Rebirth of England.

Barron also had another purpose in coming to France this time, which was to prepare to acquire the French energy and power giant - Alstom.

Alstom was founded in 1928 and its business covers power, electromechanical, high-speed rail and other businesses.

Alstom has always been known as the pearl of French industrial sector and a national treasure of France.

The famous TGV French high-speed train was built by Alstom; in Taiwan, the signaling system of Taipei MRT is also made by Alstom; in mainland China, Alstom's projects include the hydroelectric generators of the Three Gorges Dam, the Harmony CRH5 electric multiple unit, the Ling'ao Phase II nuclear power plant, the trains of Jinling Metro Line 1 and Line 2, the fully automatic signaling system of the Yanjing Airport Line, and the trains and signaling systems of the Shanghai Metro, etc.

In the energy sector, Alstom is the world's third largest manufacturer of gas turbines, second only to Germany's Siemens and General Electric (GE) of the United States...

In the field of power transmission and distribution systems, Alstom is the world's third largest manufacturer, second only to Germany's Siemens and Switzerland's ABB...

But even such a giant company is not doing well now, because Alstom has experienced a series of wrong decisions and bad luck before...

In 1999, Alstom and power giant ABB formed a joint venture, AAP, in order to compete with GE (General Electric), the leading supplier of power generation equipment at the time, with Alstom and ABB each holding a 50% stake.

AAP then developed the GT24 and GT54 gas turbine generator sets with the largest power (24 kilowatts) and highest design efficiency (26%) in the world at that time. Once the products were launched, their technical performance attracted the attention of the world, and 76 units were sold in a very short period of time.

In 2000, Alstom spent 50 billion euros to buy all of ABB's AAP shares from its partner ABB. Unfortunately, a generator set produced by the joint venture AAP was found to have defects, and Alstom paid an additional 20 billion euros in repair costs.

It can be said that this wrong decision has caused Alstom to suffer heavy losses...

But that’s not all. As the world’s largest manufacturer of luxury cruise ships, Alstom designed a win-win financing plan to sell its products to cruise companies in the Caribbean. However, the September 9th incident caused a sharp drop in the business volume of cruise companies in the Caribbean, so they stopped paying lease fees to the international bank consortium. The international bank consortium then turned to Alstom, the guarantor, to demand repayment, which made the situation even worse for Alstom.

To make matters worse, after the completion of the Channel Tunnel between England and France, which runs the Eurostar high-speed train, Alstom, as the general contractor, further established its leadership in the industry. However, budget errors led to high construction costs, causing further losses in its economic benefits.

All these incidents directly led to Alstom's financial crisis and the brink of bankruptcy...

As a French industrial giant, if Alstom declares bankruptcy, not only will its 11 employees around the world lose their jobs, but it will also lead to the bankruptcy of dozens of its creditor banks. Therefore, Alstom and its creditor banks simultaneously requested the French Ministry of Finance and Industry to intervene.

Then in October 2004, the French government stepped in to buy 10% of the shares to help Alstom overcome its difficulties.

In 2006, the French government sold its shares in Alstom to the French real estate giant Bouygues Group, which has continued to increase its stake since then. Currently, its stake in Alstom has reached 25%...

However, Alstom did not rise again after receiving the new capital injection. Instead, it trapped Bouygues Group deeply. The economic crisis in 2008 dealt a catastrophic blow to Alstom. Its stock price fell by 30% that year. Although it tried to remedy the situation by laying off a large number of employees and selling its assets to increase cash flow, it still could not stop the downward trend.

Therefore, the Bouygues Group, which has been stuck, has also considered selling its 25% stake in Alstom Group...

Barron's interest in Alstom is also due to its two main businesses, gas turbines and power generation turbines, as well as power grid transmission and distribution systems, which are of strategic significance to Barron's power industry, as well as ships and high-speed railways.

Regarding the acquisition of Alstom, Barron also entrusted the acquisition strategy to William Weber Capital, managed by Ashley.

"We have already contacted the Bouygues Group, which is interested in selling its shares in Alstom..."

Ashley told Barron:

"In addition, BNP Paribas and Natixis are creditors of Alstom Group, and we can get the support of these two banks in the sale plan."

When Alstom Group was on the verge of bankruptcy in 2004, its main creditor banks included BNP Paribas and Natixis Bank. To date, these two banks still own a large amount of Alstom Group's debts.

You should know that Standard Chartered Merrill Lynch, controlled by Barron, is one of the major shareholders of BNP Paribas; and the controlling shareholder of Natixis Bank is William Weber Capital.

Therefore, as the main creditor banks of Alstom Group, these two banks can naturally exert influence on Alstom Group and the French government in the acquisition.

After all, in addition to Barron, there are several other companies interested in Alstom Group, including Siemens, General Electric and Mitsubishi.

"Mitsubishi is not a threat here. After all, in the main business of Alstom Group, Mitsubishi is quite far away from it, and Mitsubishi does not have an advantage in bidding..."

After listing the possible contenders, Ashley analyzed for Barron:

"As for Siemens, it competes with Alstom in all aspects. Both the French government and the Alstom Group are very opposed to selling Alstom to Siemens!"

The reason Ashley said this is that the businesses of Siemens and Alstom are highly similar, which makes the French side very worried that once the two companies merge, it will lead to a large number of layoffs.

In addition, in 2004, when Alstom was in poor business and on the verge of bankruptcy, Siemens lobbied the French government not to rescue it and hoped to sell Alstom to Siemens...

It is also because of this history that Alstom expressed its dislike for Siemens.

"Moreover, as the two largest electrical companies in Europe, with full business competition, it means that if the two merge, it will directly form a monopoly in the industry, which is also not allowed by the EU antitrust agency."