Top of the big era

Zhou Buqi was a little amused. He felt that Lu Qi had been abroad for a long time and had no understanding of the domestic situation at all. WeChat is developing so well in China, what kind of trouble can it encounter?

Not to mention Alibaba’s dealings, even QChat, which is backed by QQ, has been defeated by WeChat.

From a market perspective, WeChat is invincible!

Moreover, the development of WeChat will only get better and better. As time goes by, the Matthew Effect will become stronger and stronger, and WeChat's market share and competitiveness will become higher and higher.

Lu Qi also said that it would be a disaster, which was a bit alarmist.

Seeing that the big boss was disapproving, Lu Qi tentatively said, "I just got the news. Maybe... it's night in China now. Maybe the news hasn't reached you yet, or maybe the relevant information has been sent to your mailbox."

"Is it?"

Zhou Buqi looked back at the accompanying secretary Sun Wanran.

She understood and immediately took out her tablet to check her mailbox.

Lu Qi hesitated and said cautiously: "It seems that there is a general meeting in the country recently, and many people seem to be uniting to submit proposals to the new leadership team."

"Huh?" Zhou Buqi raised his eyebrows and immediately understood what he meant, "Policy factors?"

From a market perspective, WeChat can be said to have no competitors.

It can be called invincible.

However, China is a market economy guided by policies, and the market must listen to policies. Only with the introduction of policies can products of WeChat's level be wiped out overnight.

Lu Qi nodded, "It seems so."

On the other side, Sun Wanran indeed found the relevant email, "Well, the email has been sent, and Zhang Yiming, He Yang, and Guo Pengfei all have relevant introductions... Yes, it's WeChat. It seems very dangerous!"

The atmosphere suddenly became tense.

Lu Qi looked nervous, and Sun Wanran was also worried.

Zhou Buqi had foresight and was not too worried.

In the previous life, WeChat was not subject to any restrictions and developed smoothly. In this life, Ziweixing has made greater contributions to the country than Penguin, and its social reputation and industry status are just right. There is no reason to kill this product.

It shouldn’t be a big problem!

Normally, when encountering such an urgent matter, Zhou Buqi would definitely grab Sun Wanran's iPad and check the relevant events.

But he knew what was going on.

"Oh, how was it?"

Zhou Buqi is neither impatient nor impetuous, and he has the demeanor of a general who does not change his expression even when Mount Tai falls in front of him.

This scene made Lu Qi admire him very much.

I feel that the big boss really has a maturity that is very inconsistent with his age. Even many veterans who have experienced battles do not have such a level of authority and stability.

Sun Wanran said quickly: "It's really serious. Many people are dissatisfied with WeChat's OTT strategy. There are some departments, several major operators, and some private organizations... Anyway, six or seven forces have united Well, at this two sessions, requirements were given to rectify or even ban WeChat.”

OTT is a basketball term in the NBA, which means "over-the-top pass" and refers to the connection between points that avoids obstacles in the middle.

That is, bypassing the middleman.

This is the essence of the Internet.

Almost all Internet products cannot bypass this hurdle.

Such as e-commerce.

The fact that e-commerce prices are so low actually means that various channels and middlemen are bypassed, thereby bringing more benefits to consumers.

But there is a difference.

Although e-commerce also bypasses middlemen, the scale of bypassing is larger, and it has reached a scale of tens of billions or hundreds of billions to trillions.

It stands to reason that the impact would be more serious.

However, the middlemen that e-commerce bypasses are all private enterprises.

This is very easy.

Although these private enterprises have created huge social and economic value and countless jobs, they have little say. Their rights and interests have been taken away by e-commerce... That is also taken away. Who told you that your productivity is backward? In the market It is normal for the fittest to survive in competition.

But WeChat is different.

This thing bypasses the three major operators, which are state-owned enterprises!

Although the overall scale is far behind that of e-commerce, they have the right to speak and have influence, and they can rely on the state to pull the strings behind them, so they are not afraid at all.

Although Lu Qi is in charge of overseas business, it has no real interest relationship with WeChat.

But the success of WeChat has a lot to do with him.

Because WeChat and Helo are brothers.

The underlying architecture of the two products is exactly the same, and they learn from each other's strengths and weaknesses. With WeChat as a reference, Helo can develop better overseas. Moreover, because the underlying layers of the two products are the same, the development teams can "interoperate" with each other.

For example, Helo encountered some emergency situations and needed to be dealt with urgently.

But the team at Luqi is short of manpower, and it may take 7 days to handle it. What should we do? At this time, you can ask the domestic WeChat team to help and collaborate together, and it may be completed in three days.

