MAN Group CEO Says No Control of China National Heavy Duty Trucks Plan

According to Hanken Samuelson, CEO of the German MAN Group, a trading structure with 560 million euros in shares in China National Heavy Duty Truck and 25%+1 shares will guarantee MAN's control over technology while embodying its own interest. For this new strategic cooperation, Samuelson said that in the future MAN will not have a plan to control China National Heavy Duty Truck and will not seek other partners in China.

In the afternoon of July 30th, Samuelson said in an interview with Caijing that both sides' negotiations on this cooperation began more than a year ago. The German side looks at the value of rejuvenating the market and also hopes that its own technology can be transformed into more products.

On July 15, 2009, MAN and China National Heavy Duty Truck Group also announced that they will form a strategic partnership. MAN invested 560 million euros and obtained 25%+1 shares of CNHTC. At the same time, MAN awarded China Sinotruk trucks and three engines with exclusive licensing technology.

In an interview with Caijing, Samuelson said that in the negotiation process with China National Heavy Duty Truck, MAN insisted that the principle is to ensure its own control over technology. Based on the experience of previous joint ventures, MAN believes that the new joint venture can avoid intellectual property issues.

Samuelson said that as a leading company in the industry, Sinotruk is the "best" partner that it can find in the Chinese market.

An investment banker involved in the transaction revealed to the Caijing reporter that the focus and difficulty of the negotiation lies in the way of cooperation. At the beginning, MAN hopes to cooperate in the form of a traditional joint venture company, which means that the Chinese and foreign parties establish a joint venture company, each with 50% equity.

Prior to this, the two parties had just ended their joint venture with their respective partners.

In January 2009, MAN announced that it had withdrawn from the joint venture company Yutong Group, which was established in 2002, as a lionbus. The company has been losing money since its establishment. As of the time when MAN withdrew, the loss of the joint venture company totaled nearly 100 million yuan.

The joint venture between Sinotruk and Volvo Group has also been suspended due to the fact that the cooperation has not been smooth. One argument is that the Volvo Group's dissatisfaction with CNHTC's "learning from" technology has resulted in a deterioration of the partnership.

Therefore, on the basis of summing up the past joint venture experience of commercial vehicles and passenger vehicles, Sinotruk and MAN decided to adopt a new joint venture model and hoped to carry out exclusive cooperation.

In the end, the two parties reached an agreement on the cooperation model: MAN shares in China National Heavy Duty Truck, China National Heavy Duty Truck Co., Ltd. invested in the technology to purchase MAN, and enjoy exclusive rights to the technology and cooperative products.

Samuelson said: "MAN is very satisfied with the current transaction structure of both parties. At present, there is no idea of ​​accumulating or holding China National Heavy Duty Truck, nor is it looking for new partners in China."