Rewrite the Technological Landscape

Because the two knew each other well, Ma Yun could say this sentence in a joking manner, but after taking it seriously, both of them became serious. Ali is really short of money now.

Historically, in 2000, Ali took 20 million yuan of financing from Softbank plus 5 million yuan from 5 venture capitals. In 2004, it took 60 million yuan from Softbank and 22 million yuan from 4 other venture capitals. Now it is September of 2003, Ali is of course short of money, especially after the free policy is determined, Ali's funding gap is very large.

"How much money do you want to raise now? What does Softbank say?" Ali went to Softbank not long ago. Meng Qian knew about this, because Li Qi came to Dafeng Group to talk to Meng Qian at the beginning of the month to help Ali improve the line. Regarding the matter of being on the platform, I also mentioned a little financing by the way, but Li Qi is not the boss after all, so he didn't mention the matter of wanting Meng Qian to invest.

"Softbank is willing to give money, but the premise is that they want to invest all in Taobao this time."

"It's the same as in the previous life." Meng Qian said silently in his heart. The 60 million yuan that Softbank injected into Ali in 2004 was actually for Taobao, not for Ali. At that time, Ali and Taobao were two companies. Similar to Dafeng Entertainment and Dafeng Kechuang, the concept of Ali Group has not really been moved out.

This gave birth to the subsequent Ali equity incident.

In 2005, when eBay was hammered by Taobao, it did one thing. It went to Softbank and said that it would pay 1 billion yuan to buy the shares of Taobao in his hand. Softbank naturally agreed, 60 million yuan Who wouldn't be tempted to change 1 billion yuan a year.

Ma Yun panicked at the time, but Ma Yun couldn't come up with more money to buy back Taobao's shares. Fortunately, Cai Chongxing thought of someone, Yang Zhiyuan from Yahoo.

So there is the story of Yahoo’s 1 billion yuan plus Yahoo Huaxia’s acquisition of Ali in 2005 to become the largest shareholder of the Ali Group. Yahoo paid to buy out all Taobao shares held by Softbank.

Therefore, many people have a misunderstanding. Softbank’s shares in Ali did not come from the 60 million invested in 2004. The 60 million shares bought were bought by Yahoo. The shares behind Softbank came from Lin Xialu I bought it there.

This Lin Xialu is the representative of Goldman Sachs who took the lead in investing in Ali with 5 million yuan in 1999. Goldman Sachs took the lead in buying more than 20% of Ali's shares with 5 million yuan. In 2005, Goldman Sachs invested more than 100 million yuan The price sold all these shares to Softbank, and at the same time, Softbank also bought some shares of several other venture capital.

Since then, Ma Yun's team, Yahoo, and Softbank have jointly held shares in Ali Group.

"Now that Taobao is burning money, it's okay for Softbank to invest money in Taobao, right?" Theoretically speaking, there is nothing wrong with this matter, just like Dafeng Entertainment is short of money, so if you are looking for financing, you can directly invest in Dafeng Entertainment instead of investing in it. To Gale Group.

"It's no problem, but our three-year investment budget is a bit big. Now we can't find any big investors except Softbank. When Softbank holds so many shares in Taobao, I always feel uneasy." Ma What Yun said is very true.

"What is your financing plan this time?"

"500 million."

"Soft sister currency?"

"Um."

Meng Qian rubbed his chin and thought for a moment, "The Dafeng Group has indeed been investing in some potential companies for the past two years, but our brothers and sisters will settle accounts, so we have to do research and analysis first."

"no problem."

The friendship between the two is over there. It is most appropriate for Meng Qian to use the investigation results as the final judgment standard. Whether he votes or not will not affect the relationship between everyone, and Meng Qian really wants to investigate first. Because of the early development of the Internet, although eBay is still the current leader in China, there are many more rising stars like Taobao than in the previous life.

Many of them choose to take the free route like Taobao. Even Zhang Shuxin thought about doing e-commerce last year. If it wasn’t because the company’s funds were trapped on the search engine, she might have really done it. So will Taobao in this life still exist? Just like the previous life, Meng Qian was really not sure.

