hunt hollywood

However, Simon did not stop the sequel project this time like the "Flying Beyond Childhood" series.

Mainly because of cost.

Compared with the two blockbuster series "Flying Beyond" and "Lethal Weapon", even if "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" develops a sequel, the production cost will not be much higher than that of the first one, and there will be no such big hit as Mel Gibson. Coffee requires high project profit sharing.

The first part of the film can exceed [-] million yuan. As long as the sequel does not mess around, it is still easy to recover the cost and achieve profitability.

Chapter 357

After returning from Tasmania, Jennifer stayed in Melbourne for three days before returning to Los Angeles.

The entire Westeros system only counts companies directly held by Westeros, including the core four 'women', as well as a large number of listed or unlisted companies such as Microsoft, Intel, Cisco, America Online, and Nokia , the number has reached 36, and it is still increasing, and the number of other second- and third-tier subsidiaries is even larger.

Although Simon has delegated power as much as possible, due to the large number of companies, the daily affairs of these companies that need to be handled by him are still very heavy and complicated.

The female assistant's status in Simon's business empire is now equivalent to his eyes. She is in charge of an assistant office with six other assistants, constantly screening and summarizing the information of all companies in the entire Westeros system and handing it over to Simon for processing.

Simon continued to stay in Melbourne to follow up the filming of "Batman: The Dark Knight" and remotely control the operation of the entire Westeros system.

Enterprises always look more vigorous in the early stages of development, especially in the Westeros system, which has been expanding rapidly in recent years.

Florence.

The continuous turmoil in Europe has not affected Italy. However, it has always been difficult for this country on the peninsula to have much say in Europe, both economically and politically.

Sofia Fishy also rarely cares about politics and has been negotiating with the Gucci family recently.

The last male member of Gucci's second generation, 85-year-old Aldo Gucci, died last month, and that's okay.

Melisandre has achieved absolute control of Gucci, and it is difficult for the Gucci family to have much influence on this luxury brand no matter what.

However, the internal disputes of the Gucci family are also well known to many people.Aldo Gucci did not arrange his own affairs. He held 12% of Gucci shares in his name until the last second before he died, and then gave them to his children.

Without the prior arrangement of a family trust, several children of Aldo Gucci will face the problem of inheritance tax that cannot be avoided.

The more serious problem is that several of Aldo Gucci's children can't come up with enough cash to pay inheritance tax. Although Gucci's recovery is very rapid, Sofia has used all the company's excess funds for business expansion. In recent years, They do not intend to pay dividends to shareholders.

As a result, the Gucci family had to choose to sell the 12% stake.

Melisandre, who has the support of the Westeros system behind the scenes, is naturally the most suitable target to take over. Sophia also intends to take this stake. Adding this 12% stake, Melisandre's shareholding ratio in Gucci will be Can reach 75%.

However, compared with the total expenditure of US$63 million for Simon's acquisition of 1.7% of Gucci's shares, this time the Gucci family's 12% stake in the opponents quoted a high price of US$1.5 million.Although the outside world's assessment of Gucci's market value is rising, it is impossible for Sofia to accept such an offer. After discussing with Simon, Melisandre's offer is capped at 1 million US dollars, so Sofia has been bargaining with the Gucci family.

Because there is only 12% of the shares, there is no way to gain control of Gucci, and the price is still so high. Apart from Melisandre, the Gucci family will not be able to find a second successor in a short time.

helsinki.

After Nokia's mobile communications department was owned by Westeros, without the encumbrance of other assets, and received another US$5000 million in funding, Yorma Ollila quickly started the research and development of mobile phones and base station equipment related to GSM technology.

The direct border with the Soviet Union and the turmoil in Europe this year have made the whole of Finland a little trembling, but life still has to live.

Just in the first half of the year, Finland has started to build Europe's or the world's first GSM pilot network. Although it is dominated by Germany's Siemens Group, Nokia also participated in it as a matter of course.

However, it will take at least a year for GSM to be officially commercialized.

It is impossible for Nokia's mobile communications department to completely abandon its years of accumulation. In the first half of the year, it continued to launch two analog signal mobile phones, and the sales volume was not bad.

new York.

