Entertainment: I just want to be the boss behind the scenes

Chapter 502 The boss is about to show up
Shanghu, Youzu’s headquarters.

"Deng Deng."

"Please come in!"

The office door was pushed open, and a secretary in professional attire walked in and said, "Director Xu, all the directors are here in the meeting room."

Sitting behind the desk was a middle-aged woman with short hair, Lin Qi's widow, Mrs. Lin.

But compared with a few months ago, her temperament has changed a lot. The previous gentleness and softness are gone, replaced by capable and sharp.

Since Lin Qi passed away, his company shares were inherited by his three children. Because the children were young and temporarily incapable of acting, the shares were temporarily managed by their mother, Mrs. Lin.

Mrs. Lin's real name is Xu Fang. The reason why she did not inherit the estate shares was that she had divorced Lin Qi a few years ago.

However, although the divorce was a divorce, the two were the type who only separated the people but not the family. Therefore, this matter was kept very secret and basically no outsiders knew about it. It was not until the confirmation of the inheritance that some news was leaked because of the issue of equity distribution.

In fact, this matter has no impact. She now holds the largest stake in Youzu, so she was naturally elected as the company's new chairman.

Xu Fang graduated from the University of Canberra in Australia with a degree in business administration. She was also a professional woman before and was not completely ignorant of business matters.

However, she had been away from Youzu and the management for a long time, so it was difficult for her to cope with the situation. And the company was in a turbulent time, so she had been struggling to hold on for the past few months.

In addition to work, she was also busy with the trial of the murderer Xu Yao, handling the handover of Lin Qi's various properties, dealing with shareholders and directors with ulterior motives, and taking care of three children. She was exhausted both physically and mentally.

But this is not the end. Just a few days ago, a user on Weibo suddenly posted that Youzu boss Lin Qi had been in love with her sister for many years and had an illegitimate child. Now that her "brother-in-law" has passed away, she wants to help her sister and nephew fight for the inheritance they deserve.

At the end of the article, the other party also posted a birth certificate and a lawyer's letter to prove the authenticity of his content.

As soon as this Weibo post was published, it immediately attracted the attention of many netizens. Although Lin Qi was not a wealthy family, he still had a legacy of several billion. Moreover, the way of death was so bizarre, so it was naturally very popular.

Xu Fang naturally also knew the news. Although she did not verify the other party's identity, she did not feel strange even if it was true. After all, it was indeed something her deceased ex-husband would do.

She did not try to communicate with the other party easily. Because of the little business sensitivity she once retained, she felt that this matter might be more than just a fight for inheritance.

After all, he died at the end of last year, and there was quite a stir at the time. If the other party was really just after the inheritance, why didn't he come out at the time? Instead, he suddenly jumped out half a year later, when he had just been elected as the new chairman.

She had no connections in Youzu, and the only person she trusted was the company's vice president, Zhao Ji, who was poisoned at the same time. He was Lin Qi's right-hand man, who had grown up with the company and had been working diligently and with outstanding abilities for many years.

Otherwise, Lin Qi would not have entrusted him with the responsibility of the crucial "Three-Body Universe". Unexpectedly, he almost took him away.

Zhao Ji did not feel strange when he received Xu Fang's request for help. He had anticipated the current situation when the incident just happened.

"The board of directors is very complicated, and everyone has their own agenda. If we have to say what they have in common, it's probably that they are eyeing your position as chairman and the shares you hold."

"Then can we discuss selling my shares? It doesn't need to be at a high price, as long as someone can take over and keep the company alive. After all, this is Lao Lin's life's work."

"Sister-in-law, it's not that simple. In order to provide blood transfusions to Three-Body Universe and Youzu Building in the past few years, Brother Lin pledged more than 90% of his shares. Now the stock price has fallen and is almost reaching the pledge stop loss line. So now the equity itself is a small matter, the more critical issue is the debt."

Thinking back to the previous conversation with Zhao Ji, Xu Fang couldn't help but sigh.

When Lin Qi passed away, he seemed to have left behind an inheritance of nearly 3 billion yuan, but only she knew that along with the inheritance, there were also more than 2 billion yuan in debts.

In addition to its own gaming business, Youzu has two core assets, one is the popular Three-Body Universe, and the other is the Youzu Building located in the Shanghai International Media Port.

The latter is a comprehensive entertainment center and office building that was started to be built two years ago. It is located in the core area of Shanghai and has a total construction cost of nearly 4 billion yuan.

Lin Qi sold off and pledged a large number of shares in exchange for funds for this building, hoping to move the entire Youzu into it one day. Unfortunately, he is gone and the building has not been fully completed.

This is actually the real reason for Xu Fang's headache. The value of assets is fictitious, and the actual amount will not be known until it is sold. But the debt figure is real, and the amount owed is exactly what it is.

As Youzu's stock price continued to fall, this threat was getting closer and closer. Fortunately, it had announced that it would cooperate with Arclight to develop the Three-Body Film and Television Project, which temporarily stopped the downward trend and gave her a sigh of relief.

But this is not a long-term solution. After all, it takes at least one or two years from the preparation to the broadcast of a web series, especially for such a large production. She has no confidence that she can sustain such a long time.

Therefore, the only way is to introduce new capital to take over the mobile gaming business.

Those people on the board of directors obviously had similar ideas. They all wanted to take advantage of this opportunity to acquire Xu Fang's shares at a preferential low price and then take control of the entire Youzu.

Including the previous "illegitimate child" incident, it is also very likely that they fabricated it, or at least someone was behind the scenes plotting it, with the purpose of increasing the pressure faced by Xu Fang.

