What's wrong with me being a rich man?

Chapter 99 Meeting Xu Xin

"Qunar" is an online travel website founded in 2005.

At that time, it received its first round of financing of US$200 million, and the market value of Xicheng had reached billions of dollars.

After four years, it wants to gain more market share in the market segment and wants to conduct a third round of financing.

The financing negotiations that Xu Xin participated in this time were led by Zhu Xiaohu of GSR Ventures, which was a participant in the first round of investment in Qunar.

It is worth mentioning, or rather humorous, that there is another common topic of conversation in today's meeting, Lehman Brothers.

The financial crisis is an unavoidable topic in the circle. Lehman Brothers, as the fatal fuse, is also the second round of investment institution of "Qunar".

Such a complicated connection inevitably made those who were having lunch feel emotional.

The connection that made Xu Xin feel even more haunted came from the topic discussed by Zhu Xiaohu.

"Mr. Xu, have you noticed that there is a new website called Bai Xiaosheng?" Zhu Xiaohu mentioned the name which made Xu Xin frown slightly.

Xu Xin nodded: "I heard about it."

"NetEase held a press conference this morning. They upgraded a business unit. The market of the Internet dating industry may be reshuffled." Zhu Xiaohu briefly described the industry situation in the past half month. "The fuse was the bombardment of Bai Xiaosheng."

Xu Xin smiled and said nothing, thinking that Zhu Xiaohu brought up this because of her husband.

Zhu Xiaohu continued, "I think NetEase is serious this time. Does President Xu have any news about this? We previously invested in Baihe.com. I received the news this morning. I was on the phone with them before lunch to discuss whether we should follow up on the new market move."

GSR Ventures was a participant in Baihe.com's second round of financing.

Xu Xin was stunned, and remembered that there was such an incident. Jinshajiang invested in Baihe.com, which was about two or three years ago.

She shook her head. "I haven't heard any news about NetEase. Last month, I passed by NetEase and went in to sit for a while. I think this may also be a reflection of the market situation."

Before Xu Xin founded Capital Today, she invested in NetEase in 1999. At that time, she was the managing director of the China region of Baring Private Equity, and therefore had a good relationship with Ding Lei.

Zhu Xiaohu smiled and said: "A small website has really disrupted the situation in the industry."

Xu Xin said "hmm", but his attention was still on the company "Qunar".

For many years, she has focused on investing in industries such as consumption, retail, and the Internet. Although the economic situation is not good this year, the concept of "online travel" still has a certain appeal.

After a short break after lunch, Xu Xin, Zhu Xiaohu and others listened to the presentation of Qunar executives, who explained the company's current situation and plans for the future.

Xu Xin listened very carefully, but his expression didn't change much and he hardly asked any questions.

During the "half-time break", Zhu Xiaohu jokingly asked, "Mr. Xu, what do you think of the future of Qunar?"

"I heard Mr. Zhuang say a lot, but the core seems to be just two sentences." Xu Xin said carefully, "One is that Xiecheng's profits are too high, and the other is that they want to attack Xiecheng's weak mid- and low-end hotel market."

Zhu Xiaohu nodded repeatedly, saying that Mr. Xu’s summary was very accurate.

In fact, these are the two I mentioned earlier.

Xiecheng has made too much profit, which means that there is room for price war among latecomers, and he believes that the weak mid- and low-end hotel market is indeed a good breakthrough point.

"So..." Xu Xin murmured with some worry, "If a price war breaks out, it will be very tragic."

Price wars mean a waste of money.

Moreover, Qunar's rival is already an industry leader and a listed company. Cicheng will never sit idly by and watch the pursuer easily occupy the market, and will inevitably use various means to counterattack.

In his heart, Xu Xin was not very willing to participate in such a battle. It was not that there was no chance of winning, but that the risk was higher than he had imagined.

In addition, she still hopes to invest the money in a more cost-effective position. The third round of "Qunar" is not particularly cost-effective.

Zhu Xiaohu shook his head, disagreeing with Mr. Xu's view, and said with a smile: "Price wars can effectively boost the market. If the market develops steadily, there will be absolutely no chance. 'Qunar' needs to be more aggressive to pursue its position."

Xu Xin did not comment.

GSR Ventures has already invested money and owns shares, so its stance is naturally different from that of Today Capital, which has not yet entered the market.

At 2:30 in the afternoon, the second half of Qunar had not yet begun, but President Zhuang Chenchao, who had already said a lot, suddenly received two calls in succession. His expression became somewhat excited, and he couldn't help but share the latest news with investors.

"Xie Cheng made the news!"

“It didn’t want to give old employees the opportunity to convert their options into stocks, so it just laid them off!”

"Also, the aviation insurance policy sold by Xicheng was forged!"

