Possibly the most populous city in the world (recently estimated at 25 million) and growing at an extraordinary rate of 700,000 to 800,000 people a year, Shanghai—the “City on the Sea”—surprises. There are so many dualities: old and new, city and coast, order and chaos, global yet decidedly Chinese. These juxtapositions play out on the streets—bicycles powered by feet zipping in between hybrid electric vehicles, …
Alain Visser seems, at first, like more of a fashion CEO than the head of one of the newer and more interesting automobile brands. His relaxed and open-minded attitude, a sneaky grin and Cole Haans tied with brightly colored shoelaces all set him apart from the other major car brand CEOs reading from teleprompters at the 2019 Shanghai Auto Show. Visser has a different job …
At the 2019 Shanghai Auto Show dozens of Chinese car brands, many of which aren’t well known outside the country, are showcased alongside better known global brands. Scattered between are reticent models, cleaners armed with synthetic dusters, visitors with selfie sticks and cameras on cranes—all in boiling temperatures underneath thousands of daylight-level lighting fixtures at the second largest exhibition hall in the world. “Overwhelming” doesn’t entirely capture …
