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kennethresearch · 3 years

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Global Conductive Carbon Black Market, June 2021 Report On Report Size 2021 Growth, Share, Product Types and Application, Top Key Players with Sales, Price, Business Overview, SWOT Analysis 2030

In a recently published report, Global Conductive Carbon Black Market report for till 2030. The report further now discusses; the various strategies to be adopted or being adopted by the business players across the globe at various levels in the value chain. In view of the global economic slowdown, we further estimated that China, India, Japan and South Korea to recover fastest amongst all the countries in the Asian market. Germany, France, Italy, Spain to take the worst hit and this hit is expected to regain 25% by the end of 2021- Positive Growth in the economic demand and supply.

U S Market recovers fast; In a release on May 4th 2021, the U.S. Bureau and Economic Analysis and U.S. Census Bureau mention the recovery in the U.S. International trade in March 2021. Exports in the country reached $200 billion, up by $12.4 billion in Feb 2021. Following the continuous incremental trend, imports tallied at $274.5 billion, picked up by $16.4 billion in Feb 2021. However, as COVID19 still haunts the economies across the globe, year-over-year (y-o-y) average exports in the U.S. declined by $7.0 billion from March 2020 till March 2021 whilst imports increased by $20.7 billion during the same time. This definitely shows how the market is trying to recover back and this will have a direct impact on the Healthcare/ICT/Chemical industries, creating a huge demand for Global Conductive Carbon Black Market products.

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It is also anticipated to grow on account of the growing demand for chemicals from the end users, backed by the increasing consumption of chemicals across different industries and the rising need for advanced chemicals. In India, the production of major chemicals and petrochemicals during the period 2020-2021 was close to 12000 thousand MT. Additionally, between the period 2015-16 and 2019-20, the production of the chemicals and petrochemicals in the nation grew at a CAGR of close to 6%.

Global Conductive Carbon Black Market is valued approximately at USD 136.36 million in 2019 and is anticipated to grow with a healthy growth rate of more than 7.5% over the forecast period 2020-2026. The market growth is primarily driven by increasing demand across end-user industries such as paints & coatings and plastics industries across various developing regions of the world. Additionally, growth in research and development activities by market players to attain desirable characteristics of conductive carbon black material according to need of diverse end-user industries are likely to boost the growth of the market in the coming future. However, high cost associated with the conductive carbon black than conventional carbon black and presence of alternative such as silica, are expected to hamper the market growth. Conductive carbon black is used for increasing the electrical conductivity of the material in electrical devices and appliances. Improving the material’s conductivity increases its mechanical properties and strength. Both these factors are expected to fuel the growth of the black carbon conductive industry in the coming years. Globally, producers in the conductive carbon black market are concentrating on opening up new subsidiaries and are purchasing business shares and other production firms to satisfy the growing demand from different end-use industries. For instance, in 2019, Tokai Carbon, along with its affiliates COBEX Polka sp., COBEX Shanghai Ltd. and COBEX GmbH, successfully purchased 100 per cent shares of COBEX Holdco GmbH. The regional analysis of CNC Milling Machines market is considered for the key regions such as Asia Pacific, North America, Europe, Latin America and Rest of the World. In Asia Pacific and Latin America, the conductive carbon black industries are spending heavily in research and growth. The future development of the plastics and automotive industries in the Asia Pacific countries is projected to boost the region’s conductive black carbon market.

Major market player included in this report are: AkzoNobe (Nouryon) Birla Carbon Orion Engineered Carbons S.A. Imerys Graphite & Carbon Switzerland SA. Cabot Corporation Tokai Carbon Company Limited Ampacet Corporation Phillips Carbon Black Limited Denka Denki Kagaku Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha Asbury Carbons, Inc. The objective of the study is to define market sizes of different segments & countries in recent years and to forecast the values to the coming eight years. The report is designed to incorporate both qualitative and quantitative aspects of the industry within each of the regions and countries involved in the study. Furthermore, the report also caters the detailed information about the crucial aspects such as driving factors & challenges which will define the future growth of the market. Additionally, the report shall also incorporate available opportunities in micro markets for stakeholders to invest along with the detailed analysis of competitive landscape and product offerings of key players. The detailed segments and sub-segment of the market are explained below: By Application: Plastics Battery Electrodes Paints & Coatings Rubber Others By Region: North America U.S. Canada Europe UK Germany Asia Pacific China India Japan Latin America Brazil Mexico Rest of the World

Furthermore, years considered for the study are as follows:

Historical year – 2016, 2017, 2018 Base year – 20198 Forecast period – 2020 to 2026

Target Audience of the CNC Milling Machines Market in Market Study:

Key Consulting Companies & Advisors Large, medium-sized, and small enterprises Venture capitalists Value-Added Resellers (VARs) Third-party knowledge providers Investment bankers Investors

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The report further discusses the market opportunity, compound annual growth rate (CAGR) growth rate, competition, new technology innovations, market players analysis, government guidelines, export and import (EXIM) analysis, historical revenues, future forecasts etc. in the following regions and/or countries:

North America (U.S. & Canada) Market size, Y-O-Y growth, Market Players Analysis & Opportunity Outlook

Latin America (Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Rest of Latin America) Market size, Y-O-Y growth & Market Players Analysis & Opportunity Outlook

Europe (U.K., Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Hungary, Belgium, Netherlands & Luxembourg, NORDIC, Poland, Turkey, Russia, Rest of Europe) Market size, Y-O-Y growth Market Players Analys & Opportunity Outlook

Asia-Pacific (China, India, Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, Australia, New Zealand, Rest of Asia-Pacific) Market size, Y-O-Y growth & Market Players Analysis & Opportunity Outlook

Middle East and Africa (Israel, GCC (Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman), North Africa, South Africa, Rest of Middle East and Africa) Market size, Y-O-Y growth Market Players Analysis & Opportunity Outlook

About Kenneth Research

Kenneth Research is a reselling agency providing market research solutions in different verticals such as Automotive and Transportation, Chemicals and Materials, Healthcare, Food & Beverage and Consumer Packaged Goods, Semiconductors, Electronics & ICT, Packaging, and Others. Our portfolio includes set of market research insights such as market sizing and market forecasting, market share analysis and key positioning of the players (manufacturers, deals and distributors, etc), understanding the competitive landscape and their business at a ground level and many more. Our research experts deliver the offerings efficiently and effectively within a stipulated time. The market study provided by Kenneth Research helps the Industry veterans/investors to think and to act wisely in their overall strategy formulation

