Top of the Great Era

Chapter 1461 Respect
Weekly time is very tight, he will only stay in London for two days.

The financing framework of Ziweixing Digital Media will be finalized within these two days.

The selected investors came to London one after another, namely Softbank, the partner of Ziwei Star, Germany's Allianz Venture Capital Fund, France's National Strategic Investment Fund, and the famous CVC investment fund recommended by the British authorities.

CVC is a professional sports investment institution, the most famous of which is their investment in F1 events.The former F1 competition was sluggish, the income was very poor, and there were even signs of bankruptcy.

This is not surprising.

The sports industry outside the United States is almost always dominated by people in the sports industry.It’s okay for this group of people to let them engage in sports, and let them do strategy, management, and business. Their level is very poor.

All kinds of professional sports leagues in the United States are booming. The reason is that the United States is a purely capitalist country. Whoever pays controls the field, and professional people do professional things.The capital side does strategy, the manager does management, and the sportsman only focuses on sports itself.

The British CVC investment fund is such a model.

In fact, it is to use the power of capital to learn the American model in depth.

For example, if European rugby is not doing well, CVC invested in the European Rugby League to promote reforms; for example, the professionalization of the World Volleyball League cannot be done, and CVC is actively participating in it because it cannot make ends meet.

Including the football industry, the "Toyota Cup" under FIFA has been restructured into the "Club World Cup", which has greatly increased its revenue and attention, and behind it is the investment and planning of CVC.

Then, CVC drifted away, and it was going to make a big move into European football.

How powerful is European football?
After several waves of public opinion, CVC became notorious and became a representative of evil capital.

In fact, the sports projects invested by CVC are often very successful. As long as they enter the field, they can turn a poorly managed sports industry into profit and start it in a hurry.

The reason why many football bigwigs oppose CVC is because of CVC's own strategy.

Capital is like a pistol.

In the hands of the police, it represents justice; in the hands of criminals, it represents evil.

The notoriety of CVC mainly comes from its excessive capitalization.

If, like Allianz Ventures, France Venture Capital and SoftBank Group, they are willing to spend decades growing and thriving with the project when investing in a project, then how can CVC, which has made great contributions to the world sports industry Will there be opposition?
The reason is that CVC is so fucked up.

They often play short-term, spend a few years or more than ten years to build up the scale of a sports industry, and then liquidate and leave.This leads them to often make some short-term strategic designs, which may destroy the long-term stable development of a sports industry.

The most typical is the F1 race.

In order to increase the income of F1 events, CVC has launched a series of reform measures, which have achieved very good results and quickly turned F1 events into a world-class sport.

However, in order to make money, CVC made a further move, that is, it stopped the "free + advertising" live broadcast mode and began to focus on the "subscription system".

In other words, TV viewers in the past could watch F1 races on free channels.But after CVC enters the field, you can only spend money to watch F1 events on premium channels.

This will inevitably lead to a significant reduction in the audience for F1 events.

F1 is not the same as football, basketball, or rugby.These ball games can be played by ordinary people every day, and the audience base is very large. F1 racing is different. It can only be watched, not played, and there is no offline practice. It only relies on the live broadcast of the event to attract viewers.Switching from free to paid will greatly reduce the number of viewers in F1 events.

In the short term, income has increased.In the long run, the audience is reduced.

Now that this group of viewers is gradually getting old, the audience of F1 events will be less and less in the future, and no one will watch it. What should we do?Doesn't this destroy an industry?

But CVC doesn't care that much.

Entering the market at a low price, and then launching a series of reforms, will soon turn losses into profits and make money, attracting other investment funds to take over.Then CVC decisively sold at a high position, sold its shares, and got out with a huge profit.

Therefore, CVC's investment in football will definitely be strongly resisted by the giants.

The person in charge of the professional league will retire in a few years. What they pursue is the performance during their tenure, and they don't care about the future in decades. Ordinary teams may go bankrupt after a few years or ten years, or they may not be at all. There is no future.

The century-old giants are different. They also want to continue the second century and the third century. Of course, they don't like CVC's capital operation method of exhausting resources.

It is impossible for Manchester United to accept the strategic guidance of CVC, Ziweixing Digital Media is different.

Ziweixing Digital Media welcomes CVC very much!

Zhou Buqi's popularity with CVC is even greater than that of Softbank, French War Capital and Allianz Ventures.

The other three are investment in nature, but CVC has a strategic nature. It is really possible for CVC to participate in the strategic design of Ziweixing Digital Media.

What Zhou Buqi is not afraid of most is various different viewpoints, what he likes most is the collision of ideas and sparks of inspiration.I am not afraid that you will make mistakes, but I am afraid that you will be dumb if you say nothing.If you make a mistake, you can correct it, and maybe you will be right next time.If you're dumb, you'll never be right.

Moreover, this wave of financing from Ziweixing Digital Media will transfer 20% of the shares to the four major investment institutions, raising a total of 4 million US dollars.

