I want to be a chaebol - Chapter 228 Preparing to Acquire Yahoo Korea

Sun Zhengyi stood up and hugged Song Yi, “Song Yi, long time no see.”

Then he saw Noriko Sakai, who was following Song Yi, and nodded, “Mrs. Gao Xiang, long time no see.”

Noriko Sakai nodded and said hello, “President Sun, just call me Noriko.” Son Zhengyi noticed that Noriko Sakai was not wearing a wedding ring on her hand, and he knew clearly. It seemed that the rumors of the marriage change between Noriko Sakai and Yuichi Gao were not groundless.

Yuichi Takaso was once the second-generation president of the famous ski supplies store “Kino”, and he was also considered a golden bachelor in the Tokyo metropolitan area.

Noriko Sakai thought she was marrying into a wealthy family and was preparing to quit the entertainment industry after giving birth to her son. Who knew that Gao Xiang Youyi was a fake rich man like a certain Yanjing Fourth Young Master.

The ski shop of Gao Xiang’s family couldn’t make ends meet, so Noriko Sakai had no choice but to come back and shoot commercials, Japanese dramas and movies to support the family expenses.

Takasou Yuichi, who could not make ends meet, still maintained his playboy nature and never forgot to cheat. Noriko Sakai’s best friend who had known him for many years was also Takaso Yuichi’s lover. Noriko Sakai is simply the Japanese version of The Good Wife Liu Tao.

The reason why Song Yi was able to convince Noriko Sakai to be the person in charge of AXA Tokyo Resort was because Noriko Sakai was completely disappointed in her husband Yuichi Gao. Noriko Sakai not only caught him eating secretly, but also found him smoking D.

Noriko Sakai and Yuichi Takaso are now separated. Noriko Sakai has started divorce negotiations with Yuichi Takaso’s lawyer and is competing for the custody of her son.

Masayoshi Son is also envious of Song Yi’s beauty and good fortune. Noriko Sakai, wearing a kimono, stands slim in the middle of the wooden house. There is a quiet beauty in the interlaced light in the room.

Song Yi and Sun Zhengyi were sitting opposite each other on the coffee table. Noriko Sakai was kneeling beside the coffee table, making tea for them in an orderly manner.

She first heated cups and pots for Sun Zhengyi and Song Yi, poured the boiling water into the purple clay pot, justice cup, fragrance cup and tea tasting cup in sequence, and then slowly poured them out.

Then she took out the tea leaves wrapped in oil paper and poured them into the purple clay pot, showing off some fancy techniques in the process.

After putting the tea leaves, Noriko Sakai poured the boiling water into the pot, allowing the boiling water and the tea leaves to have a brief contact, and then quickly poured it out to filter out the unfried tea leaves.

Then Noriko Sakai poured the boiling water into the teapot again. During the pouring process, the spout nodded three times. This technique is the “Phoenix Three Noddings” in the tea ceremony performance. It pays tribute to today’s guest Masayoshi Son and gives people a pleasing and refreshing spring breeze. The artistic beauty of the surface.

She brushed off the tea dust with the tea lid, then covered the teapot. After the aroma of the tea overflows, Sakai Noriko uses wooden tea clips to group the scenting cups and tea-tasting cups into groups and place them on saucers so that she can add tea at any time.

Sun Zhengyi narrowed his eyes with enjoyment and asked, “Ms. Noriko, today’s tea is different from what I’ve had before. Do you have anything to say?”

Noriko Sakai calmly answered Son’s question while dividing the pots. She poured the tea soup into Sun Zhengyi and Song Yi’s scent cups, and filled the tea to seventy percent full to express her respect for Sun Zhengyi.

“President Sun, the tea you drank today is the best Xinyang Maojian, but it is different from other Xinyang Maojian. This is Lip Tea, and it is also the tribute tea consumed by the ancient Chinese palace.” Noriko Sakai introduced.

“What is lip tea?” Son Zhengyi asked curiously.

Noriko Sakai glanced at Sun Zhengyi shyly, and Song Yi came to the rescue in time, “The so-called lip tea refers to the process of picking and making tea.”

“The tea farm will invite some young and beautiful tea-picking girls to help pick tea. When picking tea, they will put the delicate spring tea into their mouths, and then put in the tea-picking tools made of Xinyang willow. They will put the young buds Put it on the chest and use the body temperature of the tea-picking girl for initial baking. Because the process is extremely complicated, the yield is extremely low, and it has always been consumed as tribute tea.” Song Yi explained the allusion.

