Chapter 325: Creating a Billion-Dollar Unicorn Out of Thin Air
"Notify Miao Nan to come to Beijing to take charge of the project."

In the afternoon, at Tencent headquarters in Shenzhen, Xie Jingxing briefly hung up the phone.

Pony Ma, who had received the good news, put down his phone at the same time. The two looked at each other. He pursed his lips and smiled restrainedly: "Many projects under Tencent are free-range, so we try to respect the attitude of the project's front-line managers."

"It's understandable to have emotions, but if they can be resolved, then it's not a problem." Xie Jingxing said in a calm tone.

If we define the time node strictly, the entire domestic online ticketing business market only officially formed at the beginning of last year, and it has only been a year and a half.

During this period, as the three major companies of Xinda and Dang were engaged in a money-burning war, giants such as Taotaopiao personally entered the game.

Lin Ning has been able to keep Microfilm Era going until today without being defeated, and has gradually narrowed the market share gap with the leading players. The importance of the Tencent platform itself is unquestionable, and he himself has the ability.

The project needs to be integrated urgently, so it is not advisable to make drastic changes in the short term.

As long as they obeyed the general direction, Xie Jingxing and Xiao Ma Ge didn't care about his personal interests, or they didn't care at all.

Regarding issues such as the adjustment of internal management rights and the distribution of equity of the founding team of Weying Times, the specific executors of all parties, including Song Anli and Miao Nan, have plenty of room to quarrel with each other, and how to distribute the benefits depends entirely on their own abilities.

After a few words, Lin Ning's stay or departure was finalized. Xie Jingxing retracted his attention: "Then there are two issues now. The first is the traffic port. Let's sign a long-term contract."

"The specific terms of the agreement are broken down into three to five year renewals. After all, the market is changing and brothers should settle accounts clearly." Qu Dejun echoed the words beautifully.

"No problem, you can discuss the details later."

Pony Ma nodded in agreement and glanced at Zhang Xiaolong, who was playing the role of a depressed patient with a stern face next to him: "As a strategic shareholder of Weying Times, Tencent will not let Weying Times suffer any loss."

"It's the same with Xinda E. Mr. Zhang Tao will be coming to Shenzhen in a couple of days. Mr. Zhang, you guys should get together." Xie Jingxing pretended he saw nothing.

Take the long-term advertising and marketing service contract signed between JD.com and Tencent when it acquired Tencent’s e-commerce assets last year as an example.

Platforms such as WeChat and QQ have value-added services for traffic ports specifically for third-party corporate customers. In the past, Weying Times, as a subsidiary of the company, enjoyed BC-level traffic support.

For example, the WeChat discovery page embedded in the application, the QQ application recommendation page and so on, the two social software with a combined traffic diversion effect of billions of people is terrifying.

In the future, Microfilm will be completely independent and these services will have to be purchased, and may not be available under normal circumstances.

At present, Zhang Xiaolong has not yet gone completely crazy and turned into a dragon, and still maintains the last bit of his brave temperament.

He is very concerned about the external functions embedded in WeChat, and his idealistic decision on what kind of third-party corporate customers to recruit is often based on his thinking.

As a result, Xie Jingxing asked for a long-term contract, and the old fox Qu Dejun agreed to renew the contract every three to five years.

You should know that the online ticketing business that several people are talking about refers to movie tickets, but this is just an application called "Yupiaoer" under Weying Times. In addition, there are many vertical category business applications around live performances and film and television IP.

I don’t know how much messy stuff will be stuffed into WeChat. Zhang Xiaolong has a Sima face for his reasons.

However, Pony Ma didn't care much about this. What he wanted was that the new Dianping would also provide traffic port services to the applications under Weying Times on the two platforms of Ele.me and Dianping.

So Xie Jingxing asked to sign a long-term contract, which was intended to be a gentleman's agreement that neither of them would run their own ticketing business in the future and would rely on each other.

Furthermore, traffic ports are the biggest advantage Tencent can provide in this cooperation. If the price is not high enough, why would New DAEON and Wanda Cinemas pay for it?

"Then the second question is the valuation of Microfilm Times and the amount of financing."