"There are many of its employees reporting related issues online now!"

Zhuang Chenchao did not hide his happiness and finally said: "The healthy development of any industry must have sufficient competition. Once it is monopolized, all kinds of situations that are not beneficial to consumers will emerge!"

The four venture capital firms in the conference room, namely GGV Capital, Tenaya Capital, GSR Ventures, and Capital Today, were all surprised to hear the unfavorable news about Xicheng at this time.

This seems a bit coincidental, as it happened specifically when Qunar was negotiating financing.

Zhu Xiaohu smiled and asked, "How did it suddenly come to light? Which media outlet?"

Zhuang Chenchao replied: "It was a reprint of the report by NetEase."

He reached out to take the assistant's laptop, opened the NetEase report interface, and added: "It was revealed by Xiecheng's own employees on a website. Oh, it's on a website called 'Bai Xiaosheng'. The name of the website is interesting."

Bai Xiaosheng?
Bai Xiaosheng!
Xu Xin couldn't help but frown. It was this again.

She felt like she had heard this name a little too often recently.

"Can you guarantee its authenticity?" Zhu Xiaohu asked with a smile.

Zhuang Chenchao answered cautiously at this time: "I don't know, but..."

He quickly clicked on the "Bai Xiaosheng" website he had just heard of, noticed the prominent information on it, and said, "This is a real-name authentication website. I'm afraid it's not nonsense."

As a target that Qunar wants to challenge, the news suddenly revealed by Ccheng is still worthy of investors' attention.

Soon, several laptops were placed in front of everyone, and they saw NetEase’s report and Bai Xiaosheng’s revelations.

It was not the first time Xu Xin had heard of Bai Xiaosheng, but it was indeed the first time she had browsed Bai Xiaosheng’s website.

She flipped through it and asked in confusion, "Didn't they say real-name authentication? Why is this user's name 'Erlang Shen'?"

After a moment, the question was answered.

"It seems that this website has a new anonymous function, and only some people are testing it. I saw the function description and found that these anonymous accounts have been verified by real name and work."

After a while, Zhu Xiaohu was the first to comment on the Bai Xiaosheng website: "Its anonymous function... is a bit evil, and it seems that problems may arise easily."

But before anyone else could speak, he added, "This website has already criticized the Internet dating industry. If it can also attract attention from companies like Xiecheng, this little website will be quite interesting."

Xu Xin was not stingy with his evaluation. He closed the webpage and said slowly: "Projects all need people to execute them. The team for this project is not very good." Everyone looked at him. Did President Xu understand?

"The project is led by a team of university students with short-term thinking. Their last project was a few months ago, and they were just looking to make a quick buck and leave," Xu Xin commented. "It's hard for young people to settle down after tasting the sweetness of success."

Zhu Xiaohu recalled the conversation he had with Mr. Xu before and said with a smile: "Mr. Xu, you have a keen sense of smell. You know about small websites like this and the teams behind them. Indeed, no matter what project it is, it won't work without a good team."

Everyone agreed with the exchange between the two.

Everyone in the conference room has been through youth and has been dealing with money for years. They know very well what it is like for young people to make quick money and short-term profits, and will never invest in such a project.

Zhu Xiaohu changed the subject and said, "So, the team of Qunar is very trustworthy. Mr. Zhuang's work in recent years is remarkable. If there is trouble with Xicheng, this is indeed a good opportunity to catch up."

The matter of the small website was just casually discussed, the main issue was the financing of Qunar.

In the conference room, people continued to discuss the latest developments in the industry.

The meeting ended at five o'clock in the afternoon.

Xu Xin declined the dinner invitation from Zhu Xiaohu and others. She was still inclined not to participate in this round of financing, but she was not in a hurry to make a decision at this time.

This trip from Pengcheng to Shanghai is her last work trip before the New Year. The final answer about "where to go" can be given after the New Year.

It’s just right, I can also see if there are any new changes in the industry.

Oh, that noise coming from Bai Xiaosheng.

This afternoon, there were a lot of criticisms against the company from employees of Xicheng on Baixiaosheng.

Although they are anonymous and use pseudonyms, the users who spoke out are all labeled "Xiecheng employees", proving that they are current employees of Xiecheng who have been reviewed by the website. Therefore, the relevant revelations are quite authentic.

The first "Erlang Shen" to speak out was Deputy Director Jiao Shiqian. After careful reflection, he asked other colleagues who had similar experiences and found that it was not just a matter of options and stocks, but also pressured resignations.

In other words, if employees are unwilling to leave, the company may see cross-regional transfers and demotions.

As a large company, Xiecheng has positions in many parts of the country, but it is different for individual employees. Many of them have families to support, and their lives will be very troublesome once they are transferred to other cities.