Son Zhengyi laughed, “No wonder the tea soup seems to have the scent of a girl. It is really wonderful. If President Song hadn’t invited us today, I might not have had the chance to taste such a fine tea.”

Noriko Sakai handed the cup to Sun Zhengyi and Song Yi in turn with both hands. Sun Zhengyi took the tea cup with three fingers, smelled the tea again, then sipped slowly in three sips, and then gently put the cup down.

Sun Zhengyi knocked on the coffee table and thanked Song Yi for the hospitality and Noriko Sakai for her superb tea ceremony performance. Noriko Sakai obviously put in a lot of effort to entertain the distinguished guest Masayoshi Son.

“Song Yi, you specially invited me to meet here. Do you have anything important to discuss with me?” Sun Zhengyi finished drinking tea and chatted about business with Song Yi.

Song Yi said: “Sun Sang, I heard that Yahoo is planning to shrink its Asian business and sell Yahoo China and Yahoo Korea to local companies in order to return funds and reduce losses. Is this true?”

Son Zhengyi glanced at Song Yi meaningfully, “You are very well-informed. Why, are you also interested in Yahoo Korea?”

Song Yi was a little surprised, “Besides me, which other Korean company is interested?”

“Both companies, SK Telecom and LG GNS, are interested in acquiring Yahoo Korea. They have secretly contacted Yahoo’s management team this year. However, they feel that Yahoo’s offer is too high, so they have temporarily stopped the acquisition progress.” Son Zhengyi said .

“Yahoo can no longer compete with Google in the North American market. Google’s revenue has surpassed Yahoo’s in 2004, and now the gap between the two has become wider and wider. In two years at most, Google’s size will be equal to that of two Yahoo. In the Internet In the industry, talented people have emerged from generation to generation, and each has led the way for hundreds of years. The rise of Google and the decline of Yahoo are unstoppable.”

“In addition to its North American business, among Yahoo’s global businesses, except for its relatively successful operations in Japan and Taiwan Province, Yahoo has hit a wall one after another in the Chinese mainland market and the Korean market.”

“Yahoo Huaguo cannot compete with Baidu in the search engine business, and it cannot compare with Sina, NetEase, and Sohu in terms of portals. Yahoo’s management is also arrogant and unfamiliar with the Chinese mainland market. They often attribute the lagging behind in market competition to regulatory reasons. .So the decline of Yahoo China is inevitable.”

“I am also a director of Yahoo after all. I am embarrassed by your ruthlessness.” Sun Zhengyi knocked on the table and said to Song Yi.

“I have always believed that the fundamental reason for Yahoo Japan’s success is not Yahoo itself, but the choice of SoftBank as a partner.”

“Each country’s Internet regulatory policies are different. It is necessary to adopt flexible and changeable operating strategies according to current conditions to compete with local Internet giants. One trick will no longer work.”

“In 2003, Yahoo took a fancy to 3721’s traffic, licenses and good financial data, and spent US$120 million to buy 3721. 3721 founder Zhou Hongyi became the president of Yahoo China.”

“In fact, Zhou Hongyi did a good job at Yahoo China, launching many Internet businesses such as ‘Yisou.com’ and 1G free mailbox. Unfortunately, the Yahoo board of directors put forward unrealistic performance requirements for Zhou Hongyi and refused to provide financial support. Typical We need horses to run, but also horses not to eat grass. Zhou Hongyi, who is familiar with the Chinese market, naturally wants to quit,” Song Yi said.

Noriko Sakai noticed that Son’s cup was empty and thoughtfully refilled his cup with hot tea.

Sun Zhengyi sipped his tea comfortably and put the cup aside. “Although Chairman Song has lived in Seoul all year round, he knows the Internet market in mainland China well.”

“Penguin, Alibaba, NetEase, Baidu, these Internet companies all have your investment. It seems that you are more optimistic about the long-term survival of these four Internet companies in the fiercely competitive mainland China market?” Son asked unexpectedly.

Song Yi lamented that Sun Zhengyi was an old fox and had been paying attention to Song Yi’s investment direction.

“Although New Asia Network and SA Soft operate independently, New Asia Network in the mainland is still nominally a subsidiary of SA Soft.”

“Xinya Network’s online game business revenue has maintained steady growth. The number of registered users on Xiaonei.com has exceeded 100 million, with daily active users exceeding 15 million and monthly active users exceeding 30 million.”

