Chapter 819 Competition (Two in One)

As soon as the Lantern Festival is over, everything moves forward.

Overall, Fang Zhuo is quite satisfied with this year.

It’s the Chinese New Year. I received a big red envelope from Pony, met my happy relatives, made new progress on the social platform, and made a breakthrough in the key progress of the ice core manufacturing process. Except for the fact that there is no new news about mobile phones, everything is good.

On the morning of March 5, Fang Zhuo arrived at Hang Lung 23.

He sat in his office and took a few sips of tea before he began arranging for the media to silence Ice Core. The "Semiconductor Technology" manuscripts that had appeared on the Internet were withdrawn from the official website and blog, and the complimentary words that had not yet been published in this bimonthly magazine were not used. On the page again.

In addition, industry media and various mainstream media also asked people to say hello. The wafer fabs in the three regions of Bingxin will not accept interviews and do not need to carry out relevant reports.

It is impossible to hide the news that ice core has completed 65nm trial production and related future production capacity in the industry, but public opinion should be as low-key as possible and not make such a big noise.

Compared with the high profile that social platforms and Yike Mobile can have, Bingxin is better off doing things quietly.

With this in mind, Fang Zhuo decided to contact his fellow portal colleagues through the Yike President Office, and many short and long reports have been reprinted by everyone.

Everything else was easy to say, except that Penguin, who had just had a quarrel with him, was non-committal.

Fang Zhuo knew about the antagonism between them, so the administrator came to contact him, and Penguin soon became cocoa.

Near noon, just as he was about to make a call to Silicon Valley, IDG President Xiong Xiaoge called in.

"Mr. Xiong, please speak." Fang Zhuo was very polite.

"About Weibo Company's financing, what are the articles of association?" Xiong Xiaoge heard that Mr. Fang was so polite and didn't know why. She always felt that he was blaming her.

"This is led by Sina. Wang Yan will handle it after Weibo's activities for this month are completed." Fang Zhuo replied.

Weibo has arranged many activities for March, this and that, which can be summed up as "new year activities".

At present, Weibo Company is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sina, and it also uses the name "Sina Weibo" to attract traffic, but the domain name is weibo.com.

Xiong Xiaoge didn't want to hear any clichés on the phone. He asked directly: "What's the size of the first round of financing? I want to hear what you mean."

Fang Zhuoyan said concisely and concisely: "All in."

"All in?" Xiong Xiaoge hesitated for a few seconds.

"Just invest whatever you took from Penguin in the first round. There is no need to divide it into multiple rounds. There is no need to pay more for the time being. It's all given by Penguin anyway." Fang Zhuo expressed his meaning calmly.

Xiong Xiaoge wants to invest, and this is the way he invests...

Fang Zhuo waited for three seconds, but did not hear Lao Xiong's voice, and continued: "To be honest, Lao Xiong, who from Goldman Sachs called me two days ago? He asked about the financing earlier than you. Well, I think Lao Xiong is the number one investor in the country, so I have to take the lead.”

Xiong Xiaoge was not reluctant to invest, but he just felt such a competitive signal: "Mr. Fang, do you think Weibo still needs a lot of subsequent financing? Doesn't Penguin still have a dating network? Will it turn its guns?"

"Whether it will happen or not, I don't know, but Zhang Chaoyang complained to me last week, saying that he had done something to support the enemy." Fang Zhuo paused, "I said, Sina and Sohu are brotherly units, so we can have Healthy competition, I guess Sohu may look at the development of platforms like Weibo before deciding whether to enter the market.”

"What's the threshold for building such a social platform? Sohu can do it, NetEase can do it, all it takes is spending money."

"Obviously it was IDG who came first and came into contact with such a project first. Do you want to regret it in the future because you invested less money and failed?"

"Old Xiong, let me put it this way, let's make an outline of 1.55 billion first. Whether you can succeed in the future depends on your courage."

Competition in social networks is quite expensive.

The time, resources, and funds in the early stage are very critical, and it will be much better after such a period of time.

This is what Fang Zhuo said years ago: "Seize the window of time, increase resources, and spend a lot of money to work hard."

You don't just say it casually, you really have to do it.

Xiong Xiaoge once again clearly felt Mr. Fang’s determination: “It is Mr. Fang, the richest man in the Mainland, who can give me determination. In this way, when I talk to IDG partners about investment again, I will tell them exactly what you said. ”

"The richest man in the mainland is all supported by his friends. Without the support of the country's number one investor, I wouldn't be where I am now." Fang Zhuo said with a smile.

