Compared with the simple communication with Ian Grenier yesterday, the information in hand has a more detailed analysis of the causes and consequences of the sudden attack by the Ministry of Justice.
The Ministry of Justice’s doubts are mainly reflected in two aspects. One is whether the super high market share of Yahoo’s browser affects the healthy development and technological progress of the Internet industry, and the other is whether the cooperation between Yahoo and Microsoft in browser pre-installation deprives users of their freedom. The power to choose software.
Of course, under normal circumstances, any government department will not blame a company for no reason, unless the company has caused damage to the interests of users or peer companies.
The "sufferers" who initiated this hearing by the Ministry of Justice are At-Home, Excite and other Internet companies that compete with Yahoo.
The information in Eric's hand specifically marked At-Home, which is an Internet company that also operates search engines and portals.
However, relative to the huge size of Yahoo, At-Home's market value is only more than 7 billion US dollars. Moreover, At-Home's business is more inclined to search engines, and Microsoft's MSN portal currently uses At-Home's search engine tools.
In addition, the information also mentions that Microsoft not only participated in At-Home’s early venture capital investment, holding 7% of the company’s shares, but also recently approached At-Home’s board of directors in an attempt to acquire the company wholly. To develop their own search engine business.
While Yahoo has been keeping its search engine expansion low-key, Eric never expected his competitors to remain unnoticed. Microsoft's attempt to acquire At-Home was clearly not a whim.
Of course, the search engine business has a very obvious winner-take-all rule.
Through these years of accumulation, Yahoo has entered the field of artificial intelligence in terms of Internet search engines, but many competitors are still using a very primitive and inefficient tree search mode. With the technology far ahead, Yahoo is sparing no effort to continue to invest in this business. Eric is confident enough to ensure that Yahoo's search business will be the final winner.
Moreover, the most critical point is that Yahoo has also accumulated a large number of patents in search engines due to its technology being one step ahead, which is enough to form a patent barrier for many latecomers.
Now, since At-Home took the initiative to jump out, even if there is obviously a shadow of Microsoft behind it, Eric would definitely not mind pulling back with a stick.
Thinking of this in his heart, Eric turned to today's news reports about the Ministry of Justice's inquiry into Yahoo, only to find that the situation seems to be more serious than he thought.
Most of the media are euphemistically or fiercely accusing Yahoo of monopolizing the browser market, which largely affects their own development.
The AOL Portal stated conclusively that the web browser should belong to the category of basic Internet services. Therefore, this basic tool software itself should not have any tendency. Yahoo sets the default homepage of Yahoo browser as its own portal website, which is a very obvious act of unfair competition.
The article in the "New York Times" even demanded that Yahoo should completely abandon its monopoly on the patented technology of web browsers and share it with the entire industry to promote the rapid development of the entire Internet industry.
NBC's online news website even saddenedly appealed to the Federal Department of Justice to initiate an antitrust investigation of Yahoo's browser immediately, in order to curb Yahoo's continued occupation of the market with this software and squeeze the living space of other competitors.
All in all, the opinions of these media are basically that the excess market share of Yahoo browser has seriously affected the development of the entire Internet industry, so it should be restricted.
It is conceivable that once this point of view continues to spread and the Federal Department of Justice takes substantive actions at this juncture, Yahoo's stock price will fall accordingly.
Moreover, due to the media's view that as long as the Yahoo browser is suppressed, the entire industry will benefit from it, the stock price of Yahoo will fall, but the stock prices of other new technology companies of the same type will only be affected by the opposite effect and rise again, so it will not affect the recent period. The Nasdaq continued to rebound.
While Eric was flipping through the materials, the staff had already prepared the video conference connection at Yahoo headquarters in Boston.
After hastily flipping through the information, Eric raised his head and found that Ian Grenier and the others on the call screen also had solemn faces, so he had to take the initiative to make a relaxed expression, clapped his hands and said: "So, Ian, Tell me how you plan to respond to the two challenges raised by the Department of Justice tomorrow?"