“For New Asia Network, Penguin, Alibaba, Baidu and NetEase are all Internet companies worth learning from. And Sun Sang has been optimistic about Alibaba so early. I have no reason not to invest in Alibaba.” Song Yi quietly praised Sun Zhengyi again .

Masayoshi Son was very impressed by what he heard. “It took me more than 20 years to develop SoftBank to its current scale, but it only took you just four years to achieve what I achieved in 20 years. From this perspective, , you are more amazing than me.”

Noriko Sakai heard that Sun Zhengyi and Song Yi were secretly complimenting each other, and she helped Song Yi to serve tea again.

“Both Chairman Sun and Chairman Song are outstanding men and great business wizards, so they can be heroes and cherish heroes.” Noriko Sakai interjected at the right time.

Son Zhengyi laughed, “Miss Fazi said it well. But if Miss Fazi is asked to choose someone from me and President Song to spend the night with you, Miss Fazi will definitely choose a young talent like President Song without any hesitation.”

Noriko Sakai pursed her lips and smiled, but did not refute Son Zhengyi’s words.

Son Masayoshi looked at Noriko Sakai, who was smiling like a flower, and felt a little pity. However, as the richest man in Japan, he has never lacked beauties around him, and it is impossible for him to win Song Yi’s love.

“In 2003, Yahoo was preparing to acquire a search engine company in order to consolidate its market share in China. At that time, it had two acquisition targets, one was Baidu with an asking price of US$150 million, and the other was 3721 with an asking price of US$120 million.”

“At that time, Yahoo’s board of directors was wavering between Baidu and 3721, but Baidu later gave up the idea of ​​selling. Yahoo later acquired 3721.”

“Actually, I suggested to Yahoo’s board of directors to acquire Baidu, but unfortunately Yang Zhiyuan did not accept my suggestion.”

“Later, after investigation, I learned that Baidu had received a total of US$20 million in financing from investment institutions led by Blue Ocean Capital Fund in 2003.”

“They bought Baidu’s Series C 5 million convertible preferred shares at a price of US$4 per share. Baidu is not short of money, so naturally it will not sell the company to Yahoo. Can I understand that it was your move that allowed Yahoo to acquire Baidu? Planned bankruptcy?” Sun Zhengyi asked Song Yi.

“Now there is a winner between Baidu and 3721. Baidu’s search engine technology in 2004 has matured, and Baidu’s brand has also been widely recognized by mainland netizens.”

“Baidu is preparing to go public in the United States, and Yahoo China President Zhou Hongyi is preparing to resign.”

“If Yahoo’s board of directors knew that you deliberately hindered their acquisition of Baidu in the past two years, do you think Yang Zhiyuan would still agree to SA soft’s purchase of Yahoo Korea?” Son Zhengyi asked Song Yi.

Song Yi laughed immediately, “As I said just now, Yahoo Japan’s success is more due to SoftBank as a partner.”

“I was more optimistic about Baidu at the beginning, so I joined other investment institutions to invest in Baidu. Now this result also confirms my judgment.”

“From an investment perspective, SA Soft is certainly a better partner. Only by handing over Yahoo Korea to SA Soft can Yahoo Korea’s business be revived. We who invest in projects are not investors at all. person?”

“SK Telecom and LG GNS seem to be good partners, but the leaders of these two companies lack sufficient Internet thinking. No matter from which level, SA Soft’s acquisition of Yahoo Korea is the best choice.” Song Yi answered.

Son thought about it for a while, “I admit that what you said is right, but the decision-making power on whether to acquire Yahoo Korea is not in my hands. After all, I am only a director of Yahoo, not the chairman of Yahoo. If you want to acquire Yahoo Korea, It’s not impossible, it just depends on whether you are willing to give in.”

Song Yi made it clear, “Do you want Yahoo to sell Yahoo Korea in exchange for shares in SA Soft? Brother Zhengyi, you know, I am actually not short of money.”

Sun Zhengyi was called “Brother Zhengyi” by Song Yi for the first time, and he found it very interesting, “Not to mention, Brother Zhengyi sounds much more pleasant to the ears than Sun Sang.”

“Song Yi, I know you are not short of money, but SA Soft’s current financing is not just for money, but for the resources behind the funders.”

“If you plan to list SA Soft on the Korea Stock Exchange or the Tokyo Stock Exchange, then it doesn’t matter whether you accept Yahoo’s investment or not.”

“Everyone knows that based on SA Soft’s current business scale, revenue and net profit, listing it on the US stock market is the best choice. Because the US stock market will give high valuations to high-tech companies like SA Soft, Nasdaq The P/E ratio is as high as 30 to 40 times.”

