Years: Salted fish life since going to the countryside.

Chapter 1698 Trivial Matters After Returning
Han Li watched the Chung sisters enter the elevator. After returning home and closing the door, he made himself a cup of tea and sat down by the phone to make his usual calls.

Han Li's first call was to Attorney Jin, who was doing as usual.

Han Li's second call was to Anita Koch of the law firm "High T Brothers". After returning to Hong Kong from the United States, she attended a Christmas Eve dance party hosted by some foreigners in the Hong Kong government.

During the conversation, Anita Koch mentioned the possibility of buying land again, but the foreigners did not give an immediate response.

Furthermore, Anita Koch met Shaw's nephew at another ball.

During their casual conversation, the other person brought up the Shaw Brothers cinema chain again.

This Shaw Brothers nephew revealed that the total value of the entire Shaw Brothers cinema chain in Hong Kong was approximately HK$160 million.

After receiving instructions from Han Li, Anita Koch made a "prospective" offer of around 70 million to the nephew of the Shao family during their subsequent contacts.

After Anita Koch's even more outrageous bargaining, which was worse than a 50% cut, the two never mentioned the theater issue again after their meeting.

However, as the year draws to a close, Shaw Brothers realized that nearly 90% of their film business had been taken away by Golden Harvest and New Century Film Studio when they did their accounting.

The Shaw Brothers CEO originally planned to reduce investment in films and abandon the cinemas that were no longer profitable, instead focusing his resources, personnel, and energy on the more vibrant and profitable TVB television broadcasting company, aiming to make it bigger and stronger.

This situation arose during this year's review, which strengthened the CEO's original idea even further.

Therefore, some members of the Shaw family were instructed to release information on certain occasions that the family intended to sell its film and cinema chains.

If this had happened last year or the year before, many people in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and even Southeast Asia would have been waving their money at Shaw Brothers, trying to take over their cinema chains.

Unfortunately, after the talks between China and Britain on September 24 this year, the vast majority of people are not optimistic about Hong Kong's future prospects.

Therefore, Shaw Brothers Cinemas, which was usually a tempting piece of meat, is now becoming a target of no interest.

That's often how things are. What should have been a family with many suitors turned out to be a situation where no one wanted to marry into the family.

This huge psychological gap made some people at Shaw Brothers even more eager to get rid of the burden of theaters, which barely made any money each year.

This led to the incident where Shaw's nephew intentionally mentioned the theater chain to Anita Koch.

After listening to Anita Koch's explanation, Han Li thought to himself that his gains from his trip to the United States were not much different from those he used to acquire movie theaters or land.

Although those wild hills and wastelands are cheap, to develop them, you not only need to consider the actual situation and combine it with the plans of the Hong Kong government, but you also have to pour money into them yourself.

Although cinemas are many times more expensive, they have good locations, mostly in bustling and lively areas, and they also have existing properties that only need minor renovations to make money.

After quickly reviewing the matter in his mind, Han Li spoke to Anita Koch on the other end of the phone.

"You can follow up on the Shaw Brothers cinema chain matter, but there are a few things to keep in mind. First, does the Shaw Brothers intend to sell cinemas outside of Hong Kong? If not, you must push the price down as much as possible."

Secondly, at the appropriate time, you can inform the person in charge at Shaw's in this regard.
Our company's stance is either not to get involved in the Hong Kong cinema business, or if we do get involved, we hope to acquire more cinemas and theaters.

If Shaw Brothers can help spearhead the acquisition of those scattered cinemas, we can make appropriate concessions on the price of acquiring the Shaw Brothers cinema chain.

Third, as I mentioned before, if the acquisition of Shaw Brothers Cinemas can be finalized, it must include ownership of their film library accumulated over the years.

If Shaw Brothers does not agree to ownership of the film library, this acquisition cannot proceed.

After Han Li finished telling Anita Koch everything he could think of, they chatted casually for a couple of minutes before hanging up the phone.

Han Li didn't take the acquisition of Shaw Brothers Cinemas too seriously, mainly because he couldn't and didn't want to worry about it.

In the early stages, Anita Koch was tasked with negotiating with the relevant personnel at Shaw's. Han Li only needed to understand the direction of the matter, and once he felt the price was acceptable, he could make the final decision and sign the agreement.

Next, Han Li called Kenan Spencer of World Law Firm, but his secretary answered the phone.

As for Kennan Spencer, he said he flew back to Italy to spend Christmas Eve and Christmas with his family.

Han Li guessed that Kennan Spencer should take advantage of this holiday to try to make him a partner at World Law Firm in Italy.

Han Li's next call was to Ji Zehao, the general manager he had hired in Hong Kong. After receiving the call, Ji Zehao began to boast and complain.

Ji Zehao said that during this period, he not only replaced all the management personnel of the taxi company, but also made some adjustments to the management of vehicles and drivers based on the current taxi market in Hong Kong, and equipped each vehicle with the latest in-vehicle radio.

In addition, Ji Zehao has thoroughly investigated the situation of all the land under the company's name during this period, and he has decided to find someone to design and plan the land in Quarry Bay.

Han Li praised Ji Zehao and once again offered him a lucrative opportunity, finally telling him to register an entertainment company under the name of Hongtu Investment Company when he had time.

After listening, Ji Zehao asked about the name of the entertainment company when it was registered, as well as the scope of business that needed to be registered. Han Li replied with a completely indifferent answer.

"The entertainment company is called 'Infinite,' right? As for the scope of business, it doesn't matter whether we do it or not. You should apply for all the necessary permits first."

After hanging up Ji Zehao's call, Han Li drank a cup of tea, then picked up the phone and called Delina Heck of Milann, Italy.

Overall, things are going well for Delina Heck. Although the pace of expansion has meant the company hasn't seen much profit yet, everything is moving in a positive direction.

However, Delina Heck complained to Han Li on the phone that she still couldn't find a truly market-opening product, otherwise the situation would be dozens of times better than it is now.

Delina Heck made this comment unintentionally, but Han Li remembered it.

Han Li's next call was to his mother. Since it wasn't Sunday, he called the neighborhood committee directly.
(End of this chapter)