Rebirth of the Tech Madman

Compared with home video game consoles, the arcade industry, which started in the early 1970s, has a longer history, and the industrial economy has naturally grown larger. In 1981, that is, this year, it has grown to US$8 billion.

ea entered this field since the beginning of this year. As a result, it was equipped with a Motorola processor and its own display core Cassidy arcade machine. With the strongest performance product, it has attacked the city and laid a lot of ground.

This kind of destructive offensive benefits from the rich and excellent game content of "Pac-Man", "Space Invaders", "Donkey Kong", "Mario", "Thunderbolt", "Tetris", etc., otherwise Sora has a hardware platform, and even if the performance is out of the ordinary, it is a tree without roots.

Platformization is also one of the design goals of the Xiaobawang arcade, so its price is also the most expensive on the market, but with the feature that it can easily change games, and the high-quality game library, it quickly won the favor of customers.

Although it did not get the "Pac-Man" that sold millions of sets like in the original time and space, Atari's income was also envied by various people, breaking through 900 million U.S. dollars, driving Warner's stock price to 70 U.S. dollars. Away.

Atari's success is also due to high-quality game content, such as the early acquisition of the "Space Invaders" home game console platform authorization.

The performance of the two heroes ea and Atari in the video game industry is breathtaking, and the huge gap between the two makes the onlookers at a loss. Ea's success is also incredible.

People always like to summarize the theory of success. Naturally, there is no exception to the performance of ea's dominance. The final conclusion is eloquent.

For example, a powerful hardware platform that perfectly matches technology and cost, and game design and development capabilities that lead the industry...

In fact, these are all hindsight. Colleagues have long seen it clearly, which can also be seen from the pertinence of competition.

The relationship between many game companies and Atari is one-on-one, and the advertisements are extremely cynical. Both the inside and the outside are the contempt and jealousy of "the Atari 2600, whose technology is outdated, can make such a round of money".

As for the attitude of ea, everyone except to buy its products back for slice research. Often they remain silent and have nothing to say.

In addition, ea’s current development trajectory is also very different from that of its peers. Many game console manufacturers have seen the current good market and poured in from other industries, while ea has bucked the trend and seems to be jumping out of the circle of video games. Acquire assets in traditional industries frequently.

For example, real estates used as service centers in major central cities, Hollywood's United States, major league teams, toy manufacturer Hasbro, independent TV station ktvu, and so on.

ea's actions made colleagues feel a kind of maverick alienation. It seems that everyone is not rushing for food in the same trough.

After the release of the financial report, Warner optimistically predicted that Atari's performance will grow from 75 million US dollars to 900 million US dollars within a few years, and the growth rate for the next year will be 60% or even higher.

As for ea, the rate of increase was reduced to 40%.

Although ea's chassis is already very large, it is not easy to continue its leapfrog development. It is reasonable to be cautious, but with its current market monopoly, there is no reason to be so conservative. Haven't you seen Wall Street's satisfaction with you? The stock price has entered the $50 range.

If you don't understand, don't force it, anyway, follow the ea as a listed company. More and more information is disclosed. The colleagues no longer expect to overthrow this supreme giant in the short term. Instead, they cast their malicious eyes on Atari. Everyone agrees that their own The product is obviously better than the Atari 2600, there is no reason to let the other side be so moisturized.

Some data in ea's annual report has blinded many people, so that the 65% debt-to-asset ratio has been ignored intentionally or unintentionally.

But Tang Huan, who created this game monster with one hand, was like a mirror in his heart, taking advantage of the good time now. If you sort out the capital structure, you should be able to get crazy at the end. Acquire some assets.

A boss who can't operate in debt is not a qualified boss.

As for the distribution of dividends. Let's wait until 1984. Now the company is in the period of expansion, and the cash in hand is still of great use.

Of course, I hope that at that time, the North American home game console industry will not collapse too badly.

But the question is, is it possible?

All signs are showing that history is bound to repeat itself. Some situations that Hawkins is reporting can be used as evidence.

"The lawsuit between Atari and Activision has come to an end. The judge ruled that Activision, as a third party, developing games on the Atari 2600 platform does not constitute an infringement." Hawkins frowned, obviously he did not understand this. As a result, what impact will it have on the entire industry?

The founder of Activision is the music industry-Jim Levy and Atari's four top programmers:-David Crane, larrykaplan-Larry Kaplan,-Alan Miller, head——Bob Whitehead.

In July 1980, Activision released its first product-a game cassette used on the Atari 2600 game console.

The quality of the works of these four great game developers can be imagined. They were both applauded and popular, and they directly brought down the old club Ataribi, making it embarrassing.

In this regard, Warner’s anger can be imagined. Not only has it lost face, but every time Activision buys a game, it may also mean that it has lost millions of dollars in income in disguise.

These traitors of Activision are simply sucking the blood of the old master, which is really hateful.

It is not difficult to guess what happened next. Warner took Activision to court and wanted to kill the other party.

The **** decides the brain. As far as the position is concerned, Hawkins definitely does not hope that his subordinates will one day make such a fuss. The huge profits ea has made so far rely on the monopoly of its own technology.

Tang Huan pondered for a while. Slightly shook his head, "Third-party development of games is legalized, and the rules of the industry will begin to change accordingly. It is not easy to eat alone, ea has to make some necessary preparations."

"Now many people are cheering about this. They are even eager to try. The most exaggerated is that the Chicago-based food group Pany-Quaker Oats Company announced its entry into the video game industry."

Speaking of this, Hawkins looked disgusted on his face, "This company is digging people everywhere, it's just a **** mess that breaks the rules."