“SA Soft’s recent 12 net profits have reached US$400 million. All the company’s business sectors, except for the asset-heavy project Sohan.com, the social networking site inschool and online games, are all profitable.”

“If SA Soft chooses to be listed on Nasdaq, the company’s market value will exceed 10 billion US dollars in minutes, which is almost equal to 1/10 of Google.”

“If SA Soft acquires Yahoo Korea, it will completely make up for the shortcomings of search engines and portals and become an Internet giant spanning social networking sites + e-commerce + online games + search engines + portals. This will undoubtedly give investors more Space for imagination.”

“If Yahoo sells all of Yahoo Korea’s business and assets to SA Soft in a package, as long as SA Soft is willing to use SA Soft’s shares to complete the transaction, then I will be confident in persuading Yang Zhiyuan to agree to this transaction plan.” Masayoshi Son said.

Song Yi was carefully considering the pros and cons. He contacted an accounting firm to evaluate the value of Yahoo Korea. The valuation of the entire Yahoo Korea company was approximately US$100 million.

If possible, he would prefer to use cash transactions to acquire Yahoo Korea, but this is obviously not easy.

In a few months, Alibaba will acquire all the assets of Yahoo China as a whole, receive a US$1 billion investment from Yahoo, and enjoy the exclusive right to use Yahoo’s brand and technology in the Chinese mainland market. Yahoo will receive 40% of Alibaba’s dividends. rights and 35% of the voting rights.

In this transaction, Yahoo valued all the assets of Yahoo China at US$700 million. Yahoo gave Alibaba US$1 billion in cash, and Ali acquired the assets of Yahoo China for US$700 million. Yahoo has completely solved its problems in the Chinese market. It has to be said that Yang Zhiyuan did make a good deal. You must know that Yahoo later sold off its Alibaba shares one after another, withdrawing a total of 85 billion US dollars in funds.

“Brother Zhengyi, how much SA Soft shares do you think Yahoo Korea is worth?” Song Yi continued to ask.

“Ten percent of SA Soft’s shares?” Son asked tentatively.

“You really dare to speak loudly. The current valuation of SA Soft by investment institutions is generally between US$3 billion and US$5 billion. You are now listing Yahoo Korea to the Korean capital market to bid for the price. There is a company willing to If you bid $200 million, I lose.”

“South Korea has a total population of only 50 million, and the upper limit of the number of Internet users is only 30 million. It is completely different from mainland China. If Yang Zhiyuan still has this self-conscious attitude, then there is nothing to talk about, and Brother Zhengyi, you don’t have to continue. Become a lobbyist for the Yahoo board of directors.” Song Yi said.

Yahoo’s market value reached its peak this year, almost around 100 billion US dollars, but this high market value simply cannot be sustained. Because Yahoo’s high profits this year were achieved by selling Google stock. That’s why Yahoo’s board of directors is eager to liquidate the assets of Yahoo China and Yahoo Korea and seek new performance growth points for the company to maintain Yahoo’s stock price.

If Yahoo sells Yahoo Korea to South Korean Internet giant SA Soft in exchange for a share of SA Soft’s shares, it will be a win-win situation for both Yahoo and SA Soft.

Sun Zhengyi saw that Song Yi was very determined and could not do anything, so he confessed, “The opinion of Yahoo’s board of directors is at least 5%, and Yahoo needs to reserve a director seat in SA Soft.”

Song Yi replied, “From my personal point of view, I feel that this transaction is not equitable. I value Yahoo Korea at US$100 million, and 5% of SA Soft is worth at least US$250 million.”

“I know that Yahoo is planning to sell Yahoo China to Alibaba, and is planning to complete a huge financing for Alibaba, and is preparing to replace SoftBank as Alibaba’s largest shareholder.”

“I now have a serial trading plan. This plan requires the consent of Yahoo, SoftBank and Alibaba. Of course, I will communicate with Alibaba. After all, Teacher Ma and I are old friends. We have participated in the West Lake Swordsmanship twice. .”

“SA Soft will use US$100 million in cash to acquire all the assets of Yahoo Korea. As a supplement to the transaction, if Yahoo completes its investment in Alibaba, I am willing to use 5% of SA Soft’s equity in exchange for the 10% equity that Yahoo has traded from Alibaba. “Song Yi said.

