“We are not in a hurry to invest. This year we mainly focus on building up our strength, which means traveling more, seeing more, and accumulating more projects.
I always have a hunch that the entire Internet bubble is too big and will burst sooner or later. Whether it is US stocks or these domestic Internet companies, their own value is limited, but their prices are very high.
This is an unreasonable phenomenon, but the Internet itself is valuable and will subvert traditional industries in various fields. What we need to do is to find those Internet companies that can subvert traditional industries and then invest in them.
After the bubble bursts, we can take action. "
Before Wu Shiqiang returned to China, Zhou Xin had a strategic conversation with him about what to do after returning to China.
Zhou Xin did not tell Wu Shiqiang directly, please help me find Jack Ma and Pony Ma. Anyway, I just invested in their companies without thinking.
Goose Chang and Ah Li were there and would not run away, so Zhou Xin was not in a hurry to invest in them.
He planned to let Wu Shiqiang rely on himself to explore Internet companies that he thought had potential.
1999 can be said to be the first year of venture capital in China. From this year on, overseas capital began to enter China on a large scale.
Perhaps these overseas capitals have received the news in advance that China will eventually join the WTO, or perhaps China's economic development has reached a certain stage.
IDG, Sequoia Capital, Morningside Capital, Temasek, SoftBank China, these later famous venture capital institutions in China's Internet industry, all entered China in 1999.
Also in this year, after Wu Shiqiang returned to China, he rented two offices in the International Trade Center in Yanjing, and then obtained the company license through connections, and Xinxing Investment was officially established in China.
At that time, China Zun, Kingkey 100, Financial Street Center and other famous financial office buildings in later generations either had not started construction or had only one plan.
A large part of the reason why Yanjing was chosen instead of Shenhai was that at that time, most Internet companies were concentrated in Zhongguancun, and there were very few Internet companies in Shenhai.
Lujiazui is very famous, but Shenhai’s Internet industry is really lackluster.
After Wu Shiqiang returned to China, he went to Shenhai twice and wrote an investigation report on two relatively large Internet companies in Shenhai and sent them to Zhou Xin.
Shenhai Qingniao and Huasheng Computer.
Zhou Xin only replied to him with one sentence: "These are ToB-end Internet companies and do not have much investment value."
Then after thinking about it for a while, he replied to the second email:
"ToB-side Internet companies met a dead end in China in 1999. It does not mean that these companies are not technically good, but that there is no demand. In this era, most private companies, even state-owned enterprises, did not have this demand, let alone the awareness of informatization.
They don’t realize that the Internet can be a boost to productivity, or even productivity itself.
When considering investing in Internet companies now, we only need to consider ToC-side companies. The number of users, user growth rate and user retention rate are the three things we care about most. As for whether they can make money, it is not important. "
The dilemma Wu Shiqiang currently faces is that good Internet companies cannot get his turn. Companies such as Sohu and Sina that have already achieved a certain degree of popularity will not give him a chance to talk at all.
Even if Wu Shiqiang is behind Zhou Xin, the problem is that Zhou Xin has been active in Silicon Valley and is only famous but not influential in China.
And when it comes to business negotiations, Wu Shiqiang will definitely ask many sharp questions.
You must know that at the moment, even Nasdaq-listed companies do not disclose many of their key data.
For example, CDNow, and these online shopping companies listed on Nasdaq have not announced the number of users they have, but only claim that their sales are growing rapidly.
As for month-on-month and year-on-year, there is no such thing.
Even listed companies do not need to publish these data. When Wu Shiqiang was talking to Chinese Internet companies, he insisted on the specific number of users and the specific comparison results of month-on-month and year-on-year data.
Originally, there is no shortage of investment in the slightly better Internet companies, so these Internet companies are naturally not interested in investment institutions that have a lot of things like emerging capital.
This refers to Lianzhong Games. Bao Yueqiao graduated from Yan University with an undergraduate degree, and then went to the University of California, Berkeley, to obtain a master's degree in computer science.
His background and experience are very similar to that of Zhou Xin. As the founder of Lianzhong Games, I heard that behind emerging capital was his direct disciple Zhou Xin, and that Zhou Xin was very successful in Silicon Valley.
Naturally, I wouldn’t mind meeting Wu Shiqiang and talking about investment.
Lianzhong Games is also short of money, and it needs to spend money in all aspects to expand.
After the chat, Bao Yueqiao complained privately to Wu Shiqiang, saying that the other party didn't understand the Internet at all and was always concerned about trivial issues.
After chatting for a while, Bao Yueqiao declined Wu Shiqiang's invitation. You should know that Bao Yueqiao had just received financing from IDG and Sequoia Capital at that time. He felt that meeting Wu Shiqiang was to give him face.
As a result, the questions Wu Shiqiang asked him didn't give him any face at all.
Wu Shiqiang also wrote an investigation report about Lianzhong Games to Zhou Xin. Many of the data in it were vague words such as unknown, estimate, and guess.
Zhou Xin also replied to an email: "Lianzhong Games can consider investing, and the valuation depends on the price offered by the other party.
Lianzhong Games itself is definitely valuable, but the model will definitely be eliminated by the times. When we invest in Lianzhong Games, we only need to earn a wave of dividends from its future listing, and we do not pursue long-term holdings. "
Zhou Xin did not explain more to him why the Lianzhong Game model would be eliminated.
Because there is no way to explain it now, could it be said that the user stickiness of the online game website product model is absolutely inferior to the user stickiness of the instant messaging model? After QQ enters this market, will Lianzhong Games be defeated like a mountain?
In January 1999, "China Business Times" announced the top ten domestic websites, including Sina, 163 Electronic Post Office, Sohu, NetEase, etc.
These websites are all portal websites and are judged based on the number of visits, content and aesthetics.
The media has such an evaluation system, and investment institutions have the same evaluation system.
This is too unfriendly to Wu Shiqiang, who values user numbers and user stickiness.
I stayed with Zhou Xin for three months to half a year. Counting the beginning of getting to know Zhou Xin, it was almost a year.
Witnessing the magic of Riot Electronics Community and NewPay with his own eyes, Wu Shiqiang did not sum up the term user stickiness, but he believed that user stickiness to Internet companies is crucial.
This is related to the growth of this Internet company.
After returning to Yanjing, Wu Shiqiang was depressed because his work was not going smoothly. This was different from what he thought.