Fortunately, she had long ago followed the advice of her lawyer and quickly cremated Lin Qi's body. This made it impossible for the other party to do a paternity test, and thus lacked strong evidence to compete for the inheritance.

But even so, her current situation is not much better and she is still facing a difficult situation.

Inside the company, Zhao Ji could help her temporarily stabilize normal operations, but he had no more ability. Outside the company, many "capital hyenas" were planning to tear off a piece of fat lunch from Youzu.

Although Xu Fang is not at her wit's end now, she is indeed somewhat powerless.

It was at this moment that she thought of the business card that Mr. Meng had given her at the memorial service. With a glimmer of hope, she dialed the number on it.

Of course, before that, she also asked Zhao Ji to help find out the reputation of this "Mr. Meng".

The result made her feel more at ease. Apart from her personal character, in terms of business, both Arc Light Films and Meng Bai have a good reputation in the industry. Even this "Mr. Meng" is called "the timely rain of the industry" by many colleagues, and has a good reputation in the world.

Xu Fang actually didn't think about how much profit she could get from the assets in her hands, she just wanted her children to get what they deserved. So after a brief chat, she agreed to cooperate with Huguang without hesitation.

Today is the first full board meeting after she officially became the chairman, and those people will definitely take the opportunity to cause trouble.

Fortunately, she was well prepared and had already agreed with Arc Light that they would send someone over today to discuss specific cooperation and to support her, which gave her more confidence.

I glanced at the time on my phone and the other party should be arriving soon.

Xu Fang stood up, concealed the fatigue between her brows, tidied herself up, and walked out.

Arriving at the door of the conference room and listening to the voices inside, she told the secretary beside her to go in and inform her immediately if anyone was looking for her. Only then did she calm down and push the door open and walk in.

As soon as she entered the room, everyone in the room looked at her. Fortunately, after more than a month of adaptation, she was no longer nervous about such situations.

"Haha, Director Xu is a little late today."

The person who spoke was a man sitting in the middle of the conference table, who looked to be around fifty years old.

Xu Fang glanced at the other person. This man was called Chen Feng, and he was a veteran director of the company. He had invested part of Youzu's earliest venture capital.

At the same time, he is also the strongest faction among the several factions on the board of directors. Xu Fang suspected that he was behind the previous "illegitimate child" incident.

"Sorry, Director Chen, I had a phone call and wasted everyone's time."

Xu Fang did not refute the other side's soft rejection, but brushed it off with a gentle attitude.

She thought Chen Feng would say a few more words, but he also fell silent. She took a quick look and saw that he looked confident, which made her feel depressed.

The pace of the board meeting that officially began made her more worried.

Chen Feng hardly beat around the bush and directly stated that the company is now in a "critical moment" and needs to introduce new capital to help "get through the difficulties."

"I know that President Xu hopes that the business left by Old Lin can grow and develop. Our goals are actually the same." Chen Feng said leisurely: "Don't worry, if we trade it according to the market value, it will be enough for my nephews and nieces to spend their lifetime."

Xu Fang sneered: "What Director Chen calls 'market value' is probably your unique market."

"I've said before that given the company's current situation, we don't have much bargaining power. Mr. Xu has not been in the industry for many years, so we should not have unrealistic expectations of the market."

At this point, Chen Feng smiled and said, "Or let the other directors of the board speak together and listen to everyone's suggestions for Director Xu."

There are nine directors in total on Youzu's board of directors. After Lin Qi's share reduction, his shareholding has dropped below 34% and he has lost his veto power, so everything currently has to be decided by voting.

Xu Fang looked around and her heart skipped a beat. Chen Feng had won the support of several directors before, and his voting rights were almost the same as hers. So the key to the matter lay in the few "neutral" independent directors.

Both sides have been trying to win them over for some time, but there seems to be no progress. However, from the current performance, it seems that several independent directors are willing to side with the other side.

Her expression didn't change, but she started to panic. If she lost these neutral votes, things would be really troublesome.

How to do?
Chen Feng's contemptuous expression flashed across his face, and then he said in a serious tone: "Director Xu, I know you want to support the company, but many things are not enough just by having ideas. It is better to leave professional matters to professionals, so that you can have more time to train our nephews and nieces into adults."

"By the way, I heard that Xu Yao is still delaying the judgment of the lawsuit with the excuse of 'mental illness'. You should put the company aside for a while and settle this matter first. It will also comfort the spirit of Lao Lin as soon as possible."

"And a few days ago, there was a rumor on the Internet that Lao Lin had an illegitimate child. This needs to be resolved quickly, otherwise it will not be good for both the individual and the company's reputation..."

"Oh!"

Just as Chen Feng was about to threaten him, the door of the conference room was suddenly pushed open from the outside. Then, everyone saw a girl in uniform walk in.

Everyone present were members of Youzu’s management, so they could naturally recognize that this was Xu Fang’s secretary.

No one knew what the two of them said, but Xu Fang's eyes suddenly lit up. Then, she suddenly stood up and said to everyone, "Excuse me, everyone, an important partner has arrived, and I have to receive him first."

"Haha, Director Xu, are you kidding? Nothing could be more important than the board of directors." Chen Feng said grimly, "Or maybe you are just trying to delay everyone's time."

"I'm sorry, Director Chen, but this cooperative guest is indeed very important to the entire Youzu." Xu Fang said without giving in.

"Oh, really? If it's so important, why not invite him to come and meet us?"

Chen Feng thought Xu Fang would refuse, but unexpectedly she agreed immediately.

Then, a young man with a somewhat elegant air walked in.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know your company was in a meeting. I'm sorry for coming here so hastily."

The young man looked at everyone and said with a smile: "Hello everyone, I am Meng Bai from Arclight Films."

(End of this chapter)