Investment Life

Successful first time?Yan Qiaosen couldn't help laughing, not to mention that Feiyan is not yet profitable, even if it becomes profitable in the future and goes public, Chen Yuanming is also the major shareholder, so could it be possible to withdraw the capital and cash out?The contract of the three of them is far from the kind of venture capital that really aims to go public.

Yan Qiaosen's understanding of venture capital is actually not that deep.When he first started working, the entire venture capital industry in Silicon Valley was at an absolute trough. Unless it was a project with a particularly profitable prospect, it would be difficult to extract money from stingy bankers. Starting a business alone was basically wishful thinking. Part-time work is decent.Later, in the mid-80s, the venture capital industry began to pick up, but his career had already achieved some success. Coupled with the more traditional Chinese thinking, he resolutely chose a company with industry and sales as the main body, instead of putting all his hopes on the market. Pinned on the misty stock market.

On this point, the stock market crash in 1987 seems to be an excellent footnote. Those friends who made a lot of money because of the stock market during the same period were almost helpless when encountering a real stock market crash. Extremely tragic.On the other hand, my company was not listed, and the sales of several chips were also good. I survived the catastrophe without any twists and turns, and only then did I have the spare energy to enter the research and development of the MPEG format.

Afterwards, they hit it off with Meng Lisheng. When developing the VCD player, the two still had the same idea. If it wasn’t for Chen Yuanming’s sudden emergence, it is estimated that they would have chosen the low-interest loan model mainly based on mainland bank loans or government support funds instead of investing in the United States. The embrace of venture capital firms.

However, the young man in front of him was definitely not joking, shaking his head, Yan Qiaosen showed a wry smile, "Yuanming, real venture capital is not that simple. There are many people making money in Shashan Road, but not many people losing money." If you invest tens of millions, you may not even get anything in kind. If you want to get involved in this field, you need more than just financial acumen.”

"I understand this." Faced with Professor Yan's earnest teaching, Chen Yuanming did not have the slightest resistance, because what the other party said was the truth.

For high-tech venture capital, the most important thing is not the source of money, not the financiers on the East Coast who are stirring up the world, but the risk of being good at digging out rough diamonds from the gravel, and carving them into shape, and earning a hundredfold profit investor.In Silicon Valley, this typical venture capitalist may be a technical expert or a middle-level manager from a high-tech company. They are highly sensitive to technology and can see the future prospects of a technology or an industry through the fog , The previous management experience gave them the capital to support those smart freaks, let those little guys who only have ideas and know nothing about others slowly get on the right track, and turn their ideas into hundreds of millions of wealth.

The most famous example of this venture capital model in the past is the emergence of Netscape.

Just graduated in 1994, Mark Anderson, who had no money and no name, did not find a job suitable for him at first. He just wrote Internet browsing software with a few like-minded friends. When the Mosaic browser was born, venture capitalist Jim Clark found that In the face of such a senior in Silicon Valley with sufficient experience, Anderson readily accepted the invitation, and then the two jointly founded Netscape.The company was funded by Clark, and Anderson led his team to develop a new version of the Mosaic browser.Just one year later, Netscape, which had never made a profit, was listed in New York. The investment bank estimated in advance that the price per share was around 14 yuan. Unexpectedly, the stock price soared all the way after the opening of the day, and finally closed at a high price of 58 US dollars, 500 US dollars. Thousands of shares were sold out.

Clarke invested $400 million in Netscape, but the company turned into a $20 billion behemoth overnight. Since then, the company's performance has been steadily rising until it was exchanged for $42 billion in tax-free shares by AOL. , bought back. 400 million investment in exchange for hundreds of millions of profits, this kind of story that should only exist in mythology is the real charm of venture capital.

However, Netscape is inseparable from Clark's single-handed support after all. Its success is due to the combination of capital and technology, management ability and innovation ability. This model is not something that Chen Yuanming can imitate at present. No experience managing a high-tech company.Companies like Netscape and Amazon, where the founders have sufficient funds and are good at single-handed manipulation, are not his real goals.

For Chen Yuanming, there is another model of venture capital, a simple version that can be successful with a little gold finger.Now that he has come to this era, of course he will not give up this potential fertile soil because of short-term constraints. All he needs is time.

Seeing the other party's confident expression, Yan Qiaosen shook his head, but in the end he couldn't say anything.On the one hand, this young man really has extraordinary talent, and on the other hand, it is also because of his curiosity about Chen Yuanming's lofty goal. In just three months, he has surprised himself several times. What kind of extraordinary will he burst out this time? what?

The topic of venture capital is not in-depth, but others have to be mentioned.As one of Feiyan's largest shareholders, Chen Yuanming should have the right to know about the company's development. Now that they have come to Silicon Valley, Yan Qiaosen can't just let the other party sit in the reception room.After chatting for a few words, he took Chen Yuanming to visit his company.

Speaking of a company, Yan Qiaosen's current team is actually more like a studio. The scale is really not big, with only a few laboratories and a dozen employees.Nowadays, the chip industry in Silicon Valley can be said to be flourishing, but in the final analysis, it is still dominated by industrial integrated circuits and computer chips. There are almost a handful of MPEG compression decoding chips like Professor Yan.Now the company can have such a large scale, thanks to Chen Yuanming's capital injection into Feiyan, which gave him the energy and spare money to expand the team and invest more in scientific research.

