Fun fact: Chevrolet kind of bought GM. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/gm-buys-chevrole...
> "Still the owner of a considerable portion of GM stock, Durant began to purchase more shares in the company as his profits from Chevrolet allowed. In a final move to regain control, Durant offered GM stockholders five shares of Chevrolet stock for every one share of GM stock. Though GM stock prices were exorbitantly high, the market interest in Chevrolet made the five-for-one trade irresistible to GM shareholders. With the sale, concluded on May 2, 1918, Durant regained control of GM"
And then after this the DuPont Family effectively controlled GM for quite a while. They previously had a relationship because GM used DuPont paints.
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As to the manufacturer family tree: things get significantly more complicated when you add joint ventures. Ford famously partnered with Mazda, Chrysler partnered with Mitsubishi, and GM partnered with Isuzu and Suzuki and even Toyota for a while (NUMMI). Nowadays GM and Honda have a few codevelopment projects; even the concept of what a joint venture means has significantly changed. My list is this comment is far from authoritative or exhaustive.
The epic "Diamondstar Motors" as I recall. Responsible for generations of kickass cars under different names. Conquest/Starion, Laser/Talon/Eclipse, Stealth/3000GT.
Yes, and even more complicated because some of those joint ventures where country-specific. For example, in the 80s (and early 90s) due to the economic crisis in Brazil and Argentina, Ford and Volkswagen created the joint venture Autolatina to join forces during the crisis. So both brands shared engines and released sight variations of the same cars.
TEL had been identified chemically in the mid-19th century, but General Motors had discovered its effectiveness as an antiknock agent in 1921, after spending several years attempting to find an additive that was both highly effective and inexpensive.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraethyllead
Video treatment:
My favorite are outdoor clothing companies which almost all tie-in to the same Chinese investment fund. Or how glasses companies all belong to that one French conglomerate.
"These 10 Companies Own Almost All of the Brands You Use" https://thehomestead.guru/10-companies-own-brands/
https://gizmodo.com/fascinating-graphic-shows-who-owns-all-t...
https://www.dividend.com/how-to-invest/9-companies-that-own-...
https://capitaloneshopping.com/blog/11-companies-that-own-ev...
https://www.webfx.com/blog/internet/the-6-companies-that-own...
https://www.forbes.com/sites/brendancoffey/2011/10/26/the-fo...
My mental model of brands was as a quality stamp, as in people would recognize a product from advertising but if they disliked the product then it wouldn’t help. But, I think there is a second effect in play. If you start with something of high quality that people consume regularly you can very slowly lower the quality without people noticing. Continue long enough and old brands are going to end up as lower quality.
So it is with markets. There are indistinct conditions that may exist for some time, and decay, and financial privacy, etc. So even given "perfect" observation of events, it is not fully transparent.
Nor would you want it, I argue. Once you as an individual are involved with markets and partners and committed relationships, some faceless bureacracy is tracking your parking spending? or more to the point, your ownership stakes? So we must re-invent public markets. Too much to change at once, and imperfect cooperation, so.. set a direction. "messy"
I guess you get good news every day!
The "three most connected companies" through interconnecting directors are "3M (7 connections), Boeing (6 connections) and Amgen (6 connections)" ... "Other highly-connected companies include Walt Disney, Apple, Chevron, Exxon Mobil, IBM, and Procter & Gamble – each has five board members that also serve for other top 50 corporations." [2]
[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/923c92/80_...
[2] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/50-largest-u-s-companies-bo...
Personally, I lean to independent brands. I don't want my Milwaukee tools having all the same parts as the Ryobi line - makes me assume I'm being suckered into an identical tool that's way more expensive. Even if the Milwaukee is usually superior, I'm guessing some things just are exact copies with red paint. I'm the same way with say Patagonia over North Face - I'll always avoid VF Corp brands for something that's still building legacy, rather than profiting on historical credibility.
I guess the same is true with previous generation stuff. Abercrombie & Fitch, and Eddie Bauer used to be premier outdoor equipment companies with great down jackets and sleeping bags, fishing equipment, even shotguns. Now they're both brands representing clothes I don't want. Both brands sold and were aggregated with other companies in the late 1980s.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddie_Bauer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abercrombie_%26_Fitch
Geely recently bought the mobile phone manufacturer Meizu.
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/14/tesla-valuation-more-than-ni...
When VW stocks went through the roof due to a short squeeze a few years ago, a very conservative German billionaire named Adolf Merckle saw that VW's stock value was ridicilously overpriced, so he decided to bet agains the stock. But the stock price went further up and stayed there long enough to make him lose all of his money. He then committed suicide.
Amusingly, the import restrictions were "voluntary," as much as geopolitics can be voluntary.
No employee in the Ferrari factory has a non-Stellantis car (Alfa Romeo or Maserati preferably)
So I think it should be clarified that Ferrari and Stellantis (specifically Fiat) are related
Ford did not participate in the explicit bailout for the auto industry, but their financial arm did receive loans from the federal government. (GM and co. also received this type of assistance in addition to the bailout.)
I was very surprised to see they were listed as stand alone in that list.
> Ford makes limited runs so dealers can put insane markups, while GM makes cars for people to buy.