Therefore, Jiao Shiqian anonymously criticized three things.

——The options that were about to be converted into stocks were redeemed free of charge, and the relevant contract signed at that time was in English, and no Chinese version was provided!
——Employees were forced to resign, involving malicious transfers and demotions!
——A customer booked a flight from the company on November 11th and found a fake insurance policy!
If the first two issues are still within the scope of Xiecheng, the third issue is related to customers, and the nature of the issue is different.

Therefore, NetEase's reprinted report became popular and was published after a simple confirmation.

Of course, unlike the treatment when there were interests before, NetEase’s reporting position this time is not so prominent.

Even so, Bai Xiaosheng’s users were still eating up the leftover gossip about the Internet dating industry in the morning, and in the afternoon they started eating new gossip about layoffs and fake insurance policies in Xicheng!
New news! It’s the first day of 2009!

Although the sites are still new, many users have already mastered sharing the sites and posts with friends and colleagues.

The shitty things about Internet dating are boring, so why not come and watch the excitement of layoffs?
Come and have a look!

The impact of the global financial crisis is still there, and we don’t know where it will go…

Let’s listen to the reflections and experiences of those involved in layoffs.

——"I was so stupid, really. I only knew that other companies would encounter dirty things when they laid off employees, but I didn't know that I would also encounter it."

——"I clearly heard the key words from the personnel department that were favorable to my arbitration, but I didn't record them in advance. I regret it so much!"

——"I'm so stupid, really, I'm going to regret it for the rest of my life!"

It is obviously an imitation of Xianglin Sao's words, but it is particularly appropriate when placed in the scene experienced by "Erlang Shen".

As a fellow worker in the workplace, I feel extremely involved in the work and also participate in and improve the construction of the work.

"This is not like Xianglin Sao, this is Xianglin Sao in the workplace!"

"Hey, hey, can we choose a nickname for this anonymous function? Who can choose Xianglin Sao?"

The requests from the audience were answered, but the flower names were random and could not be chosen.

However, small websites always pay attention to the user experience, and soon an operation was performed in the background - Xianglinsao from Xiecheng appeared.

Different from "Erlang Shen", "Xianglin Sao" shared the process of her quarrels with people.

Such sharing made others unable to help but remind: "Don't say this, if you say this, the HR will definitely know who you are."

Xianglin's Wife was not Xianglin enough and said directly: "What am I afraid of? I have become Xianglin's Wife, what am I afraid of? Come on, wolf, come here quickly, I have Ah Mao for you to eat!"

Along with the anger of Xiecheng’s employees, the user of the fake insurance policy also appeared in the post. He did not remain anonymous, but directly stated the relevant matters and accused Xiecheng of shirking its responsibility.

For a time, Bai Xiaosheng was very busy, and continued to bring in new traffic and registered users.

Yu Xing did not expect that there would be fake insurance policies, and thought that there might be new developments, but he could expect continuous user registrations.

Bai Xiaosheng is a new website, and the effect of the last round of bombardment was very good. However, no matter how good the effect is, the number of users is only tens of thousands, while there are tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of working people on the entire Internet, which is a huge market to be tapped.

One melon costs tens of thousands, and another melon costs tens of thousands more...

Bai Xiaosheng cannot just rely on word of mouth, he needs more money to attract more people to come and watch.

On January 2009, 1, Yu Xing and his second-in-command, Lu Haiying, personally did the marketing work at Capital Today’s office in Shanghai.

Xu Xin doesn’t reply to my text message, right? Then I’ll come find your employee.

Yu Xing plans to continue to get in touch with venture capital institutions before the New Year.

However, he didn’t expect to run into the boss of Today Capital that morning.

At ten o'clock, Xu Xin arrived at the office with his secretary. As soon as he got out of the elevator, he saw two furtive young men.

She frowned, not knowing what was going on.

Yu Xing was about to ring the bell when he suddenly turned his head and saw Xu Xin himself.

He was surprised and delighted, and hurried forward to introduce himself: "Mr. Xu, Mr. Xu, hello, I am Yu Xing from Baixiaosheng website, I would like to introduce our project to you."

Xu Xin walked into the company with a blank expression: "Get out, get out."

Yu Xing was shocked: "Hey, hey, Mr. Xu..."

Seeing that someone was really coming to blast him, he made up his mind and shouted to Xu Xin, whose figure was about to disappear: "Boss Xu, I was introduced by Liu Qiangdong!"

Xu Xin stopped and looked back at Yu Xing, asking curiously, "How dare you come to see me? Do you know Zhenai.com?"

Yu Xing smiled at the two employees who had stopped, straightened his clothes, and said calmly: "Why not? I'm here to see Xu Xin from Today Capital, not the wife of the boss of Zhenai.com."

(End of this chapter)