Top of the Great Era

Zhou Buqi's playful eyes made Boss Ma laugh, "Actually, there is no secret. Everyone knows that many media have reported it, and it has something to do with control."

Zhou Buqi asked: "The financing of US$10 billion that year?"

Boss Ma said, "Yes."

Then, he briefly talked about what was going on here.

In 2005, Yahoo found that they could no longer play in the domestic market. 3721, which was acquired with huge sums of money in the early years, was far away from Baidu, and the portal was squeezed by Sohu, Sina and Netease. living space.

Then, Yahoo made a change. In terms of their strategy for dealing with the Chinese market, they wanted to change from a direct participation model to an indirect investment model.

Then, waving 10 billion US dollars in banknotes, coupled with the temptation of Yahoo China's business, entered the market in a hurry.

At first, he fell in love with Shanda, who was in full swing, and they had a good talk, but Chen Tianqiao was full of worries, worried that he would lose control of Shanda, so he gave up.

Then, it was Boss Ma's turn.

Ali successfully got $10 billion from Yahoo.But the price of this billion dollars is very high. In addition to paying Ali 10% of the shares, the agreement also stipulates that Yahoo will also have 40% of the voting rights.

There is also a 5 year agreement.

Within 5 years, Boss Ma will not be dismissed by the board of directors.

But after 5 years, the "no dismissal" clause becomes invalid.At the same time, Yahoo will add a new director to Ali's board of directors.

This means that Boss Ma’s management’s voting rights in Ali have dropped to 30%, while Softbank has kept 30% of the voting rights unchanged... In other words, Yahoo has become Ali’s veritable largest shareholder. Theoretically there is a risk of being cleared out.As long as Yahoo and Softbank reach a unity, he will step down.

Because of such harsh conditions, Shanda did not accept the $10 billion that year.

The risk is too great.

Boss Ma was very aggressive and accepted it.

This is the embodiment of the entrepreneur's confidence, courage and vision, and it is the best display of Boss Ma's personal charm.He has confidence in himself and in Ali, and he firmly believes that Ali can get better and better under his leadership.

As long as Ali's performance is thriving and getting better and better, then he can always get the support of Sun Zhengyi.At that time, he and Softbank will have 60% of the voting rights together, so he won't be afraid of Yahoo.

Shanda didn't accept it, mainly because Chen Tianqiao was afraid and didn't have confidence in his own level. What if Shanda fails in a few years?Once Shanda's performance declines and its management is poor, he, the founder, may be asked out by the major shareholders.

Now Ali, although the stock price keeps falling and is scolded by stockholders in Hong Kong Island every day, the overall operation is still very good. Boss Ma's position is very stable and he has won great support from Sun Zhengyi.

However, the existence of Yahoo, the largest shareholder, and the voting rights in their hands are always a hidden danger.

Boss Ma's move this time has nothing to do with making money, nor with reclaiming Yahoo's stock. The fundamental purpose is to reclaim Yahoo's power.

He wants Yahoo and Softbank to have voting rights combined, and they can't shake the management.

He can firmly control Ali's control.

Zhou Buqi had dealt with Boss Ma too much, and knew him very well.In particular, he still has foresight, so he guessed Boss Ma's thinking and layout in an instant.

snort!
Sure enough, it was a big game of chess!
However, it was inconvenient to say some things in front of Masayoshi Son, so Zhou Buqi laughed and talked about it for a while, and made an analysis of the current situation of Yahoo and the various forces in the industry who were eyeing Yahoo.

When Carol Bartz stepped down, Yahoo's market capitalization was only $160 billion.

Now Yahoo doesn't even have a CEO, and people are in a panic, but because of the market hype, many capital institutions have initiated acquisition invitations for Yahoo, which makes this stock hot in no time.

Now Yahoo's stock price has reached 15.7 US dollars, and its market value has risen to 205 billion US dollars.

Zhou Buqi said with emotion: "Three years ago, Microsoft offered 446 billion US dollars to acquire Yahoo. They thought the price was too low and did not agree. Now the market value is only 200 billion US dollars. Have you met Yang Zhiyuan? Did you regret it later?"

Sun Zhengyi said with a smile: "It's always embarrassing."