However, Meng Qian’s investigation focused on several points. The first is whether Taobao is firm in the free line, and the second is whether Taobao’s sales team has captured the huge group of small businesses in Jiangxi Province, and whether they have made good use of the power of these small businesses. The third is whether Taobao has noticed the importance of express delivery.

One of the many reasons for Taobao’s success is the cooperation with the express delivery industry. Many people say that Sitong Yida took off on Taobao, especially since the cooperation between Yuantong and Taobao in 2005, Sitong Yida has embarked on the fast track, but at the same time The development of Taobao is also inseparable from the reverse promotion of the express delivery industry, which is a process of mutual promotion.

Of course, what Meng Qian was most concerned about was whether or not Taobao would launch Alipay. As a result, Ma Yun decided to launch Alipay despite all the arguments.

In addition to what Meng Qian cares about, the company also has some routine data analysis, such as customer stock, customer growth rate, platform daily transaction volume, transaction volume growth rate, etc.

After more than ten days of repeated research and communication, the two parties reached a preliminary financing intention, but there is a problem that Meng Qian must first clarify with Boss Ma, "Our investment is considered to be invested in Taobao or Ali. ?”

"At present, I want to separate the two sides. Taobao has just started, and it is actually quite troublesome to put them together now."

"Okay, let's wait for the final valuation." Meng Qian is actually more inclined to this approach, because Taobao has just developed and can be cheaper.

"Well, by the way, Chong Xing told me that Softbank and Fidelity have to give face. Since they are willing, they have to save some face."

What Ma Yun said was nonsense to Meng Qian. Although Softbank and Fidelity did make additional investments, Ali did a lot of homework in the past. Now that Taobao has just launched, people are asking for additional investment? If Softbank and Fidelity were really so optimistic about Ali, it would be impossible for Ma Yun to run so many companies during this round of financing.

Fear of being manipulated by Softbank is not a reason that can be fully explained. If Softbank is really so optimistic about Ali, then the initiative should be in Ali's hands.

Meng Qian knew in his heart that this was because he was afraid that Taobao would not be manipulated by Softbank, but by Dafeng Group. This was to guard against himself.

Hey, the mall.

Taobao’s financing plan is 500 million yuan, but the financing received by most companies is lower than the plan. However, Dafeng Group is willing to invest this money. After all, it has more than 2 billion cash in hand, which makes Ali panic. Now 500 million is enough to buy half of Taobao.

As for whether it is Ma Yun's intention, Cai Chongxing's intention, or someone else's intention to suppress the shareholding ratio of Dafeng Group, Meng Qian does not know.

But Meng Qian didn't really want to give up his shares. Since he judged that Taobao is likely to develop like it did in his previous life, then Taobao's shares are really valuable. If you buy it now, it will double ten times in three years, Double it a hundred times.

More importantly, as the major shareholder of Taobao, the resources of the Ali department in the future.

So Meng Qian stepped forward directly, "We have a cooperation with Softbank. If you don't want Softbank to take up Ali's shares, I can come forward and talk to them. They should still give me this face."

Meng Qian's words choked Ma Yun directly.

But the step that should be given still has to be given, Meng Qian continued immediately, "But to be honest, 500 million funds is not a small pressure on Dafeng Group, and it would be a good thing if there are other venture capital."

Ma Yun also understood what Meng Qian meant. He was afraid of being manipulated by Dafeng Group. Dafeng Group can invest less first, and some venture capital money can also be used by Ali, but Softbank has already taken some shares of Ali before, so don’t do it again. Let him come in.

Fortunately, Ma Yun didn't seem to want to give Softbank any more shares. Meng Qian made a concession, and the two reached a unity.

On October 10, 2003, after several rounds of negotiations and evaluations, Dafeng Group acquired 36% of Taobao's shares with 300 million soft sister coins.

And the next day, Taobao launched Alipay.