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aapnugujarat1 · 4 years

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Soros and India

By: Chitra Patel Is George Soros angry with Modi or with his failed ambitions? Billionaire Philanthropist George Soros recently delivered a speech in Davos where he accused Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi of creating a Hindu National State and threatening to deprive millions of Muslims for their citizenship. But who George Soros exactly is and what are his connections to India? In 1969, George Soros started hedge fund management and eventually grew through the European Exchange Rate Mechanism in 1992 where he sold short more than $10 Billion in pounds profiting for $1 Billion. He is tagged as the ‘the man who broke Back of England’ and caused Black Wednesday. With this profit he started “Open Society Foundation” George Soros developed he theory of reflexivity which states that “market values are often driven by fallible ideas of participants, not only by economic fundamental situations”. Ideas and events influence each other in reflexive feedback loops. In short, theory of reflexivity is a redefined and implementable session of psychological war. This is the reason Soros is regarded as ‘the puppet master’ of various global controversies and crises. George Soros: Financial Spectator, Stock Investor, Philanthropist and Liberal Political Activist. Soros first visited India in December 2006, where he described India as a favourable nation with tremendous opportunities. He declared that he will be investing in India. In 2008, Soros Economic Development Fund (SEDF), Omidyar Network and Google.org announced $17 Million to small to medium enterprise companies for India – “Song Investment” at Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad. In 2010, Soros bought 4% stake in Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) from Dubai Holdings. Twilight Saga – Soros and Omidyar It is believed that 2014 National Elections was funded by Omidyar Network India in support of Modi Government. Jayant Sinha, profiled as Venture Capitalist, Senior Advisor and Independent Director was the Director of Omidyar Network India that time, was also a BJP candidate (Winner) from Hazaribagh, Jharkhand, India. Open Society Foundation was in the list of 11000 banned foreign NGOs by the Indian Government in 2014-15 session. This might have triggered the hatred of Soros towards Modi as his foundation was involved heavily in Indian NGOs and SMEs. More importantly Soros criticised Modi for specially banning Christian NGOs, he also said that Modi’s vision is to eliminate every community from India other than Hindus as he himself originated from RSS, a Hindu devoted organization. The Make Over – Aspada Aspada was founded in 2009 and believed to be managing $100 Million in capital. In 2011, Aspada Foundation acquired Song, majority stakes of which were owned by SEDF. In 2013, Aspada Foundation committed $10 million to early stage businesses to make education, healthcare, and financial services more accessible to low-income people in India. Aspada also invested in agricultural supply chain companies in an effort to support small holder farmers. Aspada Foundation received that $10 million from the Soros Economic Development Fund (SEDF) and worked to promote economic opportunity and sustainable impact in India. In 2014, they committed additional $15 Million to Aspada. Additionally, in March same year, it invested Rs 10 crore in Mumbai-based non-banking financial company Neo Growth Credit, a NBFC firm funded by Aspada. In 2019, LGT Group, the largest family-owned private banking and asset management group, originally known as The Liechtenstein Global Trust, owned by the Princely House of Liechtenstein, acquired the majority stakes of Aspada from SEDF. Aspada is now LGT Lightstone Aspada but with the same ‘so called’ visionary approach as Soros. Rooted in 90’s In 1994, George Soros and his offshore company Quantum Fund were in India, obviously looking for some easy form of cash. Then Soros Fund Management (SFM), reputed to be one of the world's leading fund managers, had already taken up a 33% stake in its tie-up with the GIC Mutual Fund. Another Soros company, Chatterjee Petrochemicals Ltd. (CPL), run by a Soros money handler, Purnendu Chatterjee, has secured 25% equity in Haldia Petrochemicals Ltd., a 36-billion-rupee project near Calcutta. There were also reports that the Quantum Fund NMV, a Netherlands Antilles-based investment house, was picking up stocks from the Bombay stock exchange. Soros's procurement of 33% of the GIC Mutual Fund and investment in the Bombay stock exchange was no surprise, since Soros was considered as “a shark who follows money instead of blood”. But the CPL's procurement of the 25% equity in Haldia Petrochemicals Ltd. offered a clear insight into how the Soros operation functions. According to the reports of Ramtanu and Susan Maitra (renown journalist/authors), the CPL frontman was on Purnendu Chatterjee, a New York-based entrepreneur with ethnic ties into West Bengal. Chatterjee was given a boost by the local media as an investor par excellence, and, in due time, he made contact with the ostensibly Marxist Chief Minister of West Bengal, Jyoti Basu. Basu, whose British connections were always underplayed, went through with the deal without really checking the pedigree of the CPL, Soros, Quantum Fund, et al. As Ramtanu and Susan Indian puts it, it was a case of "naïve cunningness" on Chatterjee's part. The Economic Times, a leading daily, was asked on Aug. 17, 1994 that why CPL's mysterious silence about the source of its funding was ignored, The paper reported that Chatterjee had acquired a poor reputation because of his troubles with the American Securities Exchange Commission, and it evinced surprise that he had developed direct contact with the West Bengal chief minister, Jyoti Basu. It would not be the first time in India that non-resident Indian investors, under the guise of giving back to their country some profit of their labour elsewhere, had taken the country for a ride. However, the Indian government's avowed commitment to "globalization" and free-market liberalization, and obsession with money, will no doubt bring more of the sharks like Soros into this rather desperate economic scene. But Soros, whose Quantum Fund N.V. board members include luminaries from such powerful financial operators as N.M. Rothschild and Sons merchant bankers and London based St. James Place Capital, has also been linked to the underground. According to reports from US State Department officials, Quantum Fund raised a huge amount of money to demolish European monetary stability in 1992. During this operation, such well-known criminals as Marc Rich, a fugitive metals and oil dealer now based in Switzerland, and Israeli arms merchant Saul Eisenberg were silent investors, along with a third Soros partner, Rafi Eytan, known as "Dirty Rafi," who had served in London previously as the Israeli Mossad's liaison to British intelligence. Offerings in 2000’s On 28 July 2010 SKS (www.sksindia.com), India’s largest microfinance institution (MFI) with 5.8 million clients, became the first MFI in India to float its shares through an initial public offering (IPO).1 The IPO was successful by any financial market standard: the offering was 13 times oversubscribed and attracted leading investment groups, such as Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, and George Soros’ Quantum Fund. Also, in 2010 The Indian state of Andhra Pradesh experienced a staggering 200 suicides by farmers in land. It was believed that SKS Microfinance which gave them loans was somehow credible. An 18-year-old girl drank pesticide after she was forced to hand over money meant for an exam fee, leaving a note, “Work hard and earn money. Do not take loans.” Later that year SKS secured an initial US$64 million from a group of 18 anchor investors who agreed to buy 18 percent of the offering at the top of the offering window of INR 985 per share. The anchors included JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, India ICICI Prudential, Reliance Mutual Fund, and George Soros’ Quantum Fund. Connection to India India’s peculiar Ideology of democracy and the population boom provides potential market attracts businessmen all over the world. It is suspected that the Indian Economy is not being driven by India’s policies or Government, it is more to do with such ‘Internal Businessman’ like George Soros. Like Hillary Clinton in United States (2006 Elections), George Soros through hid numerous ventures, was one of the major funder/donors for Prime Minister Modi. “Not so Digital India” Under PM Modi’s vision of Digital India, The Government of India introduced biometric-based identification (AADHAR), a Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to help citizens of India enjoy services like opening a bank account, filing tax returns, and availing rations swiftly by digitally authenticating their identity. A team of researchers from the Indian School of Business (ISB) and Digital Identity Research Initiative (DIRI) investigates and monitors the back-end servers of UIDAI. DIRI, launched in 2017, is funded by Omidyar Network India and in 2019 they had given a grant of $1.8 Million to DIRI and committed $500000 more for future grants. “Open Society and Ford Foundation – Under FCRA Scrutiny and Anti-India” George Soros financed radical environmental groups partnering in “Global Climate Strike” to the tune of nearly $25 million. At least 22 of the left-wing activist groups listed as partners in the Global Climate Strike received $24,854,592 in funding from liberal billionaire George Soros between 2000-2017 through his Open Society Network. Among the organizations receiving Soros funding were Fund for Global Human Rights, Global Green Grants Fund, 350.org, Amnesty International, Avaaz, Colour of Change, and People’s Action. Each of these groups has climate-related agendas and goals spanning from reducing global carbon emissions to less than 350 parts per million and 100 percent “clean energy,” to the elimination of new fossil fuel projects and a “green civil rights movement.” The group 350.org, founded by Bill McKibben in 2008, has fought against coal power in India. It is not clear how much funding the Global Climate Strike has actually received from these groups or in total. And, of course, Soros’ funding is over 18 years, so the numbers highlighted are not immediately relevant. But what the investigation does show is how the Strike is being funded by a wide range of left-wing foundations, many of which in turn have relied on Soros money at some stage in the past. This is the list of the relevant Soros donations:

