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As a Swede, I say: Sweden needs to deal with the Chinese majority ownership of Volvo Cars for strategical reasons. Conflict is brewing between US/EU and China.
by tpmx 4y ago
As a Swede, I say: Sweden needs to deal with the Chinese majority ownership of Volvo Cars for strategical reasons. Conflict is brewing between US/EU and China. It will be cheaper to deal with it sooner than later.
The newly installed Swedish PM has a strong hands-on understanding of the issues at hand - he spent years working in China. He's also strongly critical of China's policies.
(Geely is the majority owner of the now public Volvo Cars company. Volvo Cars AB is one of the largest Swedish companies in terms of number of employees.)
- rippercushions 4y agoUnlike eg Huawei, Volvo is not exactly a strategic target for anybody though.
- tpmx 4y agoIt's strategical to Sweden because of the branding, the number of employees and the dependencies on a very large number of component suppliers in Sweden. At one point the PRC will decide to just pull the design part of Volvo Cars out of Sweden. It would be incredibly naive to not think this would happen. Hence there needs to be an intelligently designed government intervention.
- timidiceball 4y agoSomething like one third of new vehicles sold in Norway last month were Chinese EVs. All internet connected, always on like all new EVs
- slaw 4y ago> the Model Y is ahead with 3,063 units, followed by the ID.4 (903), Enyaq (629) and Model 3 (602). Also well placed are the Polestar 2 (343) and the Volvo C40 (338) – with the electric version of the Volvo XC40 adding another 239 new registrations. The BMX iX establishes itself with 296 units ahead of models such as the Hyundai Ioniq 5 (262), Audi Q4 e-tron (250) and VW ID.5 (237). It looks like 80% of cars were made in China. Tesla, Volvo, Polestar. https://www.electrive.com/2022/10/04/bevs-reach-77-market-share-in-norway-over-september/ https://www.electrive.com/2022/10/04/bevs-reach-77-market-sh...
- tpmx 4y agoVolvo C40/XC40 Recharge is made in Ghent, Belgium. Source: https://www.media.volvocars.com/global/en-gb/media/pressreleases/287197/volvo-cars-starts-production-of-c40-recharge-in-ghent-belgium https://www.media.volvocars.com/global/en-gb/media/pressrele...
- slaw 4y agoYes, Chinese XC40 are sold to different markets. Europe gets XC40 from Belgium.
- tpmx 4y agoAh, you're correct: https://www.media.volvocars.com/global/en-gb/media/pressreleases/251367/volvo-cars-starts-chinese-production-of-xc40-small-suv-in-multi-brand-luqiao-plant https://www.media.volvocars.com/global/en-gb/media/pressrele...
- peppertree 4y agoFord drove Volvo into the ground before selling it Geely. While I agree CPP needs to be kept at arms length, sentiment like this is pure nationalist dog whistle.
- tpmx 4y agoHang on a moment here. You're saying my resistance to CCP ownership of Volvo Cars is a "dog whistle"? Well, it's not, I'm saying it out loud. It's a really bad idea that Sweden needs to do something about. It doesn't have to be Swedish ownership, but it can't be the CCP. Volvo Cars will also be more successful without any ties to the CCP.
- peppertree 4y agoYou are saying "national security" out loud and it's dogwhistle for xenophobic nationalism. Taking a company that's being successfully turned around in the name of national security is wrong.
- tpmx 4y agoI am saying that the CCP is bad. I am not cloaking this statement in any kind of ambiguity. Again, where is the dog whistle, exactly?
- peppertree 4y agoPeople often can't see their blind spot so I'm going to try one more time to explain this. This has nothing to do with "national security". If it did Swedish government would have rescued Volvo along with Saab when it was worth pennies. Geely is a private company that took the risk and made the investment to turn Volvo around. People like you see things through the lens of race and nationalism. That gives you justification to rob others. You Swedes are amateurs in this game. US was founded on the idea of robbing other race groups in the name of security.
- 4y ago
- user_named 4y agoWhat do you mean deal with it? Geely owns Volvo Cars. There's nothing for anyone to deal with. Additionally, Volvo would no longer exist without Geely.