Chapter 447: Never fought such a rich battle
Tuesday, November 1st.
The capital city has entered autumn at this time. The scorching heat has faded and the weather has gradually turned cooler. The leaves of the trees on both sides of the road have gradually turned yellow and fallen down in a swirling wind.
People walking on the street are wearing all kinds of clothes. Those who are resistant to cold are wearing short-sleeved thin shirts, and those who are afraid of cold have put on thin down jackets. However, the most common clothes are windbreakers, jackets, and sweaters.
On the university campus, the bell rang, the last class of the morning ended, and students poured out of the teaching building like a tide and poured into the school’s cafeterias.
Guan Rong had a meal with her classmates in the cafeteria and packed up another portion before leaving.
After a while, she returned to the dormitory. After entering, she put the packed lunch on the big table in the middle of the room, and then patted the bed near the door.
"Wake up, I brought you lunch!"
A girl in light yellow pajamas and messy hair on the upper bunk opened her eyes, slowly sat up and stretched.
When she heard Guan Rong's words and saw the packed meals on the table, she smiled sweetly.
"Rongrong, you're the best!"
Then he stood up and got out of bed.
"Wow, spicy hot pot~
I like it the most, and I’m hungry.”
As he said this, he took out his chopsticks and started eating.
"By the way, Rongrong, did you call the two classes for me this morning?"
Guan Rong sat in front of her bed and turned on the computer.
"I called out to you. Luckily there were a lot of people in class today, so the teacher didn't take it seriously and let it go."
"Hehe, Rongrong, you are the most loyal!"
"I'm asking you to control the amount of time you spend playing games. Playing during the day is fine, but if you keep staying up all night, I'm afraid you'll die before you graduate from college."
After hearing the advice from her best friend, the gaming girl Gong Miao felt a little embarrassed.
"I went on a dungeon run with my guild last night, and then I watched two episodes of a TV series afterward. By the time I realized it, it was almost dawn. I'll be more careful next time."
Guan Rong ignored her and logged into Weibo to see what news there was today.
"Huh? What kind of app is this?"
"What's wrong?"
Hearing Guan Rong's voice, Gong Miao, who was eating spicy hot pot, raised his head and asked suspiciously.
"I saw Gu Wei posted a new Weibo post saying he had opened his own account on TikTok. Friends who like him can go to TikTok to watch him.
What is [TikTok]?
"Let me see, let me see"
Gong Miao brought the spicy hot pot and sat next to Guan Rong.
She and Guan Rong are both fans of Gu Wei. Every time a new drama of Gu Wei is released, they will be the first to watch it. Gu Wei’s Weibo is a place they must check every day.
However, in addition to chasing stars and watching TV series, she also likes to play games, while her good friend Guan Rong is not interested in games at all.
"Really? It says it's a music-themed short video app, probably similar to Kuaishou. Gu Wei's short videos kind of lower his profile."
Guan Rong picked up her cell phone from the bed.
"Don't worry about it, just download it first."
"Yes, yes, yes."
Gong Miao didn't even bother to eat. He went back to his bed, found his phone, went into the App Store, found [TikTok] and started downloading.
After downloading the APP, she opened [TikTok] and Gu Wei's account automatically appeared in front of her.
In the vertical screen of the phone, Gu Wei was wearing a light blue casual outfit with only his upper body exposed, and the background was a white wall.
He greeted with a smile.
"Hello, everyone, I'm Gu Wei!
I am very happy to be the spokesperson for TikTok. From now on, I will officially join TikTok. We will be a family. I hope everyone can pay more attention to me, like my posts, and we can communicate more.
Remember to follow me~
Heart!"
As he spoke, Gu Wei raised one arm, pinched his thumb and index finger together, and made a heart shape to the camera.
"Wow! Gu Wei is so handsome, and what he said is so sweet. I want to follow him, I must follow him!!"
Gong Miao said as he clicked the red heart on the right side of the screen and then turned the focus back on it.
Guan Rong did the same thing as Gong Miao. She watched Gu Wei's video over and over again, then slid her finger upwards and started watching other videos on Douyin.
Soon, she was attracted by some interesting music videos. She thought those videos were relatively simple and she should be able to shoot them herself.
Guan Rong did it as soon as she thought of it. She found a very popular video of finger dance that only filmed the upper body, and started practicing according to the original version. After a while, she recorded a version that she was quite satisfied with.
I admired it a few times and then hit send.
This is the first work she posted after downloading TikTok.
"Rongrong, you have class this afternoon, aren't you going?"
Guan Rong only reacted when she heard Gong Miao's voice. She glanced at her cell phone and saw that it was already past one o'clock.