"Later this month, I will meet and chat with Wang Yan again." Xiong Xiaoge finally said.

Fang Zhuo was incompetent, and Wang Yan had to do this in the first place.

He ended the call with Lao Xiong, thought for a while, and called Wang Fengyi, who was also a candidate for the number one investor in the country.

This call is much simpler.

"Brother Wang, at the end of the month and the beginning of the month, Weibo will raise funds."

Wang Fengyi asked: "How to vote?"

Fang Zhuo still had the same opinion: "All in."

Wang Fengyi replied simply: "Okay."

Fang Zhuo was just about to say a few words before hanging up the phone, when the person on the other end suddenly hesitated.

"Wait a minute, Mr. Fang." Wang Fengyi said hesitantly.

Fang Zhuo was surprised: "Brother Wang, tell me."

"This money will be invested after Shenxin Technology has finished its first quarter performance report, right?" Wang Fengyi asked.

Fang Zhuo also agreed: "Okay."

In this way, the general situation of Weibo’s first round of financing has been basically finalized.

In fact, other investment friends have also called to inquire about financing after the Weibo went online these days, but the three companies have been cooperating for a long time, and only the B round will decide whether to introduce new investors.

I originally wanted to have lunch with Su Wei on the 22nd floor, but the executive meeting downstairs was delayed, so Fang Zhuo had to eat with a few semiconductor materials.

Before the meal was over, Zheng Yingfeng, who was contacted by the Electronics Division last time, called again.

Zheng Yingfeng only gave a brief notice last time, but this time he had a more detailed and even tedious discussion, with one theme - what does Bingxin need?

This position does not talk about policies, industries, and international competition, but just asks if there are any specific needs that can be implemented.

For example, after the 65nm production capacity is formed, which domestic fields can place orders.

For example, can the universities that cooperate with Bingxin make more efforts?

Zheng Yingfeng is very serious, and he also said without too much concealment that there is enough room for price.

Fang Zhuo actually had no worries about Bingxin's capacity filling. 65nm will be a first-line process this year and next year, and it is relatively easy to find buyers. Moreover, the important reason for skipping the 90nm process in the first place was that the cost of 65nm was almost the same as that of 90nm, and it could also form a price advantage as the yield rate increased.

In other words, even if there are difficulties in competing with the mature 65nm of Taiji and UMC, it can also take the market share of other manufacturers' 90nm first.

Process is justice!

The call lasted for a long time. Zheng Yingfeng had a good impression of Mr. Fang, who was able to handle various situations at will. Fang Zhuo also felt that this young leader of the Electronics Department had a very down-to-earth work style.

Before going to the United States, Fang Zhuo would go to Beijing to report to the leader in person, so he made an appointment with Zheng Yingfeng to further discuss Bingxin's actual needs.

At that time, we will see the situation and see if we can be brothers.

Finally, before hanging up the phone, Zheng Yingfeng revealed a piece of news. In addition to supporting enterprises, the current research is also taking the positioning and consideration of cities as topics. Everyone hopes that Bingxin can continue to work hard.

At two o'clock in the afternoon, Su Wei, who had a quick lunch, went upstairs to visit Boss Fang.

"Boss Fang, we plan to start another storage center in the first half of the year to open up the southwest direction." Su Wei mentioned the content of today's meeting.

Fang Zhuo praised: "Good, Boss Su has worked hard, and you are worthy of being the first e-commerce president in China."

Su Wei smiled: "Boss Fang likes to praise people more and more now, and Sun Tongyu certainly cannot agree with this title."

"Taobao's development is really good." Fang Zhuo did not hesitate to praise competitors, "It really stimulated the vitality of sellers and buyers."

"We also discussed a sensitive topic today, whether Yiguo should look for opportunities to enter C2C." Su Wei became serious. Any e-commerce practitioner can see the prosperity of Taobao.

Fang Zhuo heard this without hesitation and smiled: "C2C can be put aside for the time being, and we should first eliminate all the competitors in B2C. If we get involved in C2C in the future, I hope to try it under the premise of sufficient traffic."

Dangdang in B2C is catching up, but it may need to work harder, but the momentum is much stronger than before.

After a long period of integration with Joyo.com and Amazon China, it finally became "Joyo Amazon" after the Spring Festival this year. The subsequent actions are worth observing.

There are also offline competitors such as Suning and Gome, who are also ready to move.

But in general, Yiguo has a very good competitive situation in the B2C track. It can do well in this area before considering more competition in other directions.

Fang Zhuo and Su Wei discussed the situation of Yiguo for a while, and then the two of them browsed Weibo together.

