. A series of new words with special features of age, such as Fu Er Dai (rich second generation), Guan Er Dai (the officiallings), Ping Die (competition of family background), Tu Hao (beverly hillbillies) and others, emerged in recent years. Those groups are always closely connected with some luxurious cars. At present, however, people from all circles of the society have realized that the sustainable improvement of a nation's economy must be based on the innovation rather than the borrowed prosperity and distorted consumption. Thus, we should abandon the vanity as well as corruption and come back to rationality and reality. In recent years, I am very glad to find that the car users in China have preferred to choose the products which are designed in a low-profile way rationally, which, in my opinion, demonstrates their personality, confidence and rationality in consumption.

Nearly all the car users in China know that Volvo is reputable around the world for its safety performance, but seldom can tell the reason. Some people think that it is mere an advertisement, and some attribute it to its thick steel plate or security configuration, all of which show their lack of knowledge about its history. Volvo's reputation as the safest car is not a self-glorification, but a proven fact that the evidence can be found in statistical analysis report on traffic accident from the police office as well as the recommended list of insurance company. The European consumers, the Swedish consumers in particular, are best acquainted with the excellent performance of Volvo. Its performance on the ice and snow are acclaimed as a wonder and any ornate words are not enough to describe its outstanding safety performance. In 2013, the sales volume of Volvo was 226,095 in Europe and 61,146 in China while the total sales volume of cars in the two markets were 11.9 million and 21.98 million respectively. Volvo needs to sell nearly 500,000 vehicles a year in China to make its market share to compete with that in Europe. Statistics show that Volvo tops the luxurious brands in Netherland in 2013. Its safety performance and low profile style are well known among the consumers in US and Japan and no one will choose Volvo for showing off.

Although Volvo establishes plants in both Europe and China, the two markets witnessed completely different performance. Despite of some historical factors, including insufficient time since it entry and Chinese consumers' unfamiliarity with Volvo, it is necessary for the firm to study the Chinese buyer, the Chinese market features and finally find the way out. To my delight, the sales volume of Volvo in China increased by 45% in 2013, which may indicate that Volvo began to obtain the recognition of Chinese users. This is also a start for the Chinese consumers to be more rational and mature in consumption.

In the new period of China, the government allows enterprises to make any positive attempts  that are not prohibited by law and hold itself within the legal authorization. At the same time, it also launches large-scale anti-corruption drives and takes strong measures against the vanity, which is the fountain of a transparent economy. I believe that all enterprises in China have realized the great determination of the government. The Chinese economy, which is further deepening the reforms, will provide the enterprises with a bright future. Finally, I sincerely wish the global economy a speedy recovery, the global peers in China a better development and the Geneva Moto Show a complete success.