The founder of Qidian, who was off the stage, never expected that he would get the opportunity to ask Li Mu questions at Li Mu's press conference. Not only did he promote his brand, but he also received Li Mu's commitment to invest. More importantly, Li Mu He publicly expressed his optimistic view on online novels, which will definitely trigger the explosive development of online novels.
At this moment, he was feeling particularly excited and excited, sweeping away the gloom that had accumulated in his heart recently.
The reason why I feel gloomy is because the Qidian founding team is not having an easy time right now.
Qidian.com is the founder of a new industry, and in the early stages of this industry, it cooperated with authors on a share basis, which means that Qidian's business model is a "consignment system" that is very enviable by sellers in the commercial field.
The so-called consignment means that the commodity producer takes the initiative to deliver the goods to the seller. The seller does not need to pay fees in advance, but sells the goods first and then settles the settlement with the producer regularly.
In this way, the most huge "purchasing cost" is eliminated.
Just like Wal-Mart, a huge store opens and goods costing tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars are put on the shelves. Wal-Mart may not have spent a penny on it, which greatly reduces the cost of operating the company.
Qidian is now the "Wal-Mart" in the field of online literature. Authors upload their works to the website, and then sign a "consignment system" sharing agreement with the website. However, the consignment is not actual goods, but digital content created by themselves. Qidian.com These contents are put on the shelves for sale, and after the revenue is generated, they are divided with the authors on a monthly basis.
In this mode, it is easy to make money from the starting point.
However, even though the data of Qidian Chinese website has always been very optimistic, the paid reading model has a certain foundation, and the company's overall operation has positive cash flow, Qidian still lacks a real driving force, a force that can make it seize the opportunity. A powerful push for opportunities to take off quickly.
It is not difficult to run a profitable company. You can buy a leather spatula for ten yuan, print some dog-skin plaster advertisements for twenty yuan and put them up everywhere, and then go to people's homes to help people use the toilet. You can also make money. The total is only thirty yuan. The cost is earned by opening three toilets, up to six toilets, and any additional toilets will be considered a net profit.
However, it is too difficult to run a company with broad prospects and strong explosive power.
Just like a self-employed person who opens a restaurant, it is not difficult to open a small restaurant and make a profit every month. However, 99% of people do not have the skills to turn a business that earns three thousand yuan a month into a business that earns three million yuan a month. After all, there are very few behemoth catering companies like Haidilao with such capabilities.
The Qidian team is not satisfied with their company having positive cash flow every month. They hope to seize a wave of opportunities and make online literature bigger and stronger. However, relying on the current slow development speed and profitability, they need to accumulate It took a long time before I could try to break through.
Therefore, in order to seek this breakthrough, the Qidian team has been looking for suitable financing and merger and acquisition opportunities, sacrificing equity in exchange for energy.
Li Mu is indeed very optimistic about the potential of the novel industry in the future, but the reason why he has not done it is because this industry still needs a long time to incubate. At least for now, it can only be regarded as a mosquito's thigh to his own industry. It’s not even considered useless. He has so many profitable businesses and so many concepts that are favored by the world. There is no need to create an online literature that everyone still doesn’t understand.
If he hadn't met the founder of the Qidian team to ask him a question today, Li Mu might have waited for Shanda or another company to cultivate a good industry foundation before directly choosing an acquisition with the greatest potential. Shanda Literature has been operating for so many years. The final asking price was only a few hundred million dollars.
However, since they met by chance today, and since it was such a coincidence that he selected the person in charge of this company among thousands of company leaders, Li Mu felt that the time was ripe to make arrangements in advance.
In Li Mu's memory, Qidian was directly acquired by Shanda in 2004, and the amount of the acquisition was only two million US dollars, which was almost 17 million according to the exchange rate at the time. From this memory, two judgments can be drawn:
First, Qidian's business model had difficulties in financing in 2003-2004. The stories they told and the concepts they created were not recognized by capital during this period. Otherwise, Qidian would have carried out at least one round of financing first. Gradually release equity and gradually absorb capital, rather than directly selling it to Shanda in one go;
Second, the founding team of Qidian itself does not have high expectations for the return on this project, otherwise they would not agree to sell it for only two million US dollars;
With these two points of judgment, Li Mu can basically determine the appetite of the starting point team during this time period.
…
Li Mu then selected a second questioner. This time, he chose a Western-looking reporter.