Now the data protection of VCD discs has achieved initial results. It is difficult to directly copy the content on the disc with a simple CD-Rom. The development of the MPEG-2 format is also in full swing. Look, this company is well run and has a lot of potential.

However, after carefully visiting Professor Yan's company, Chen Yuanming frowned slightly, "The size of this company is intended to only engage in research and development, not production?"

He didn't get the expected approval, but instead, Feixian Tianwai said this, Yan Qiaosen was startled, and smiled wryly. "Of course we should focus on research and development. Now that we have obtained the patent right of the chip, we have grasped the lifeline of production and can easily make profits from it. Why do we need to build a special production plant? Even if Feiyan starts construction in the future , setting up a production line is enough, and blindly expanding the company’s scale is not a long-term solution.”

"Well, generally speaking, there is nothing wrong with this method." Chen Yuanming retorted simply, "But for the VCD industry, the chip is also one of the core technologies, and Feiyan's family will definitely not need this kind of chip in the future. If possible If so, this profit does not need to be handed over to others, or in other words, people should also give it to themselves."

"What do you mean?" Yan Qiaosen was a little uncertain about the meaning of Chen Yuanming's words, "Could it be that you still want to build a chip factory?"

"Not only chips, but also CD production." Chen Yuanming smiled slightly, "and the factory will be built in China."

"Ah..." Hearing this, Yan Qiaosen suddenly turned around, "You mean, are you planning to build downstream industries?"

Upstream and downstream industries are things that any company boss in this era can understand. For example, automobile companies may develop various models, but they do not produce parts and components themselves. Accessories.Similarly, in the high-tech field, studios and large companies with intellectual property rights and research and development capabilities are the so-called upstream industries, while those that quantify these technologies and push them to the market are the downstream industries.

Upstream and downstream industries are indispensable in any industrial chain. Without the raw material support and technology development of upstream industries, downstream industries are like cooking without rice and lack market competitiveness.On the contrary, without the labor-intensive and cheap production of the downstream industry, the upstream industry is like a tree without roots, unable to push products to the mass market.If you want to truly occupy the market, the key is to have both lines in place.

"That's a good point." Chen Yuanming nodded lightly, "Nowadays, the domestic technical force is still very weak. It would be too costly to directly support the high-tech industry, and the results would be ideal. But if we start from the downstream industry, it will immediately let those who have People with courage and courage get the first pot of gold, and continue to invest in further research and development to learn and improve the technology in their hands, so that turning passive into active is a more ideal investment model.”

"But technological upgrades..." Yan Qiaosen was a little hesitant. Such an idea is good, but the technological soil in China and the United States are not at the same level at all, and it is difficult to achieve achievements similar to Silicon Valley, at least for now.

"Yes." Of course, Chen Yuanming is well aware of Yan Qiaosen's worries, "However, just like those big international companies do, the industrial chain can be layered and cross borders. If we use Silicon Valley as the seed, What about the soil? To breed talents here, improve technology, improve products and reduce costs in China, then this industrial chain will have a competitiveness that other countries cannot match, and it will also win countless possibilities for the future.”

The words were so loud that Yan Qiaosen felt that his heart was beating again. Yes, if it is done, if not only VCD can be operated in this way, then what kind of opportunities and challenges will it be for China?Although as a Chinese American, he has been away from his homeland for too long, but the more he is abroad, the more he can understand the yearning and ardent expectation for the motherland.Only when the country is strong and the people are strong, this is the eternal truth.If the country is weak and everyone can be bullied, then all you can get in a foreign land is insult and discrimination.But now, the reform and opening up is being vigorously launched in that land, and that country will surely catch up with this era at a hundred times the speed before, and once again rank among the top in the world!

"Infinite possibilities..." Yan Qiaosen smiled. If it wasn't for this, why would he cooperate with Meng Lisheng, why would he lay Feiyan's foundation on the land of China. "Well said! Even for this possibility, you should try it."

Looking at Professor Yan's shining eyes, Chen Yuanming exhaled softly, the partner he chose was indeed right. The development of VCD is only the first step in his plan, and the establishment of a downstream industrial chain is the key to follow-up.The same is OEM, he would rather those downstream manufacturers put on more domestic brands, rather than become a sweatshop for multinational companies.

Nowadays, in the electronics industry, China has lost at the beginning, but it is not too far behind. Just look at the number of Chinese in Silicon Valley. It is not that the Chinese are not smart or incapable of doing it. They just stumbled at the starting line for various reasons. superior.The fall was painful, but not irreparable.The next ten years will be the beginning of China earning foreign exchange and opening up the international market. He sincerely hopes that those people's ingenuity will be used on a more positive and competitive level, instead of constant plagiarism, internal friction, and eventually losing everything.

All thoughts were tumbling in his heart, but the expression on Chen Yuanming's face did not change at all, he just smiled slightly, "That's right, let's try it."

The author has something to say: Netscape (English: Netscape) is a brand that started in 1994.It is also a commonly used abbreviation for Netscape Communications Corporation.Netscape Communications Corporation was once an American computer services company, famous for its web browser of the same name, Netscape Navigator. In November 1998, Netscape was acquired by America Online (AOL).