King of Capital

Chapter 74 Baidu Enters the Game
Su He's ability to poach people from Juntaicheng was inseparable from the fact that her team had worked with Xie Jingxing before, and Taihe Capital had a good reputation.

It was not easy for Tang Manlai to start Xiyou Capital from scratch. He just picked up Song Anli, who was left alone because her boss ran away, and He Chuan, who was in the same situation.

Together with three middle and back-end financial and legal staff and a securities investment manager, there are seven people in total in the huge office, which does save meeting time.

Xie Jingxing pushed open the door of Tang Man's independent office. The speakers in the office played the balanced and orderly melody of "Bach's Cello Suite". She was lying flat on the sofa with a steam eye mask on her head, and her hands were pressed against her stomach.

A stick of incense was burning slowly on the desk. The faint sandalwood scent pulled people into the quiet ancient temple in the mountains. The scene looked very peaceful.

"What are you so flustered about? Remember to knock next time...Mr. Xie." Tang Man sat up, took off her blindfold and smiled awkwardly.

"Sorry, I forgot to knock."

Xie Jing Xing looked around: "It seems that you have adapted well. I have a set of classic Bach works LP records at home. I will bring them to you later."

Tang Man quickly tidied the sofa in her slippers, called He Chuan outside the office to make tea, and then went back to her desk to put out the sandalwood.

Xie Jingxing waited for her to finish before talking about business: "How's the progress?"

"I have talked to several funds under the Guoxin system in the past few days, and their intentions are not high. They think the prospects for policy guidance are not optimistic."

Tang Man's expression returned to normal, and after a short pause, he continued, "Several funds under the CCB and CIC groups also think so, but they are willing to discuss the details. The general managers of Suzhou Yuanhe, China Merchants Capital, and China Merchants Financial Investment Fund also want to meet with you in person."

"I'm quite busy recently, so you'll be in full charge. Give me the results before the middle of next month."

Xie Jingxing was annoyed, why wasn't it over yet? Zhou Fenglan's father wasn't the emperor and didn't care about financial affairs, so why bother catching wind and licking with such a long tongue?

Tang Man felt out his inclination and gave a suggestion: "No problem, I think we can have in-depth communication with the CCB department."

"Try to maintain the financing ratio at 4/3/3," Xie Jingxing emphasized.

Tang Man frowned slightly: "So, early investors including Xiyou won't follow up with investment in the next round?"

"Let's not follow it for now. We have to take the mentality of the founding team into consideration. Our lead investor Cheng Wei is a little reluctant." Xie Jingxing explained helplessly.

According to the previous agreement, Didi's next round of financing will be led by Taihe, followed by Tencent and state-owned funds, with a base of US$1 million and a maximum of US$1.5 million, with a 4/3/3 investment share distribution. The other early investors probably saw that Tencent and Alibaba were fighting, and were panicked by Boss Cai's "hunt order" and were not prepared to follow up and invest in the next round.

In this case, Xiyou's follow-up investment can easily disrupt the current balance of Didi's equity structure.

Cheng Wei was forced by capital to compete with Kuaidi Dache, but that doesn't mean he doesn't care about the actual control of the company. This can be seen from the fact that Didi's AB equity structure means that the management always holds more than 50% of the voting rights.

The same goes for Tencent. If Taihe Xiyou holds a majority stake, their investment in the development of mobile strategy will be in vain.

Xie Jingxing thought for a moment and said soothingly: "This round of financing is just the beginning for Taihe to buy a ticket to get on board. When the day comes when the fight really starts, Xiyou will have the right to follow up with unlimited investment and fire."

"To be honest, I don't quite understand what you are thinking. Alibaba has used all its connections to find me, and some fund managers hid themselves away when they heard that I was trying to get them to invest in Didi."

Tang Man got a satisfactory answer and pretended to be puzzled and played the victim to talk about how difficult it was. In fact, she didn't care about Ali's pressure at all. If the sky fell, there would be someone tall to hold it up. The rich second generation with powerful hands and eyes in front of her was not afraid of her, so what did she have to be afraid of?

She only cared about Xie Jingxing's promise: Didi's acquisition would be bigger than WhatsApp's and would eventually be realized.

There was no way Su He could snatch this project away. She was hoping to take over this project and beat Shen Nanpeng, and top the Forbes China Best Venture Capitalist list...

"The state-owned funds that will be pressured by Alibaba are not what we need. This project is yours, so you should take more responsibility."

Xie Jingxing felt annoyed when he saw her aggrieved face, so he gave her a reassurance pill and changed the subject, saying, "Take care of Song Anli for a while."

"I quite like this girl." Tang Man agreed without hesitation.

"If there's nothing else, I'll leave first. I don't really like Anji White Tea that much. Su He is just fooling you."

Xie Jingxing glanced at the teacup on the table and said something with a sense of evil, then patted his butt and walked away. He was going to give a speech at Zhejiang University tomorrow, so he had to review the manuscript with Su He in advance.

Passing by the front desk, Song Anli was still busy answering the phone. In fact, Liu Qiming had already hired a front desk administrator for Xiyou, and she was here as a transitional position.

The variety show had a confidentiality agreement in order to increase ratings. The last episode was broadcast and the whereabouts of the eight interns were announced. After the confidentiality agreement expired, she was able to transfer to the investment team and work under the title of Grapefruit Capital.

Xie Jingxing is different. He became famous overnight after the WhatsApp acquisition case. Now everyone knows his name... It is impossible to hide it. The program team can only accept it and use him as a publicity point...

