Chapter 282: 500 million US dollars! Liu Zhiping: People who are being rubbed in don’t mind, so why are you feeling wronged?
Hangzhou, Jinsha Hall by the West Lake, and the lush lobby garden.
Chen Yansen strode in, followed closely by Gao Weilin, Cheng Weixing and Song Yuncheng. In addition, there were six experienced financial and legal staff following him.
Regarding the valuation of Kuaidi Dache's Series B financing, although each institution has made a quote, how to coordinate the equity ratio distribution and bind the long-term interests of all parties still requires an in-depth and comprehensive negotiation process.
As soon as he reached the door of the banquet hall, Chen Yansen saw Ma Liyun outside the door.
At the same time, Ma Liyun also saw him.
The two men looked tense, then smiled at each other.
As he expected, Ma Liyun was a pure businessman. As long as there was a conflict of interest between Senlian Capital and Ali, the other party would not break off with him.
What's more, he just refused to join Cainiao Logistics, which was far from enough to make e-commerce company Ma bear a grudge against him.
Take Ding Lei for example. The conflicts between NetEase and Ali are much more serious, but when they met by chance in the bar last time, Ma Liyun still took the initiative to say hello.
Seven years later, Ali spent another 2 billion US dollars to acquire NetEase Kaola.
This shows that Ma Liyun’s principle of action is: not talking about friendship, but only considering interests.
"Congratulations, Mr. Chen. Pinbei has surpassed Yidong in daily active users and sales data." Ma Liyun hesitated for a moment, but still took a step forward and said with a smile.
"Thank you, Mr. Ma. Compared with Taobao, Pinbei still has a lot of room for improvement." Chen Yansen smiled faintly and responded softly.
Ma Liyun's words are tantamount to saying: I have noticed the threat posed by Pinbei to Taobao.
But Chen Yansen doesn't care. There is no such thing as no competitors in business.
Every segmented business track is similar to a battle among thousands of groups. There are no less than tens of thousands of competitors, big and small. Only by defeating most of the competitors can you gain a foothold in the industry and gain the right to share the fruits of victory.
Including Ali, they first fought against Huicong and eBay, and then fought against Dongdong before becoming the overlord of China's e-commerce industry.
But after excluding Pinbei, Dongdong, Suning, Gome, Dangdang and Yixun, there are still numerous domestic e-commerce competing websites, as many as thousands.
At every moment, we are competing with Ali for market share.
Can Ma Liyun win? "The strategy of burning money to grab market share is too capital-intensive. It has only been five months since the A round of financing, and the 90 million US dollars are almost used up. Mr. Chen, Kuaidi Dache must speed up its expansion, otherwise it will be easily caught up by competitors."
Ma Liyun smiled and did not take Chen Yansen’s words to heart. Instead, he talked to him about the marketing rhythm of Kuaidi Taxi.
"Don't worry, Mr. Ma, I know what I'm doing." Chen Yansen replied.
The current promotion costs of more than 10 million per day are indeed too much for all investors to bear.
The first time, Li Yanhong refused to negotiate; the second time, Chen Yansen refused to negotiate.
In fact, Ma Liyun had communicated with Zhu Xiaohu, Yu Heng and others in advance and decided that they would have to endure for another month at most. If Kuaidi and Didi could not determine the winner by then, they would have to end the subsidy war even if they had to force negotiations.
"Boss Ma, Boss Chen, why are you both standing at the door?"
At this time, Zhou Shouzhi and a middle-aged man in a light gray twill suit came over together.
"Who is this?" Chen Yansen turned around, looked at the other person, and asked Zhou Shouzhi.
"Mr. Chen, nice to meet you! I am Cai Yongjin, the general manager of Goldman Sachs Asia. I have communicated with Mr. Gao Weilin of your company on the phone before."
Cai Yongjin held Chen Yansen's right hand and introduced him with a smile.
"Mr. Cai, I've heard a lot about you. Let's go in and chat."
While Chen Yansen was talking, he was also secretly observing the other person.
Cai Yongjin is in his early fifties, wearing a pair of rimless glasses and having sharp and bright eyes. As a Chinese, he has been working as the general manager of Goldman Sachs Asia for more than ten years, which shows his ability.
"no problem."
Cai Yongjin nodded in response, and then exchanged a few brief greetings with Ma Liyun and Gao Weilin.
The crowd chatted as they walked and stepped into a luxurious and exquisite banquet hall.
