Top of the Great Era

Chapter 1574 The consumer market will only shift and will not disappear
The Spring Festival is less than a month away. The elders in the family are all traditional. It is impossible to celebrate the festival abroad. The big family of Zhou Buqi will definitely go back.

During this period of time, Zhou Buqi had to sort out several things about Ziwei Star Global, at least mobilize them, and then hand them over to his subordinates.

Mainly four things.

First, to start the TV series project of the whole series of "The Lord of the Rings", it is necessary to find Tolkien's descendants to purchase related TV series adaptation rights such as "The Silmarillion" and "Children of Hurin".

This is actually easier.

Nothing more than money.

If they disagree, Ziwei Star Global has plenty of ways to deal with them.According to the agreement, MGM will distribute 7.5% of all profits from the two sets of "Lord of the Rings" and "The Hobbit" to the Tolkien Foundation.

If there is no profit after doing the accounting, there is no need to divide the money.

Hollywood has long been used to this routine.

Interest holders should submit obediently.

Just like the "007" series of movies, part of the copyright is in the hands of the descendants of the British "007" novels.What right do these British people have?Basically, what Hollywood says, they will do.

However, under normal circumstances, Zhou Buqi doesn't want to go too far, and everyone is still mutually beneficial and win-win, making money and sharing together.The premise is that the other party has to cooperate.

It shouldn't be too difficult to do this, the Amazon in the previous life did it.

Second, start He Fengshan's biographical film project.

This process will be relatively long.

It is necessary to collect as much information as possible, and contact He Fengshan's descendants to obtain permission to shoot.It is also necessary to find a producer and a screenwriter to write out the first draft of the script.

Then there is the director.

Zhou Buqi prefers Li An.

Although the protagonist of this movie is Chinese, this movie cannot be a mainland movie.He Fengshan is not better than himself, so it's okay to criticize and satirize him.If you make a film that praises him and praises him, it will be difficult to pass the domestic censorship system.Even if it is passed, the plot will be changed beyond recognition, and some parts of historical nihilism will be modified and deleted as required, and it is impossible to obtain the consent of Mr. He Fengshan's descendants.

This can only be a Hollywood movie, which can be shot freely, and it is more appropriate for Ang Lee to take the shot.

But he is currently out of schedule, and he has already taken over the 6th Century Fox project "Life of Pi".Originally, the film may be launched in June this year.

But with the release of "Avatar", 3D movies became popular.And the fantasy theme of "Fantasy Drifting of Boy Pi" just fits the visual setting of 3D movies the most.

In addition, Ang Lee himself also likes the challenge of new technology. After some discussions, 4000th Century Fox decided to add an additional 3 million US dollars to make this movie into a [-]D blockbuster.

Then, the launch date was pushed back, probably until next year.

But don't worry.

After he finishes filming "Life of Pi", it won't be too late to come back and take over the filming of He Fengshan's biography.There is "Schindler's List" in front of it. If this biographical film about a diplomat in the Republic of China is to be successful, it must be meticulously crafted.

The third thing is to promote the acquisition of Lucasfilm.

The two parties have reached a verbal agreement, and this matter is basically settled.Next, it is necessary to discuss the specific details of the acquisition.

The promotion process of this matter is very smooth, and a unification should be reached soon.

Zhou Buqi has only one request - the sooner the better.

You can even give in appropriately.

The sooner you sign, the sooner you finish.

If Disney suddenly jumps out to bid, it will be troublesome. It is impossible to win Lucasfilm at a price of US$35 billion.Once the two parties start bidding, it may be possible to raise the price to 45 billion US dollars.

The fourth thing is to talk to Hulu's management.

almost!

It's time to close the net!

On January 1, Universal Pictures held a premiere of a horror film called "The Werewolf".It stands to reason that it is just a horror film, and it is not worth the premiere at all. This is the privilege of blockbuster films.

However, this movie is different, and it can be called the most important horror movie in the past 20 years.

First of all, there is a brand, which is a remake of the classic old film "The Werewolf" in 1941.

Secondly, it is directed by the big-name director Joe Johnston. His last film co-produced with Universal Pictures was called "Jurassic Park 3".And he has already received an invitation to Marvel's new blockbuster "Captain America" ​​this year.

The most attractive thing is the super luxurious cast, Benicio De Roni, Anthony Hopkins, Emily Blunt, Hugo Weaving, and even Chaplin's own daughter Jay Latin Chaplin.

The production cost is as high as 9000 million US dollars.

In the low season of January and February, "The Werewolf" is the most watched new film in Hollywood, and it has received a lot of attention.

At the premiere, Zhou Buqi invited Jason Kilar, chairman and CEO of Hulu, who did not refuse, and brought his girlfriend to attend.

That's a good sign.

After the premiere, Zhou Buqi naturally invited him to have a cup of coffee.