Most of the organisations mentioned above were listed in the banned NGOs under FCRA act by Indian Government in 2014. Open Society has also funded US based NGO Greenpeace, which came under heavy scrutiny by the Indian Government in 2014, which claimed that the NGO’s activities, research, and peaceful protests were “working against the economic progress of the country.” Greenpeace’s FCRA registration was then cancelled in August 2015 due to alleged failure to disclose the movement of funds properly. This cancellation was seen by many observers as heralding a new phase in the interpretation of FCRA regulations wherein the Government of India altered the definition of activities considered harmful to the national interest. The Ford Foundation has faced similar challenges. In March 2015, the foundation was placed in the “prior permission” category after the MHA reportedly found that it was funding non-FCRA registered NGOs, a violation of Section 7 of the FCRA. Earlier that year, the Gujarat government filed a complaint with the MHA that the Ford Foundation’s funded “anti-India” activities of two NGOs–Sabrang Trust and Citizens for Justice and Peace and requested that the FCRA registration of these two NGOs be cancelled. After several months of seeking ministry clearance to process any foreign contributions, the Ford Foundation was taken off the government watch list and was granted the ability to fund its affiliates after registering under the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA), which falls under the jurisdiction of the finance ministry and maintains even tighter regulations that that of FCRA. Read the full article

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beertengoku · 5 years

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{:en}What comes first – the brewery or the beer? In this day and age, with contract breweries making beer for others, and phantom breweries popping up at different breweries to make a beer before going elsewhere, it’s not a straightforward question. Moreover, if you’ve dealt with any Japanese official then you’ll have been met with bureaucracy galore.

Far Yeast Brewing may seem like a relatively new brewery compared to others in Japan; however, their Kagua range of beers gave them a good head start in the craft beer industry in Japan. And also an unusual route into getting their beers sold around the world too. However, their beer came before a brewery was established and it’s interesting to see how Yamada-san, owner of Far Yeast Brewing Company, started his long and storied road into making craft beer, owning a company that exports craft beer from Japan and also overseas, as well as a bar in Shibuya.

Yamada-san had worked as a venture capitalist, and had been involved in internet start-up companies in Japan. He was studying for an MBA in 2005 at Cambridge when Baron Bilimoria, himself a Cambridge graduate, came to deliver a presentation to students at Judge College on the Cobra Beer operation. Yamada was already knowledgeable about beer in Europe after having visited Belgium and Munich – two European powerhouses of beer. Listening to Bilimoria talk Cobra Beer and how it is suited to Indian cuisine (its low carbonation and soft flavours pair nicely with a spicy curry), Yamada-san had an idea – how about a beer brewed to pair with Japanese food? While Asahi Super Dry may be well known outside of Japan for its clean (or some might say bland) taste, it does not pair with the often delicate flavours found in Japanese food.

After numerous attempts, making adjustments along the way, Yamada-san chose two adjuncts to be used: sanshō, (Japanese pepper), and yuzu (Japanese citron). Both of these ingredients are often used in Japanese cooking, with sansho used as a sprinkling on kabayaki-unagi (broiled eel) and sometimes yakitori (grilled chicken). It is also one of the seven ingredients of shichimi, Japanese seven spice. Yuzu peel is often used as a garnish for dishes, while its flesh is used in ponzu sauce.

Starting out as Nippon Craft Beer Company in 2011, and with these two flavours, the Kagua range was born. However, working from his apartment meant that a brewery was needed to make these beers. For this he contacted De Graal brewery in East Flanders, on the edge of the Flemish Ardennes. As sansho and yuzu are indigenous to Japan, these are picked and then flown over to Belgium. Once the Kagua beers are made, they are then exported to Japan and other countries.

Yet, this wasn’t enough for Yamada-san. The Kagua (馨和, which translates to “Japanese aroma”) range of beers are often viewed as being Belgian and not Japanese – simply because they are brewed in Belgium. Therefore, Yamada-san began looking for a brewery in Japan to make a range of craft beer for the Japanese market, brewed in Japan.

In 2015, the Nippon Craft Beer Company decided to change their name. The name “Far Yeast” originates from the craft beer brand the company launched in April 2013, which served as the follow-up to its first brand, Kagua. The thinking was that, as Japan is often referred to as being in the “Far East” by those in Europe (the birthplace of beer), the company aimed to deliver great beers from this “far east” place. This explains not only why the company named one of its beers Far Yeast, but it also describes the overall philosophy of the company.

Sonata village, located in Yamanashi, is probably a new name to all but the most knowledgeable of Japanese villages. On the day of our interview, it also proved to be one of the most inaccessible too – with power lines down, and fallen trees lining the roads after a massive typhoon hit Kanto. Yet, this village was home to one of Japan’s largest car navigation manufacturers too. The building was lying empty when Yamada-san came across it. it filled both criteria for a brewery – it was close to Tokyo, and also cheap.

With the license obtained in 2017, Far Yeast Brewing named the brewery Genryu Brewery (The Headwaters Brewery) and started off with a simple line of a Belgian style IPA, Tokyo Blonde and Tokyo White. All of the beers produced use local groundwater from the River Tama. These beers come in a variety of labels too, with the beers sold in the local area branded with a label found only in the area, while those sold outside of the village having a different labels.

Stepping inside the brewery was an unusual experience. There main office seemed like a community centre, with some long fold-out tables and chairs being used for desks, while inside the brewery itself, the layout of the brewery itself is a remnant of the car navigation factory. With ceiling height restricting placement of the mash and hot liquor tuns, as well as the fermenters, everything is at the front of the building. The back and sides of the brewery are more interesting, as Yamada-san explained the future of the brewery. With the barrel aging program and also sours deemed a success both commercially and with feedback from customers, some of the brewery has been set aside to allow an expansion, with the potential for more barrels. The bottling system has also increased in size, with an eye for a canning line too.

Far Yeast Brewing Company are also working hard to get their beers into smaller places that might not be your first choice to drink craft beer. Kirin approached them to make beers for their Tap Marche system, and the 4L PET Bottles used for the system can also be spotted around the brewery, with chilled filled ones wrapped up in black cellophane wrap to stop skunking from light. While craft beer lovers may not be fans of the system, it’s going to certainly challenge the method of how beers are delivered and sold.

The staff at Far Yeast Brewing also have an equal say into the recipes of the beers made too. A democratic process that allows everyone to come up with an idea, and also helps out during the brewing process too. All of the staff take turns in the various stages of brewing beer – from mashing to bottling, measuring to cleaning, and PR too.