Yu Heng from Huake Capital and Zhu Xiaohu from Sands Venture Capital could no longer sit still when they saw Cai Yongjin, and they quickly stood up to greet him.
"Mr. Cai, why are you here?" Zhu Xiaohu asked with a humble attitude and a smile.
After all, in the investment banking field, Cai Yongjin is his predecessor. Before he went to college, Cai Yongjin had already joined Morgan Stanley and served as a senior investment manager in the project financing department.
"Of course, you are here to participate in Kuaidi Dache's Series B financing. Your achievements in the past two years are remarkable and you have made great progress."
Cai Yongjin praised.
On weekdays, most of the investment projects he personally handles are cooperation in the fields of oil, electricity and automobiles. Although Goldman Sachs has been involved in Internet companies such as Kuaidi Dache, the relevant person in charge is just an investment manager below.
Yu Heng looked at Cai Yongjin, and his opinion on the value and potential of Kuaidi Taxi once again raised to a higher level.
The group sat down one after another. Chen Yansen looked around and found that the Penguin representative had not arrived yet.
Unexpectedly, as soon as the thought came to my mind, Liu Zhiping, Lin Chenfeng and others walked in quickly from outside the door.
"Sorry, I was delayed for a few minutes on the road." Liu Zhiping greeted everyone one by one.
"Now that everyone is here, why don't you tell me your thoughts, Mr. Chen? I'm sure you've already looked at the quotations from all the investment institutions."
Cai Yongjin leaned back and asked straight to the point.
"Huazhong University of Science and Technology and Sands Venture Capital offered the lowest price. My bottom line is 3.2 billion U.S. dollars. If it's lower than this, I can only say sorry."
Chen Yansen raised his eyelids, met everyone's gaze, and spoke slowly.
The implication is that either Huake and Sands Ventures withdraw, or the price is raised to US$3.2 billion.
Although Yu Heng's first-round offer was only a little over 3 billion, it does not mean that his authority is limited to 3 billion. He can certainly make the decision with a floating space of less than 200 million.
Zhou Shouzhi and Cai Yongjin looked at each other and immediately realized that their offer should be the highest.
But judging from Chen Yansen's attitude, the other party obviously does not want to give up Huake and Sands Venture Capital. After knowing the offers from Goldman Sachs and DST, he is still willing to accept a minimum valuation of US$3.2 billion.
This is a smart young man with a broad vision! Cai Yongjin commented secretly.
The essence of financing is to exchange equity for funds and resources. Many founders easily fall into the mindset of "choose whoever has the highest valuation."
However, they often overlook whether the equity structure supports sustainable development and whether venture capital institutions can bring invisible resources for business growth.
In these two aspects, Chen Yansen's handling methods are extremely sophisticated.
During the A round of financing, Senlian Capital introduced five investors at once, with dispersed equity ratios. Except for Penguin and Ali, which had slightly higher ratios, the shareholding ratios of DST, Huake and Sands Venture Capital were all between 2% and 3%.
Chen Yansen does not have to worry at all about losing control due to excessive dilution of equity.
After hearing Yu Heng's reply, Zhu Xiaohu felt that everyone's eyes were focused on him. He thought for a moment and finally nodded.
Gao Weilin had informed him in advance that this round of financing would adopt a layered financing or phased financing strategy to solve the problem of inconsistent quotations.
For Huake and Sands Ventures, a valuation of US$3.2 billion is already the limit.
As for the difference, Yu Heng and Zhu Xiaohu will have to use extra resources to make up for it, otherwise Chen Yansen will still kick them out.
"Given the different quotations from all parties, Kuaidi Dache's Series B financing will adopt a tiered financing approach. The difference between the highest valuation and the highest valuation can use multiple payment methods such as industry resources, management support, talent network and capital ecology."
Chen Yansen said slowly.
This plan is not fair to DST and Goldman Sachs, but they are foreign capital after all, and they cannot provide any help to Kuaidi Dache in terms of policy dividends.
For example, Huake Capital offered the lowest bid in the A round of financing, but it was able to easily obtain authorization documents from transportation associations in North China, East China and South China, allowing Kuaidi Dache to carry out top-down promotion in the taxi industry.
On the driver's side, the reason why Kuaidi Taxi can surpass Didi Taxi is absolutely inseparable from the assistance of Huake Capital.
The same goes for Penguins and Ahri. If you can’t offer a price, you have to give resources.
"I have no objection." Zhou Shouzhi was the first to express his opinion.