While Simon and his female assistant were spending their time together in their cabin in Tasmania, James Raybould officially signed a shareholding agreement with Qualcomm, a wireless communications technology company headquartered in San Diego.

In the past two years, Qualcomm has initially completed the patent layout of CMDA technology, and has been recognized by companies such as AT&T, Bell Pacific, and Motorola. It has also established a cooperative relationship with South Korean telecommunications companies, and continues to obtain funds from all parties to invest in CDMA commercial technology. research and development.

However, after companies such as AT&T quickly exhausted their capital injections several times in a row, Qualcomm has recently faced a shortage of funds.

If Westeros' shareholding is not accepted, Qualcomm's funds on the books are less than 20 US dollars, and even the wages of employees in August may not be paid smoothly.

The strength shown by Westeros when it seized the control of America Online and Cisco made Qualcomm's management quite scrupulous, but it is also difficult for Qualcomm to find a big fund that can immediately spend a large amount of money in a short period of time. host.

After some bargaining, Westeros acquired 3500 million common shares of Qualcomm at a cost of US$400 million, accounting for 20% of Qualcomm's total share capital at this time.

However, Westeros did not get the terms and promises to maintain its shareholding ratio in the follow-up financing or IPO process like other holding companies. Continue to promote the IPO work.

San Francisco.

With the further promotion of Eaglet Portal and World Wide Web technology, although July has not yet passed, the number of AOL users has increased more than the entire June. It is estimated that the number of World Wide Web access users this month will increase by 7 to 6 households.

In order to keep up with the pace of market expansion, whether it is Eaglet or AOL, they can only use the phrase 'funds are burning' to describe it.

Eaglet is completely in a state of burning money. From browser software, server software, portal website technologies to the underlying JavaScript language development, the R&D investment is huge, but sustainable revenue is far away.

Simon originally hoped to subsidize the portal department through software sales, and this goal is obviously not realistic in the short term.

Carol Bartz, who is in charge of the software department, has a rather strong personality. Although she has already started to earn revenue from the installation of browser software, she not only does not intend to subsidize the portal website department, but instead uses the $2000 million invested by Simon Midcut walked away with $1000 million for the development of the software division itself.

For Jeff Bezos, the remaining 1000 million US dollars, the maintenance of the portal team and the latest construction of two new data centers can only be maintained until the end of August.

Fortunately, Jeff Bezos has already begun to explore the advertising business, and has successfully obtained two advertising orders from IBM and Microsoft. The amount is not large, and the total is only 80 US dollars, and he also refused Gates to increase advertising. Contributed in exchange for advice on prioritizing the development of browser software for the Windows platform.

Simon is very satisfied with such a vision that does not care about gains and losses.

In order to allow users to get the latest features as soon as possible, Eaglet's IE browser will update several times almost every month.

For customers, if the browser software on one platform is often updated more timely than another platform, it will naturally produce bias unconsciously.

However, although the Windows operating system has begun to rise, Apple and traditional Unix computers are still the mainstream these years. Machine, IE browser is not yet possible to bias Microsoft.

As for the rivalry and disagreement between Jeff Bezos and Carol Bartz, Simon didn't get too involved.

Appropriate internal competition is also beneficial to enterprise development.

Moreover, it is not yet time for the software sector to subsidize portals.If that day really comes, Simon will not condone Carol Butz's waywardness.

In addition, at the end of July, 7 Internet cafes opened by America Online officially opened for business.

The excellent publicity and marketing in the early stage, the casual environment inside the Internet cafe that is no less than that of a coffee shop, and the public's curiosity about the Internet have attracted a large number of customers in a short time.

However, as originally estimated, these 100 Internet cafes basically do not make money.

The hourly fee is 3 dollars, 20 computers in each Internet cafe, and the business hours are from 7:11 am to 28800:[-] pm. Calculated, even if an Internet bar is fully operating at full capacity, the theoretical monthly income is only [-] dollars. Half of it is not bad.

As it happens, the approximate break-even point for each Internet cafe is $15000.

If you want to make a profit, as originally expected, you can only rely on drinks and snacks or sell a little more peripherals.

Although these 100 Internet cafes have little hope of making profits, AOL has no intention of giving up this business.

