Chapter 109

$10 million, % stake, and a board seat.

Song Anli lived up to expectations and successfully finalized the general conditions for investing in ZOOM with Yuan Zheng through a video conference. The subsequent specific investment contract details will be handed over to the law firm.

After the video conference, Xie Jingxing and she set out at night from Menlo Park to San Francisco, which was an hour and a half away, to attend a cocktail party.

"Mr. Xie, which law firm do you personally prefer?"

During the ride, she took the time to send consultation emails to the top ten law firms in the business field in the United States. Not only the ZOOM project, but all subsequent legal business of Grapefruit in the United States will be outsourced to the law firms on a long-term basis.

Xie Jingxing said casually in English: "I don't have any preference. Maybe the new friends I met tonight can introduce us to some good law firms."

"...You can speak with a RP accent?" Song Anli widened her eyes.

Xie Jingxing said as a matter of course: "I forgot to tell you that my junior high school English teacher graduated from Oxford University in the 1990s and majored in classical literature."

"So you are cosplaying as a British aristocrat by dressing like this today?" Song Anli was shocked.

Xie Jing Xing smiled: "If someone cosplays as a Qing Dynasty noble, how would you react?"

"They'll probably think he's a clown." Song Anli said sincerely, feeling a little embarrassed to go out with such a boss.

Xie Jing Xing smiled slightly: "So I'm just cosplaying a little bit of the mysterious oriental 'old money' rich man style, American country bumpkins are more receptive to this."

"Well... he looks quite elegant." Song Anli looked at him carefully and decided to take back her previous evaluation.

The 'London accent' of English that people often refer to is generally the accent of the working class poor people in the East End of London. The accent that the British old man uses when greeting the New Year on TV every year is what the serious aristocratic gentlemen consider to be authentic English - referred to as the PR accent.

Xie Jingxing was a typical young Chinese man who spoke with the RP accent of a British aristocratic gentleman. He wore white sneakers, casual pants and a casual suit, and had no other accessories on his body except a watch.

The whole person's dressing style is completely different from his usual style. He looks very relaxed and reserved, and indeed has the air of a low-key, mysterious rich man.

Song Anli thought, no wonder she was forced to wear a cheongsam, with bracelets and watches jingling on her wrists, and all kinds of accessories sparkling all over her body, like a moving jewelry display cabinet.

She raised her delicate hand and stroked the Tiffany bracelet on her wrist. This bracelet was a gift from Spielberg to Audrey Hepburn. After being passed around for several times, it was collected by Xie Jingxing at an auction and just given to her.

It was a personal gift, not reimbursement from the company. Audrey’s name was engraved on the surface of the bracelet, and a sentence was engraved on the inner circle - You are my "inspiration" Always.

Song Anli's mind was in a mess. The car arrived at the destination and slowly stopped in front of a three-story villa facing the street. This was a membership club bar with a decoration style that was very traditional American Western.

When you push open the door, what comes into view is two shotguns overlapping and hanging on the wall. A stuffed deer head is placed on the table against the wall under the shotguns. Next to the deer head are several rows of cheap Maker's Mark bourbon whiskey, which is equivalent to Niulanshan or Red Star Erguotou in China.

"please."

A middle-aged white man with high boots, a cowboy hat and an unshaven beard put his hand on his waist and deliberately lowered his voice.

Xie Jingxing looked at the 'Drinking Theme' notice on the wall, shrugged his shoulders and picked up the glass of wine.

"Sir, men and women are equal." The white middle-aged man reminded.

"..."

Xie Jingxing was speechless, and Song Anli also picked up a glass of wine. The two of them walked smoothly into the main hall of the villa. Their sight suddenly opened up. A dozen men and women were sitting together in twos and threes, chatting.

In the center of the central dance floor stood a guy wearing a pirate hat and playing Captain Jack, who was talking about macroeconomics. There were a few listeners sitting around him, and Captain Jack wrote something on the big blackboard behind him from time to time.