Even if he does not accept it, Chen Yansen will adopt a phased financing approach in order to disperse the shareholding ratios of investors: first accept the funds based on the valuation consensus, and then start the next phase of financing with the remaining amount after the previous company is finalized.
This is equivalent to splitting the B round of financing into many times.
There is no difference in essence, which is why Chen Yansen spoke frankly.
"No problem, but the value assessment of additional resources needs to be recognized by everyone." Cai Yongjin pushed his glasses and said in a deep voice.
Whether it is tiered financing or phased financing, it is very common in the investment industry. As long as all parties involved can accept it, there is no big problem.
Seeing that the two investment institutions with the highest bids had agreed, Chen Yansen no longer had any concerns and asked Gao Weilin and Cheng Weixing to communicate with the investment institutions separately.
The accompanying financial analyst of Senlian Capital distributed the financial health data of Kuaidi Dache, including its capital income structure, costs and profits, to the financial personnel of each investment company for review purposes.
Once the general direction is determined, the subsequent negotiations are usually more involved.
Ma Liyun invited Cai Yongjin, Chen Yansen and others to the octagonal pavilion downstairs for tea, and handed over the contract details to the people below to handle.
As soon as he left the banquet hall, Liu Zhiping came over and asked, "When will Pinbei's Series B financing start?"
"Mr. Liu, you know that Pinbei is not short of money." Chen Yansen replied with a smile.
He knew in his heart that it was probably Ma Wenteng who was anxious.
The traffic entry agreement between Pinbei and Penguin was originally signed for only one year. Seeing that the contract was about to expire, Ma Wenteng wanted to continue using traffic resources in exchange for a deeper cooperation with Chen Yansen.
"What about the first-level traffic entrances of WeChat and QQ?" Liu Zhiping asked. He didn't believe that Chen Yansen would not be tempted.
"I feel embarrassed to have been using Penguin's free traffic all the time." Chen Yansen said this, but there was no sign of embarrassment on his face.
Liu Zhiping sneered. He didn't believe Chen Yansen's nonsense at all. The people who were being rubbed didn't mind, so why did you feel wronged? Then he asked again: "Penguin can only give money and traffic, what else do you want?"
"Add Orange Pay to the WeChat ecological entrance." Chen Yansen stopped and replied with a smile.
Orange payment?
Liu Zhiping laughed and shook his head, saying, "Pony will never agree to this unless you sell Orange Pay to WeChat or let Penguin invest in Orange Pay and take control of the shares."
"Then let's change it and add Kuaidi Dache and Kuaipao to the first-level traffic entrance." Chen Yansen said calmly.
"..." Liu Zhiping pointed at Chen Yansen and couldn't help laughing. He thought the other party was playing the 'broken window game' with him, so he cursed angrily: "You are greedy!"
"Penguin is also a shareholder of Kuaidi Dache and Kuaishou." said Chen Yansen.
"It's just one of them, not even a major shareholder. If you're willing to give Penguin more shares, Pony can explain to the board of directors."
After Liu Zhiping finished scolding, he began to think about this issue seriously.
"How much is too much?" Chen Yansen asked.
"That depends on your sincerity." Liu Zhiping replied.
The two walked behind and in just a few minutes, they reached a preliminary agreement.
If Penguin wants to invest more money, Chen Yansen will certainly not stop them.
Whether it is the food delivery or online car-hailing sector, the initial cost of cultivating the market and users is as high as tens of billions or even hundreds of billions. The more suckers the better.
In the next two days, Chen Yansen either visited NetEase or visited Ali headquarters.
It was not until the last afternoon of July that all investment institutions confirmed all the contract details with Senlian Capital.
The formal signing and payment process will take another half a month to a month. The processes of each company are different, some are fast, some are slow.
However, Chen Yansen was not in a hurry. After all, there was still nearly 20 million US dollars in the public account of Kuaidi Dache, which was enough to last until the next payment came in.
at the same time.
Li Yanhong of Yanjing had received the news a long time ago. When he learned that Kuaidi Dache's Series B financing amounted to more than 500 million US dollars, his brows frowned instantly.
According to the current subsidy war trend, the monthly capital consumption is 300 million yuan, and Kuaidi Dache can last another year.
What about Didi? Is Legend Capital willing to continue investing in it?
That night, Cheng Wei learned the result. His heart skipped a beat and the pressure on him suddenly increased.
(End of this chapter)
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