Far Yeast Brewing Company are ubiquitous at beer festivals across Japan, and all the members on the team go to as many festivals and events as their schedules allow. There is a two-fold reason for this: getting the Far Yeast Brewing brand out as much as possible but also trying to get as much feedback from drinkers as possible. While the brewing process is democratic, getting feedback is vital to improving their beers according to Yamada-san. There have also been numerous collaborations with breweries and communities, both domestically and overseas. These beers have also been used to test out new techniques, such as barrel aging using red and white wine barrel, kettle sours using cherries, and peaches, gose, and also pine needles.

The final piece in the Far Yeast Brewing Company lineup is the taproom located in Shibuya called Far Yeast Tokyo Craft Beer & Bao. The bar opened in 2017 and specialises in bao, a steamed soft bun with a variety of fillings inside, with the full Far Yeast Brewing lineup on tap., has grown to host a variety of events, from special magazine events to music nights. Due to licensing laws, though, it’s not possible to buy bottles to take home. While Yamada-san didn’t give anything away with regards to expansion of the chain, there was a wry smile on his face as talked about the possibility of it.

With plans for collaboration beers and also further expansion into different brewing styles, Far Yeast Brewing’s change from a phantom brewery to one with a physical location and firm plans for the future goes at odds with how many breweries in Japan started. The evolving lineup and collaboration is going to be exciting to see.{:}{:ja}何が最初に来るか – 醸造所かビールか？契約醸造所が他の人のためにビールを製造し、ファントム醸造所が別の醸造所に現れてビールを製造しているこの時代には、それは簡単な質問ではありません。さらに、もしあなたが日本の役人と話をしたことがあれば、あなたは官僚主義に遭遇したことでしょう。

ファーイーストブルーイングは、日本の他の醸造所と比べて比較的新しい醸造所のように思えるかもしれません。しかし、彼らの「馨和」のビールは日本のクラフトビール業界で良いスタートを切りました。そしてまた彼らのビールを世界中で売る珍しいルートも。

しかし、彼らのビールはビール醸造所の設立前にやってきて、ファーイーストブルーイングのオーナーである山田さんがいかにしてクラフトビールを製造するようになり、クラフトビールを国内外から輸出している会社だけでなく渋谷のバーを経営しているのを知るのは興味深いことです。

山田さんはベンチャーキャピタリストとして働いていて、日本のインターネットスタートアップ企業に関わっていました。彼が2005年にケンブリッジでMBAのために勉強していたときに、ケンブリッジの卒業生であるBaron Bilimoria がCobra Beerの運営についてJudge Collegeの学生にプレゼンテーションを行いました。山田さんは2つのヨーロッパのビールの大国であるベルギーとミュンヘンを訪問した後だったので、ヨーロッパのビールについてすでに知識がありました。

山田さんはBilimoriaの、Cobra Beerがインド料理にどのように適しているか（その低炭酸とソフトな風味がスパイシーなカレーと相性が良い）、という話を聞き、日本の料理と合わせるビールはどうだろうと考えました。アサヒスーパードライは、その清潔な（または口当たりの良いと言う人もいるかもしれない）味で日本の外でよく知られているかもしれませんが、それは日本の食べ物に見られるしばしば繊細な風味と対になりません。

山田さんは何度も試みて、途中で調整を加えながら、使用する付加物として山椒と柚子の2つを選びました。どちらも日本の料理によく使われています。山椒は、蒲焼きうなぎ、焼き鳥などに振りかけています。日本の七味の7つの成分の一つです。ゆずの皮は料理の飾りとしてよく使われ、その果肉はポン酢で使われます。

2011年に日本クラフトビールカンパニーとして始まり、これら2つのフレーバーで、「馨和」蚊ぐわシリーズが誕生しました。しかし、彼のアパートから仕事をすることは、これらのビールを作るために醸造所が必要であることを意味しました。このために彼は、Flemish Ardennesの端にあるEast FlandersのDe Graal醸造所に連絡しました。山椒と柚子は日本固有のものであるため、これらをベルギーに送りました。 Kaguaビールが作られると、それらは日本や他の国々に輸出されます。

しかし、山田さんにはこれだけでは不十分でした。 Kagua（馨和、「日本の香り」と言います）のビールは、ベルギー産で、日本産ではないと見なされることが多いのですが、それは単にベルギーで醸造されているからです。そのため、山田さんは日本で醸造された日本市場向けのクラフトビールを作るために日本で醸造所を探し始めました。

2015年、日本クラフトビールカンパニーは社名変更を決定しました。「ファーイースト」という名前は、2013年4月に創業したクラフトビールブランドに由来し、最初のブランドである「馨和」の後継となりました。考えは、日本がヨーロッパ（ビールの発祥地）の人々によって「Far Yeast（極東）」にいるとしばしば言われるので、会社がこの「ファーイースト（極東）」の場所から素晴らしいビールを届けることを目的としていくということでした。これは、同社がそのビールの1つをFar Yeastに指定した理由だけでなく、会社の全体的な哲学についても説明しています。

山梨にある其方村Sonata Villageは、おそらく日本の村を最もよく知っている人以外は誰にでも新しい名前でしょう。私たちのインタビューの日には、それがまた最もアクセスし辛いものの1つであることが証明されました。そして、巨大な台風が関東を襲った後に倒れた木が道を塞いでいました。それでも、この村は日本最大のカーナビゲーションメーカーの本拠地でした。山田さんがそれに出会ったとき、建物は空っぽでした。それは醸造所の両方の基準を満たしていました – 東京に近く、そしてまた安価でした。

2017年に取得したライセンスで、ファーイーストブルーイングは醸造所を源流ブルワリーと名付け、ベルギースタイルのIPAと東京ブロンドと東京ホワイトのラインナップから始めました。生産されたすべてのビールは、多摩川の地元の地下水を利用しています。これらのビールにはさまざまなラベルがあり、地元で販売されているビールにはその地域でしか見られないラベルが付いていますが、村外で販売されているビールには異なるラベルが付いています。

ビール醸造所の中に足を踏み入れるのは珍しい経験でした。醸造所自体の内部には、醸造所自体のレイアウトはカーナビゲーション工場の名残でありながら、本部のオフィスはコミュニティセンターのように見え、机には長い折りたたみ式のテーブルと椅子が使用されていました。天井の��さがマッシュやホットリカーの醸造桶、発酵槽の配置を制限しているので、すべてが建物の正面にあります。

山田さんが醸造所の将来について説明したように、醸造所の裏と側面はもっと面白いです。樽熟成プログラムとまた商業的にそして顧客からのフィードバックの両方で成功し、醸造所のいくつかはより多くの樽の可能性と共に拡大を可能にするために取りおかれました。ボトリングシステムもサイズが大きくなり、缶詰めラインにも注目しています。

ファーイーストブルーイングはまた、クラフトビールを飲むことがあなたの最初の選択ではないかもしれない小さい場所に彼らのビールを入れるために一生懸命働いています。キリンは彼らのTap Marcheシステムのためにビールを作るように彼らに働きかけました、そして、システムのために使われる4L PETボトルはまた醸造所で見ることができます。クラフトビール愛好家はシステムのファンではないかもしれませんが、それは確かにビールがどのように配達されそして売られるかの方法に挑戦することになるでしょう。

