The entertainment empire began with Liu Yifei's premarital pregnancy.

"Welcome, General Manager Zhao, General Manager Shen, General Manager Zhou, General Manager Jin, and General Manager Yan!"

At the entrance of Zhewei Capital, Xu Hongfei stood at the front, followed by Zhou Mingxuan, Meng Shuyao, Bai Bing, and Ling Rou, the CEO of Time Coffee.

"President Xu!"

Zhao Zhengping, Shen Nanpeng, Zhou Quan, Jin Tao, and Yan Feng walked over and greeted them with smiles.

"Please come in, everyone!"

With a smile, Xu Hongfei led everyone into the meeting room.

"President Zhao, President Shen, President Zhou, President Jin, President Yan, you are all old acquaintances, so I won't say much. Let me introduce you. This is Ms. Ling Rou, the CEO of Time Coffee."

Inside the meeting room, Xu Hongfei gave a brief introduction and then handed the stage to Ling Rou.

"Mr. Zhao, Mr. Shen, Mr. Zhou, Mr. Jin, Mr. Yan..." Ling Rou walked up to the counter, her expression somewhat serious.

He greeted everyone first before slowly speaking.

"The Time Coffee brand..."

Ling Rou opened the PowerPoint presentation and stood in front of everyone to begin her passionate speech.

At first, Ling Rou simply felt that the Time Coffee brand was excellent in terms of both its meaning and its culture.

Later, Zhewei Capital provided support.

Under Ling Rou's leadership, Time Cafe underwent sweeping reforms and development.

To date, Time Coffee has opened eight branches in Beijing. Initially, she estimated that it might take a year to recoup the costs.

However, unexpectedly...

After the initial development, it only took three months to recoup more than 80% of the investment.

Although she hasn't fully recouped her investment yet, achieving an 80% return is enough to demonstrate that her marketing and operational model is successful and replicable.

In that case, it's time to expand Time Coffee nationwide.

This is very important.

In the domestic coffee market now, it's not like it was in later years, when Shangdao Coffee was the number one brand in China.

However, in recent years, Shangdao Coffee has been developing worse and worse, and its business model is too outdated.

This is the perfect time for Time Coffee to replace Ueshima Coffee.

"Dear executives, I believe you have all seen the company's information."

After Ling Rou finished her introduction, Xu Hongfei stood up and looked at everyone: "The Time Coffee brand was initially 100% invested in by Zhewei Capital."

"Currently, Zhewei Capital internally values ​​the Time Coffee brand at $2 million, and is now offering 20% ​​of its shares for Series A funding."

Time Cafe is still too small in scale.

A valuation of $200 million is neither high nor low, considering that Zhewei Capital invested over $100 million in the early stages.

In fact, Zhewei Capital still has money in its accounts.

However, in investment banking, the worst thing you can do is to hog all the profits.

If you try to make money all by yourself, no one will like you. On the contrary, if you have good connections, everyone can invest together and make money together.

In the future, other investment banks will not overlook you when they have good projects.

That's how this industry works; everything is interconnected. No one can say, "I can do it all by myself," that's impossible.

"Strong Wind Investment approves of this valuation!"

Zhao Zhengping, sitting next to the conference table, nodded seriously.

Strong Wind Investment is Lin Bufan's business, and it's a well-known investment bank on Wall Street.

The domestic market is the biggest market in the future, and Lin Bufan certainly can't let it go.

Strong Wind Investment cannot focus solely on overseas markets; the domestic market is naturally not to be overlooked either.

Zhao Zhengping is the head of the domestic branch of Strong Wind Investment.

Of course, Zhewei Capital will eventually expand overseas, but now is not the right time.

"Strong Wind Investment requires a 10% stake!"

Zhao Zhengping looked at Xu Hongfei, and after thinking for a moment, he spoke.

A 10% share is 20 million US dollars.

Strong Wind Investment has only been established in China for two or three months, and with the help of Zhewei Capital's platform, it is the perfect time to make its name known.

"Mr. Zhao, isn't your Strong Wind Investment a bit too greedy?"

Shen Nanpeng of Sequoia Capital looked at Zhao Zhengping, his tone indifferent.

"There are only 20% of the shares in total. You Strong Wind Investment took 10%, and the rest isn't enough for the rest of us to eat." As soon as Shen Nanpeng finished speaking, Zhou Quan followed up.

Zhou Quan is an employee of IDG Capital.

Both Sequoia Capital and IDG Capital are top-tier investment banks in China.

The other two are Jin Tao, who works at Shenzhen Capital Group, and Yan Feng, who works at SAIF Partners.

To reiterate, when it comes to investment projects, Xu Hongfei is looking for allies for Zhewei Capital, such as Sequoia Capital, IDG Capital, Shenzhen Capital Group, and SAIF Partners.

These are all top-tier investment banks in China.

Some smaller investment banks simply didn't have the opportunity to participate.

Money is not a problem for Zhewei Capital, Sequoia Capital, IDG Capital, Shenzhen Capital Group, and SAIF Partners. What they lack most is connections.

For the Time Coffee brand to grow, it must coordinate relationships with all parties involved.

In particular, this brand plans to open stores nationwide, which involves an even larger network of relationships. Even with its wealth, Zhewei Capital alone could not manage to operate it.

Sometimes, money is just the most basic entry ticket.

"5%, that's the lowest we can go!"

Zhao Zhengping frowned slightly. Strong Wind Investment had just entered the domestic market, and he couldn't afford to offend these people, so he had to settle for second best.

Sequoia Capital, 6%.

Shen Nanpeng looked at Xu Hongfei.

IDG Capital, 5.5%.

Zhou Quan followed suit, asking for a 5.5% share.

Currently, Strong Wind Investment, Sequoia Capital, and IDG Capital together account for 16.5% of the investment portfolio.

Shenzhen Capital Group: 1.8%.

SAIF Partners: 1.7%.

Finally, Jin Tao and Yan Feng also spoke up to express their opinions.

Ultimately, Sequoia Capital led the investment round, with IDG Capital, Strong Wind Investment, Shenzhen Capital Group, and SAIF Partners also participating, bringing Time Cafe's total funding to $4000 million.

Forty million US dollars is enough for Time Cafe's initial development.

Based on an average investment of 100 million per store, this amount of money would be enough for Time Coffee to open 320 directly operated stores.

This calculation only covers the cost of renting a property. If you were to buy a shop directly, the cost would be at least five times higher, or even more.