Countercurrent 1982

Chapter 1978 Amazon

"Hello, Mr. Brown." The next moment, Duan Yun walked up to Brown Jones with a smile on his face, and held out his hand.

"Hello, boss." Brown Jones immediately held Duan Yun's hand together when he saw this.

Brown Jones looks only in his 30s. It is hard to imagine that he was a millionaire in the past. In the early 90s, his net worth exceeded one million dollars. He was definitely a proper rich man, but his business failed. All his efforts were in vain, and he was also burdened with hundreds of thousands of dollars in foreign debt.

In fact, there are many such entrepreneurial losers in the United States, and their fate is very bleak. The myth of making a comeback has become an inherent routine in many film and television dramas, but in fact, for most people, they may only have such a life. Once you have a chance, if you fail, it will be difficult to turn around. It is because of this that there are frequent failures in entrepreneurship, and eventually suicides by jumping off buildings.

But judging from Brown Jones' expression, he seemed to be a very optimistic person. He was dressed very business-like, and his hair was combed meticulously, giving him a very strong elite look.

"I'm very interested in your past entrepreneurial stories. I want to invite you to dinner tonight. I don't know what you want?" Duan Yun said to Brown Jones.

"I'm sorry, today is my son's birthday. I've already bought a gift and I'm going to give it to him tonight, so I can't accept your invitation." Brown Jones said.

"Alright then." Duan Yun nodded.

For those who didn't expect Brown Jones to reject his invitation, you must know that Duan Yun's current status is not what it used to be. In terms of his wealth, even in the United States, he is definitely a billionaire admired by thousands of people, but The Brown Jones in front of him didn't give Duan Yun any face, and directly rejected him in public.

"If there is another time, I would be happy to accept the invitation." At this time, Brown Jones added another sentence.

"That's great." Duan Yun smiled slightly, and continued: "Then tomorrow night, let's find a restaurant, I really want to hear your past story."

"Okay," said Brown Jones.

After making an appointment with Brown Jones, Li Yun introduced other employees of the company to Duan Yun one by one.

Compared with Brown Jones, the resumes of these other American employees seem ordinary. Some are college students who have just entered the society, and some are employees who have been in Silicon Valley for many years. Through Li Yun's introduction, Duan Yundezhi has someone who has even been in the company. Worked for more than a dozen companies, almost all of them tech start-ups.

This also illustrates a problem from the side, that is, in the current Silicon Valley, it is difficult for new technology companies to succeed. Once they fail to make a good product before the funds are exhausted, then bankruptcy is inevitable, so that every day Silicon Valley Some companies have gone bankrupt, and some companies have existed for less than half a year, which makes some employees with insufficient resumes have to change jobs frequently. This has almost become the norm for many technical personnel in Silicon Valley.

Just like in China, after meeting the employees of these American branches, Duan Yun delivered an impassioned speech. The general content was to encourage these employees to work hard. If they make achievements, the company will definitely reward them. if.

Later, Duan Yun learned more about the current business situation of the company, and affirmed Li Yun's work.

"President Duan, why are you so interested in this Brown Jones?" Li Yun asked Duan Yun on the way out of the company.

"I'm just interested in the projects he used to create companies, and as a failed entrepreneur, I think he should have a lot of experience to share with us." Duan Yun said.

"Actually, I always thought he was an exaggerated person, and he had a high self-esteem." Li Yunliu frowned slightly.Then he said: "But he does have a good management skills, and he knows many people in the American business community, which is also an important reason why I hired him with a high salary."

"Exaggerated? Could it be because of his previous business plan?" Duan Yun asked.

"Indeed." Li Yun nodded lightly, and continued: "Can you imagine that he wants to change the existing business model and use the Internet to sell things? I can't understand this at all, because there are many Problems cannot be solved, such as how to pay? And how to guarantee after-sales service? Moreover, although the logistics in the United States is much stronger than that in China, the cost and transportation time are still very high. Can you imagine buying a billion-dollar product and possibly transporting it? Will the fee reach ten dollars? So the idea of ​​this kind of Internet shopping is completely unrealistic, but he is very confident that even if the company goes bankrupt now, he still doesn't want to give up..."

"What if the user is willing to bear the freight?" Duan Yun asked suddenly after pondering for a while.

"Huh?" Li Yun was startled when he heard this.

"In fact, his business idea is not useless. I think it is still feasible in some aspects." Duan Yun said.

"You don't really think so, do you?" Li Yun glanced at Duan Yun and said.

"So I need to communicate with this Brown Jones first. His company has indeed failed, but you can't think that his business method is completely unfeasible." Duan Yun paused, and then said: "As you said before In that way, the United States is a land full of miracles. In the past half a century, countless business miracles have been born here. Many of the things that were considered absurd before have become classic business examples. Our company wants to establish a business in the United States With the emergence of a sudden force, sometimes you have to use your sword to go the wrong way..."

In fact, Duan Yun said this because of Amazon's success in the 90s.

As recently as 1994, a "well-funded start-up company" in Seattle posted a job posting online, recruiting "extremely talented developers to help lead the development of Internet e-commerce." Familiar with web servers, websites and Development technologies such as HTML will be helpful to job seekers, but they are not necessary skills.

"To be part of the company, you must be "talented and self-motivated, full of work ethic, and a good team player." "Significant equity shares" will be included in employee compensation.

And this is Amazon's first job advertisement.

In the ensuing 20 years, Amazon has turned the e-commerce world upside down, becoming an e-commerce giant with more than $880 billion in annual revenue.

However, Amazon was originally just a little-known online book seller, founded by Bezos on July 1995, 7, and started operating out of his garage.Amazon didn’t have any inventory at all at the time; Amazon bought whatever books customers wanted from resellers.

According to the listing documents submitted by Amazon, the company's revenue in 1995 was only US$51.1, and it rose to US$1996 million in 1570. That is to say, it took Amazon just two years to grow from an unknown A small company has turned into an Internet giant with annual revenue exceeding tens of millions of dollars.

(End of this chapter)