Son Zhengyi lamented that Song Yi really refused to take any losses. Now Yahoo and SoftBank value Alibaba at about US$2 billion to US$2.5 billion.

Under Masayoshi Son’s persuasion, Yahoo was prepared to invest US$1 billion in exchange for 40% of Alibaba’s shares. The 10% of Alibaba’s shares were worth almost US$250 million.

“In this transaction plan, although Yahoo obtained 5% of SA Soft’s shares as expected, it felt that SA Soft was taking advantage from the beginning to the end. This kind of serial transaction plan may not be able to impress the Yahoo board of directors.” Masayoshi Son shook his head.

Although SA Soft’s current company valuation is as high as US$5 billion, there is still a question mark as to whether 5% of SA Soft’s shares are worth US$250 million.

Yahoo is planning to spend US$1 billion in real money to invest in Alibaba. If SA Soft uses 5% of its shares, it will exchange the 10% of Alibaba shares bought by Yahoo. This transaction plan means that Yahoo will not make any profit, so of course SA Soft will take advantage of Yahoo. How could Yahoo’s board of directors agree to Song Yi’s transaction plan?

Song Yi added, “The difference between me and Yahoo now is how much the 5% stake in SA Soft is worth. This is the key to completing the series of transactions, right?”

“I can add a supplementary agreement. After the transaction is completed, SA Soft will complete its listing in the United States within one year.”

“One year after listing, based on the average share price of SA Soft in the past 12 months. Assuming that the market value of the SA Soft shares held by Yahoo is less than US$500 million, I personally will unconditionally repurchase Yahoo’s holdings for US$500 million. This part of SA Soft shares is no problem, right?” Song Yi said.

When Son Yi heard what Song Yi said, his heart suddenly fell. If Song Yi was willing to buy back the SA Soft shares held by Yahoo, it would naturally be no problem.

According to Masayoshi Son’s estimate, if SA Soft successfully acquires Yahoo Korea, it will be listed in the United States as the first Korean Internet stock. SA Soft’s market value after listing will not be less than 20 billion US dollars.

Then the value of the SA Soft shares held by Yahoo will not be less than US$1 billion. Even if SA Soft’s listed stock price is undervalued, Yahoo still has Song Yi’s $500 million in cash to back it up.

The advantage of this is that Song Yi bought 10% of Alibaba’s equity from Yahoo in advance with US$500 million two years later. This is still a good deal for Yahoo.

10% of Alibaba’s equity is now worth US$250 million. This is like Yahoo lending Song Yi US$250 million this year, and Song Yi will repay Yahoo at least US$500 million two years later. The return on investment in two years is 100%, which is already quite impressive.

“I already know your request. I will submit your transaction plan to the Yahoo board of directors for discussion. If there is a result, I will notify you as soon as possible.”

“Teacher Alima, do you need me to help you communicate? Ever since SA Soft also started to build an e-commerce website, Search Korea.com, Teacher Ma has been more wary of you. He is actually worried that you will use Search Korea.com The model will be copied to the Chinese mainland market,” Son said.

“Souhan.com will never enter the Chinese mainland market. For mainland Internet companies, I mainly focus on investment.”

“If SA Soft becomes a shareholder of Alibaba, it will also be a good thing for Mr. Ma. I can help them launch Taobao business into the Korean market. Xiaonei.com and Xinya Game Hall can also help Taobao attract traffic. SA Bank also needs to learn “Given Alipay’s advanced experience in electronic payments, SA and Alibaba still have more cooperation than competition,” Song Yi said.

As SoftBank is a shareholder of SA Soft (Japan) Co., Ltd., Masayoshi Son has also been worried about the listing of SA Soft. Now Song Yi finally relented and gave a clear timetable. Masayoshi Son feels that today is not in vain.

“If SA Soft completes its listing, your personal assets will exceed the tens of billions of dollars, surpassing Samsung’s Chairman Chen Kunxi, and officially becoming the richest man in South Korea. If this moment really comes, will you become excited? You His mood is too stable, unlike young people of your age.” Sun Zhengyi asked a question curiously.

“After this series of transactions is completed, I will invite Teacher Ma and Sun Sang to AXA Tokyo Resort as guests. The three of us can take a group photo of the richest man in China, Japan and South Korea.” Song Yi smiled. explain.

A smile appeared on Noriko Sakai’s face, “Then I am really honored to be able to entertain the richest men from Japan and South Korea today.”

I’m going to go cycling on the riverbank this weekend, so I’ll update it first. See you tomorrow. Thank you everyone for your monthly passes!