ファーイーストブルーイングのスタッフも、作ったビールのレシピについて同じように言っています。みんながアイデアを思いつくことを可能にし、また醸造プロセスの間にも手助けする民主的なプロセス。スタッフ全員がビールの醸造から瓶詰め、計量、清掃、広報まで、さまざまな段階で役割を担当します。

ファーイーストブルーイングは日本中のビール祭りに参加しています、そして、チームのすべてのメンバーは彼らのスケジュールが許す限り多くの祭りやイベントに行きます。これには2つの理由があります。ファーイーストブルーイングブランドをできるだけ多く出すことですが、できるだけ多くの飲酒者からフィードバックを得ようとすることです。山田さんによると、醸造プロセスは民主的ですが、フィードバックを得ることは彼らのビールを向上させるために不可欠です。

国内外で醸造所や地域社会とのコラボレーションも数多くあります。赤ワインや白ワインの樽を使ったバレルエージング、チェリー、ゴーぜや松の木を使ったケトルサワーなどの新しいテクニックを試すこともできます。

ファーイーストブルーイングのラインナップの最後のピースは、ファーイースト東京クラフトビールとバオと呼ばれる渋谷にあるタップルームです。 2017年にオープンしたバーでは、バオという豊富な種類の詰め物を入れた蒸した柔らかいパンと、ファーイーストブルーイングのフルラインナップを用意しています。特別な雑誌のイベントから音楽の夜まで、さまざまなイベントを開催します。ただし、免許法により、持ち帰り用にボトルを購入することはできません。山田さんはチェーンの拡大に関して何も譲っていませんでしたが、その可能性について話されているように彼の顔には笑顔がありました。

コラボレーションビールの計画とさまざまな醸造スタイルへのさらなる拡大により、ファーイーストブルーイングはファントム醸造所から物理的な場所を持つ醸造所への変更と将来のための確固たる計画が日本の醸造所の開始数と相反します。進化するラインナップとコラボレーションを見ると楽しくなるでしょう。{:}

Far Yeast Brewing Company Interview・ファーイーストブルーイングのインタビュー {:en}What comes first - the brewery or the beer? In this day and age, with contract breweries making beer for others, and phantom breweries popping up at different breweries to make a beer before going elsewhere, it’s not a straightforward question.

#Chubu Brewery #Far Yeast Brewing Company #Yamanashi Brewery

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ramialkarmi · 7 years

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'Do you want to see the car?': The story of the day that Tesla stunned the world (TSLA, F)

In early 2016, Ford was intensely preparing to stage a history-repeating assault on the 24 Hours of Le Mans in France.

With two teams and four new Ford GT race cars competing in both North America and Europe, the goal was to grab a win at the grueling endurance competition and remind the world of Ford's 1-2-3 triumph in 1966 over Ferrari — 50 years before.

But while Ford and Chip Ganassi Racing were battling it out on the track, another challenge was taking shape.

In California, Tesla CEO Elon Musk was preparing to pull the cover off his long-awaited Model 3 mass-market vehicle — a car intended to show the auto industry that Tesla was ready to take its disruption to a whole new level.

In this excerpt from Business Insider Senior Correspondent Matthew DeBord's book "Return to Glory: The Story of Ford's Revival and Victory in the Toughest Race in the World" (Atlantic Monthly Press), we get a front-row seat at the Model 3 reveal, a vehicle that began production this week — and watch as Ford and the rest of the 100-year-old car business try to respond.

And so it begins ...

On a balmy March evening in Los Angeles, just three months before the most advanced Ford race car ever built would take to the Circuit de la Sarthe in France, Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk took to a stage at his electric-car start-up’s design center, just a few miles south of Hollywood and the American cinematic dream factory.

Musk was there to pull the cover off a dream that had nothing to do with movie magic. Instead, he sauntered onstage dressed entirely in black and, after some awkward jokes, made a few comments about the impending catastrophe of global warming—one of the multi-billionaire’s overriding personal preoccupations and the reason he bought into Tesla in 2004 after making $180 million when eBay acquired PayPal, the electronic payments service he had cofounded. He then proceeded to preside over the rollout of Tesla’s much-anticipated Model 3, a mass-market electric vehicle that would sell for $35,000 when it hit Tesla’s showrooms in 2017.

Tesla was already selling a pair of game-changing cars: the Model S sedan, which in its most advanced configuration, equipped with the “Ludicrous” acceleration mode, could scorch a zero-to-sixty run in less than three seconds, outrunning supercars from Ferrari and Lamborghini; and the Model X SUV, with its exotic, up-swinging “falcon wing” doors and “bioweapon defense mode” air-filtration system. But these long-range electric vehicles (EVs) sold for $100,000 and up, to a well-heeled elite, including Silicon Valley venture capitalists and titans of finance.

That certainly created useful cash flow for Tesla (if not profits), but it didn’t suit Musk’s grand vision, which was to accelerate humanity’s transition from the era of fossil fuels—an era that had filled the atmosphere with carbon, disrupting weather patterns, and making the planet hotter. In early December 2015, Musk gave a speech at the Sorbonne in Paris, in connection with the United Nations Climate Summit, in which he called governments’ reluctance to tax the generation of atmospheric carbon the “dumbest science experiment in history” and “madness.” He went on to call for a global carbon tax, as he had done several times before.

No chief executive of a traditional automaker would even consider giving a speech like the one Musk delivered, although several have raised the suggestion that car companies—as producers of a technology that alongside burning coal to generate electricity contributes much of the carbon in the atmosphere—should be part of the sweeping solution.

The multi-trillion-dollar global auto industry has found itself smack at the center of what can’t be responsibly characterized anymore as a debate. Unfortunately, despite the fact that the majority of car executives aren’t global-warming deniers, there are more than a billion vehicles on the roads worldwide, and automakers continue to build millions of new cars and trucks every year. If they stop, or attempt to radically convert to manufacturing vast fleets of Tesla-like vehicles, they’ll rapidly go bankrupt.

They are, however, not stupid. Gasoline is simply the most convenient fuel for their products currently. Almost without exception, the world’s car companies are trying to move in a Teslaesque direction, if haltingly and on a rather small scale at the moment.

Elon Musk and his vision of the future

Musk bought into Tesla, eventually displacing cofounder Martin Eberhard in an unpleasant management coup, specifically to attack what he considers to be the biggest problem facing humanity. But he didn’t want to be boring. He reasoned that a sexy, fast electric car—such as the original Roadster Tesla soon produced—would shake EVs free of their “glorified golf cart” stigma and convince both buyers and investors to fund the demise of the internal-combustion engine.

Tesla began selling stock to the public in 2010, at seventeen dollars per share. A few years later, the Model S was launched; Motor Trend would name it Car of the Year in 2013. Tesla had endured numerous near-death experiences prior to the IPO, including an episode in 2008 that brought the company just weeks from bankruptcy. But once the Model S started selling, the accolades began rolling in—the luxurious EV, with its brisk acceleration, sharply minimalist looks, and huge central dashboard touchscreen, was a hit with the automotive media. The stock went, as they say on Wall Street, parabolic; in 2014, it would flirt with $300 per share, ensuring early investors a return of around 1,200 percent.