Zhou Buqi asked: "Didn't there be several private equity offers some time ago? Do you know how much the offer is?"

Sun Zhengyi said: "The pressure is relatively low, and it should not exceed 200 billion US dollars."

Zhou Buqi laughed and said, "It's no wonder this family can sell it!"

Masayoshi Son explained this, "Yahoo now is not the same as it was when Microsoft acquired it three years ago. Three years ago, Yahoo also encountered some troubles. It also fired the CEO and replaced it with a new CEO. But Yahoo at that time The family background is very strong, and there are more than 20 billion US dollars in cash flow in the account. So they have the confidence and think that Yahoo can rise again."

Zhou Buqi heard what he meant, and was shocked, "After Carol Bartz became the CEO of Yahoo, he lost all the funds in his account?"

Sun Zhengyi sighed, "She has made too many wrong decisions."

Boss Ma added next to him: "Now Yahoo is really a mess. There is no money in the account, no new business, and after so many years, it can only rely on the main portal network to earn advertising fees."

Zhou Buqi nodded, "So now is a better opportunity to buy the bottom than three years ago, and take advantage of his illness to kill him."

Sun Zhengyi smiled, "No, it's just cooperation."

Zhou Buqi then asked, "Have you quoted the price yet?"

"Not yet." Sun Zhengyi is leading the case. After all, this is the US market. He is more suitable than Boss Ma to handle the case. "I will meet with people from Blackstone Group and Bain Capital in a while and come up with a comparison." Appropriate trial offer plan."

"I'm afraid that won't work."

Zhou Buqi disapproved of this idea.

Sun Zhengyi was very surprised, "What's wrong?"

Zhou Buqi said indifferently: "I don't think that people like Blackstone, Bain, and Sequoia can understand Yahoo and give the most fair quotation. The most important thing to do in the Internet industry is courage. Either live or Die, there is no middle option."

Boss Ma smiled and said nothing.

Sun Zhengyi smiled, "What is courage?"

Zhou Buqi said: "The size of courage is the amount of risk you take."

Masayoshi Son nodded, "It's okay, go meet them first, try to quote a price first, and see the reaction of Yahoo's board of directors. It also shows an attitude to them, we are here for real, we really want to acquire Yahoo .”

Zhou Buqi got a little angry, so he pulled Boss Ma and told Sun Zhengyi that they would not go to see people from Blackstone Group and Bain Capital.

Anyway, each of these international capital giants is tougher than the other. They have their own set of investment rules and cannot take excessive risks.

This is not angel investing.

Like angel investment, the risk is huge, but the scale of investment is relatively small, usually hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars.Investment institutions cast a wide net and invest more, as long as one of them succeeds in investing, they will make money.

Yahoo is a large project worth tens of billions of dollars, so risk control will be very strict.But once the risk control is strict, it will hinder some bold and big actions.

Zhou Buqi didn't like them at all.

Sun Zhengyi was a little embarrassed, "How about we go together?"

"No, we won't go." Zhou Buqi smiled, "Old Ma, what do you think?"

Boss Ma coughed and scolded the bastard 360 times in his heart, really annoyed and helpless.He took action against Yahoo this time because he was worried about accidents and wanted to bypass this guy.

Unexpectedly, this guy was like a dog's skin plaster, and it was pasted from thousands of miles away.

In terms of magic tricks, Boss Ma feels that he is invincible, especially in overseas markets, where his grand vision is the easiest to succeed.

It's a little bit worse domestically.

Especially when facing a kid like Zhou Buqi, he failed almost every time.

What he was most worried about was that this kid got involved and wreaked havoc inside.Unexpectedly, this guy still ran over.

There was no other way but to bite the bullet and deal with it.

Boss Ma smiled and told Sun Zhengyi that it would be fine for Sun Zhengyi to talk to the two major investment institutions alone, and he trusted him very much.Anyway, it is a quotation for the first phase, and there will be a long-term future.

Boss Zhou canceled his vacation all the way and ran over, always wanting to "treat" him enthusiastically.Boss Ma felt that he had to have a good talk with him, no matter what, he couldn't let this bastard spoil his good deed!