America's Road to Fame

Chapter 228 Acquisition of Ubisoft
At this time, Ubisoft's market value was only less than 10 billion US dollars, and this kind of acquisition did not require William Chen to personally do it.However, he happened to come to France for a trip, and in his previous life, he had played many games produced by Ubisoft, so he was still very interested in this company, so he stopped by as a tourist.

Montreuil is located in the eastern suburbs of Paris, very close to the city, less than two kilometers away.Ubisoft's headquarters is in an orange-red four-story building.

Ubisoft CEO Guillermo led William Chen and his party to visit Ubisoft first, and saw a lot of game posters and figure figures made by them. From these items, we can see the past glory of this company, including their Well-known games such as "Rayman", "Operation Rainbow", "Split Cell", "Prince of Persia" and "Assassin's Creed" have been produced.

When William Chen was asked by the other party about his intention to buy shares in Ubisoft, William Chen had nothing to hide and said directly:

"I do have the idea of ​​acquiring Ubisoft. Our Meta entertainment media company hopes to cover all entertainment industries, so it is necessary to enter the game industry. This is a market that cannot be ignored. But now there are many game companies, we need to make a choice , so when I encounter a suitable opportunity, I don’t mind giving Ubisoft the first choice, after all, I have played your company’s games before, and I still recognize your production strength very much.”

"But sorry, Mr. William, you know, Ubisoft only wants to develop independently and will not accept any mergers and acquisitions."

Hearing what Guillermo said, William Chen smiled and said:

"I understand your concerns, Mr. Guillermo, it is true that companies such as Vivendi and EA, after acquiring independent game companies, often end up destroying each other. This can be seen from many facts, You don’t want to be acquired, that’s why you lose your independence, don’t you?”

Seeing the expression of approval on Guillermo's face, he nodded, William Chen knew it well, and he continued:
"But we are different. Our Meta entertainment and media company is a multi-field company. In the game industry, there are currently no cooperative partners. Therefore, instead of viewing this as an acquisition, you might as well regard it as a cooperation with us. Our Its subsidiaries include Marvel Entertainment and [-]th Century MGM. How huge are these game material libraries? Once you become part of our group, then you will be able to obtain the authorization of these copyrights. For game companies, I am afraid that this It's the most beautiful thing."

"And there is no need to worry about the independence of the company. If you can understand my previous investments and acquisitions, such as Netflix, Tesla, and your French Hermes, we will never interfere with them The independent operation will only provide the most important help as a partner, so I think you should not generalize, why not try to cooperate first?"

Of course, William Chen didn't expect to be able to persuade Ubisoft, mainly the Guillermo family, with his rhetoric.Ubisoft was first founded by the five Guillermo brothers, and the current CEO is their descendants. At present, the Guillermo family only holds about 15% of the company's shares, but has more than 25% of the voting rights, higher than Chen William 20% of the shares in the hand have voting rights.

But now William Chen continues to increase his holdings of Ubisoft shares in the secondary market. It will be a matter of time before his voting rights surpass the Guillermo family, unless they immediately use resistance methods, such as the poison pill plan, or find the white knight. To help them get hold of the shares, when it really comes to that point, it will be purely a contest of funds, and instead they will be in trouble with each other. This is not what William Chen hopes.

Unexpectedly, William Chen met officials from the French government again. Just like when he bought Hermes before, their main concern was whether William Chen would conduct a hostile takeover of Ubisoft. If so, they would consider protecting their country’s enterprise.

It is not difficult to deal with them. In the current economic crisis, if such an acquisition party has to set up thresholds, it can only have a very negative impact on them attracting overseas investment.

Moreover, Chen William's performance after the acquisition of Hermès is enough to prove that he did not maliciously sell the local company after the acquisition. Instead, he has always respected the local management's leadership of the company, so the other party did not express any disapproval of this If there is too strong resistance to this acquisition, it is estimated that the main thing is to warn him not to use too drastic means at this time.

When news of Chen William's intention to acquire Ubisoft began to circulate in the market, and people discovered that someone had bought a large number of Ubisoft shares in the secondary market, with the emergence of follow-up buying, Ubisoft's share price also accumulated. up more than 20%.

At this time, William Chen already held 29.9% of Ubisoft's shares. According to French law, if the shareholding ratio exceeds 30%, a public tender offer must be made, and a detailed rule is provided for shareholders to decide whether to sell their own shares. The stock in it is sold to companies that want to buy it.

Therefore, at this time, William Chen's acquisition of Ubisoft has reached a critical point, and now it depends on Ubisoft's attitude.

When William Chen notified Ubisoft of the shareholding amount again, the company's CEO expressed his hope to meet William Chen again.In this meeting, the other party did not act too tough, expressing the hope that if William Chen acquires Ubisoft, the independence of the company must be guaranteed, and the company cannot be split and sold at will.

William Chen naturally has no objection to this point. He acquired Ubisoft in the hope of making a presence in the game industry. It is not like other game giants at all, just to eliminate the threat.

After this point was reached, Chen William said that even if Ubisoft was acquired by Meta Entertainment Media, it would still continue to be led by the current management. Unless there is a major business error or a major problem with the business strategy, the parent company will not interfere Bi's independence.

So the next day, Meta Entertainment Media Company announced that it already held more than 30% of Ubisoft's shares, and now it issued an acquisition offer to all shareholders, and Meta Entertainment Media Company will acquire the shares in the hands of all shareholders at a premium of 30%.

After the release of the tender offer, shareholders successively agreed to their acquisition offer. In the end, Meta Entertainment Media acquired a 76.5% stake in Ubisoft. From the beginning to the end, it cost 8.5 million yuan and became the controlling party of Ubisoft. It was announced that Ubisoft officially became a subsidiary of Meta Entertainment Media Company.

Through the acquisition of Ubisoft, Meta Entertainment Media officially entered the game industry, and also opened a door for the IP they mastered to exert influence among players through games and earn profits.

At present, about 23.5% of Ubisoft's shares are still floating around. Among them, about 15% of the shares of the Guillermo family have not been sold and are still in their hands. In addition, there are sporadic shares in other companies that are optimistic about Ubisoft's future investment. In the hands of the opponent, these have no effect on the overall situation.

After the completion of the acquisition, Ubisoft held a general meeting of shareholders, and William Chen became the chairman of Ubisoft. The board of directors has 7 members. Meta Group will only send 4 people to the board of directors to maintain control of the board of directors. The remaining three Two of them are members of the Guillermo family, and one is an investor representative.

As for the daily management of Ubisoft, Guillermo is still the CEO and has not made any changes. This is because William Chen has kept his promise to maintain the independence of Ubisoft in operation and will not interfere with the company's daily management. .

At the same time, Ubisoft has also been authorized by Marvel Entertainment to start developing games based on the Marvel Universe. The first game is an adaptation of the upcoming "Iron Man" storyline. Work with them to launch versions of the game for each platform.

After all these are completed, William Chen will also end his trip to France this time, and the next destination is England.

After Camillo Hagen contacted the Glazer family, the owners of Manchester United, the Manchester United club also knew of Chen William's interest in Manchester United. It can be said that not only the Manchester United club, but now this news has been known all over the world .

The reason for this impact is that, on the one hand, the behavior of the Glazer family has been disliked by the fans in the past few years after the acquisition of Manface, so they desperately hope that someone can stand up to save Manchester United; The factors that are fueling the flames are, after all, his current media group, after acquiring the "New York Times", has become even more powerful, and has taken a step forward in controlling public opinion.

These public opinions naturally added a lot of pressure to the Glazer family, which was in an economic crisis at this time, and the situation was not so good.

(End of this chapter)