After Mark Zuckerberg thought about Li Mu's experience, he immediately made his decision. After chatting with Larry Page and others, he privately said to Li Mu: "Mr. Li, I have carefully considered it. After a while, I decided to accept Mr. Page’s suggestion, take a leave of absence from Harvard, and then move the company to Silicon Valley, what do you think?”
Li Mu smiled slightly and said: "I support suspending school, because the next few years will be the golden period of the rapid development of the Internet. If you are still half in school, this high-speed train will tear you apart when it starts. But now is not a good time for you to move your company to Silicon Valley."
Mark Zuckerberg asked in confusion: "Why? Silicon Valley is the center of the industry. If you are in Silicon Valley, you can have access to more core resources in the industry."
Li Mu smiled and said: "Your current business line is aimed at college students. Silicon Valley is a gathering place for Internet elites, but it is not a gathering place for college students. So what you have to do now is to temporarily take a break from school and then go all out." Enter the giant ivory tower of college campuses and college students across the United States."
With that said, Li Mu asked Mark Zuckerberg: "Have you noticed that those people just now, including Larry Page, didn't pay too much attention to the core of the Facebook project?"
Mark Zuckerberg nodded and said, "It's exactly what you said."
Li Mu said: "Do you know why?"
Mark Zuckerberg shook his head.
Li Mu said with a smile: "Because deep down they don't think you are a real Internet entrepreneur. They think you are just a college student who is just messing around among college students, and your project is just like a college student who is messing around." project, this proves that they don’t attach much importance to the college student group, just like the NBA Lakers’ mentality towards a certain college basketball team. They think that you are not professional players at all, and your level and prospects are not worth mentioning at all. "
Mark Zuckerberg agreed: "Indeed..."
Li Mu snapped his fingers and said with a smile: "This is the best situation. When others start, their development depends entirely on Gou. If he shows up at the slightest moment, the boss will quickly annihilate him, but your current start is at the right moment. In a field that these so-called big guys don’t pay attention to or care about, this group has tens of millions of potential users and nearly 100 million potential users around the world. Once it grows to a sufficient level in this field, you will be waiting for you from When you enter Silicon Valley from college, you are already one of the big guys in Silicon Valley."
Speaking of this, Li Mu added: "There is a great man in China who once created a great strategy of surrounding the cities from the countryside. Now this strategy is suitable for you to learn and imitate. For the elites in Silicon Valley, there are only Silicon Valley, New York, Los Angeles, and Wall Street." It is the 'city' of the Internet industry, and it is suitable for the strategy of surrounding cities with rural areas to catch them off guard."
Mark Zuckerberg couldn't hide his excitement and said: "Then when I go back, I will take a leave of absence first, and then quickly make Facebook bigger and stronger among college students!"
Li Mu nodded: "I will arrange for the additional investment money to be called to you soon. Larry Page will direct all Google's search traffic about the university to you. You don't have to worry about anything next, and you will do your best." The college student community is expanding rapidly."
…
After chatting with guests from afar at the cocktail party, Li Mu met in private with Steve Johnson, the head of Sequoia Capital.
What Steve Johnson is most concerned about right now is the subsequent capital operations of Makino Technology and Li Mu’s other companies. Sequoia has tasted huge benefits from Makino Technology, and is somewhat impatient to find other breakthroughs, but Li Mu’s current attitude towards capital Being extremely cautious, due to the upward trend of the global capital market, Li Mu now hardly gives any opportunity for capital to penetrate, which makes Steve Johnson scratch his head.
Whenever the capital market goes down, companies rush to raise funds. Because they are worried about the capital winter that may come at any time, they sacrifice part of their shares in advance and reserve cash to survive the winter. But every time the capital market goes up, companies start to Just grit your teeth and wait for the price to continue rising before selling your shares.
Now that the global capital market is doing very well, Li Mu is naturally not in a hurry to raise funds, but is looking forward to achieving a very large-scale fund-raising through listing.
After Li Mu and Steve Johnson sat down, the latter handed Li Mu a cigar and said with a smile: "Mr. Li, have a try, the best Cuban cigar in the world."
Li Mu shook his head and said with a smile: "Thank you, but I can't get used to smoking this thing."
As he spoke, Li Mu took out a pack of domestic cigarettes from his pocket and asked him, "Want to try this?"
Steve Johnson hesitated for a moment, then smiled cheerfully and said: "OK, give it a try."
Li Mu took out two Panda cigarettes, handed one to him, lit one himself, and then asked him with a smile: "Steve, are you doing anything good for you to ask me to meet in such a hurry?"
Steve Johnson lit a cigarette and took a puff, savored it, then exhaled the white smoke and said with a smile: "To be honest, Sequoia has always prepared a lot of cash just waiting for you to say hello, but you are not willing to do another round of financing." , there is nothing I can do..."