As expected, after reaching an agreement on the traffic port, Xie Jingxing began to talk about money: "Calculate it with US dollar funds."

"We haven't had time to compile financial reports for the online ticketing business that New Dang has spun off, but based on experience, we can roughly estimate that it's $4 million."

Qu Dejun once again cooperated: "On the way here, I took a look at the investment agreement that Microfilm Times is discussing with Wanda Cinemas. The original plan was to value it at $4.5 million, transfer 22% of the equity, and raise $1 million."

“So even if the starting valuation is one billion US dollars, why don’t we raise 2-3 million first?” Pony Ma seemed to be seeking advice.

The situation was too urgent and no one knew how much the other party was worth, so they could only estimate based on their guesswork.

However, before the merger with New Dianping, in January last year, during the Spring Festival offensive led by Xie Jingxing to encircle Meituan, the original Dianping started a crazy subsidy war of three yuan for watching movies.

Later, during the period when "Lost in Thailand" broke the box office record last fall, New Big Elephant teamed up with Meituan to subsidize Baidu Nuomi's low-priced movie tickets.

After the two battles, the market share of Xindai's online ticketing business, offline equipment, project team and other assets converted into assets will not be lower than that of Weying Times.

Qu Dejun had no objection to paying the money, and Xiao Ma Ge, as the one who was getting the benefit, naturally had no objection either.

Microfilm Times has a need to import and distribute films from abroad and expand its business in Southeast Asia, so it is reasonable for it to raise funds in the form of US dollar funds.

"If we add in Wanda's investment in channel cinemas and some cash, we will have raised another $2-3 million in financing."

Xie Jingxing said after careful consideration: "We will try our best to introduce the Cultural Industry Fund to invest, with Pony Ma leading the investment and Grapefruit Capital making up the difference."

"Mr. Xie is very wealthy and we are under a lot of pressure." Qu Dejun said self-deprecatingly to ease the atmosphere.

Brother Ma changed the subject with great interest and asked, "How many cinemas do you have?"

"Less than three hundred." Qu Dejun smiled and took the opportunity to make a small move. The specific number is about 290 theaters with 2500 screens, all of which are directly operated, and there are 5000 million cinema members.

Their theater distribution channels and upstream and downstream film and television product production and procurement channels are very valuable, and the specific amount they need to put out as a stake in Microfilm Times needs to be carefully calculated.

"So the final solution is that Tencent will provide Weiying Times + traffic ports; Xinda E will provide all online ticketing services + traffic ports on the payment platform; and Wanda will provide the distribution channels of the cinema line + part of the cash."

Xie Jingxing concluded: "We will establish a new joint venture company with the original brand name of 'Weiying Times' unchanged, introduce 2-3 million US dollars in financing to build a film and television production system, and seek mergers and acquisitions to integrate online ticketing business."

"What do you two bosses think?" He let out a tired breath.

Qu Dejun frowned and thought: "Pony.com has very good production capabilities. Our Wanda and Tencent film and television production departments can also join the entire distribution system for win-win cooperation."

"The China Literature Group that Tencent just formed is a treasure. Mr. Ma, please don't keep it to yourself." Xie Jingxing joked half-jokingly.

Brother Xiao Ma shook his head and laughed: "Mr. Xie, you can pick any IP you want. If it doesn't work, I will personally sponsor you to make a movie based on the IP, but you have to choose a script with a female perspective, right?"

"I think it's reliable. If we let a top female star, Concubine Pei, star in the film, Wanda would also be happy to sponsor and invest in it!" Qu Dejun is very good at creating an atmosphere and taking the opportunity to build closer relationships.

The two old guys laughed teasingly in the blink of an eye. Xie Jingxing has always been thick-skinned about this kind of thing: "Don't mention it, if you sponsor me, I will definitely accept it."

"Well, let me be honest, I'm not kidding. It seems that we do have a script adapted from a novel called "July and Ansheng". If Concubine Pei is interested, let her take a look at the script." Qu Dejun offered benefits seriously.

Xiao Ma Ge was not so good, he really had no idea about such a small business as investing in movies, so he could only wave his hand to indicate that he could pay.

