Chapter 1289 Chapter One Thousand and Two Loves Chapter 88: Luring the Wolf into the House
What’s more, with LV’s status in the European fashion industry and Henri Lacamier’s connections in the business world, he has many options for cooperation. .
There are actually many colleagues who have cooperated with each other, have a certain degree of friendship, and can trust each other.
Just like the Chanel company or the Pierre Cardin company, there is actually no need for him to put his money on a stranger whom he has just met and does not know very well at all.
Then why did he do this?
The answer is also very simple, that is, he is too conceited and too greedy.
In fact, if anyone could really put themselves in Henri Lacamier's shoes, it would not be difficult to understand the choice he made in a hurry.
Don’t forget, the merger of LV and MH was originally a decision made by Henri Lacamière himself.
But he never thought that he would get such a result. In fact, he already deeply regretted it in his heart.
In addition, he had just suffered a big loss from MH's back stab, and the pain in his back had not dissipated.
He was inevitably a bit cynical, so much so that he had doubts about the concept of "companions."
So even in the face of the unfavorable situation at hand, for him, whether to introduce another evenly matched ally was actually a choice that made him feel quite embarrassed and worried.
Yes, although old partners like Chanel and Pierre Cardin are good, their cooperation in the past was only temporary cooperation for a certain product or for a certain theme event.
There is no equity involved, nor are they tied together.
God knows if Henri Lacamier turned to them and brought them into his company.
After MH and Guinness are subdued, will these old friends also have conflicts with him because of their interests and power?
If this is the case, what will he do then?
Not to mention that he has too many scruples in terms of relationships, even in terms of strength, these old friends are not at the mercy of others.
But Bernard Arnault of Dior is completely different to Henri Lacamier.
First of all, in Henri Lacamier's view, although this person has abilities, he studied architecture. He was an unknown real estate agent five years ago and had just entered the fashion industry a few years ago. of newcomers.
The qualifications are still young, the experience is lacking, and the team is weak and has limited strength.
Today's Dior fashion has an annual turnover of just over 100 million US dollars, which is far behind Louis Vuitton. The two companies are not at the same level.
This can even be seen when they both chat with each other.
Henry Lacamier could feel that Bernard's attitude was particularly humble. He only asked for advice in a low voice and treated him like a student treating his teacher.
This also gave him blind confidence, believing that after the company stabilized, he would be able to firmly grasp the younger generation in the industry simply by relying on his industry status and company qualifications.
Secondly, Henri Lacamier also knew that the Dior in Bernard Arnault's hands was actually bought from the French government.
In Henri Lacamier's view, since this kid can obtain the approval of the French government to complete the commercial acquisition of this well-known brand, and he can achieve such perfect results, he has indeed helped Dior out of business. A quagmire of trouble.
This undoubtedly represents that Bernard Arnault is a reliable person, not only has certain abilities, but also has business reputation.
In addition, this man looks elegant, comes from a prestigious school, and looks like a gentleman.
As a result, Henri Lacamier also committed the problem of judging people by their appearance, and subjectively believed that Bernard Arnault's character should be more reliable.
Finally, in addition to this, Henri Lacamier actually had a small calculation in his heart that was not easy to talk to others.
That is that he has actually been thinking about the Dior fashion in Bernard Arnault's hands.
In this world, many people mistakenly believe that Dior is a unified brand owned by only one company.
But in fact, this brand is divided into two parts: fashion business and beauty and perfume business.
And Dior’s life experience is far more complicated than people think.
On October 24, 1957, Christian Dior died of a heart attack.
These two businesses were sold to different objects by his descendants.
From this day on, Dior's brand has been in a state of division.
Bussac Textile Group acquired Dior’s clothing business, which was later acquired by Bernard Arnault due to operational difficulties.
LVMH Group has always owned Dior’s beauty and fragrance business.
This means that whether it is Henri Lacamière or Bernard Arnault, the Dior brand in their respective hands is incomplete.
