Reborn: Billionaire in College

“This track is kind of interesting.”

Not only Chen Pingjiang was in the office, but also Zhang Yiming, Liang Rubo and even Shen Nanpeng had arrived.

It was not accidental that Chen Pingjiang came across Peng Zhining’s Douyin video. He learned about it from a conversation with Zhang Yiming.

"I think your consideration is unnecessary. Copyright issues can be discussed. It is something the video author needs to consider. Strictly speaking, what they are doing is secondary creation." Chen Pingjiang said with a smile.

He had watched many videos like this in his previous life.

Moreover, this kind of video will hardly repel anyone, and anyone who clicks in will want to watch it.

Because it fully captures people's curiosity.

Who doesn't want to know what other people think of them? They want to hear good and bad things.

It is human nature to feel happy when hearing good words and to curse when hearing bad words.

Zhang Yiming didn't come here specifically to report. This was just a small matter and it was not necessary to waste the big boss' time with such a thing.

"Well, such videos are a bit obvious, and their shortcomings are also obvious. It is difficult to make them a hit, and they are very easy to be copied by later comers." Zhang Yiming nodded and skipped the topic. "The separation of TikTok and its parent company can be carried out at any time, but should other regions also follow suit?"

Chen Pingjiang turned to Shen Nanpeng with a smile on his face, "That depends on how big Mr. Shen's appetite is."

Even though Shen Nanpeng could tell that Chen Pingjiang was joking, he still didn't dare to be arrogant and waved his hand quickly: "Don't do that. This time I am just a middleman to help Sequoia headquarters to match them up. You guys need to discuss the details. But given our relationship, I can reveal something privately that does not violate professional ethics, which is that the headquarters does not seem to have too many ideas about other regions."

Chen Pingjiang nodded: "It's normal to have this idea. After all, it's a high-quality asset. To be honest, even Zuckerberg called me, but I rejected him."

The purpose of today's meeting is to find a thug to take charge of TikTok's North American business.

Relying on the past friendly relationship between Chen Pingjiang and Shen Nanpeng, Sequoia was already included in the long list of financing institutions.

In addition to Sequoia, there is another one - General Atlantic.

In fact, this is not something to be ashamed of.

If you want to make it in someone else's territory without any local connections to do public relations, it's basically impossible to make it.

Just like when Uber entered China, it also had to find a large number of national teams to endorse it locally.

The principles are always the same.

Although TikTok has not been targeted by anyone yet, it does not prevent Chen Pingjiang from making moves early and making more preparations.

Even if we cannot nip the crisis in the bud, we must try to fight it as much as possible.

Chen Pingjiang was unwilling to change or adjust the equity division of the parent company ByteDance, but agreed to sell TikTok overseas and introduce strategic partners.

And because of the special nature of TikTok, this cooperation with Sequoia and Pan Atlantic is limited to the North American market.

Tiktok Global will be separated from Tiktok and operated and financed independently.

And it is independent of TikTok business in other countries and regions.

In fact, TikTok's global business has always adopted a regional operation strategy.

The Asia-Pacific market (such as Indonesia, Japan, and Southeast Asia) is directly managed by ByteDance, and content recommendations and user data are independent of TikTok Global.

Due to regulations such as GDPR, user data in European markets (such as the UK and France) is stored on local servers and operating entities are separated from North America.

Emerging markets (such as Brazil and Mexico) are led by local teams, and the content ecosystem and business strategies are more in line with local culture.

The content should not be interchangeable.

TikTok content pools in different countries are isolated from each other. For example, videos uploaded by American users are only visible to North American users, while content uploaded by Indonesian users is targeted at the Southeast Asian market. In fact, the same is true for YouTube and Twitter.

Although the call is to maintain global unity, in fact "invisible partitioning" is achieved through technology and strategy.

The benefits of doing this are:
On the one hand, countries have different policies on data storage and algorithm management.

On the other hand, it can also be better localized.

Otherwise, a Korean would always see videos of Europeans and wouldn't even understand what they are saying or writing, which would inevitably lead to the failure of TikTok to develop in that region.

After Tiktok Global operates independently, it can open up for financing. As long as the founding team retains sufficient voting rights, the rest can be done as they please.

In this way, it will have enough strength to cope with the competition from the two apps Reels and Shorts that will emerge in the future.

"Let Lao Liang lead the team to North America this time. As long as the demands are not excessive, we can discuss it. If you can't make up your mind, discuss it with Lao Zhang." After thinking about it, Chen Pingjiang handed the task to Liang Rubo.

Tiktok Global's independent operation and independent financing is a big thing, but also a small matter. The direction has been set, and the only thing left is to see what kind of good price it can be sold at, and it would be best to do it once and for all to prevent other institutions from coveting it.

After all, Tiktok is indeed important to Chen Pingjiang, but not that important.

Chen Pingjiang defined it as a platform for cultural output and a window for communication, used to realize its own soft power. As long as the right to vote can be guaranteed, nothing will be a problem.

Rather than guarding a treasure trove and eventually being driven out of North America, it is better to find yourself a bunch of thugs and let them take action when things get tough.

…………

On the other hand, Peng Zhining, who was at Brown University, spent a thrilling week that could change his life.

From being on the verge of despair and becoming autistic to an unexpected turn of events, and now to seeing the blue sky after the clouds have cleared.

Life's ups and downs are fascinating.

In the past week, all data of the short videos moved by Peng Zhining have exploded.

In just one week, the number of fans has reached 37, and the total number of video views has reached 4200 million.

This is the charm of the Douyin algorithm. The higher the quality of the content and the less homogeneity, the easier it is to get promoted. In rounds of PK, videos with good data can enter the next round, and then get more traffic and be seen by more people.

In a track with almost no competition, Peng Zhining was able to take advantage of this wave of traffic.

What surprised Peng Zhining even more was that his efforts were not in vain.

Sure enough, some merchants came to us, two of them.

One is an advertisement for a dating app, and the other is an advertisement for a second-hand recycling app.

The operation is also very simple. You just need to insert an advertisement of no less than 30 seconds in the middle of the video.

The two parties agreed to calculate the money based on the backend playback volume.

Peng Zhining once used a calculator to calculate that one million views would amount to three thousand yuan.

If calculated based on 4700 million, it would be more than 14 yuan.

Of course, the calculation is not that simple. The video before the advertisement is inserted naturally has no money.

While Peng Zhining was delighted, he was also alerted by the emergence of competitors.

It came faster and more than expected. (End of this chapter)