Didn't they just announce fixed price direct to consumer sales for EV's?[1] Regardless, I'm not quite sure what you mean by that. Dealers reap the markups, not Ford, and they're hardly moving any of those trims compared to the F-150 and other "normal" vehicles. If anything it's hurt them. The Focus RS was arguably axed because of dealer greed[2]. Of course Shelby has more fanboys, Chevy doesn't have an equivalent. Ford has made non-Shelby Mustang Cobras in the past and currently have the Mach 1 to replace the Shelby GT350. Having shopped for both I can say with confidence that regular Camaros trims in general tend to be higher marked up than Mustangs because their production volume is much lower, especially with the 1LE package. Ford churns out performance pack Mustangs like they're base models.
[1] https://www.kbb.com/car-news/ford-ceo-wants-future-of-online...
[2] https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2017/07/barks-bites-focus-...
The movie makes it look like scrappy Carroll Shelby and Ken Miles were simply smarter than the clowns at Ford but that's not the whole story.
These networks sprawl out pretty quickly, I imagine. Modern cars rely on microcontrollers and microprocessors, and without chip fabs that comes to a halt. They also require varying amounts of steel, aluminum, carbon fiber, other plastics and metals, and natural rubber.
Then there's the physical locations and the international ownership / leasing / agreement structures. For example, Rust Belt manufacturing of vehicles in the USA for the US market has mostly relocated to Mexico:
https://napsintl.com/mexico-manufacturing-news/mexicos-auto-...
> "According to Forbes, about 80 percent of the cars manufactured in Mexico are exported globally, with about two-thirds of those exports going to the United States. In 2014, the industry comprised about $19 billion in investments. Production for that year was estimated to reach 3.2 million cars, double what it had been five years prior."
A network map of everything that went into a Mexican-made vehicle that was purchased in the USA would be highly complex, and if you then asked for an ownership map of all the shell companies, holding compenies, investors, primary owners etc. involved, the complexity would likely increase by a factor of ten.
Just tracking the global production and ownership of raw lithium and electric car battery manufacturing, for example, would be a fairly massive undertaking.
IKEA’s organizational structure might sound a bit confusing at first, but I looked into it to see how its business model works so that you could gain clarity on that.
Put it shortly, IKEA as a brand comprises two separate owners. INGKA Holding B.V. owns the IKEA Group, the holding the group.
At the same time that is held by the Stichting INGKA Foundation, which is the owner of the whole Group. IKEA Group is not the owner of the brand, which is managed by Inter IKEA Systems B.V., part of Inter IKEA B.V. that is the real owner of the IKEA Concept.
Thus, IKEA Group is a franchisee that pays 3% of royalties to Inter IKEA Systems.
But technically Audi owns the whole group. VW doesn't plan and design the engines, gearboxes and cars, Audi does. VW is more a logistics and SW company now, just with a big brand name, with the cheaper "Audis" labelled as VW.
Porsche cars are made by Porsche AG which is a subsidiary of Volkswagen AG - Porsche SE then holding a controlling stake in Volkswagen AG.
Also was aware that Nissan and Renault cooperate, but didn't know there is also Mitshubishi with them. Btw. Adobe Acrobat logo would like to have a word.
Then just recently FCA and PSA formed Stellantis.
PSA and Fiat worked together previously, as their van the Fiat Ducato is basically the same as the vans from PSA group and the same as the Iveco Daily. They closely worked also together in other areas.
The small cars by Fiat was also partly joined development with Opel in the mid 1990. That relationship worked loosely for years, even while Opel still was part of GM.
Their hobby is telling other countries that they suck because their economy is bad (partly because of NL being a tax haven).
Maybe someone has more information than me.
Hyundai, kia and Genesis for instance, share the same ev platform.
Volvo and polestar too,with their EVs.
Audi, Vw, Porsche too have all launched EVs with surprisingly similar specs ( especially in terms of miles/kwh).
These ownership trees help explain why, clearly.
https://www.businessinsider.com/10-companies-control-the-foo...
https://www.webfx.com/blog/internet/the-6-companies-that-own...
But the thing that's super stark is how many marquees Stellantis have; I can't help but think that some consolidation and focusing of resources would be beneficial (and I'm well aware that plenty is shared already).
Sometimes as I'm out and about I'll see old Ford-era Jaguars and I'm pleased that the company has independence to make its own vehicles.
edit: "after it will have brought" I guess
Tata is a huge conglomerate with businesses that apparently have nothing to do with each other.
Steel, Salt, coffee/tea, hotel chains, multiple airlines, IT, car companies, watches, financial companies, phone companies (?), jewellery, air conditioners, the list goes on.
(Whether any of their products are good is a different matter; it may or may not be — I don't really know.)
Tata motors in India has been pretty good over the last few years. They now make very desirable products designed for the Indian market — ie., spacious, efficient, practical cars with good enough performance, reliability, high scores in GNCAP crash tests, at a price which a lot of Indians can afford.
Tata cars probably won't win any races, but they have finally figured out the pulse of the Indian market.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-toyota-mazda-idUSKBN1AK0R...
https://www.automotiveworld.com/news-releases/mazda-continue...
(Memory could be off on time and which publication..)
But yeah, buying a Volvo is what keeps the CCP in power.
> It was founded by former PayPal owner Elon Musk
Hah. Nope.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla,_Inc.#Founding_(2003%E2%...
Granted, he wasn't there to sign the articles of incorporation, but he joined very early.