Only when they are united can Dior be a complete Dior.
So in fact, Henri Lacamière still has a dream hidden in his heart that is difficult to express openly.
On the one hand, he wanted to use Dior’s beauty and perfume business as a bait to seduce Bernard Arnault and turn him into a donkey led by a carrot for his own use. Be your own pawn.
On the other hand, he wants to gradually control Bernard Arnault, his ally, and eventually transfer Dior fashion to the LVMH group to achieve "unification" with Dior beauty and perfume.
It must be said that Henri Lacamie is indeed the fourth generation of Louis Vuitton. He is indeed a cunning man who has calculated everything.
He looked for a partner who seemed to be suitable anywhere.
Not only can it help him solve his current dilemma, but after solving the problem, it can also help him make LVMH bigger and stronger.
Bernard Arnault will use his Dior fashion to put together the last piece of the LVMH puzzle for Henri Lacamier, so that the LVMH group that falls into his hands will shine with the brilliance of the sun and become a France's largest fashion group.
How wonderful it would be if all this could be realized!
But the problem is that Henri Lacamier is only a Frenchman after all.
He suffered a loss because he had never read Chinese history books, nor had he read "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and "Sun Tzu's Art of War".
He doesn't understand what "can't take advantage of all the advantages, can't take advantage of all the cleverness", and doesn't understand what "the agencies are too clever in calculating, and they end up taking Qingqing's life".
How could he ever have thought that Bernard Arnault, who seemed harmless to humans and animals and wished to treat him as his father's support, was a wolf in sheep's clothing?
He is really a ruthless person who can even kill his own father. How can he be willing to be manipulated by him?
In fact, it is not surprising that Henri Lacamier was thinking about the Dior clothes in his hands.
But why were they not thinking about plotting against him?
So the final result goes without saying.
Due to Henri Lacamier's mistrust, he was completely confused by Bernard Arnault's appearance. Not only did he fail to bring in reinforcements, he instead led the wolf into the house, adding an extremely insidious enemy to himself.
Don’t look at the fact that Bernard Arnault agreed to him on the surface, but in fact he didn’t do what the two of them combined. On the surface, they are just pretending to be arrogant, playing "pretending to be a pig and eating the tiger" with Henri Lacamier.
But behind the scenes, this guy played an extremely insidious trick - killing someone with a borrowed knife.
Yes, when he received the investment invitation from LV and found out that he could actually get involved in the other half of Dior's business, Bernard Arnault was really ecstatic about this opportunity.
And he is backed by Lazard Investment Bank. If he is really willing to raise the funds needed to acquire shares from the investment bank, this condition will be met, and it will not be a big problem.
But both Bernard Arnault and Lazard Investment Bank are eager for quick success and quick profits and are very practical.
If they participate in any investment, they only hope to maximize their benefits and obtain the greatest benefits in the fastest way at the lowest cost.
As for everything else, it doesn't matter. They don't care about credibility, morality, face, conscience, etc. at all.
So after careful analysis of this matter, they found that LV was actually at a disadvantage, or that the MH and Guinness alliance had greater overall strength and a greater chance of winning, so they did not plan to take action. Help LV.
Because if they clearly support LV, once they make any move, it will be equivalent to provoking the alliance between MH and Guinness. Not only will there be no way out, but they are also likely to receive a severe blow from the other party.
How can these two wine companies be trivial?
Regardless of industry status, personal connections, or capital, they are not comparable to them. If this treasure is misplaced, it will be terrible to steal the chicken but lose the rice.
However, if they give up and waste this opportunity, there will be no benefit at all, and they are unwilling.
After all, they have been salivating over this big fish like LVMH for a long time. Now that they are looking for it, can they still miss it?
That’s a crime!
So the final result of the discussion is that they should blend in, but they must follow the jungle law of the jungle and try their best to stand on the side of the strong.
Not only must we never help LV, but we must sell LV cleanly and completely.