Xie Jingxing didn't mind picking up pie in the sky, but Concubine Pei was pregnant and went to the United States to protect her pregnancy. Her studio signed a highly educated goddess with a pure school beauty face. She was pretty. Let's see if she is suitable.

The three of them chatted and laughed while deciding on a film project, then turned around and criticized which director was a rip-off while discussing some topics about cultural exports.

Lin Ning thought that the new DAE’s entry of capital was like holding a hammer and seeing everything as a nail - it was madly burning the market.

But in fact, in the eyes of Xie Jingxing, Xiao Ma Ge and Qu Dejun, the film industry is just a market with a total scale of 600 billion and a 40% online ticket purchase ratio.

This is the growth dividend from the three local life companies who spent a year burning money on subsidies.

Therefore, the market side needs to spend money, the content of film and television production needs to spend even more money, and the integration of the entire market through mergers and acquisitions needs to spend more money!

Ultimately, the importance of film and television theater distribution lies not in its own market size, but in the fact that it is one of the most downstream businesses in the pan-entertainment industry chain. Otherwise, why would Meituan, Baidu, and Xinda E all take it as an entry point?

"He created a unicorn worth tens of billions of dollars out of thin air. This is unprecedented in my life. Mr. Xie has a broad vision." The atmosphere was harmonious and everyone was chatting and laughing. Qu Dejun's tone was complex, with a mixture of true and false emotion and flattery.

Xie Jing Xing smiled helplessly; "To be honest, we were all forced to do nothing but stick together for warmth."

Qu Dejun smiled knowingly, he was really forced to do it.

Baidu invested in China Film Star Media and Meituan chose Light Media. After the two companies successively made marriages, the pattern of the entire theater chain and online box office was determined.

Wanda Cinema has no choice but to choose a camp. Conversely, Tencent and New DAESH have no choice either. They cannot build their own cinema chains to compete with Meituan and Baidu.

The Wanda Cinemas + New DAESH + Tencent camp can be said to be inevitable, but it was originally a small-scale operation, and the people below instinctively gathered together to come up with a strategic financing plan of US$1 million.

Now, the business is being personally managed by the aggressive young coach Xie, with Wanda and Tencent participating as group entities.

"Don't be discouraged. We are cooperating for mutual benefit and growing together." Xiao Ma Ge said with some meaning.

Xie Jingxing and Qu Dejun looked at each other, then looked at him, and the three of them laughed without saying a word.

According to asset valuation, New DAE and Tencent invested roughly half and half in the newly established Microfilm Era, and Wanda Cinema’s investment + part of the funds should be less.

Xie Jingxing said that he would raise another 2-3 million US dollars in financing and strive to introduce strategic investment from the entertainment industry, and the remaining difference would be covered by Grapefruit Capital.

The three of them are well aware that the actual subsequent financing amount will definitely be capped at US$3 million, and the difference that Grapefruit Capital will guarantee will definitely be significant.

Therefore, on the surface, it seems that New Big Elephant has made a drastic decision to directly divest the platform's online ticketing business and package it as a gift to Weying Times, and the equity structure of Weying Times is dispersed.

In fact, the internal relationship is complicated. Neither the Grapefruit Group nor the Tencent Group can reach a 50% controlling stake, but the former will have a relatively higher shareholding ratio, while the latter has a management team headed by Lin Ning.

As the third largest shareholder, Wanda coordinated in the middle to form a stable triangle structure. There was no such thing as mutual support. Everyone was on guard against each other and cooperated for mutual benefit. It was always so chaotic.

"You guys chat, I have a meeting."

Zhang Xiaolong, who was watching coldly and couldn't get a word in about the conversation between the riddlers, took the opportunity to say something, then patted his butt and left in a cool manner.

Qu Dejun quickly caught up: "Mr. Zhang, wait a moment, let's talk."

"Mr. Qu, let's meet at the coffee shop downstairs later." Xie Jingxing greeted him without any hesitation.

Xiao Ma took off his glasses and wiped them slowly. In a blink of an eye, the office returned to silence, and the two people waited quietly for the other to speak first.

(End of this chapter)