The financials would pitch and yaw wildly over the next two years, as investors tried to figure out when, if ever, the carmaker would make money and whether its innovations, including an astonishing self-driving autopilot feature, would completely disrupt an auto industry that had been selling largely gas-burning cars, and lots of them, for over a century.

But on that early evening in March, Musk was a conquering hero, a South Africa–born heir apparent to Henry Ford and the late Apple founder and CEO Steve Jobs. Musk’s other company, SpaceX, was taking care of another scope of his vision, the effort to make humans a “multi-planetary” species with a colony on Mars, the planet to which Musk said he would retire.

It is easy to understand why Musk, then forty-four, was a model for Robert Downey Jr.’s character Tony Stark in the "Iron Man" movies. He did cars. He did rockets. He even did solar energy in his role as the chairman of SolarCity, a company started by his cousins. (And acquired by Tesla in 2016 for $2.1 billion.) He was the superstar entrepreneur of Silicon Valley. Musk attacked huge problems head-on, like a technologist of old. And he was aware of just how quixotic his ambitions were. Starting a car company, he would say, is idiotic, and an electric-car company is idiocy squared.

An unprecedented number of preorders for the Model 3

What got Detroit’s attention that night wasn’t the Model 3 itself; the car had been much discussed for several years, and everyone knew what to expect in a smaller, less expensive Tesla. Rather, the star of the show was the preorder counter, displayed behind a bright red Model 3 on a huge screen on the stage.

Analysts had expected something like 150,000 Model 3s to be reserved, each with a $1,000 refundable deposit. By the time I took a photo of the counter at the event, it had crossed 174,000. In a month, 373,000 reservations would be logged, creating the potential for $13 billion to flow into Tesla’s needy coffers, assuming a relatively conservative average price of $35,000 for each sale. Who knows how many of those reservations will ultimately turn into sales? Even if only a quarter or a half of them do, it is still an impressive number and a testament to the potential demand.

"So, do you want to see the car?" Musk winkingly asked, before giving three preproduction versions of the car the stage.

A better question—and one that he would ask as the preorders surged—was, "How many of these cars can we actually build?"

The traditional auto industry is secretly obsessed with Tesla (and not-so-secretly obsessed in the first six months of 2017, when Tesla's market capitalization surged past $50 billion, topping Ford, GM, and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles — the Big Three had become the Big Four). Not since Preston Tucker, an innovator of the 1950s whose own quixotic life was chronicled in Francis Ford Coppola’s 1988 film "Tucker: The Man and His Dream," had anyone so thoroughly captivated the iconic world of the American automobile.

The CEOs of major auto companies tend to be either hard-charging, sharp-elbowed "car guys" or technocratic bean counters. Occasionally a major change agent such as Alan Mulally will come along, but many chief executives got to the big chair after decades of loyal service.

After Mark Fields got the CEO job at Ford in 2014, he freely admitted that the company had bought a Tesla Model S, taken it apart, and put it back together again. He later said the company would do likewise with the Model X SUV.

But even by the secretive standards of Tesla fascination, the Model 3 preorder palooza was earth-shattering. From Dearborn to Toyota City, the automakers just couldn’t believe it. The astounding number of deposits showed the intense desire to join the club that the brand represented. The only meaningful comparison to draw was with Apple. In the auto industry, you could say that Ferrari held a similar mystique, but Ferrari didn’t have the ambition to dethrone the gas-burning engine or sell half a million cars a year. Tesla did, and it was sort of appalling to mainstream auto executives.

Traditional automakers work desperately hard to capture and retain customers, spending billions to convince them to stick with certain brands and to advance through vehicle hierarchies, from inexpensive mass-market cars to pricey luxury rides. What was astonishing about Tesla’s Model 3 launch was that hundreds of thousands of buyers were happy to give Tesla an open-ended, no-interest cash loan, with no meaningful guarantee beyond Musk’s word that the cars would arrive on time.

Musk’s promises had a poor track record. Both the Model S and the Model X had suffered from production delays and early quality-control problems. In fact, Musk admitted that Tesla had been guilty of "hubris" in designing and engineering the Model X, which had many complicated features that slowed the assembly line. The doors had to be completely redesigned at the eleventh hour. The second-row seats turned out to be so complicated that Tesla would eventually take the supplier off the job and engineer this component itself.

Later, quality-control glitches would appear. The entire Model S fleet was voluntarily recalled in December 2015 because a seat-belt assembly could fail. The initial production run of the Model X, several thousand vehicles, would also be recalled because the third-row seats could pitch forward in a crash.

Much earlier, there had been battery fires with the Model S, and Tesla had been compelled to design a shielding system for the bottom of the car to prevent punctures of the battery pack. Tesla’s advanced electronics and software, while game changing in many respects, were buggy in the way that Silicon Valley code typically is (the ritual is to release the software and fix it later). In an annual dependability survey by J. D. Power and Associates conducted in 2016, Tesla owners reported so many problems that Tesla finished in the bottom five, undercutting the narrative that its vehicles were redefining the ownership experience with rapid software updates.

Even though Musk admitted that the Model X SUV was so advanced that Tesla “probably shouldn’t have built it,” his boundless gumption still captivated the industry.

Musk calls his own shots

In the traditional auto industry, Musk had only one prominent naysayer, former GM product guru Bob Lutz, who had worked for BMW and for Chrysler under Lee Iacocca before coming to GM and straddling the pre- and post-bankruptcy companies. I talked to Lutz about Tesla on several occasions between 2014 and 2016—once at the Detroit auto show in January 2016, when he was preparing to reveal a new American-made supercar venture with onetime Tesla competitor Henrik Fisker—and he was always unflinchingly equal in his praise for Tesla’s cars and his disdain for Musk’s management of the company.

Lutz’s attitudes toward global warming were controversial. While not exactly a climate-science denier, he was skeptical that taking internal-combustion engines off the road and replacing them with more expensive and less versatile electric cars was a solution. But that wasn’t what shaped his negative views of Tesla— he actually didn’t think that Tesla was doing a very good job of running its business. In a sense, he and Musk were on the same page: the cars were simply too difficult to build.

But with Ford’s and GM’s stock prices languishing, even as both carmakers notched steady and impressive profits through 2014 and 2015, executives grumbled about how easy it was for Musk to sell additional Tesla stock, which the carmaker did in both 2015 and 2016, raising almost $2 billion in the process. And even though Detroit had been sweepingly reinvented by the financial crisis, the familiar infighting and territorialism that have always defined the auto industry hadn’t disappeared.

In the 1980s, Detroit had endured the Japanese arrival in force in the U.S. market. The Big Three had been forced to adapt, to become more efficient, and to see their companies as large manufacturing and management teams, “flat structure” organizations, where the lowliest assembly-line worker had the power to stop production if he spotted a problem. Sure, Toyota and Honda continued to be extremely hierarchical, in the Japanese business tradition. But when it came to actually building cars, the “relentless pursuit of perfection,” to borrow a famous tagline from Toyota’s Lexus luxury brand, was a mandate that Detroit had to accept. Unsurprisingly, customers preferred cars that always started, didn’t rust out in a matter of years, and could be passed down from generation to generation, Dad’s Honda Accord becoming Junior’s college car.