Ian Grenier didn't say much, looked at the information in front of him, sorted out his thoughts briefly, and said: "About the first question, our way of dealing with it is that the super high market share of Yahoo browser, Not only did it not hinder the development of the Internet industry, but it promoted the progress of the entire industry. It was Yahoo who first launched the easy-to-use graphical interface browser that connected the chaotic Internet with ordinary people’s lives. Over the years, all COM Companies have directly or indirectly benefited from the unification of technical standards by the Yahoo browser. If Yahoo hadn’t done this at the beginning, but instead allowed the market to have multiple Internet format standards, then the Internet industry would never have developed so rapidly.”
Eric nodded and asked, "So, what about the second one?"
Ian Grenier continued: "First of all, Yahoo browser is completely free. Therefore, pre-installing Yahoo browser on the Windows system will not cause additional costs to users. Secondly, Yahoo browser can be uninstalled. , Therefore, we have not deprived users of the right to choose freely. If they are dissatisfied with Yahoo browser, they can uninstall this software by themselves. Regarding this point, if there is a stalemate, Yahoo can still make certain compromises, such as Windows During the system installation phase, add a reminder whether the user needs to load the Yahoo browser."
Eric tapped his fingers on the desktop silently, thought for a moment, and said: "Ian, you should understand that their purpose this time is to allow us to allow other companies to launch the same type of browsers to compete with Yahoo. This , how are you going to deal with it?"
"We won't and don't have to compromise on this, Eric," said Ian Grenier, apparently prepared for this. "Yahoo browser is good enough for users. Open other companies to enter this field." , in order to compete with the Yahoo browser and realize their own advantages, these companies will only take the initiative to formulate differentiated standards, which will damage the entire Internet industry. Just as the entire federation has become accustomed to 110V AC, and all household appliances are using it This standard. Now, someone wants to forcefully promote the 220V AC network in other countries, which will not form any healthy competition, and will only cause a completely unnecessary waste of resources for the entire society."
After listening to Ian, Eric said, "The last example about the voltage standard is very good. At the right moment tomorrow, you can bring it up in court."
Ian Grenier smiled and said, "I think so too."
Afterwards, everyone continued to discuss a lot of details freely, until the end of the meeting, Eric said with a serious face: "Since our competitors have tried their best to initiate this hearing, then, while responding, we also We must fight back, otherwise, Yahoo will only be seen as weak and deceptive, and more companies will definitely jump out in the future.”
Everyone's expressions of relaxation were put away one after another.
Eric paused for a short while, and then continued: "About At-Home, although everyone knows that there is a shadow of Microsoft behind it, since it jumped out this time, it should have the expectation of suffering the consequences. I just watched , At-Home's main business is an Internet search engine. Although Yahoo's patent system is mainly defensive, it is also sufficient for us to use it as an attack weapon when necessary. I will give you a week to collect At-Home's violations of Yahoo! Evidence of technology patents, not only search engines, but also advertising business, I think they will definitely not let go of imitating the model of Yahoo advertising alliance. This time we will not only file a huge claim, but also let them stop the infringement of Yahoo technology, So, do you understand?"
The people in the two meeting rooms all agreed, and Ian Grenier also nodded, but then said: "Eric, isn't a week too hasty?"
Eric looked at the call screen and said: "I asked every company in the Firefly system to set up an additional patent management department, and I reminded everyone on various occasions the importance of patents for the development of new technology companies. In order to let you always pay attention to the patent trends of yourself and your competitors. So, don’t tell me that you have not collected relevant information on weekdays, if you do, then you are negligent.”
"Of course we have, but the evidence cannot be too complete," Ian Grenier nodded. "And, if we want to file a lawsuit, our legal team must formulate a detailed litigation strategy, which will take time."
"You only have one week," Eric insisted: "Also, it seems that I need to re-check the work of the patent management departments of each company, Carly, write this down."
Caroline responded seriously, lowered her head and started writing in her memo.
In the conference room in Boston, Ian Grenier couldn't help but smile wryly in his heart.
He is confident that Yahoo's patent management department will not make any mistakes, but if other brother companies are caught off guard by Eric's surprise attack, he will inevitably be complained about.