The other party stood up, nodded slightly to Li Mu, and said politely: "Hello, Mr. Li, I am a reporter from the Los Angeles Times. When Google announced that it would acquire Muye & Baidu, many Western media and experts in the Internet and economic fields expressed their opinions. One worry is that Makino Technology will have a negative attitude towards subsequent cooperation after acquiring Google's shares. My question to you is, how will Makino Technology cooperate with Google after today? Or, in other words, will Google be released? At what level of priority?"
After hearing this question, Li Mu raised the corner of his mouth slightly and replied in fluent English: "Your question feels very much like the question asked by the bride's relatives or friends to the groom before a wedding, such as: She will be here today. I’m going to marry you, will you treat her well in the future? How will you treat her well? Will you tolerate her at all times... "
When Li Mu said this, the audience burst into laughter, and the reporter who asked the question also laughed. He had never thought about this before asking, but when Li Mu said this, he felt that there was really no difference.
At this time, Li Mu's expression gradually became serious and he said: "Actually, I think that neither cooperation nor marriage should be the responsibility or obligation of one party. Whether two people can be married for a long time does not depend on whether the man treats the woman well or not. , it does not depend on whether the woman is good to the man, but on whether the two people can work together, work together, and remain close to each other. The same is true for the cooperation between Makino Technology and Google. For us, we must We will do everything we can. For example, we will guide Google search traffic in various product links, bring more users to Google, and realize Google’s demands for us. At the same time, Google must also cooperate with Makino Technology’s grand strategy, which is good. To realize Makino Technology’s demands for Google, only in this way can we maintain a close cooperative relationship for a long time.”
The reporter who asked the question nodded very seriously and said, "Thank you, Mr. Li."
Li Mu smiled slightly: "I have one more thing to add regarding the question you just mentioned."
The reporter hurriedly said: "Mr. Li, please speak."
Li Mu said: "There is a folk name in China called 'Long-tongued women'. The original intention is to describe those gossipy women who especially like to talk about others behind their backs. Of course, I don't have any gender discrimination here. This is just an old saying that has been circulated among Chinese people for many years. So, Now, who is the typical portrayal of a 'long-tongued woman'?"
Having said this, Li Mu paused and said with a smile: "It's the media and experts you just mentioned who speculate that we will have a negative attitude towards Google! Their irresponsible empty remarks are like a girl who is about to When she got married, a bunch of gossipy women wanted to tell her: Your fiancé actually doesn’t love you at all. In fact, he married you for your money rather than your person. In fact, he married you for your money and not your person. There are other women out there, and they won’t treat you well if they marry you... "
"To be honest, from the perspective of us Chinese people, this kind of person is quite wicked."
The audience once again burst into laughter. In fact, every company of a certain scale has encountered false accusations from the media and so-called experts. Today they say you are not good, and tomorrow they say you are not good, so I just talk about it. Everyone doesn't like people who dare to say anything. Li Mu's words just said what everyone has always wanted to say but has never had the chance to publicize.
After the applause, Li Mu chose another entrepreneur representative. After the other person stood up, he couldn't wait to ask Li Mu: "Mr. Li, you have been emphasizing the Internet 2.0 era just now, and you have also been emphasizing that Makino Technology should take the lead in entering the 2.0 era and transform into An open platform, so I would like to ask, what is the core gap between the 1.0 era and the 2.0 era?”
Li Mu replied with a smile: "The core difference between the 2.0 era and the 1.0 era is actually the difference between large planters and landowners. Large planters plant their own land no matter how much land they have. If they can't grow it themselves, they hire more workers to help." You are responsible for what you plant, how you plant it, and what to do with the harvest after planting. The workers are only responsible for contributing their efforts and receiving wages; while the landlord is responsible for himself. No matter how much land he has, he will plant part of it or not plant it at all, and the rest will be left to him. If you contract it to others to plant it, the landowner doesn’t care what you plant, how you plant it, or what you do with it after planting. He only charges rent based on the area, or receives a share based on the harvest.”
After that, Li Mu added: "You should have heard of our YYtunes. We have created a platform dedicated to selling music, and opened this platform to record companies, music studios and individual creators around the world, so that they can Upload your own works to our platform and provide them to our users, allowing them to make money from our users, and at the same time convert our users into their fans. This is the platform concept in the 2.0 era, but in In the next 2.0 era, Makino Technology will open up all platforms and build the entire group ecology into an open platform that is inclusive of all rivers!"
(End of chapter)