Musk was a different animal—a leader who called, seemingly, all his own shots. He was initially ridiculed when he appointed himself as Tesla’s product architect, while at the same time having an experienced designer, Franz von Holzhausen, from Mazda, for the real aesthetic work, and JB Straubel overseeing how the cars were engineered at the nuts-and-bolts level. But then the Model S arrived, and with it dropped jaws and widespread media accolades.

Musk didn’t have to fight through a bureaucracy—he was the bureaucracy, and at Tesla, bureaucracy was the enemy. So if Musk wanted to ignore structure, he just did. He had a hardworking communications team, but if he had something to say, he took to Twitter, often at odd hours and on weekends, sending reporters scrambling. He had hardworking engineers, but if he wanted to make a change to a Tesla vehicle, he made it.

In Tesla’s required financial filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company never failed to cite the so-called “great man” risk: without Musk, Tesla would be in big trouble. The CEOs of big car companies think they have power, and they do. But Musk had power of a different order, as well as lots of stress.

Ford's fights to keep up

By the time Ford was turning practice laps at Le Mans in early June 2016, Musk was running a company that was a decade old. And he was under as much pressure to innovate as everyone else in the industry. Ironically, Ford was probably better prepared to manage the transformation in mobility that Tesla was helping to usher in.

In the face of a massive disruption to the accepted way of doing business, scale can be an invaluable asset. At base, Musk’s company was all about demonstrating that there was a paying buyership for its type of vehicle, reversing the thinking that had followed the demise of GM’s EV1 project from the 1990s, which had brought the first mass-produced electric car to market, but only in a limited way, via leasing.

When GM decided to conclude the program and crush all the EV1s, save a few historical examples, it was widely assumed that electric cars were once again going to be at best a sideline of the auto industry. (GM’s decision inspired the film "Who Killed the Electric Car?" which alleged that the carmaker had acted more to preserve itself from an electric revolution than to dispense with a money-losing experiment.)

Ford’s angle on transportation in the twenty-first century was the preoccupation of Bill Ford, who, once Alan Mulally took over as CEO, could concentrate on delivering a deeply counterintuitive message: that the company we credit with creating the mass-market automobile wanted to curtail its dependence on four wheels and an engine in the future.

The idea was really quite logical. Ford would become a mobility provider. If you needed to own a car, Ford would build one, and Ford dealers would sell it to you—and Ford would lend you the money to buy it. But if you didn’t want to own a car, Ford would provide you with transportation. And if you wanted any aspect of your mobility experience to be more pleasant or efficient, Ford would create—or partner with other companies to create—the information corridors to make that happen.

Ford began to tackle this process in earnest around 2010, and Fields made it a prominent part of his leadership pitch once he became CEO. It was a good fit. Fields had always been a forward-looking leader. (But not forward-looking enough; he would be ousted by Ford's board of directors in May of 2017, as the carmaker's stock price lagged. His replacement, former Steelcase CEO Jim Hackett, was a close confidant of Bill Ford and would undertake the major change in Ford's story.)

Scale can be a strength when a company is being actively disrupted, but the classic theory on the subject—articulated by Harvard Business School’s Clayton Christensen in his seminal book "The Innovator’s Dilemma"—says that size can protect for only so long. And that’s because new entrants can innovate much more rapidly than incumbents, even if the established business is itself actively trying to innovate.

The core problem—an advantage, actually, for smaller, newer companies—is that the very things that insulate the established player prevent it from moving fast enough. The critical sticking point is failure. Big companies can afford to fail, but they can’t undertake the failure process rapidly enough. And unless their businesses don’t require much cash for research and development, as is the case with software-driven internet firms, they can’t afford to invest in hundreds of over-the-horizon efforts.

For one thing, there’s a disincentive for companies that already have scale to do small stuff; it’s more cost-effective for them to simply buy up smaller companies. And for another, they can be undermined by competitive threats that are enabled by the newest technologies.

Silicon Valley wants to eat Detroit's lunch

It’s this second threat that was generating the biggest risks for Ford and its rivals in 2016.

The ride-sharing service Uber, founded in 2009, came on the scene with a brash, sharp-elbowed CEO named Travis Kalanick aiming to eliminate the taxi business in big cities.

By the time the Ford GT race cars were getting their first taste of the Circuit de la Sarthe, Uber was valued at a staggering $65 billion and had just taken a $3.5 billion investment from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, as the oil-rich nation sought to diversify beyond the natural resource that had transformed it into one of the world’s most influential and richest countries. (Tesla staged an impressive debit of self-driving technology in Pittsburgh in 2016, but in 2017, the company slid into crisis as workplace-culture issues dogged the startup and Kalanick was caught on video arguing with an Uber driver; the CEO later apologized, admitting that he need help overcoming the drawbacks his harsh style.)

Tesla shook up the traditional carmakers. But they could still figure out what Tesla was: an automaker with some high-tech credibility and electric motors, plus a charismatic leader. Uber was much harder to figure out. Pundits began to argue that with Uber, nobody—except for Uber drivers—would ever need to own a car again. And as self-driving cars accelerated their development, the drivers started to drop out of the picture. The future would consist of autonomous vehicles, owned as large fleets, appearing and disappearing as needed, dispatched by software.

Design, horsepower, speed, the automobile as an icon of freedom— that would all be relegated to the misty past, like stagecoaches and Conestoga wagons. All that would matter is that your pod-mobile appeared when summoned and that it moved you from point A to point B.

Automakers were far from sure that this—for them—dystopian future would come to pass, but they were determined to avoid a slide into irrelevance. GM began to move very aggressively in 2015 and 2016, investing $500 million in Uber’s competitor Lyft, buying up the assets of a mobility start-up called Sidecar, which had gone bankrupt, and most dramatically, buying an obscure self-driving outfit, Cruise Automation, for nearly $1 billion. By the end of 2016, Cruise’s self-driving technology would come to market under the GM banner, as the automaker began selling its Bolt EV, beating Tesla’s Model 3 by at least a year.

But Ford wasn’t hanging back. It created a small fleet of self-driving cars to perfect the technology, which by 2016 was mainly capable of letting drivers take their hands off the steering wheel for freeway driving, as long as they continued to monitor their vehicles. It was widely expected, however, that over the next decade, higher levels of autonomy would be rolled out, leading ultimately to the end of drivers behind the wheel.

The traditional auto industry is, in fact, pretty good at assessing risks. And the broadly held notion that it just wants to stick to the same old, same old, year after year, is simply false. The industry is far too competitive for anyone to avoid innovation; the carmakers that struggle to sell cars are the ones that are forced to starve their research-and-development budgets for too long.

The internal-combustion engine, introduced in the nineteenth century, had been perfected by the early twenty-first, through a process of continuous innovation undertaken by the global auto industry (the gazillion patents related to the internal-combustion engine were one of the reasons that critics often accused the industry of stalling on change).

In fact, a few start-ups in the early 2000s and 2010s were even trying to push the internal-combustion engine to breakthrough levels. A company called Transonic Combustion, which failed because it couldn’t make its technology adequately reliable, developed a fuel-injection system that upgraded gas-burning efficiency to unheard-of levels, with engines delivering 100 miles per gallon.