"Oh no, I lost track of time playing this [TikTok], I can't be late!"
Guan Rong was a little worried.
"It's okay, there's still time. If you play for a while longer you'll miss it."
Gong Miao reminded from the side.
"Aren't you going this afternoon?"
Guan Rong asked as she packed her things and took out the books she needed to take to class in the afternoon.
"Hehe, I won't go. I didn't go in the morning anyway, so I might as well give myself a day off.
Good Rongrong, in the afternoon lab class, if the teacher isn’t noticing, please sign your name for me.”
"I'm really impressed by you."
Guan Rong waved her hand to show that she understood, then quickly walked out of the dormitory.
Starting from the first day of November, more than a dozen celebrity artists including Gu Wei joined Douyin. Among them are super traffic figures like Gu Wei and Yang Mi with tens of millions of Weibo fans, as well as new first-line actresses in the circle such as Nazha and Zhang Tianai. Their joint entry into a newly launched APP immediately attracted widespread attention from fans and netizens.
The number of downloads of the [TikTok] APP has surged since the 1st. From only a few hundred thousand downloads at the beginning, the number of downloads exceeded 10 million in just ten days, and the number of daily active users reached hundreds of thousands. Although there is still a certain distance from the leading short video platforms such as [Kuaishou], [Miaopai], and [Meipai], the speed of catching up is amazing, and it has become a software with great potential recognized by the industry.
ByteDance headquarters in Beijing.
"Mr. Gu, we're really grateful to you for this. This morning, we received news from Sequoia Capital that they've almost approved ByteDance's current valuation of 11 billion yuan and hope we can start the Series D financing process as soon as possible."
In the president's office, Zhang Yiming and Gu Wei sat opposite each other. He picked up the coffee in front of him and took a sip with a smile on his face, obviously in a very good mood.
"[Sequoia Capital] is wise. Whether it's $10 billion or $11 billion, they won't lose money by leading the Series D round now, and they'll actually make a lot of money in the future from this investment!"
"Haha~ Mr. Gu, to be honest, I like this about you.
Every time I talk to you, I feel that as an investor and major shareholder, you have more confidence in ByteDance than I do as the founder of the company!"
Gu Wei smiled slightly. He was certainly confident. No one in this world knew better than him how influential TikTok would be in the future, and what a behemoth ByteDance would become.
"Kuaishou is now firmly at the top of the short video market. It has over 300 million registered users and 40 million daily active users. It has also produced many internet celebrities. This year's MC Tianyou is very famous. I've heard his song 'Drunk Alone,' and his single-person follower count has exceeded 10 million.
Although we have made a good start, there is still a big gap between us and Kuaishou. We need to increase our investment in the future to gradually catch up with them and eventually surpass them."
Zhang Yiming smiled and nodded.
"Don't worry, our team has the technology, strength and confidence. This month, [TikTok] added a contact search function and opened QQ and Weibo portals. With the guidance of you, Mr. Gu, and many celebrities, I believe that by the beginning of next year, the number of app downloads will not be a problem.
And we are about to launch a new recommendation mechanism and support plan: [Centralized Operation Model].
This model focuses more on prioritizing the support of some users to become popular, and then drives ordinary users by increasing the creative enthusiasm and stickiness of top users.
In addition to the $1 billion in funding after the D round of financing, the company will invest huge publicity resources in the operation of [TikTok].
In the future, [TikTok] will definitely become the real leader in the short video field! "
Zhang Yiming is now full of confidence. He feels that he has a trump card and it would be unfair if he doesn't win.
ByteDance itself has technology, and its unique algorithms and push technology are unique in the industry.
From the outside, there is the major shareholder Gu Wei providing traffic. With Gu Wei's fame and popularity, he is "feeding" the newly launched APP [Tik Tok]. The traffic is simply like a river flowing back. You can imagine how jealous other companies in the same industry are now.
Finally, the completed D round of financing brought a large amount of funds to the company, so he didn't have to worry about money for future development.
It can be said that the time, place and people are all right now. Zhang Yiming has never fought such a prosperous battle before.
"I feel relieved when you are so confident. You can always come to me if you need any help in the future."
Gu Wei picked up the coffee in front of him and took a sip. His elegant demeanor and handsome appearance made Zhang Yiming opposite him admire him. He is worthy of being the most popular star in China. This appearance is completely a gift from God. If he is not popular, who will be popular?
"By the way, when our Series D funding round is completed, the market value of your shares will be close to 10 billion RMB. You'll be the first billionaire in China in your twenties, right? Tsk tsk."
Gu Wei looked up, picked up the tissue on the table and wiped the corners of his mouth that were stained with coffee foam.