The specific method is to bring funds to negotiate with MH and Guinness, and gain the trust and acceptance of the other parties by selling LV in exchange for some shares.
Then we will use Bernard Arnault's personal charm to continue to stabilize LV, and use the alliance's knife to kill the pig and divide the meat, and first completely destroy LV.
In this way, after Bernard Arnault made a plan with Lazard Investment Bank, and with the help of the investment bank's funds, he found MH and Guinness to surrender, and as expected he won received the other party's welcome.
To this end, the three parties simply established a new company and formed a new alliance.
By putting together the funds they hold and the 24% shares owned by MH, the interests of the three parties are completely tied together.
And that's not all. Next, Bernard Arnault also cleverly took advantage of the mentality that MH and Guinness both cooperated but were also afraid of each other, hoping to contain each other.
Using his personal charm and outstanding eloquence, he actually won the support of both parties. He became the controller of the new company, occupying 60% of the control of the new company.
By this time, Bernard Arnault had basically mastered the knife used to kill people.
And soon, Alain Chevalier, the former president of MH, also had a close look at Henri Lacamie, the fourth generation of LV.
After the new company of the three-party cooperation acquired a certain number of shares, Alain Chevalier, as the promoter, convened a board of directors and formally requested that Bernard Arnault, the representative of the new company, be admitted as a director of the company.
And also announced through the media, "We need a strong shareholder organization to prevent hostile takeovers, and now we have found our very good partner, Mr. Bernard Arnault. He He is simply a gentleman.”
There is no doubt that when this incident came to light, Henri Lacamie, the fourth generation of LV, was stunned at the board meeting!
This old man almost vomited blood because of Bernard Arnault's two-faced manipulation!
Only then did I understand how dangerous the world is, and what it means to "know people, know faces, but not know people's hearts."
In fact, before this, Bernard Arnault had been flirting with him, making him always feel that this was my own person, and he was just waiting for his rice to fall into the pot.
Who knew that after waiting and waiting, we would actually get such a result.
Yes, the other party did put the rice into the pot.
But it is a pity that this Bernard Arnault suddenly became his opponent.
The food he cooked was not for himself. Everyone seemed to be uniting to plot against him.
Needless to say, it was difficult for Alain Chevalier to remain calm after encountering such a sudden blow. He was simply furious and couldn't sit still at all!
I thought to myself, you are a bitch, you are not with me, why are you running over there?
Okay! Aren’t you trying to spite me? Then I can't let you be happy, I have to respond to you with anger.
So at that time, Henri Lacamier slammed the table and stood up, threatening in front of all the board members that he would purchase shares and increase his shareholding ratio to 33%.
This number is a very subtle number. If Henry can really do what he says, one person will own so many shares.
This means that he has veto power on LVMH's major decisions.
Of course, on MH’s side, no matter how many alliances there are, they can’t do whatever they want.
But the problem is that Henri Lacamière was enjoying himself, but he didn’t understand that “a biting dog never barks”.
In fact, what he said impulsively was a wake-up call for the other party.
Didn’t he say that he wanted to buy a veto power?
Bernard Arnault would definitely not allow it.
It turned out that it was too late but too soon. Bernard Arnault's hand really spread faster than the rumors.
And not only is he fast, he is also rich!
Within three days, Bernard Arnault spent US$600 million on behalf of the three parties to acquire shares in the open market regardless of cost.
The shares of LVMH under the company's name reached 37.5%, and he became the largest shareholder of LVMH, with the first veto power.
By this time, Henri Lacamier was really on the verge of tears.
If he was full of anger when he made bold words in the boardroom and formally declared war.
Now I feel so regretful that my intestines are blue.
It was like sitting on pins and needles, like a thorn in the back, like a lump in the throat!
And now that the situation has collapsed, what else can he do in this situation?
That was the only way left, so he decided to put aside his old face and seek help from his old friends.
(End of this chapter)