Background
Li Shufu was born in Taizhou, Zhejiang, China in 1963.
书福 李
Li Shufu was born in Taizhou, Zhejiang, China in 1963.
Li is a study in perseverance and the pursuit of a dream. He was educated locally.
He started out in 1984 manufacturing refrigerator components, but the venture was forced to close when it failed to get the necessary licenses. In 1994, seeing the great desire for expensive imported motorcycles, Li decided to design and manufacture motorcycles domestically. He was challenged by the difficulty of obtaining the appropriate licenses but this time around he successfully obtained the necessary government permission, and in just a few years his motorcycles could be found in 22 countries around the world, including the United States.
A true entrepreneur, Li was not content to succeed in just one industry. Leveraging his manufacturing experience and entrepreneurial savvy, Li decided to move into automo- tive production. Despite continued difficulties in obtaining government licenses and numerous challenges in finding partners willing to work with a new automotive company, Li rose to the challenge and put together his dream of designing, manufacturing and selling automobiles in China. In 1997 Geely became China’s first privately owned automobile manufacturer and by 2000, Geely had sold more than 600 000 motorcycles and 150 000 automobiles, making Li one of the richest men in China.
Geely’s entry into the market can be seen as a key point in China’s automotive history. Geely, under Li, found a market by producing affordable cars in a country where the high price of automobiles was curtailing the number of sales necessary to develop an economy of scale and reduce production costs. Li’s determination enabled him to exploit a great opportunity by providing a good to a segment of the population that was not being serviced by the state-owned auto manufacturers or the foreign car companies. Li has no intention of stopping here; he intends to produce and sell automobiles around the world and compete with the biggest domestic and global automobile producers. Li’s continued focus on competition and the setting of aggressive goals, such as the aim of selling two million cars by 2015, is a key strategy for the company.