The trend of worshipping the mountain on Weibo is still there, but more variants have appeared.

Such as, "Fang Zhuo, I'm here, I want to marry you", "Mr. Fang, the house has been sold, the fund has been bought", "I saw Mr. Fang through my friends' network"...

Fang Zhuo didn't feel anything, but Su Wei was very happy, and she felt a little bit of the joy of socializing with strangers.

At three o'clock in the afternoon, Su Wei still had to deal with business.

"When are you going to Beijing?" She knew that Fang Zhuo would fly directly to New York from Beijing.

"The preliminary date is the 18th, I don't know if there will be any changes." Fang Zhuo replied, "The task on the mobile phone side is very heavy."

Yike mobile phones need someone to watch them, and Yu Hong, who returned to China for vacation, returned to New York on the fifth day of the Chinese New Year.

"Then I look forward to watching Mr. Fang's press conference from the video in June." Su Wei said with a smile, "After the press conference, you give me two usable mobile phones, and I want to try out what kind of products are worth Mr. Fang's energy."

Fang Zhuo exhaled, and unknowingly, it was only more than three months away from the press conference.

...

Early March.

The holidays of Bingxin employees gradually ended, and everyone moved towards the mass production goal again.

The newly launched Weibo showed a good development momentum. The management team headed by Wang Xing extended their evil hands to the platform they were familiar with, which was strongly resisted by the public opinion of Penguin.

It was too bullying. You Sina have no bottom line?

However, Wang Xing remained silent about it and just continued to firmly implement the strategy.

Fang Zhuo watched from the sidelines and did not say anything. After all, the public opinion did not seem to show any sympathy for Penguin.

On March 16, just as he was about to fly to Beijing in advance, new movements suddenly appeared in the industry.

It's not Sina and Penguin, it's not Weibo and dating websites, it's Taobao and Paipai that are fighting!

First, a seller found that his store on Taobao had problems with traffic and weight. Then he compared it with his peers and contacted Taobao. It was almost confirmed that it was because he also opened a store on Paipai.

Then, more and more such cases occurred.

After exploration and summary, everyone found that this was not a random action by Taobao. Most of the sellers who encountered the situation were sellers whose Taobao stores were better than Paipai.

In other words, it is easy for such sellers to make a choice, and almost all of them will choose Taobao, which has more traffic and faster development.

Such competitive means caught Penguin off guard.

Because of the size gap, Penguin first released a mild statement - last year, we were doing eBay together, Taobao, have you forgotten?

Taobao's response was simple - I was the one who did it last year, it had nothing to do with you.

Along with the test of attitude, Taobao still unswervingly let the sellers make a choice, and the latter did not surprise anyone. Some closed Paipai.com stores, and some removed similar products first.

This choice has not yet affected those sellers who are doing well on both sides, but the situation is obvious, and this scene will not be far away.

Penguin upgraded its public opinion response and began to criticize its competitors' practices.

Taobao was not afraid at all, and even cited the example of the previous competition between Dating.com and Friends.com, saying that Penguin should recognize commercial competition.

Later, executives faced the media and still used this example to talk about the users of Friends.com moving to Weibo.

"The natural flow of users on different platforms is like the free flow of merchants and sellers from Paipai.com to Taobao."

"They recognize the prospects of Taobao, it's that simple."

The competition between Taobao and Paipai.com seemed overwhelming from the beginning. The latter is likely to be boiled in warm water first, and then die suddenly in a wave when facing the loss of sellers.

Now, many people are speculating on Weibo, wondering whether Paipai.com can last for a year like Friends.com.

When Fang Zhuoren arrived in Beijing and saw such a scene of competition, he felt it was too funny. This Taobao-Paipai fight always gave him a sense of déjà vu of Penguin using its traffic advantage to attack other competitors.

Just as practitioners and people who like to have fun focused on the dispute between the two companies in the field of e-commerce, news from the United States excited many Weibo users.

Closed down.

Closed down.

Closed down.

Within one day, three US subprime mortgage companies successively declared bankruptcy.

The impact of HSBC's previous write-down of $10.8 billion in related assets seemed to have appeared.

Before everyone x-on:Mr. Fang, another more shocking news came. New Century Financial, the second largest subprime mortgage company in the United States, announced a layoff rate of more than 50%.

There are also reports that the company is not far from filing for bankruptcy liquidation.

"Is this an impact? Is it the aftermath? Or is a storm brewing?"

"I don't know why, I suddenly became excited, x-on:Fang Zhuo."

"Lehman, are you okay?"