After all, Simon's fundamental purpose is to promote World Wide Web technology.

In the plan, after a period of exploration and operation, AOL intends to expand the Internet bar industry by means of authorized franchising. Franchisees only need to pay a certain franchise fee to AOL to obtain a full set of technical and program support. It is relatively easy to make a profit with a flexible mode of operation, appropriately increasing the number of computers, increasing the price of Internet access, or developing additional businesses.

Los Angeles.

In the absence of Simon, Daenerys Entertainment is still as vibrant as a little beast in spring.

The financial data for the first half of 1990 have been calculated. Although the management has not released detailed data, both the company's internal and external media have already obtained a rough idea.

In the first six months of this year, Daenerys Entertainment made a fortune just from the surprise box office hit "Pretty Woman."

However, "Pretty Woman", a film that is enough to support a film company's annual performance, brought in more than $1.6 million in box office revenue for Daenerys Entertainment in the first half of the year, but it was less than Daenerys Entertainment. One-tenth of the pre-tax profit of Silk Entertainment in the first two quarters.

It's just that "Batman: Beginning", which hit the box office at the end of last year, made Daenerys Entertainment a lot of money in both box office and peripherals in the first half of the year.

In addition, since the end of 1988, Daenerys Entertainment has accumulated "Scream" series, "Dead Poets Society", "Rain Man", "The Sixth Sense of Spirituality", "Bodyguard", "Flying Beyond Childhood" and so on. A large number of blockbuster films, in the first half of 1990, continued to bring Daenerys Entertainment a large sum of money in overseas theaters, video tape markets and TV broadcast platforms.

Daenerys Television's series of hit reality shows and other TV projects are also bringing steady revenue to the company.

Not only that, Daenerys' entertainment consumer goods department under the leadership of Nancy Brill, including games and music businesses, has made a lot of money because of a series of projects produced by the company.

Among them, the fighting version of the "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" video game released by Blizzard Studios in March, although it did not reach the sales level of last year's role-playing version of the game, within three months, the cumulative sales of game cassettes also exceeded 3 million boxes. The amount will exceed 100 million boxes.

Because of the preferential quota from Nintendo, five games can be released every year with special discounts. In addition to the fighting version of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles", Blizzard Studios will also launch a role-playing version of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" in the second half of the year. Danielle EA, which has a stake in Silk Entertainment, will also provide three other games to enter the Nintendo console.

Combining all these, in the first half of 1990, Daenerys Entertainment's after-tax net profit reached 5.73 million US dollars.With the success of films such as "Ghost Love" and "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" in the summer, the net profit figure for the whole year can at least double.

After the financial report came out, Amy Pascal was even in a trance during this time.

She officially signed a contract in March 1987, and the contract ended in March 3, a total of four years.

According to the company's performance in the first half of the year and her original compensation terms, the compensation she can get this year, the sum of cash and stock awards, is likely to exceed 1 million US dollars.

$1 billion.

If someone had told her a few years ago that she could become a billionaire, Amy would have thought the other party was talking nonsense.

Hollywood executives, except for the top Steve Ross, Lou Wasserman and a few other bigwigs who have been in high positions for a long time and have made the company a sufficient scale.For others, the salaries are actually not high. Everyone is busy, and they are all just earning a hard-earned money.

Even for Steve Ross, the total salary he received last year was only more than 3600 million U.S. dollars, but this has been scolded by the media and shareholders as a sieve.

Those who are really in Hollywood know that the most profitable people in this industry are only a handful of top superstars.

As for the executives in the circle, although they seem to have great power, they are also subject to many constraints. Most of the time, they have to be angry with investors and do everything possible to accommodate the stars. They are not as beautiful as the outside world imagined.

Yet she, Amy Pascal, a woman, can make $1 million a year in an industry where the objectification of women is widespread.

In a trance, Amy even occasionally thought very hopelessly, how should she spend such a large sum of money?

During the vigorous expansion of the Westeros system, time passed silently in the last few days of July 1990.

In the last week of July, the situation in the Middle East, where the situation has been tense to the extreme, is getting more and more rainy.

Under the pretext of Kuwait's 'sneak mining' of Iraqi oil, after demanding that Kuwait forgive its debts and provide huge compensation to no avail, the most elite Republican Guard tank and armored division in Iraq has already sent troops to the Iraqi-Korean border.

