When he first left Germany to come to business school in Los Angeles, Martin Schuermann thought he was headed west for the beach. Instead, his cab driver took him to Azusa, as in Azusa Pacific University in the San Gabriel Valley. That was just the first of several unexpected turns that led Schuermann, who thought he would be a banker in Germany, to become the chief executive of Vision Motor Corp., an El Segundo company that is developing experimental electric trucks. Unlike most electric trucks, Vision’s vehicles use a hydrogen fuel cell to charge batteries on the go. It’s interesting stuff and quite a switch for Schuermann, who previously had been in the entertainment industry, working for actor Don Johnson, German media conglomerate Bertelsmann AG and Hollywood film production company Intermedia Entertainment. He also has a celebrity wife: former MTV VJ Downtown Julie Brown. Schuermann met with the Business Journal at his El Segundo office to talk about how he owes his job to his spouse, how me made the switch from show business and how he plans to revolutionize trucking.
Question: You almost certainly are the only guy running a truck company that was once in the movie industry. How did you get into Hollywood.
Answer: I was finishing my M.B.A. thesis in 1991 and, through this internship at a film company, I ran into Don Johnson. Don and I became good friends, so in ’92, Don basically invites me to come to his company – Buffalo Wallet Productions.
Is that why you came to the U.S., to get into the entertainment industry?
No, I had my eyes on banking. I did a bank apprenticeship in Germany and studied international business at University of Munster, so I really wanted to stay on the business side. My plan was to come here and get an M.B.A., maybe a year and a half of practical training at an investment bank in L.A., and then get back to Germany. But, you know, I got stuck.
Where’d you get your M.B.A.?
That’s a funny story, actually.
I’m all ears.
There was this supposedly Los Angeles university called Azusa Pacific University.
Yes, in the heart of Los Angeles …
Exactly. (Laughs.) So they were promoting their M.B.A. program at the University of Munster and I figured this must be a good school to go to. I applied, I got accepted and basically jumped right in.
When did you realize how far from L.A. it was?
I arrived at LAX and jumped in a cab and showed the cab driver the address. He looks at me and says, ‘Are you sure you don’t want to take a shuttle?’ I said, ‘No, take me to this address.’ So he gets on the freeway and he turns east. After like 40 minutes, I say, ‘Hey man, the beach is that way!’
So you hadn’t looked this up beforehand?
Well, keep in mind, back then we didn’t have Google maps and things. It was not as easy to do. I probably could have done a little more research (laughs), but I was so excited.
What was Azusa like?
It’s a pretty Spanish neighborhood. Coming from Germany, that’s a real culture shock. I was like, ‘Wow, people speak more Spanish than English.’ My roommate, who was also from University of Munster, he and I had the same reaction and decided we had to do something.
Like what?
We made sure to finish our classes in Azusa before September, and then made a deal with the dean there that we could do the rest of our classes at UCLA. So we were done with Azusa by the summer and we could move to the beach. We became roommates in Marina Del Rey and finished our M.B.A.s from there.
Did you feel like you’d been duped?
I think there was a bit of false advertisement. There should have been some disclaimer, but I don’t regret it. It was fun. It was an experience.
So exactly how did you run into Don Johnson, and what made you guys hit it off?
I loaned money to a company that was developing a project with him and Melanie (Griffith), so I had the pleasure to participate in private meetings with Don and his agent. That’s how we met, and we just hit it off. We traveled together quite extensively. He’s a very smart, very fun guy.
How much did you loan the project?
I think it was $125,000.
Where’d a young guy get that kind of money?
It was savings. I always worked; I always made money. My family is well-off, but we also have always learned to budget and put away money.
What did you do?
During my high school time, I always worked on the side as a roadie. I did that all the way through undergraduate studies.
Work for any big bands?
Oh, yeah. I worked for the largest lighting company, at the time, in Germany. So we had every big act, from Michael Jackson to Pink Floyd to Tina Turner. They would all rent from this company. It was great: free concerts and you get paid
What did your parents do?
My father had a large slaughterhouse, or butcher shop. He made sausages. The slogan was, “Schuermann’s sausages in everybody’s mouth.” In German, it sounds much better. When he was 40 and I was 15, he retired. He sat my brother and I down and asked us if we wanted to take over that business. We both weren’t really interested in dead animals, so he decided to sell. Then he invested in real estate.
What did a young guy like you exactly do for Don?
I was the executive vice president of his production company, so I was basically the financial guy. We made relationships with Bertelsmann networks, and there were developments we did with Bertelsmann’s film arm. I opened up for him the international market.
Was the project you loaned money to ever produced?
(Laughs). Of course not. That was my first attempt. I guess I paid the tuition for it, too.
So how long did you work for Don?
We did a TV show called “The Marshal,” and did work on some of the movies Don was working on. Then in ’95 we sold “Nash Bridges” to CBS. At that point, Bertelsmann approached me to represent them here in the U.S., so I thought it might be a good time for a change.