"As the industry leader. ea engineers should be very popular, right?" Tang Huan asked with interest.

In order to satisfy both the interests and honors of game engineers, Tang Huan set up a corresponding system at the beginning of ea's establishment.

The packaging of each released game is similar to a record. The names of producers, programmers and other participants are printed, but this name is not a real name, but a nickname given to yourself by individuals to prevent competitors from trying to find their way. Dig people.

In this way, in addition to receiving extra bonuses based on project performance, engineers are also taken care of.

but. No matter how well thought of the means to win hearts and minds, it may not be foolproof.

Just as the world martial arts can only be broken quickly, as long as the disruptor is willing to pay the cost. With heavy profit temptation, you can always find a breakthrough.

Therefore, Tang Huan does not think that his ea can be completely monolithic, but his mentality is very relaxed, the technology is not all, once there is a threat who is not within the scope of calculation, the cash flow that philosopher has always prepared will be sent to the scene. Destroy the opponent in the budding state.

In the Internet era in the original time and space, many promising emerging companies were bought by predators such as Apple and Google, which had a lot of cash. Get its latest technological achievements.

"It is true that someone left, but the level is limited. It will not affect the overall work." After Hawkins finished speaking, a dumbfounded expression appeared on his face. "I communicated with them. Many of these people were actually seduced by the promotion of ordinary engineers to project managers."

"I would rather be a chicken head than an oxtail. It is understandable." Tang Huan laughed, "It seems that the gold content of ea engineers is still quite high."

...

In order to acquire Pacific Bell, the largest subsidiary of AT&T, Tang Huan has set up a company called Galaxy Communications, and the first batch of pledged funds from all parties have been put in place.

Among them, the Kuwait Investment Commission is US$2 billion, the Singapore Government Investment Corporation is US$1.8 billion, the various Japanese consortia are US$2.3 billion, Tang Huan is US$2.7 billion, the Wang family of Treasure Island, Warren Buffett, Motorola and others US investors totaled 1.2 billion U.S. dollars.

Although this financing capacity is not comparable to that of the well-known private equity investment company-kkr, the scale of such an acquisition is enough to write a strong stroke in the history of the 1980s.

"After some shareholders of AT&T saw the money, their saliva would have flowed to the ground." Zhuang Menghua described vividly.

Since the little girl can pass the Hong Kong entrance examination to Harvard, Tang Huan naturally has high hopes for her and try to help her find internship opportunities in some large companies.

With this acquisition of Pacific Bell, Zhuang Menghua once again got a chance to deal with things, and at the same time he also assumed the responsibility of paying attention to the subtle dynamics of Tang Huan.

"Since you are so tempted, why does the negotiation progress seem to be stagnant?" Tang Huan asked casually while flipping through the documents.

"Isn't this because the incident was accidentally exposed to the media some time ago. Some guys became afraid of being pointed at their backbones. They were too greedy and only cared about their own interests." Zhuang Menghua replied with deep amusement. .

"So they are entangled in some branches and ends?" Tang Huan snorted disdainfully. "The official checkpoints such as the US Department of Justice and the US Federal Communications Commission have all passed, but they were dragged down by these guys in the end. ."

At this time, just seeing some clauses, Tang Huan took up his pen and gave instructions.

AT&T hopes that after Galaxy Communications acquires Pacific Bell, it can continue to tacitly purchase equipment from its own subsidiaries. Otherwise, don't even think about using Bell Labs' technological achievements.

Tang Huan swiped his pen and wrote, "Don't treat Bell Labs as a threat. It is a treasure in your eyes, but it is not indispensable to me."

Zhuang Menghua poked his head and glanced, then laughed suddenly, "It's not appropriate for you to give instructions like this?"

"If you don't write like this, you won't be able to express my dissatisfaction." Tang Huan casually added an exclamation mark at the end of the sentence.

The next clause is that AT&T hopes to buy shares of Fangyuan Computer at a price of $10 per share.

Tang Huan became more upset, and immediately replied, “I’m not Apple Computer, and you’re not Xerox. History will not repeat itself. If you want to buy shares, the price per share is 20 US dollars, and this It's still a friendly price, don't not appreciate it."

"Between the lines, there is simply a strong resentment." Zhuang Menghua, who was very interesting, laughed louder.

"My Fangyuan Computer Company, if it completes its listing in 1983 as planned, its value is definitely more than US$15 billion, which is no worse than Pacific Bell. They want to pick up the bargain this way, have they considered my IQ?" Tang Huan was annoyed. There was a cross on this clause.

"You do have the capital so you don't give face to AT&T." Zhuang Menghua stopped his laughter~www.readwn.com~ and nodded solemnly, "Who told you to use only two'phones to get rid of the shackles of cables and move on. 'And' The future of telecommunications networks is to transmit data rather than just sound. So many people can coax you into more than 10 billion US dollars."

"Kids don't use words at all. This is not coaxing, but cooperation." Tang Huan said while writing at the end of this document, "My patience can only be kept until December, and I hope to reach an agreement as soon as possible."

"Bring this document to the people at Goldman Sachs. I don't want to continue wasting time, and I don't want to have many dreams at night, so I hurried to work hard." Tang Huan handed the document to Zhuang Menghua and solemnly ordered.

...

The fall of the second half of this year is scheduled to be held in Las Vegas on November 19th for three days and lasts until November 22nd.

With the success in business operations, the influence of the industry summit forums organized by him has gradually increased. If anyone has the opportunity to speak on such occasions, it definitely shows that he has a widely recognized position in the industry. .

There is no doubt that Tang Huan is one of the heavyweight speakers. The topic of his discussion on industrial development this time is "From Data Processing to Network Communication". (To be continued)