Not wanting the Arab brothers to go to war with each other, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak took the initiative to visit Iraq to speak for Kuwait, and left after being frustrated.

Countries in the Middle East that also felt threatened held a large-scale joint military exercise with the US Persian Gulf Fleet on July 7 in an attempt to deter Saddam Hussein.At the same time, international crude oil prices also soared rapidly in the last week of July.

In just one week, it has soared from the original low of 13 US dollars to a high of close to 20 US dollars.

Cersei Capital cleared all its short contracts on Monday, July 7, but it was swallowed up by the rising crude oil price.

When crude oil prices soared in the last week of July, the long positions that had suffered huge losses turned into profits in just a few days, followed by staggering profits.

Chapter 358 War Breaks Out (Revised)

Brisbane on the east coast of Australia.

The time was July 7th, and Hollywood's summer vacation was still going on, but MGM CEO Shirley Lansing had to fly here.

Because Christopher Scars, chairman of Qintex Group, the Australian parent company of MGM, has absconded suddenly.

Things have to start with the Japanese stock market bubble.

We all know Australia is a highly dependent economy.

Throughout the 80s, thanks to the rapid rise of Japan, the Australian economy relied on exports of minerals and agricultural products to Japan to grow rapidly. In just ten years, Australia’s GDP doubled to $3000 billion.

However, as the Japanese stock market bubble burst at the end of last year, the Australian economy has also been dragged into a downturn since the beginning of this year.

In the 80s, when the Australian economy was booming, Qintex Group relied on massive debts to expand rapidly.

If the Australian economy continues to grow strongly, the company may still be able to survive. When the domestic economic situation takes a turn for the worse, bank credit tightens, and investors tend to be conservative, Qintex Group will soon be unsustainable.

After completing the acquisition of 70% of MGM's equity last year, Qintex Group has undergone asset restructuring during this period, and the overall debt amount still reached 17 billion US dollars, which is not counting MGM's own debt of more than 8 million US dollars, which has reached a new high.

Probably because he knew that Qintex Group would not be able to last for too long. Since the end of last year, Christopher Skass has continued to draw blood from this company through various channels, and then transferred the funds to overseas accounts.

In a recent financial review, the board of directors of Qintex Group discovered that an abnormal "management fee" of US$1350 million was illegally transferred to an overseas company. After further investigation, it was discovered that this was a shell company registered by Christopher Scars .

After urgent consultations with shareholders and creditors, the board of directors of Qintex Group finally chose to call the police.

Christopher Scars was arrested, released on bail the next day, and fled to Spain without further ado.

With Christopher Scars on the run, the Qintex Group instantly became a hot mess on the verge of collapse.Shareholders and creditors don't even have the energy to pursue Christopher Skass now. How to avoid the collapse of Qintex Group is the most important thing.

In its heyday, Qintex Group was involved in various industries such as media, film, resort and jewelry retail.However, until now, the two most valuable assets of the company at this time are only the Seventh TV Network in Australia and the MGM in the United States.

Seventh TV Network has been operating fairly well in recent years. However, although it is a TV network covering the whole of Australia, it is naturally impossible for Australia's TV network to compare with North America, and its current valuation is only 8 million US dollars.The price of 70% of MGM’s equity was US$10 billion when it was purchased last year. If it chooses to sell at this time, the US$10 billion should not be a big problem.

Coupled with some other fragmentary assets, the overall valuation of the assets under the name of Qintex Group can basically cover debts.

However, if the bankruptcy liquidation is carried out immediately, these assets will definitely depreciate.

Moreover, assets involving tens of billions of dollars, including all kinds of complicated bond relationships, if you want to directly liquidate, it will definitely not be possible in the short term. Qintex Group can only maintain it as much as possible and proceed step by step Asset restructuring, so that the losses of shareholders and creditors can be minimized.

Qintex Group headquarters in Brisbane.

Seeing Simon, Shirley Lansing finally relaxed from her somewhat bewildered mind.

When she first heard the news and rushed to Australia, Shirley Lansing felt that she would soon lose her position as CEO of MGM, which she had just secured for a long time.