Eric ignored Ian Grenier's thoughts and continued: "Besides, isn't Microsoft going to launch its own digital music player recently?"
Everyone nodded, and Tina Brown, who was sitting next to Ian, took the initiative to say: "Microsoft's player is called Zune, and it will be released in the middle of next month. Yahoo just made a feature about it last week. I personally Audited. The Zune uses Microsoft's WMA audio format, and Microsoft is said to be partnering with Warner Music to jointly operate an online music store."
In fact, in June, Sony has launched a digital version of the Walkman that competes with Firefly Electronics' Fireflyer player. That product uses Sony's unique ATRAC audio format, and Sony's online music store has also been opened simultaneously.
However, compared with the Fireflyer, Sony's digital version of the Walkman is not only far inferior to the Fireflyer, which has experienced three generations of technology accumulation, in terms of various basic functions, but also has almost strict anti-piracy restrictions. Absolutely no audio content available outside of the Sony Music Store.
At the same time, Sony once again showed its inefficient and fragmented side. For the benefit of its own department, Sony Records provided almost all outdated music for the Sony Music Store.
In terms of the most critical price, the Sony Digital Walkman is even more expensive than the Fireflyer player.
Therefore, one can imagine the sales prospects of this product.
With the content cooperation between Firefly Electronics and the two major record companies EMI and Universal, and the further promotion of Fireflyer players in North America and Europe, the current monthly sales of Fireflyer have exceeded 3 million units, and the total sales volume for the whole year of 1999 is likely to be reached 35 million units.
In comparison, the total sales volume of Sony Digital Walkman has not exceeded 300,000 units since it was launched in June. It can only be described as bleak, and it is not enough to pose any threat to Fireflyer players.
In Eric's view, the biggest significance of Sony's digital Walkman is to resolve the monopoly of Fireflyer players. Whether it is the Fireflyer player or the Yahoo music store, there are competitors at this time, so the Firefly system will receive much less antitrust censure.
Compared with last year, this year Firefly Electronics' Fireflyer player is calculated based on the sales volume of 35 million units. With the further reduction of comprehensive costs, the overall will bring about 2 billion US dollars of excess profits to Firefly Electronics.
Faced with such an attractive market, other technology manufacturers will naturally not give up. Microsoft has recently planned to launch its own digital music player.
However, unlike Sony, which obtained a full set of digital music player patents from Firefly Electronics in exchange for the micro-camera module patent, Microsoft did not have this treatment, which means that Microsoft is destined to be unable to hide from Firefly Electronics. patent barriers.
Eric waited for Tina Brown to finish speaking, and said to Mayer bluntly: "Contact Victor and them later, since Gates and I are playing tricks, then don't blame me for making Microsoft's Zune unable to be officially released. Let the Zune prototype be disassembled and analyzed as soon as possible to collect enough evidence."
After instructing Mayer, Eric finally looked at the crowd and said: "Finally, there is one more point. Everyone must have read today's news. In the eyes of those people, Yahoo browser now seems to be a barrier to the entire Internet industry. The culprit of development. People always sympathize with the weak, so this view will obviously have a market. Once it spreads, and the Department of Justice is looking for us again at this time, then Yahoo’s stock price will definitely plummet, but Other new technology companies will benefit from this. The entire Nasdaq market will not be affected, and the Department of Justice will have no scruples. So, we can't make it too easy for these people, and, do you know what our biggest advantage is? "
Everyone showed a curious look.
Eric didn't wait for everyone to express his opinion, and said: "Whether it is Wall Street or the new technology industry, they are worried that the Nasdaq index will start to fall again. However, we don't care. Whether it is Yahoo, or Cisco, Amazon and other companies, We are more concerned about the long-term development of the company than the temporary gains and losses of the stock price. So, since they want to trouble Yahoo, let the entire Nasdaq market follow suit. We originally planned to be in the next crisis. Only then did I announce strategies such as non-reduction of holdings and layoffs to reduce expenses to maintain the stock price. Then, there is no such restriction now. It just so happens that I need a sum of money recently. Therefore, starting tomorrow, the firefly system will publicly announce the reduction of holdings! "