Just seen the news that Dressta are to be bought over by the chinese,b----r that it wont be too long before we're all reading out of the little red book. Sorry guys, did'nt realize Stock had put up a post earlier on the same subject Neil
So will they leave it in Poland or move it to the home land. Something else to add to the nevery buy list. To quote the chinese "The American's spent themselves silly, they borrowed it all from us, now they work for us." "Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha." That is why it is time for a change in Washington.
When China buys out the majority of stock in Caterpillar. Shuts down operations in North America. Moves all manufacturing to the far east. Wonder how long it will be before that happens.
CAts in negotiations right now to pull out of Illinios as the corporate office, it made the news a few nights ago, they want to leave the state and relocate to another without as high of taxes, one of the dakotas or florida are considered or somewhere else??? As for manufacturing moving, just how much is made here, more like assembled here, not made here, these components are shipped in from whereever now.
Neil, sorry haven't had time to pm you yet. Did you know Volvo have a 70% stake in Lingong? I don't expect the factory t move from Poland to China just yet. Mind you, I'm thinking of learning Mandarin just in case. As for Cat moving out of Illinois, the corporate office may move but the manufacturing and development probably won't. They've spent too much the last ten years. I think the term is "brinkmanship".
I seriously doubt this is a game of brinkmanship on Cats part. They have several states that would like to have them. Some may even be willing to foot the bill for construction of new plants, or offer such sweet deals it would be worth the move. Lets be honest, cost savings besides taxes are easy to see. A state closer to deep water ports would work well for cats current operations of sub assemblies, parts, and final assemblies.
Here's an article on Cat http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20110330-712575.html
Thats interesting Brian, that Volvo own a substantial slice-there were rumours recently of Volvo getting a dozer line, this one way of doing it.
Things are getting so bad in Illinois tax wise and business climate that some companies have even moved to Wisconsin which has its own tax problems and a poor reputation as far as being business friendly. Several years ago Boeing moved its headquarters from Seattle to Chicago. I still can't figure why they did that either.
Cat is starting to like Texas very well. No state income taxes. They've built a couple of plants and distribution centers here. Just opened one last week in Waco. Lots of big tax breaks involved of course. Plenty of ports on the Gulf Coast, cheap non unionized labor(some of them foreign exchange students from across the border), very good infrastructure, and cheap land. I don't see that Cat would ever move production out of Illinois to here though. They have a lot invested there. I think they're trying their case in the media to get what they want. I can't see that I blame them. Maybe ol' Wun Hung Lo won't get his way with Dressta after all if Volvo has a stake in the game.
If Volvo has a stake in the game and are the majority player as someone said above here than they will play it their way. That is sure what they did here after they got their claws in to Mack Truck. As for Cat going to Texas I can't say that I blame them either. Illinois with their new tax policy is going to drive both business and people out of the state. Their recent 66% income tax increase on people and the additional tax on business because they can't control their spending will have the same result as it has had in New York State and to a greater extent in New York City. It is the same with pretty much every state and the Feds too. They don't have a revenue problem, they have a SPENDING problem. Here in Wisconsin our new governor is doing his darndest to stop the flow of red ink and now a lot of people are screaming it is to extreme. Or in other "I want my cake and eat it too."
Volvo really has nothing to do with this at all. They may own a stake in Lingong, but I fail to see how that has any influence on this at all. Lingong is not buying Dressta, LiuGong is, and they're completely different companies.
Thanks for clarifying that point, Brian. ;-) And let's make clear that Cat's official stance was never that they "wanted to leave the state" -- Olberhelman claims that reporters read far too much into his comments. Maybe there are secret talks about moving away from IL, but that's simply conjecture at this point. In addition, this has nothing to do with brinksmanship. There is no disaster to speak of; if Cat is trying to play the state, it's just trying to get into a state that offers a competitive business environment. No use tossing around words that are more serious than needed to describe the situation.
Volvo has nothing to do with LiuGong. Volvo does have a share in the Chinese company SDLG ( Shandong Lingong Construction Machinery Co), Also I think you will find LiuGong has bought Dressta. Wouldnt be suprised to see the Liugong / Dressta venture set up in India.
As far as the Cat plants in Peoria being indispensable, the plants were closed for I believe more than two years during a bitter labor negotiation a few years ago. It didn't seem to affect much in parts or machine sales that I saw. Cat has lots of plants in lots of places.
The labor dispute with Caterpillar was in either 1992 or 1996. I don't remember which year it was for certain and went on for about 18 months if I recall correctly. Cat took on the UAW and started hiring off of the street to maintain production.
Bless you, Neil, you made a spelling mistake and now you've got us in all sorts of trouble. Komatsu 150, you're right Cat have plants all over the world, but they don't each produce full line, eg as far as I know D9, 10, 11 are only made in Peoria, they only have the one indoor proving ground, the biggest wheel dozers and undeground shovels are Oz, the tracked loaders are Grenoble, etc.