By early 2016, Ford felt awfully good about where it stood, in terms of preserving itself and embracing the future. The company even had an in-house futurist on staff, and had since before the financial crisis, to spot important trends before they became existential threats—or massive missed opportunities.

But as someone who had covered the company for a decade, and who had a front-row seat for everything happening in Silicon Valley thanks to my job at Business Insider, a website that obsessively monitors, analyzes, and reports on technology, I could tell that the pace of change and the multiplication of risk were picking up speed.

Ford had the right overarching idea, as expressed by Bill Ford. It had the right messages, as expressed by Mark Fields (and later, by Jim Hackett). And it had the right people: designers, engineers, and managers who were technologists at heart. Ford even set up shop in Silicon Valley, to be closer to the action.

But this was a global enterprise that employed tens of thousands—and that had to keep its core business cranking. That meant building a million F-150 pickup trucks every year, no small task. Even if 100 percent of the company knew that enormous disruptions were afoot, at best only 10 to 20 percent of the company could focus on Ford disrupting itself.

Detroit tries to disrupt itself

The scrappy companies that were undertaking the disruption, of course, could go all out on the effort. For them, there was no point in striving to survive—the only acceptable outcome was to make it big, to hit the jackpot, or to vanish completely.

In late 2015, I went to Detroit to interview GM CEO Mary Barra. The first woman to lead a major automaker, Barra said all the right things about how the 100-plus-year-old carmaker, and by association the industry that it was part of, would ride out all the new threats.

At GM headquarters in the Renaissance Center in downtown Detroit, sitting in Barra’s large and gracefully appointed but far from ostentatious office, I listened as she accepted the deluge of risk that was sweeping through the industry. Barra had spent her entire life at GM—her father had worked there, and GM was the only place she had ever worked.

"I can’t tell you what technology is going to exist in five years," she said. "All I can tell you is that if we sit here five years from today, it will be something that’s dramatically impacted the industry that we can’t even name right now."

I thought I was being lightly irreverent when I said to Barra that I hoped we could make a date to talk again then. But although she was amused, she wasn’t prepared to make light of what she was up against.

"We’re going to disrupt ourselves, and we are disrupting ourselves," she said, her voice unwavering after a nearly hourlong interview. "So we’re not trying to preserve a model of yesterday."

Ford’s Mark Fields unhesitatingly echoed Barra’s message. He came to Business Insider in March 2016, right before the New York auto show, and in an interview came right out with it. "There’s a lot of talk around technology companies disrupting the auto industry," he said. "Our approach is very simple: we’re disrupting ourselves." Before the year had ended, he would pledge Ford to get a fully self-driving car on the road by 2021.

To have the CEOs of the two largest U.S. automakers saying exactly the same thing within months of each other might sound like groupthink, but it isn’t. The auto industry has been unique not just in declaring a self-disruption and getting out ahead of the curve rhetorically, but in enacting that disruption as enthusiastically as possible, embedding a positive attitude toward new technology in everything it does.

For example, when Fields presided over the reveal of the new GT in early 2015, he stressed how advanced the supercar was—and that it was technology joined to emotion and history. Disruptive technologies made the new GT possible.

Don't forget the allure of an amazing car

And for what it’s worth, the GT is the pinnacle of Ford’s automotive technology. It is designed to go fast in the straight line and through the corners; crafted almost entirely from carbon fiber, the most advanced material in the carmaker’s manufacturing playbook; and powered by one of the most sophisticated engines Ford has ever built, the race-proven, turbocharged EcoBoost V-6. Styled to turn heads, on the street and on the track, it as an emblem, a new icon. Its reveal provided stirring evidence that Ford was back, and better than ever.

But it was also the culmination of a century of one type of thinking about cars. The GT was glorious. But all around it, the idea of a person in a machine going fast—the idea that was the animating spirit of the multi-trillion-dollar global auto industry—was being discarded.

In August 2016, Fields announced that Ford would have a small fleet of fully autonomous vehicles on the road by 2021, leapfrogging the more incremental approach to self-driving technology that Tesla and others were embracing. Both the established automakers and the newest of the new entrants anticipated that the driver would exit the stage in the future; at around the same time that Fields made his announcement, Uber rolled out its own driverless test fleet in Pittsburgh.

At one point, a year before the GT hit the floor at the 2015 Detroit auto show, I went on a drive with a company that offered seat time in some of the world’s most exotic and exciting cars. I sampled a Lamborghini, a Porsche, a Ferrari, a Maserati, an Aston Martin, and a Mercedes. My partner for the event was a former Ferrari owner, a young guy who knew and loved high-performance cars. We stopped several times during the day to switch vehicles. At around noon, the gorgeous machines were all lined up in the parking lot of a grocery store in the New Jersey suburbs. My partner had made money when a tech company he was part of was sold. He understood how fast things could change in the new century.

"Look," he said, gesturing toward the supercars, a few million bucks in the best the auto industry had to offer. "We aren’t going to see that for much longer."

Was he right? I wasn’t sure, even though I knew he was without question onto something. Everyone who built and sold cars for a living was trying to figure out what that something would mean. But for twenty-four hours in June 2016, we were going to forget all about disruptions and electric cars and self-driving vehicles and the twilight of the supercars. The best racing teams in the world were headed for a showdown at the toughest race in the world, and I knew I wasn’t the only one still excited by the raging machines, at an almost primordial level.

Read more about "Return to Glory" at matthewdebord.com.

Buy the book at Amazon.com.

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ramialkarmi · 7 years

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'So, do you want to see the car?': The story of the day that Tesla stunned the world (TSLA, F)

In early 2016, Ford was intensely preparing to stage a history-repeating assault on the 24 Hours of Le Mans in France.

But while Ford and Chip Ganassi Racing were battling it out on the track, another challenge was taking shape.

In this excerpt from Business Insider Senior Correspondent Matthew DeBord's book "Return to Glory: The Story of Ford's Revival and Victory in the Toughest Race in the World" (Grove Atlantic), we get a front-row seat at the Model 3 reveal — and watch as Ford and the rest of the 100-year-old car business try to respond.

And so it begins ...

Elon Musk and his vision of the future

An unprecedented number of preorders for the Model 3

"So, do you want to see the car?" Musk winkingly asked, before giving three preproduction versions of the car the stage.

A better question—and one that he would ask as the preorders surged—was, "How many of these cars can we actually build?"

Even though Musk admitted that the Model X SUV was so advanced that Tesla “probably shouldn’t have built it,” his boundless gumption still captivated the industry.

Musk calls his own shots

Ford's fights to keep up

Silicon Valley wants to eat Detroit's lunch

It’s this second threat that was generating the biggest risks for Ford and its rivals in 2016.

The ride-sharing service Uber, founded in 2009, came on the scene with a brash, sharp-elbowed CEO named Travis Kalanick aiming to eliminate the taxi business in big cities.

Detroit tries to disrupt itself

"We’re going to disrupt ourselves, and we are disrupting ourselves," she said, her voice unwavering after a nearly hourlong interview. "So we’re not trying to preserve a model of yesterday."

Don't forget the allure of an amazing car

"Look," he said, gesturing toward the supercars, a few million bucks in the best the auto industry had to offer. "We aren’t going to see that for much longer."

Read more about "Return to Glory" at matthewdebord.com.

Buy the book at Amazon.com.

Join the conversation about this story »

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