Unknowingly, the time came to five o'clock in the afternoon. Outside the glass curtain wall of the city of Liberty, the sunset dyed the horizon where the sky and the sea meet in a magnificent orange. Eric and Chris were still in their original seats. It seemed like it hadn't moved all day.
It has been half a year since Eric made up his mind to acquire Disney. In the past six months, in addition to secretly absorbing Disney's stock, Chris also conducted a lot of detailed investigations on the entire Disney Group, including Disney's shareholders, Disney Creditors and their attitudes towards Disney management, as well as detailed information on the various assets of the Disney Group, these data investigations alone cost millions of dollars, and it can even be said that no one knows better than Chris Disney.
Throughout the day, Eric remained a listener most of the time and asked his own questions from time to time. Chris is always very patient to answer questions for Eric.
But when the sunset completely sank into the horizon, things were more or less discussed. Chris finally said: ""Cut Throat Island" has just been drawn, and because of the huge loss, now is the moment when Disney shareholders and creditors are most dissatisfied with the management. The best time for us to launch an acquisition, so we try to launch an acquisition offer one week later. We need a week to integrate the scattered Disney ∞⊙, stocks, and set up an acquisition team. By the way, I just forgot to say this it's..."
Eric held a list of Disney's upcoming movies in the second half of the year, raised his head and asked, "What?"
"I don't have enough people in my hands to build a professional acquisition team, so I want to cooperate with Morgan Stanley, you know. I still have a certain network at Morgan Stanley. And they have a ready-made M&A team. Can take assets Appraisals, legal matters, price negotiations and all acquisition matters.”
Eric said: "This is no problem."
Chris said again: "Actually, I mean, you should have heard that Michael Ovitz led the CAA team to help Panasonic acquire Universal, and finally got a commission of 70 million U.S. dollars. It will be cheap."
Eric laughed and said, "Everyone knows that the Japanese are the fat sheep that come together to be slaughtered by themselves, but we are not. How much does it cost to hire Morgan Stanley's team?"
"If calculated based on a team of 100 people, I estimate that it will cost 50 million US dollars. Once a hostile takeover is initiated, it will take at least half a year to complete the acquisition, and it is not impossible to delay it for a year or two," Chris said and looked at Eric , waiting for his decision.
Although Disney's current market capitalization is only over three billion U.S. dollars, the amount involved in the final acquisition will not be less than five billion U.S. dollars. Morgan Stanley is equivalent to taking a 1% commission from it. This ratio is very reasonable, because Eric I vaguely remember that these big investment banks charge more than 10% commission for assisting shareholders of listed companies to sell stocks.
Thinking of this, Eric quickly made a decision. Said: "Then hire the Morgan Stanley team. In addition, tell the person in charge of Morgan Stanley that if they can complete the acquisition within half a year, I can increase the commission by 30% on the basis of the original commission." remuneration."
For corporate mergers and acquisitions, the longer the delay, the greater the variables, and the higher the price must be paid. Many hostile takeover cases end up in the end after a long delay, so not only did Chris not dissuade Eric from This suggestion, on the contrary, showed admiration for Eric's decisiveness: "I will pass this condition on to Morgan Stanley."
In the following week, while Chris made the final deployment in secret, Eric did not stay out of it.
With the box office of "Toy Story" successfully surpassing 100 million on the first day of release in the third week, and the box office of "Terminator 2" rising steadily, professional box office statistics agencies have made two estimates for the total North American box office of these two films. With a valuation of 100 million U.S. dollars, one summer file has two films with a box office of over 200 million at the same time. This achievement is enough to make all Hollywood film companies jealous.
Therefore, Firefly Film Company held a grand celebration party in Eric's Pointe Manor. Stars and film company executives also approved dozens of media reporters to enter the party.
It is no surprise that all these actions are used to create momentum for the next acquisition. The greater the influence of Firefly, the more beneficial it will be for the next acquisition.
In just one week, not only the box office results of "Terminator 2" and "Toy Story" were widely publicized, but also "Cutthroat Island" and Fox's "Condor Condor 2" were shot again. Eric It is planned to conduct a wholly-owned acquisition like Sony and Panasonic, and it is not prepared to replace the equity in the hands of Disney shareholders with Firefly shares.
So this series of hype is not intended to make Disney investors confident in Firefly and sell their stocks. In many newspaper related articles, Eric has been explicitly or implicitly expressing a point of view, if you don’t sell it , Disney will continue to produce bad films such as "Cut Throat Island" or "Condor Condor 2", and it will also be sniped by the Firefly blockbuster. Of course, although many people were keenly aware of the smell of gunpowder, no one realized the meaning of Eric's previous remarks until after Firefly submitted a takeover offer to Disney.
On Monday, July 22, 1991, Michael Eisner did not take any rest during the weekend. Because of the disastrous box office failure of "Cut Throat Island", he has been trying to appease Disney's shareholders and creditors for more than half a month.
Eric's remarks about the so-called "Cut Throat Island" trilogy made Michael Eisner's teeth itch with hatred. A short sentence made his situation worse. A large number of shareholders accused Michael Eisner of giving up The good cooperative relationship with Eric, Michael Eisner is also hard to say, he certainly wants to cooperate with Eric, but after the turmoil last year, it is already difficult for the two parties to cooperate again.
After having breakfast in the villa in Malibu, Michael Eisner had no intention of going to the Disney headquarters to work.
He has asked someone to buy a plane ticket, and today he is going to visit Disney's current largest shareholder. Bass family in Texas.
Disney has grown to the present day. The Disney family that created the Disney brand has long ceased to be Disney's majority shareholder. At present, the Disney Family Foundation only owns about 3% of Disney's stock, while the Bass family, which made their fortune through oil, successively obtained 16% of Disney's equity in the 1970s and 1980s, becoming Disney's largest shareholder.