…………On Thursday, August 8, Xie Jingxing and other Juntai leaders met up to lead the Su He team to Hangzhou, while the others went directly to Zhejiang University to prepare for the afternoon speech.

He went alone to a teahouse near Building No. 2 of the West Lake State Guesthouse. In the ancient pavilion overlooking the lake, a middle-aged woman with short men's hair sat with her back to the lake and made tea by herself. It seemed that she had quite some knowledge of the tea ceremony.

There were blooming lotus flowers floating in the lake behind her, and a few ducks swimming around. Xie Jingxing thought that it seemed like he should let Tang Man come forward today.

"Mr. Xie, I've long heard of you. Please take a seat." Deng Wei leaned over and gestured across the long table.

Xie Jing Xing sat opposite him with a half-smile: "Boss Deng's Qi cultivation skills are really good."

"Didi entered Shanghai, and we were the first to start the subsidy. In the past two months, we have spent 18 million yuan, and we are still alive. Of course I can sit still."

Deng Wei smiled calmly and poured him a cup of tea. "I have worked in Shanghai for more than ten years, and I have always believed that the essence and original intention of Internet subsidies for customers is to serve the people. From this perspective, I have to thank you for your generosity and personally inviting all Shanghai people to take taxis."

"You're welcome. In the next two months, we plan to spend 38 million to treat all the people in Magic City to taxis, as a welcome gift for our new arrival." Xie Jingxing picked up the teacup and took a sip.

Deng Wei remained calm and said, "You are indeed the man who led the WhatsApp acquisition. Mr. Xie is very generous. On behalf of the people of Shanghai, I would like to thank you again."

That’s right, Xie Jingxing personally took the lead in the attack and the effect was immediate. Didi’s server crashed once yesterday and again during the morning rush hour today, but the more this happened, the more stable she became.

In her opinion, Didi's series of strong attacks in the past two days can be described in two words - anxious, anxious to take over the Shanghai market, and anxious to acquire Bumblebee.

Currently, Kuaidi and Didi together account for 80% of the market, while others including Bumblebee and many other small fry such as Yidao and Yaoyao share the remaining 20%. However, Bumblebee occupies the market in important cities.

As long as Didi and Kuaidi have the ambition to defeat each other, one of them will be unable to hold back and make an offer before Bumblebee runs out of working capital, and she is very patient about this.

"Mr. Cai from Alibaba and I talked on the phone last night. I suggested that neither of us should acquire Bumblebee, and he agreed." Xie Jingxing put down his teacup and picked up a handful of pistachios, slowly peeling the shells and leaving the kernels.

Deng Wei's face froze for a moment, then returned to normal: "Everyone, just listen to this kind of game, don't take it seriously."

"He hinted to me that online car-hailing had a bright future and there was no need to get involved in the competition between Alibaba and Tencent. I said OK, I could swap my Didi shares with Alibaba for Kuaidi shares, but he was unwilling to do so."

Xie Jingxing sighed: "Boss Deng, how about I invest in Bumblebee? You are responsible for managing it and I will pay for it and work together to do great things, make it bigger and stronger, and create more glory."

"...Mr. Xie, please stop joking like that. We are not children anymore."

Deng Wei was a little unhappy about being hit here and there by him. The young man behaved frivolously, talked nonsense and was not reliable.

Xie Jingxing restrained his expression: "That's not a joke, I sincerely invite Bumblebee and Didi to merge."

"Mr. Xie, to be honest, I just spoke to Mr. Cai before you came. The pressure he put on me was too great. It's either a merger with Kuaidi or we become enemies. I have to think carefully for the future of the company." Deng Wei was frank and hesitant.

In fact, it was not only Alibaba boss Cai who put pressure on her, but Baidu also gave her hope. The latter had originally decided to give up investing in Bumblebee, but in recent days it saw Tencent and Alibaba showing signs of increasing their all-in bets.

CEO Li Yanhong frowned and felt something was wrong. There must be a conspiracy. The wise cerebellum once again occupied the IQ high ground and firmly believed that losing money in investment was not important, but if he missed the opportunity and was left behind by Alibaba and Tencent and fell out of the first echelon, that would not be good.

So I took the initiative to post it here to say that we could discuss the investment matters again.

Deng Wei solicited investment from Baidu in the past two months in order to burn money to raise the company's valuation and find a suitable opportunity to sell it to Didi or Kuaidi. Now, if she takes Alibaba's money, she will miss the route of making quick money by speculating on valuation and selling the company.

Later on, she had no choice but to join the battle between Didi and Kuaidi. This was not the situation she wanted to see, but the price offered by Baidu was very tempting, so she wanted to hear the quotes from both Didi and Kuaidi before making a decision.

"Okay, Mr. Deng, please think about it carefully. I have something else to do and I'll leave first."

Xie Jingxing threw down the pistachio in his hand and stood up and left without any hesitation.

"Hmm, huh? No…"

Deng Wei almost fainted. She wondered how you could give her a preliminary offer. She forced herself to hold back the words that were about to come out of her mouth and said, "To be honest, I don't understand what you are thinking. Why do you have to personally participate in the competition between Tencent and Alibaba?"

"People say that the three Mas are several floors above the rest of the domestic business community, and that ordinary people can only look up to them."

Xie Jing Xing shrugged: "I don't believe it. Brother Ma looks no different from an ordinary person. I want to take another look at Teacher Ma to confirm how high they are standing."

(End of this chapter)