When Duan Yongping left, he made a verbal agreement with Subor: within one year of leaving, he would not compete with Subor in the same industry or in the domestic market.
Duan Yongping kept this gentleman's agreement. After he left, Yang Minggui succeeded him as the general manager of Subor. Two years later, Yang Minggui also chose to resign and took an employee named Liu Lirong with him. They then founded Jinzheng together to do VCD and DVD business. A few years later, Liu Lirong left the company and founded Gionee mobile phones.
In September 1995, Guangdong Ligo Electronics Co., Ltd. (the predecessor of BBK Electronics) was established. In 1996, Ligo Electronics was renamed BBK Electronics. In its early days, the company was a joint-stock company, and the Taiwanese computer manufacturer Acer once invested 19% of the shares.
BBK then started making student computers, telephones, and language repeaters. In just two years, BBK cordless phones achieved the number one market share in the national cordless phone market.
In November 1995, the fledgling BBK Electronics bid 80.12 million yuan for a five-second advertisement slot after CCTV's News Broadcast, but failed. The advertisement slot was won by Wang Zhuosheng of Qinchi Winery for a sky-high price of 320 million yuan.
Back then, the domestic liquor business was truly such that as long as you produced it, you made money; there was no liquor that couldn't be sold.
In November 1996, BBK Telephone Factory obtained the first "network access license" for corded telephones from the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications.
In 1997, 24 of Subor's distributors joined BBK Electronics, and just over two years later, Subor faded into obscurity and disappeared from the historical stage.
In August 1997, BBK (步步高) commissioned Jet Li to film an advertisement for its VCD player. At the same time, BBK again bid for a 5-second advertising slot between the evening news and the weather forecast, but unfortunately missed the opportunity again.
The advertising deal was ultimately won by Hu Zhibiao's Aido for a staggering 210 million yuan. Aido was the largest VCD manufacturer in China at the time. Hu Zhibiao, then 28 years old and at the height of his power, uttered a domineering statement on the spot: "210 million yuan, too cheap." He was incredibly arrogant.
Shortly after, Aido went out of business due to a broken capital chain, and Hu Zhibiao was arrested by the police on suspicion of commercial fraud and sentenced to eight years in prison.
In the VCD market, Aido often uses the same tactics that BBK (Vivo and Apple) has employed, including hiring Jackie Chan as its spokesperson and promoting the slogan "We have been working hard, Aido VCD," with the famous song "True Hero" as the background music.
Duan Yongping countered the move and even retaliated by hiring the then-popular Stephen Chow as a spokesperson. Chow's catchphrase, "BBK repeater, making foreign language learning easier!" immediately captured the hearts of students. It is said that Stephen Chow accepted two advertisements in total, one for BBK and one for Wahaha.
Subsequently, BBK also invited Jolin Tsai, A-mei, and Arnold Schwarzenegger to endorse various BBK products.
By the end of 1998, BBK VCD had successfully broken into the top three in the industry. That year, BBK finally won the CCTV advertising bid with 159 million yuan. At the same time, Duan Yongping commissioned someone to compose a song for BBK called "BBK", with lyrics that read: "There is justice in the world, hard work always pays off, BBK".
Nobody asked me how I was doing.
Which is more important, reality or goals?
Running every second
The troubles haven't lessened at all.
There are always people who go through this hardship like me.
Loneliness and applause are both necessary.
Who can predict success or failure?
Passion is destined to burn
Justice will prevail in this world.
Effort always pays off
Saying is not as good as doing.
If you're going to do something, do it the best.
Justice will prevail in this world.
Effort always pays off
Saying is not as good as doing.
If you're going to do something, do it the best.
BBK
This song, accompanied by the BBK DVD commercial featuring Jet Li wielding a sword in the desert, resonated throughout every television set in China. Performed by Jing Gangshan, Lin Yilun, and Gao Linsheng, with lyrics by the renowned corporate song expert Chen Shu, a college student majoring in international trade and a complete novice who had never attended a music academy, is the musician who has created the most corporate songs, city songs, tourism songs, advertising songs, and industry songs. His debut song, "The Wine of September 9th," released at the age of 22, became a global hit among Chinese communities worldwide. Now, if you ask any uncle or older person, they will all know this song.
Chen Shu received the assignment at 2 a.m. He had just finished writing and was about to turn off the lights to rest when he received a call from musician Wang Gang. Wang Gang said that a TV commercial needed music, but writing the lyrics had become a problem. The copywriters at the advertising agency had already revised the draft several times, but it still hadn't been approved by the client. Chen Shu was asked to write the lyrics overnight and have a finished product before dawn, so that the client could give it a final review at 9 a.m. the next day. Chen Shu accepted the challenge, washed his face with cold water, and began to immerse himself in the process of creating the song.
In 1999, BBK secured a CCTV advertising slot for 2000 for 126 million yuan.
Before BBK entered the mobile phone business, it had already hired celebrities such as A-mei, Jet Li, Stephen Chow, Jolin Tsai, and Arnold Schwarzenegger as spokespeople, and had bid for CCTV advertising for many years. It can be seen that advertising has always been one of BBK's strategies.
Duan Yongping retires after achieving his goal
Also in early 1999, as BBK's business continued to expand, Duan Yongping restructured the company, establishing three independent companies based on the principles of personnel following business operations, independent shareholding, and no subordination between them. These were BBK Educational Electronics (Huang Yihe is now retired and Jin Zhijiang has taken over), BBK Audiovisual Electronics (Chen Mingyong), and BBK Communication Technology (Shen Wei).
The three companies respectively engaged in businesses such as e-readers, learning machines, VCDs, DVDs, cordless phones, and mobile phones. In 2001, Duan Yongping took the lead in registering OPPO. Later, Shen and Huang had no intention of participating, so Chen Mingyong bought out the OPPO brand.
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