"ByteDance won't be going public in the near future, and I can't transfer my shares. What difference does it make to me whether it's 10 billion or 10 billion? They're just paper wealth.
I’m not short of money.”
Gu Wei's remarks seemed a bit pretentious, but he was also speaking the truth.
Compared with the economic value of ByteDance shares, he actually values the voice he has as a major shareholder of ByteDance more.
You should know that Weibo is also one of ByteDance's shareholders. These two future network traffic pools have a very strong role in publicity. As a major shareholder, Gu Wei will have no problem manipulating public opinion in the future, but at least he will have no problem protecting himself from harm.
Although [TikTok] has its own unique underlying push algorithm, if [ByteDance] manually intervenes just to prevent a piece of news from fermenting, it doesn't take any effort at all.
"I had forgotten that with your current fame, your annual income is probably higher than the annual net profit of many listed companies. You are definitely not short of money.
And I remember that movie you filmed a few months ago, Detective Chinatown 2, was produced by your own company, right? It grossed 3.9 billion. Although I don't understand the ins and outs of your entertainment industry, I know you must have made a killing on that movie."
Gu Wei touched his chin.
"It's not bad. After deducting the costs and all the profits, [Detective Chinatown 2] will probably still have more than 800 million in net profit."
In fact, when filming "Detective Chinatown 2", Gu Wei served as director, screenwriter and leading actor, and took away a total of 60 million in remuneration.
Coupled with the various product placements in the film, Wei Ming Tian Xia’s investment was almost recovered during filming.
The subsequent box office revenue sharing is almost pure profit.
Zhang Yiming also took a breath after hearing what Gu Wei said.
It's not that he hasn't seen the world. This round of ByteDance's valuation is 11 billion US dollars, and Zhang's net worth is also over 10 billion yuan, but his billionaire status is all based on the valuation of the company. Now it's difficult for him to pay out 100 million in cash.
Even if there is a billion US dollars in financing coming in immediately, that is money in the company's account, not his personal wealth.
Of course, if the company goes public later, he can get a lot of cash by simply cashing out a little bit. This is why all business leaders want their companies to go public. As long as the company goes public, he can achieve financial freedom instantly by cashing out the shares.
After chatting with Zhang Yiming for a while, Gu Wei declined his dinner invitation and left ByteDance.
He got into his shiny black Rolls-Royce in Beijing and drove to the Peninsula Hotel in Beijing.
The celebration banquet for Operation Mekong breaking through 2 billion was held there today.
When Gu Wei arrived, the banquet was about to begin, and Yu Dong went outside to greet him in person.
"Mr. Yu, don't be so polite. You're making me panic."
Outside the banquet hall, Gu Wei looked at Yu Dong who came to pick him up and smiled politely.
"No way, Mr. Gu, we are the closest partners. This is what I should do."
Yu Dong welcomed Gu Wei in with a smile on his face.
Different from the previous celebration party for "Detective Chinatown 2", Bona Film Group invited many media to attend today, and the entire celebration party was more about publicity than celebration.
The main creative team stood in the center of the stage.
Yu Dong stood in the middle, with Lin Chaoxian and Gu Wei standing on his left and right respectively.
The staff pushed up a large sculpture made of ice, with a 2 in front and 9 zeros in the back.
Then, under the witness of the media, everyone swung the small hammers in their hands and smashed the ice sculpture.
"[Operation Mekong] is a mainstream blockbuster. To be honest, it was unexpected, but also reasonable, that it could make 2 billion at the box office.
Thanks to Director Lin, Gu Wei, Han Yu, and all the film's creative staff. It is your dedication that made this such an excellent film possible.
I have to announce one thing here. During the National Day holiday, public security officers, armed police officers and firefighters across the country were on duty. Many of them did not have time to watch "Operation Mekong" because of their busy work.
In response to this situation, Bona Film Group decided to thank the police officers, armed police officers, and firefighters for their hard work and contributions to the country and the people.
Starting tomorrow, public security officers, armed police officers, and firefighters across the country can watch the movie "Operation Mekong" for free at Bona Cinemas with their ID.
Bona Film Group hopes to pay tribute to the anti-drug police officers who are fighting on the front lines in this way. We hope that this film can be seen by more people in the country to show the spirit of "never forget history, heroes will always be there."
After Yu Dong finished his speech, everyone at the scene, including the media, burst into warm applause.
After he finished speaking, the microphone was handed to Lin Chaoxian, and Director Lin also expressed his thoughts after the movie became a huge hit.
Originally, Yu Dong wanted Gu Wei to say a few words, but he smiled and shook his head to refuse.
Operation Mekong was a huge hit, and he had already gotten enough publicity, so there was no need to say anything more at the celebration party.
(End of this chapter)
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