How long were you there?
I was there until 2000; until I met Julie.
Julie being, of course, your wife, former MTV VJ Downtown Julie Brown. How’d you meet?
We met in April 2000. I remember it because I was standing with the owner of a popular restaurant and nightclub in Hollywood. I was standing right at the entrance. In walks my future wife. And my friend just basically greets her, he shows her to a booth and then comes back to me to continue the conversation. And I basically said, ‘How rude of you. You just greeted this beautiful woman and you didn’t introduce me.’
So he took you over to her?
He walked me over to the booth and said, “I’m sorry I didn’t introduce you. This is my friend Martin. Martin, this is Julie.” Several hours later of long talk, her car got lost in valet. We ended up sitting in my car for another hour and a half until 2 in the morning until the valet located her car. I called her actually that night, breaking every rule in the singles book.
You mean later that same morning?
Yeah. I called her and invited her to breakfast. She didn’t make it to breakfast, but we had brunch together. That started the relationship. We basically have spent almost every single day together after that.
Did you know who she was when she came into the club?
No. I came to the U.S. in 1990, and so I really grew up with the MTV of Europe. We had completely different VJs. I was not familiar with her work on television at all. I’m a fairly shy person, I probably wouldn’t have had the balls to tell my friend to introduce me to this beautiful woman if I knew she was a celebrity.
So after more than 10 years in Hollywood, how did Vision get on your radar?
My wife and several of her girlfriends (were getting together). I just happened to come along. The only other guy within this group of women was Lawrence Weisdorn (a Vision founder).
So you both kind of got dragged along by your wives?
Yeah, and naturally we started talking and he started pitching the idea. At that time, I was still actively running Intermedia.
What was the pitch?
The original two guys that basically bred this idea of an electric drive train in combination with hydrogen fuel cells, they developed a drive train they had installed in a Hummer. Lawrence showed me the actual Hummer. Julie’s first response was, “I want one.” She’s like, “I like the Hummer, it’s just you can’t drive it anywhere because you get flipped off.”
When did you start thinking seriously about the company?
At that first meeting, he got my attention, but I also said, “Look, how much does that cost? Who’s going to buy a $200,000 Hummer and where do you fill it up? It’s an interesting science project, but I don’t know where your market is.”
When was this?
That was in 2007. Then in mid-2008, the ports basically announced they need to clean up the air and they announced this clean truck program. Then we sat down and started discussing, can this work in real heavy-duty trucks? At that point, I became interested because now there’s a market.
Is there?
They make sense at the ports. If you buy a Hummer, you want the convenience of filling it up wherever you are and driving it wherever you want. But with trucks at the ports, there are these routes that are predesigned, and they all come back to one central spot, the ports.
You’re not an engineer, so what do you bring to this?
I think the business sense is important. If you look at early hydrogen vehicles, they’re the brainchild of a group of engineers. They don’t care about the money. They basically design something they think is great and can do everything without thinking about a potential market.
How much does one of your trucks cost?
The base model is $270,000. But right now, we’re making them in onesies and twosies. When you streamline the production and streamline the vendor supplies, you can definitely shave some cost off the vehicle.
What’s your goal for Vision?
I want to become a supplier to the big truck manufacturers and supply our components so they can offer it to their buyers.
Is your wife involved in your work much?
We’re both involved in each other’s. She’s doing a lot of work for Billboard and I kind of help her on the business side, how to position certain shows they’re developing together. And she gives me her input on what’s going on here.
What do you do together that’s not work?
We like to travel. We used to go sailing quite a bit, but we actually sold the boat about two years ago. And we like to just sit with friends. Julie has a very eclectic group of friends.
I can only imagine.
Well, imagine a Christmas party with proclaimed atheist Bill Maher and Larry David and about 50 others.
That could be a movie right there.
When Julie said, ‘Bill’s having a Christmas party, let’s go,’ I said, ‘Absolutely, yes.’ Christmas and Bill Maher in one sentence? I thought, I need to be there just to see what he has in mind.
And?
It was a blast.
Martin Schuermann
TITLE: Chief Executive
COMPANY: Vision Motor Corp.
BORN: Hamm, Germany; 1965.
EDUCATION: Studied international business at University of Munster; M.B.A. from Azusa Pacific University.
CAREER TURNING POINT: Meeting actor Don Johnson in 1991 and going to work for him.
MOST INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE: Am.b.a.ssador Steven Green, a friend since 1993 and former U.S. am.b.a.ssador to Singapore. His father, Karl Heinz Schuermann, “who has the strongest moral values of anybody I have ever met.”
PERSONAL: Lives with his wife, Julie, and daughter, Gianna, in Marina Del Rey. “All Europeans are living as close as possible to the beach.”
ACTIVITIES: Running, snowboarding, skiing, wakeboarding.