Under the dim light, I saw that it was actually a mind map and various financial data. The scene looked a little funny. "Shieh, this way."

Jim Goetz, who was sitting at a round table in the corner surrounded by several men and women, waved.

Xie Jingxing looked around: "Why don't you guys drink this paint?"

"Because we all drank all the paint." Another middle-aged white man with a big nose and a square head said familiarly, his expression seemed to be provocative and slightly hostile.

Xie Jing Xing gave him a middle finger in return: "Then can you help me drink this cup of paint?"

"...You are such a scoundrel." The big-nosed white man complained.

Xie Jing Xing sat down next to him, and clinked glasses with him, "Come on, Bray, we are old friends."

"We are acquaintances. We have met a few times at most."

Jim Breyer half-heartedly insisted on drawing a line between the two. He was an early investor in Facebook and the largest shareholder of Facebook after Zuckerberg. The recent acquisition of WhatsApp caused him heavy losses, and it is not known whether he can maintain his position as the top ten investors in the world.

At the same time, he also has a Chinese wife named Zhao Jian. Zhao Jian’s father is a Chinese shipping tycoon and his sister is the US Secretary of Labor. She is known as the first Chinese in history to enter the cabinet. His family is top Chinese.

Through this relationship, he and Xie Jingxing had met several times in various public social occasions. He had never taken this young rich second generation seriously before. When the WhatsApp acquisition case was at a critical moment some time ago, he wanted to be a peacemaker, but his wife sternly refused and said she could not help.

So they tried to get Elon Musk to come forward in a roundabout way, but as his wife had predicted, the matter ended without even a meeting.

So Jim Breyer was indeed unhappy with Xie Jingxing, but as a Chinese son-in-law who had been featured in the People's Daily and was about to serve as the chairman of the advisory committee of Tsinghua School of Economics and Management and wanted to have the best of both worlds, it would be a bit of a loss for him to show actual malice.

There's nothing we can do about it, they're all prince consorts, but the other party's methods of living off the king seem to be more sophisticated.

Xie Jingxing, who forced Facebook to acquire the WhatsApp acquisition, is qualified to have a drink with him. On the surface, the two of them are smiling and thinking that everything is fine with them, but all the grudges are in the wine.

With the help of Breyer's simple jokes and disguised self-introductions, everyone continued the topic that had just been interrupted, exchanging information with each other about what good projects have emerged in Silicon Valley, how much money a certain company is raising, etc.

Xie Jingxing spent most of his time listening and occasionally interrupting to say a few words, while observing the guests at the cocktail party. There were not many people coming and going, and the number always remained at more than 20. Most of them were investors and founders who were well-known and would appear in the news.

"Did you go to secondary school in England?"

Xie Jingxing was sipping his wine out of boredom when a yellow-skinned mixed-race woman with burgundy hair who was standing a seat away suddenly leaned forward and asked.

He did not answer but asked: "Why do you say that?"

"You look like an 'Old Etonian,'" the woman whispered mischievously.

Xie Jingxing raised his eyebrows: "...This sounds like a disparagement."

"No, maybe I'm praising you for being in the best 1% in the world." The woman showed no sign of weakness.

Xie Jingxing was speechless. Eton College is a private aristocratic school in the UK. It has trained many elite prime ministers from all walks of life, but it is often labeled as "Old Eton" because of its old-fashioned, conservative and mean nature. On the other hand, under the elite education model, students will be told by their teachers on the first day of school that they must become one of the 1% of the population in this country and the world.

This kind of conversation was really uncomfortable. He looked at the woman's appearance carefully and she didn't seem to be a famous female hero in the world.

　I had a cold and my mind was a bit foggy these days. I felt a little better this afternoon. While I was typing, I wanted to drink some wine in the evening and take a bourbon whiskey easter egg. As a result, I started to have a fever while typing. I forced myself to finish this chapter. I may have to go to the hospital for an injection. I may not be able to update in the evening, but I will try my best to code.

　
(End of this chapter)