After it is done, both parties will share the results and benefit together.

If WeChat dies, it will also have a negative impact on Helo’s long-term development overseas.

Lu Qi was very worried, "This is not the first time something like this has happened. When QQ launched mobile QQ, it was suppressed by operators. Fortunately, mobile QQ joined Monternet at that time and became Monternet's No. 1 A big money-making tool. Although QQ mobile phone caused damage to the operator's SMS business, it made up for it with Montnets business, and the two parties eased the relationship."

Sun Wanran was still looking down at the email, then he sighed lightly and raised his head, "Well, that's it. In the past few years, WeChat only sent messages and was only for SMS business, which was actually not bad. After all, QQ has appeared on mobile phones. It’s been so many years. But last year WeChat launched a voice message function, which made many people nervous and caused dissatisfaction among operators.”

Lu Qidao: "Yes, although I have been working in Silicon Valley, I am also familiar with the domestic situation. I go back several times every year to attend some activities and participate in some speeches."

This is not surprising.

For many executives and industry experts of large technology companies, there is a special KPI, which is speech.

They have to attend various high-end technology forums, give lectures in universities, or participate in some industry seminars, etc. They represent the company on these occasions and show the company's products, technology, development direction, etc. to the outside world.

It’s both brand building and a rallying cry.

Maybe many geniuses heard similar lectures and were influenced to join the company.

The founding of Google was actually a speech given by Li Yanhong as the chief scientist at Stanford on behalf of their company, which gave Larry Page and Sergey Bryn Mawr an idea of ​​starting a business.

Lu Qi continued: "I remember that the original situation was due to the interests of Monternet, and the mobile phone QQ was retained. The Internet completed OTT for operators in the SMS business and opened a hole. However, then something happened Many products tried to cut into the phone business of operators, but were quickly stopped by the authorities.”

"Yes, they acquiesced at first, but later the operators united to demand a boycott, and they took advantage of the two sessions to integrate the proposals jointly put forward by several forces. Then a series of Internet phone products were blocked."

Zhou Buqi came from that period, which he knew very well.

The year before last, Microsoft had spent $8.5 billion to acquire Skype.

Skype is an Internet phone product.

Through this product, users can rely on network communications and bypass operators to make free calls. This really screws up operators in various countries.

Because it meets the huge market demand, Skype quickly becomes popular all over the world.

Except domestically.

This business is banned.

As a result, the level of imitation in the domestic Internet industry is so high that almost all good projects in Silicon Valley have been imitated and copied to the country. Only products such as Skype are a serious no-go zone.

It's no wonder that Lu Qi and Sun Wanran were so nervous.

Seven or eight years ago, China issued relevant documents to ban the "Internet telephony" business, and the operators won a great victory.

Now, it's Ziweixing's turn.

Sun Wanran said weakly: "Last year, WeChat launched a voice message function. Although it was generally well received by users, the operators were very opposed to it. This disagreement has not been resolved for a long time. During the Spring Festival this year, WeChat launched another A new function is available for video calls, allowing users to make video calls to wish the New Year through WeChat..."

Zhou Buqi took a deep breath.

Even if they were foresight, the oppression was quite severe.

Depend on!

This is stepping on a red line!

WeChat’s video calls are more powerful than those Internet phone products like Skype back then. It's not just internet phone calls, it's also face-to-face video!

Not only is it free, but it also allows video, which is better than the phone service provided by the operator!

Can this prevent them from organizing a rebellion with righteous indignation?

If market competition cannot be overcome, then policies should be used to suppress it.

Zhou Buqi sighed in a daze.

This really surprised him.

Not because of the troubles he encountered.

It is the group of domestic private entrepreneurs.

He originally thought that Alibaba’s boss Ma had made a huge contribution to the development of the domestic Internet industry, especially the business development of Alipay. It really took half his life to build the entire Internet convenience system.

The old horse is very respectable.

Only now do I understand.

It turns out that it’s not only Ali’s horse boss, but also Penguin’s horse boss. The pressure WeChat has withstood and the contribution it has made to society in terms of convenience and benefit to the people seems to be no worse than Alipay.

At this level of entrepreneur, no one can be far behind!

In this life, WeChat has become a product of Ziweixing.

This pressure to rush the tower against the red line naturally fell on Zhou Buqi.

Seeing that he was silent, Lu Qi cautiously suggested, "How about arranging a flight to return to China? This matter must be dealt with quickly."

"Huh?" Zhou Buqi smiled and waved his hand, "It's okay, don't worry, Ziweixing is not one of those small companies that made Internet phones in the past. It's okay, wait and see what news Meng Houkun has."