"I heard that you have a big disagreement with Comcast?" Zhou Buqi asked knowingly when the coffee was served.

Jason Kilar sighed, "Very big, bigger than before!"

"Oh?"

"They just want to do free content."

"Not surprising." Zhou Buqi is an industry insider. He has already obtained the relevant data, and said with a smile: "Last year, the video advertising revenue in the United States reached 43.9 billion U.S. dollars, an increase of 49%. This is an emerging industry. industry with great potential.”

This is the difference between China and the United States.

As a video website in China, even if all the film and television content is pirated, the website does not need to spend money to buy copyrights, and the mere advertising fee cannot meet the operating expenses of the website.

However, the scale of online advertising in the United States is large, with a small base of netizens and small traffic, so there are certain industry advantages.For Hulu, relying on video advertising revenue alone last year, it was basically able to maintain a balance of payments.Those revenues from on-demand subscriptions are basically net revenues.

Jason Kilar is a veteran practitioner of the Internet, he can't be so short-sighted, Netflix is ​​coming menacingly!

If Hulu wants to be competitive, it must make a breakthrough in the system of monthly subscription membership, instead of only paying for on-demand services as in the past.

But here comes the problem.

Members cannot have advertisements, which means losing the video advertising market with huge growth potential.If the membership business is not started and the advertising business is also lost, is it not troublesome?
This is where Hulu's management and Comcast disagree.

It is also the fundamental contradiction between entrepreneurs and large companies.

What big companies pursue is stable development, and what entrepreneurs are pursuing is not to be broken but not to be established.In Comcast's view, Hulu's current model is already very good, and even produced some profits last year, which proves that Hulu's current model is the best!You know, YouTube lost $3.8 million last year!
This is the same as the game, the tactics are changed only after losing. Hulu won, why change?Just follow the development of this tactical idea.

Jason Kilar was very unwilling and sighed, "Mr. Zhou, do you know Blockbuster?"

Zhou Buqi thought for a while, "I heard that it seems to be a competitor of Netflix."

Jason Kilar said: "Yes, Blockbuster operates an offline videotape and DVD rental business. Netflix has been engaged in an online rental business in the past few years. In the past year, Blockbuster has at least Closed 1000 stores."

Zhou Buqi nodded, "The economic crisis has too much impact on physical stores."

"The economic crisis has affected Blockbuster. Netflix's online rental and Redbox's DVD automatic rental machines have all had a great impact on Blockbuster. I don't know much about Blockbuster's operating conditions, but I judge that the company used to be worth a lot. The nearly [-] billion dollar giant group is likely to go bankrupt within a year or two."

"Hundred billion giants..."

Zhou Buqi was very touched.

The change of the business model brought about by the change of the times has a great impact on a company. Once the change is not timely, it will be completely abandoned by the times.

Jason Kilar said: "Hulu is developing very well now relying on the video advertising model, which is only temporary. The development of the Internet is changing with each passing day. If Hulu can't keep up with the pace of the times to complete the change, it will soon be abandoned. Eliminated. Blockbuster is about to go bankrupt, but fans’ demand for watching movies has not decreased, and this kind of consumer market with an annual value of up to 100 billion US dollars will not disappear, but will only shift.”

This point of view really hits the nail on the head, and Zhou Buqi has a theoretical new idea around the streaming media track, "Free advertisements can't consume the consumption of movie fans. The rental market of 100 billion US dollars per year is only available through membership subscriptions." Streaming media platforms can take over."

Jason Kilar sighed again, "But not many people understand."

Zhou Buqi smiled and said, "There will always be someone who understands."

Jason Kilar smiled, "Who is there?"

Zhou Buqi was noncommittal. During this period of time, people from Ziwei Star Universal had been in contact with them frequently, and the meaning was already obvious. He said indifferently: "When I acquired Universal Pictures, I divested all the TV station assets under Universal Pictures, and kept to Comcast."

"Are you so pessimistic about the television industry?"

"I am more optimistic about the streaming media industry!"

"Netflix?"

"Netflix is, of course, but streaming media's opponent is not only the movie DVD rental industry, not just the annual rental market of 100 billion US dollars. It is also the TV industry's annual consumption of up to 1000 billion US dollars. Any individual streamer No media platform can afford such a large fund."

Jason Kilar took a deep breath, he understood the ambition of boss Zhou, "Ziweixing Universal wants to support Netflix, but Netflix alone is not enough. The streaming media industry will ultimately challenge the traditional TV industry , requires the emergence of many, many streaming media platforms.”

Zhou Buqi smiled slightly, "Netflix is ​​Netflix, Ziwei Star Global is Ziwei Star Global. Now, Ziwei Star Global lacks an experienced, capable, passionate and aggressive management team around the streaming media industry."

"I understand."

Jason Kilar looked very determined and clenched his fists.

(End of this chapter)