Top of the Great Era

In the evening, Zhou Buqi received an invitation from Sun Zhengyi to have dinner with Ren Yuxin by his side.During the day, he walked a long way around Tokyo.

Major game companies in Japan are basically located in Tokyo.

Zhou Buqi talked about what he learned from Chen Dong. Many big game companies have decades of history, and all levels have become rigid.

Not only are the employees too old to keep up with the times, but the company's business model is also the same as it was decades ago, and even the company's partners have decades of relationships.

You know, in the 80s when Japanese technology was the best in the world, it was of course no problem, and technology companies could support a large number of distributors.

But with the decline of the economy, those old relationship households will gradually lose their tails.

For a game company, the profit margin is only 10%, which is simply shocking.

This is usually data only available to manufacturing companies with little core technology.

Ren Yuxin nodded, "It is really complicated to take action against a big company. This is probably the reason why European and American game giants have not taken action against the Japanese game industry for a long time."

"Is Capcom a big company?"

"Calculate."

"Fuck!"

Zhou Buqi rubbed his forehead, feeling a little headache.

This time Changyou came to Japan for acquisitions. One of the main goals is to acquire Capcom and win the intellectual property rights of well-known games such as "Street Fighter", "Monster Hunter", "Resident Evil", and "Devil May Cry".

Especially "Monster Hunter", crushing all competitors in the same type of game.

The company's current market cap is only $8 million, which is really cheap.

With so many classic games added together, the price is the same as "Talking Tom Cat".The only trouble is that once Capcom is taken over, it is really difficult to deal with the old relationships behind the company.

Ren Yuxin said: "It's true that big companies are not doing well. Whether it's Capcom or Konami, even if the other party agrees to sell, they will sign a series of prerequisites. Layoffs are not allowed, and old partners are not allowed to be terminated. "

Zhou Buqi let out a "huh".

Ren Yuxin smiled and said: "However, there are no problems with other small companies. This kind of big company, even if Capcom's market value is only 8 million US dollars, it is already very successful. Especially with decades of history Game companies, while pursuing success, also pursue the company's decency."

"Yes, decent." Zhou Buqi agreed with this statement, "Japanese business society is a market economy with cultural repression. It's really not decent for a small company that has not yet succeeded to pursue success as its primary goal. , but easier to operate.”

Ren Yuxin glanced at him, "Either take down these small companies first, Capcom and Konami... It's really too difficult. Don't say they won't sell, even if they do, we will deal with a series of follow-up questions." It is difficult to deal with, and a better solution must be found."

Zhou Buqi was sitting in a black Mercedes-Benz car and was going to Sun Zhengyi's house for a family dinner. He nodded, "Okay, I will ask Sun Zhengyi later to see what he thinks. I can't let him be in vain. Don’t work with Changyou’s shares.”

Ren Yuxin twitched the corner of his mouth.

People are spending real money to buy Changyou's stock, why are they taking it for nothing?Boss Zhou seems to be convinced of Sun Zhengyi, but he is really not polite at all.

However, Ren Yuxin didn't dare to say anything more about this, and said with a smile: "I walked around today and learned something about it. I really... I really feel that the Japanese game industry is out of the era."

Zhou Buqi asked: "What's the situation?"

Ren Yuxin said: "They were surprised to find the prospect of social games, and they are actively planning."

"What?"

Zhou Buqi thought he had heard wrong.

Ren Yuxin smiled and said: "Really, it's a social game. The social games on Japan's previous SNS sites are usually made by small companies, and those big companies don't like it at all. However, last year's fourth In the first quarter, they seem to have finally reacted, and individual companies began to transform towards social games.”

"I go!"

Zhou Buqi really didn't know what to say for no reason.

The hottest period of social gaming is over!

The hottest period was around 2010.

So far, it's been downhill.

Domestically, the total revenue of friends.com's social games exceeded 2010 billion yuan in 44, and fell to 36 billion yuan last year.Not to mention the United States, social game giant Zynga's performance after listing was far below expectations, and its stock price broke rapidly, pouring cold water on the social game industry.

Even the old guys at EA have smelled it, and suddenly found that EA's strategic transformation towards social games in the past few years has failed!
This has led to a series of subsequent adjustments of EA, the reorganization of the board of directors and the change of power in the management.

Japan is simply too absurd.

When social games are in full swing, those big game companies turn a blind eye and don't care about this kind of unpopular gadget at all.Now that the sun is dying and the west mountain is dying, the big company has finally reacted, and belatedly, it is necessary to actively carry out a strategic transformation to social games...

Compared with these game companies in Japan, EA is simply a god.

Ren Yuxin said: "Right now, there are two big companies transforming into social games. Guess who they are?"

Seeing his expression, Zhou Buqi was taken aback for a moment, "Could it be Konami and Capcom?"

Ren Yuxin said in a deep voice, "It's these two."

Zhou Buqi slapped his forehead.

Convinced!
What a fart to buy now!

These two companies have embarked on a path of death. If they are acquired, wouldn't they be asking for trouble?It would be fine if we could decisively close unpopular business lines and lay off a large number of employees, but these two points could not be achieved at all.

Ren Yuxin said: "Capcom is actually not bad. It's just trying to make social games and launched a few products that test the water, such as "Smurf Village". So far, it's relatively successful. In the fourth quarter of last year, Revenue is over $300 million through Facebook’s open platform.”

Zhou Buqi seemed to understand it all at once, and suddenly said: "It's the profit margin! Social games are games that can be operated completely digitally, and don't need to be divided by those old systems. The $300 million revenue of "Smurf Village" , with a gross profit of at least $250 million."

Ren Yuxin nodded, "That should be the reason. Capcom is just making some attempts, and it is Konami who has really taken steps to strategically transform into social games. Well, it can't be called transformation, it is business expansion.”

Transformation generally refers to abandoning old business and investing in new business.

However, Japanese companies have institutional shortcomings and cannot give up old businesses.If Konami is interested in the field of social games, it can only expand its enrollment and form a new department.

If we can only increase but not decrease, it will inevitably become more and more bloated and redundant.

Zhou Buqi narrowed his eyes and slowly thought: "So, Konami is going to increase the weight of social games..."

Ren Yuxin said: "Yes, the main development direction of Konami next is Konami. They just announced that they will increase their expected sales this year to 34.8 billion US dollars. At the same time, they will increase their expected profits. To 2.89 million US dollars, the increase rate is as high as 20%. In this period of downturn in the game industry, Konami is not only the only major game company in Japan and even the world that announced an increase in expectations.”

"Because of social games?"

"Yes, all the expected growth is from social games."

"Opportunity!"

Zhou Buqi's interest in the company Konami is far less than that of Capcom, except for the game "Pro Evolution Football".

If Konami's core strategy is to shift towards social games, it will inevitably reduce the weight of "Pro Evolution Football".

Well, this is probably the reason why "Pro Evolution Soccer" in the previous life was far behind EA's "FIFA Football" with almost no struggles.

"FIFA Football" has always been EA's core ace game.