Li Mu smiled calmly and said: "Apple has already completed the acquisition, and financing is no longer attractive to me at this time."
Steve Johnson said: "So I am not going to talk to you about financing this time. I want to talk to Mr. Li about the future IPO of Makino Technology."
Li Mu raised his eyebrows and asked him: "What specifically do you want to talk to me about the IPO?"
Steve Johnson smiled: "I mainly want to know the approximate time plan for Makino Technology's IPO."
Li Mu said: “After both Google and Baidu successfully IPO, Makino Technology will launch its own IPO plan.”
Steve Johnson nodded and said with a smile: "Mr. Li is really scheming. After these two companies IPO, the valuation of Makino Technology will further rise. It is indeed the best time."
After flattering him, Steve Johnson asked Li Mu with a serious expression: "Mr. Li, Makino Technology should have started preparing for the IPO internally, right? Can you disclose the current progress?"
Li Mu smiled noncommittally and said, "Steve, if you have any ideas, you can just say it. We are partners after all. There is no need to go around."
Steve Johnson hesitated for a moment and said: "Mr. Li, in fact, Sequoia and I personally very much hope to cooperate with you in depth on the IPO of Makino Technology. We have estimated the future valuation of Makino Technology. Assuming that Makino Technology maintains its current growth rate and acquires an additional 30% of Google's shares, Makino Technology's IPO fundraising is likely to exceed US$20 billion, creating the largest in the history of Nasdaq. A large-scale IPO, however, all this must be based on a mature, reliable and strong underwriter team."
Li Mu nodded. At this time, he understood Steve Johnson's motivation. What he wanted was to be the underwriter of Makino Technology's IPO in the future.
In a Nasdaq IPO, the first step is to submit for review. The second step is to find a suitable underwriter team, and then determine the valuation, number of shares issued, and price with the other party, and then the other party will promote the IPO shares to Generally speaking, for their large clients, the stocks issued by U.S. stock IPOs are basically not sold to retail investors. They are all divided up among large clients with assets exceeding one million U.S. dollars. Those who can can fall into the hands of retail investors during the IPO stage. stocks are generally junk stocks.
Sometimes, when companies fail to list in the United States, it is not because the company does not meet the requirements for listing on Nasdaq, but because the company is not satisfied with the price given by the underwriter. Shanda Literature, a former domestic literary giant, has launched plans to go public in the United States many times. , but it was started and stranded many times, and it was finally abandoned for listing and sold as a whole. The main reason for the stranded listing was valuation differences with the underwriters.
Before a company goes public, it will have two valuations. One is the company's own valuation of itself, and the other is the capital market's valuation of itself. This is no different from finding a job and communicating with the employer about salary. If the company's salary If the offer is lower than expected, most job seekers will reject it. If the job seeker's salary requirement is relatively high, most companies will also reject it.
If a company that is preparing to be listed on Nasdaq sets its own target valuation of US$1 billion, they hope to raise US$100 million by issuing 10 million shares at US$10 per share, accounting for 10% of the company's total shares. , but the underwriters feel that the prospects of this company are not as good as the company itself thinks. In the eyes of the underwriters, the company can only be valued at US$500 million. If other conditions remain unchanged, the corresponding value per share It can be sold at a price of $5. If the price is higher, it will be difficult to sell all the shares issued in the IPO.
On this basis, if the company accepts the underwriter's valuation, then he also takes out 10% of the shares, but can only raise 50 million US dollars. The psychological expectation has been discounted in half, which is naturally difficult to accept, but both parties No one was willing to give in on this issue, so this IPO could only be stranded due to huge differences.
Therefore, in the IPO process, the role of the underwriter is still very important. The strength of the underwriter must be sufficient, and the underwriter must also sufficiently recognize the value and prospects of the client company. Although Makino Technology has a high reputation globally , and the capital market recognition is also very high, but when it comes to IPO, it is still necessary to have a reliable underwriter to work together and strive to maximize the interests of the company during the listing process.
For sellers at any time, the best selling price is just close to the highest limit accepted by buyers, and the same is true for Li Mu.
So Li Mu asked him: "Do you want to be the underwriter of Makino Technology?"
Steve Johnson nodded calmly at this moment and said: "Mr. Li, to be honest, with the size of Makino Technology's IPO, I'm afraid no investment bank can afford it on its own. According to our estimates, it will take at least three to six First-tier investment banks have come together to form an underwriting team, and we hope that with our close cooperative relationship with Makino Technology, we can become the lead bank for the IPO of Makino Technology."
PS: I'm extremely sorry. I was traveling with my wife during the holidays, and the World Cup was also included, so I didn't bother to update yesterday. But don't worry, I didn't bet on football...
(End of chapter)