After CVC enters the market, it can get at most one director's seat and nominate a vice president-level executive.

That's all.

They only have the right to make suggestions, and the decision-making power can only be in the hands of Zhou Buqi.Even CVC themselves don't have the confidence to share decision-making power with a capital crocodile at the level of Boss Zhou.

Zhou Buqi has such strength.

Facing these four employers, he has no pressure, and he is not at all worried that they will be able to make waves in Ziweixing Digital Media with the little shares in their hands.

Even if the three major European investment institutions, CVC, Allianz and French War Investment, join forces, it is impossible for Softbank to cooperate with them.

Therefore, in the process of contact and talks, Zhou Buqi has a relatively high attitude, only paying attention to himself and not caring about others. In fact, he is sending a signal that Ziweixing Digital Media wants to "focus on me".

This wave of financing of 7 million US dollars is mainly used in 4 directions——

One, research and development.

There are football communities, mobile apps, official website business restructuring, streaming media technology development, as well as data analysis, eagle eye technology and other fields.

Second, open up new markets.

This mainly refers to going to Europa Continent to establish various branches and recruit teams.

Three, marketing.

Once a product is made, it needs to be introduced to the market, and the investment in marketing is often higher than that in research and development.

Fourth, intellectual property rights.

This is the most helpless thing, the copyright management is too strict, Ziweixing Digital Media wants to get some game data for analysis, they have to buy the copyright.Copyright fees are also paid for news content and short clips in the football community.

……

Zhou Buqi’s plane was relatively large, and Sun Zhengyi and his investment assistant Rajiv Misra were invited to come together, and other SoftBank people took other planes to Los Angeles.

The financing plan of Ziweixing Digital Media has been reached.

The 4 major investment institutions share 20% of the shares equally, 5% for each, impartial.

Since then, the ownership structure of Ziweixing Digital Media has been determined. Ziweixing International holds 65% of the shares, Zhou Buqi holds 10% of the shares, Softbank, Allianz, French Investment Fund and CVC each hold 5%, and there are 5% management option pool.

This thing is basically done.

The next point is to return to Los Angeles and start the project of Ziwei Star Global!
Zhou Buqi naturally talked about the copyright of "Spider-Man".

Unexpectedly, it was opposed by Rajiv Misra, who had dark skin, "I don't think Ziwei Star Global has any need to acquire the copyright of 'Spider-Man'!"

"Ok?"

Zhou Buqi frowned.

Rajiv Misra is not black, he is a low caste Indian, very capable.Even Zhou Buqi once thought of poaching him as an assistant, the level is too high!
In Silicon Valley, Zhou Buqi has come into contact with many Indian executives, and the general impression left by these people on him is that they are humble, gentle, and especially friendly.

But Rajiv Misra is different, he is a hardliner.

The professional resume is also very strong!
He graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a master's degree in computer science and is an IT genius.But after graduating, he didn't go to work in Silicon Valley, but went to Wall Street as a trader and started playing finance.

When the subprime mortgage crisis broke out in 08, he was one of the top [-] "vultures" on Wall Street, who bet wildly on the subprime bond market.Even the Hollywood movie "The Big Short" has his shadow.

Because of this wave of operations, he lost his job at Deutsche Bank, and was then recruited by Sun Zhengyi to serve as the vice president of Softbank Group and the president of the Vision Fund, in charge of investment business.

Rajiv Misra said indifferently: "Zhou, I respect you very much, but business is business, and rules are rules. Ziwei Star Global has no reason to buy the copyright of 'Spiderman'."

Zhou Buqi was very upset and glanced at him, "This is an order."

Rajiv said in a deep voice, "This is ridiculous."

Zhou Buqi looked at Sun Zhengyi, "Is this what you mean?"

Sun Zhengyi coughed lightly, "I never said that."

Rajiv waved his hand and said firmly, "Mr. Zhou, you are the best investor I have ever seen. I have full respect for you. However, please also respect my work."

Zhou Buqi was stunned for a moment, "What? I don't respect you anymore?"

"I'm talking about my job."

"What do you mean?"

"Purchasing the copyright of 'Spider-Man' is not in the interests of Ziweixing Universal."

"This is a mistake in your judgment."

Zhou Buqi didn't want to explain too much to him, the other party was in the investment business, not in the entertainment business, so there was no need to make it too clear.

Rajiv Misra's tone was not good, and he was a bit cold, "Mr. Zhou, it is Marvel who really benefited by spending huge sums of money to acquire the copyright of 'Spider-Man'! And you are the major shareholder of Marvel! I have Reasons to suspect that you are using Ziwei Star Universal and 'Spiderman' projects to transfer benefits to Marvel to enrich your personal pockets!"

"Is this what you mean by respect?"

Zhou Buqi was a little angry, feeling that his personality had been despised.

(End of this chapter)