In 1984, it was with the support of Roy Disney, the veteran of the Bass family and the Disney family, that he was able to take the position of Disney CEO.
The driver drove Michael Eisner to Los Angeles Airport. A small private jet was already ready to stop. This was one of the benefits of Michael Eisner as the chairman and CEO of Disney.
After the plane took off, Michael Eisner explained a few words to his assistant. He just planned to go to the lounge to rest for a while. These days, he was exhausted physically and mentally in order to cope with the box office fiasco of "Cut Throat Island".
Not long after falling asleep, there was a knock on the door of the cabin lounge, and the assistant's voice was a little hurried: "Mr. Eisner, Mr. Eisner, Mr. Wells is in a hurry."
Michael Eisner, who was suddenly woken up, frowned and got up and walked out of the lounge. The assistant looked at Michael Eisner's gloomy expression, handed over the handset of the cordless phone, and explained softly: "I said you are resting. .But Mr. Wells says it's urgent."
Michael Eisner nodded expressionlessly, and took the phone. He closed the lounge door casually, turned around and went to the sofa to pour red wine for himself, and asked, "Frank, what's the matter?"
"..."
The president of Disney on the other end of the phone, Frank Wells, spoke in a hurry. It took more than a minute for Michael Eisner to realize that the red wine in the goblet had overflowed a lot, but Michael Eisner But he no longer had the heart to care about these things anymore. He put the empty red wine bottle on the table, hung up the phone and walked out of the lounge, shouting to his assistant, "Nick, inform the captain that the plane will return immediately after landing, and return to Los Angeles."
Near noon, Michael Eisner finally returned to the Disney headquarters, and the members of the Disney board of directors who received the notification had already waited in the conference room in advance.
Sitting at the head of the meeting table, Michael Eisner read through the acquisition plan submitted by Firefly without saying a word, cursed in a low voice, and then asked Frank Wells: "Frank, are you sure this is not Is this a joke, where did Firefly get the funds to buy Disney, how do they have so much money?"
Looking at Michael Eisner, who looked excited and was about to jump up at any time, Frank Wells explained patiently: "I have personally called Eric Williams to confirm this."
"I'm asking where did they get the money?" Michael Eisner's voice had turned into a growl.
Frank Wells shook his head. Michael Eisner was about to continue his attack when a director sitting at the bottom suddenly asked tentatively, "Could it be the previous oil crisis?"
Michael Eisner was stunned for a moment. Reminiscent of Eric's actions in July and August last year, he quickly confirmed this point. That time Eric raised a total of 700 million U.S. dollars
It's been almost a year since Eric didn't do anything before, and everyone thought that Eric didn't make much money that time, but seeing the acquisition offer in front of him, Michael Eisner realized that everyone They were all fooled by Eric.
Clenched his fist in embarrassment, Michael Eisner raised his head and said, "Now, let's talk about what to do. If the acquisition of Eric Williams is successful, then all of us here may be Pack up and get out. So, we must not let him succeed."
The conference room was soon filled with chattering discussions. The 16 directors of Disney were either friends with Michael Eisner, or they were former Disney employees. Because of Michael Eisner's monopoly of power, the The power has been greatly weakened, but these directors don't care about it. Anyway, if Disney makes a major decision-making mistake, Michael Eisner will definitely be the one to blame, just like "Cut Throat Island". Therefore, no one will be dissatisfied with this kind of job that is not responsible and can get a high salary, so they don't want to lose their job because of the acquisition.
"The most important thing now is to stabilize the shareholders. As long as they stand with us, it is unlikely that Firefly will acquire Disney."
"Hey, it's a pity that "Cut Throat Island" has just caused such a big loss. Firefly seized the timing very well."
"Don't forget that there are creditors. Last week we just discussed the plan to postpone the payment of the principal and interest of due debts. Now this plan must not be brought out again, otherwise the creditors will definitely put pressure on us. After all, the performance of Firefly is It's great."
"Firefly already holds 11% of the shares, which is a big problem."
"..."
"..."
The conference room was buzzing for five minutes, but Michael Eisner couldn't hear any useful suggestions from these people. This made him very angry, and he even ignored that this situation was caused by himself. Yes, in order to consolidate its power, of course Disney's board of directors should have as many mediocrities as possible.
Ignoring the nonsense of these people, Michael Eisner said to the assistant: "Call all the management for a meeting. In addition, let the legal department send a letter to Firefly, we refuse the acquisition."
"Mr. Eisner, according to the procedure, we should disclose this matter to the shareholders," the assistant reminded softly.
Michael Eisner gave the assistant a dissatisfied look: "You just have to do what you should do."
The assistant responded with a guilty conscience and left silently.
Michael Eisner patted the table to stop everyone from discussing, and then said: "Okay, stop arguing, and discuss it after the management comes."
A bunch of directors fell silent.
On the day when Firefly submitted the acquisition offer to the Disney board of directors, the Disney board of directors made a decision to reject the acquisition, and selectively disclosed part of Firefly’s acquisition plan to shareholders, and at the same time, it also included Michael Eisner’s words Sincerely handwritten letter.
While disclosing the acquisition offer to shareholders, Disney's board of directors approved the first counterattack plan, a golden parachute, in just three days to protect the interests of all Disney management personnel.
While disclosing the acquisition offer to shareholders, Disney's board of directors approved the first counterattack plan, a golden parachute, in just three days to protect the interests of all Disney management personnel.
While disclosing the acquisition offer to shareholders, Disney's board of directors approved the first counterattack plan, a golden parachute, in just three days to protect the interests of all Disney management personnel. (To be continued..)