Rebirth of the Great Entertainment Empire

…

January 15, 1984.

Back to the Future, which was released for 33 days, was drawn in Hong Kong, and won a box office of 36 million Hong Kong dollars.

Merry Christmas, which was drawn a week earlier than Back to the Future, won a box office of 25.7 million Hong Kong dollars.

Owl and Dumbo, drawn 11 days earlier than Back to the Future, won a box office of 23 million Hong Kong dollars.

actually--

The box office of Owl and Dumbo has a chance to surpass the box office of Merry Christmas.

But just when the box office of Owl and Dumbo is about to catch up with that of Merry Christmas, Golden Harvest Cinemas will release Aftermath starring Zheng Zeshi, so Owl and Dumbo can only be played in Shaoxing. Twelve theaters in the theater chain continue to show.

Therefore, the box office of Owl and Dumbo is more than three million Hong Kong dollars lower than that of Merry Christmas.

This incident greatly stimulated Pan Disheng, plus Xu Cun and Yang Ziqiong got closer, and Cen Jianxun had been lobbying from the sidelines, so that Pan Disheng's determination to acquire Shaw Cinemas to form Debao Cinemas became more and more determined. big.

But--

After Cen Jianxun had two contacts with Fang Yihua, representing Shao Yifu, Pan Disheng realized that he was taking things for granted.

The results of the negotiations between China and Britain are becoming more and more obvious-most people of insight can see that the British G will probably not be able to win this negotiation. In other words, Xiangjiang will be taken back by China G sooner or later.

Now, Shaw Brothers' Hong Kong local box office market has been snatched up by other film companies, and only the Nanyang and Taiwan markets can make some money.

But Shao Yifu, who has seen the general situation clearly, is planning to build a good relationship with the mainland in advance. For this reason, Shao Yifu is even ready to agree to join the Hong Kong business community's visit to Beijing led by Xinhua News Agency.

Shao Yifu's move is bound to offend Taiwan, so it will be a matter of time for Shaw Brothers to lose the Taiwan film market, and the Nanyang market alone cannot support Shaw Brothers.

Therefore, Shaw's suspension of production is already the general trend.

It is precisely because of this that Shao Yifu sincerely wants to sell Shaw Cinemas—after all, in the absence of good movies, the cost of maintaining a theater chain is not a small amount.

One really wants to buy, and the other really wants to sell. Normally, this deal should be easily reached.

But the fact is otherwise!

Shao Yifu offered Pan Disheng a price of 340 million Hong Kong dollars—among which, the four leading theaters of Shaw Brothers alone offered a price of 200 million Hong Kong dollars. Six of the remaining eight theaters are owned by Shaw Cinemas, with an asking price of 120 million Hong Kong dollars. The other two theaters are rented by Shaw Cinemas, and there is still a five-year lease term, and the asking price is 20 million Hong Kong dollars.

Is Shao Yifu's price black?

Of course—no matter how good the four leading theaters of the Shaw Brothers are, they cannot surpass the Taiping Theater. Xu Cun only spent 35 million Hong Kong dollars to buy the Taiping Theater, and the price was still high. Therefore, the four leading theaters of the Shaw Brothers It is impossible for a theater to be worth 50 million Hong Kong dollars. The six theaters owned by Shaw Brothers are all medium-sized theaters with 400 to 800 seats. Although the locations are not bad, they cannot be worth 20 million Hong Kong dollars each. The two theaters rented by the Shaw Brothers only paid 1.3 million Hong Kong dollars to each of the real owners of the two theaters a year, that is to say, they paid a total of 1,300 Hong Kong dollars to the real owners of the two theaters in five years. Ten thousand Hong Kong dollars, Shao Yifu asked Pan Disheng for 20 million Hong Kong dollars, and made seven million Hong Kong dollars.

Didn't Shao Yifu intend to sell Shaw Cinemas? Why did he offer such a high price?

actually--

There are three reasons why Shao Yifu set this price:

First, since the negotiations between China and the UK have made substantial progress (one country, two systems has reached a consensus, China and the UK are currently conducting the seventh round of negotiations, the main topics are the arrangements after 1997 and the transition period related issues.), so Xiangjiang Real Estate has a trend of recovery. In other words, the current house price is much higher than when Xu Cun bought the Taiping Theater. Moreover, if it is not a last resort, no owner is willing to sell the real estate in his hands at this stage.

Second, in terms of theaters alone, every theater in the Shaw Cinemas chain is not worth the price quoted by Mr. Shaw, but it cannot be calculated like this—although at most 100 million Hong Kong dollars can be used to build twelve Shaw Theaters For a theater of this scale, it is very difficult to get a good location occupied by Shaw Brothers theaters, especially the four leading theaters of Shaw Brothers. Moreover, the twelve theaters of Shaw Brothers, especially the four leading theaters that have existed for the longest time have accumulated the reputation of Shaw Brothers for decades, and many movie fans have the habit of going there to watch movies. . There is also a very important point, Shaw Cinemas sells theaters, not theaters, there is a big difference between the two!

Third, the four leading theaters of the Shaw Brothers theater chain were built by Shaw Yifu himself, brick by brick, so in the depths of his heart, Shaw Yifu actually did not want to sell the Shaw Brothers theaters, especially the four leading theaters of the Shaw Brothers— ——If it wasn’t for a fire in TVB City that caused heavy losses to Shao Yifu, Shao Yifu took over the stocks of several shareholders who lost confidence in TVB, and most of Shao Yifu’s money was trapped in real estate projects. Come out, Shao Yifu must only rent and not sell Shaw Cinemas.

The price of 340 million Hong Kong dollars was far beyond Pan Disheng's expectations—although Pan Disheng told Cen Jianxun that he was willing to spend 100 to 200 million Hong Kong dollars to build Debao Cinemas, Pan Disheng's upper limit was 100 million Hong Kong dollars. You know, Pan Disheng's current net worth is only 600 to 700 million Hong Kong dollars, and a large part of it is real estate such as stocks, real estate, and brand franchise rights. How could he spend 200 to 300 million Hong Kong dollars to buy Shaw Cinemas? ?

Since you can’t buy it, then rent it—Pan Disheng is not as possessive as Xu Cun, so after hearing Shao Yifu’s quotation, Pan Disheng asked Cen Jianxun to talk to Fang Yihua about the price of renting Shaw Cinemas.

But--

The rent that Shao Yifu gave was also unbearable for Pan Disheng-Shao Yifu paid a rent of 80 million Hong Kong dollars for five years to the four leading theaters of Shaw Brothers, and 60 million Hong Kong dollars for five years for the remaining eight theaters. One payment for five years. In other words, if Pan Disheng wanted to rent the entire Shaw Cinemas, he would have to pay 140 million Hong Kong dollars at a time.

Renting the Shaw Cinemas would cost 140 million Hong Kong dollars, of course Pan Disheng was unwilling!

At the same time, Xu Cun, who was preparing to expand the theater chain, also set his eyes on the Shaw Brothers theater chain, especially the four leading theaters of the Shaw Brothers, and sent Xian Feiran to contact Fang Yihua.

With Xu Cun participating in the competition, Shao Yifu's price was even more aggressive - Xian Feiran and Cen Jianxun talked to Fang Yihua several times respectively, and the quotation of Shaw Cinemas did not drop at all!

Xu Cun is rich, but he doesn't want to be taken advantage of.

Therefore, Dreamworks and Debao's acquisition of Shaw Cinemas ended in a stalemate.

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