Entertainment: I am the peak

Chapter 735 Lobbying for a Joint Acquisition
Simplified Chinese website is currently focusing entirely on the Feng Xiaogang case.

The following day, the tax authorities issued a decision requiring Feng Xiaogang to pay the outstanding taxes, late fees, and fines, totaling 20.39 billion yuan, within a specified period after receiving the aforementioned penalty decision.

The whole world is shocked!

This number is scary!

20 billion!
The following day, Xu Fan issued an apology letter via Feng Xiaogang's Weibo account, stating that he would actively cooperate with the investigation and pay the outstanding taxes and fines.

According to previous regulations, this 20 billion could exempt him from punishment for stealing gold coins, but the case of laundering gold coins should still be judged according to the established rules.

Many people in the industry were terrified and began to investigate and correct their mistakes. They believed that as long as they remained in the industry, they could earn their money back eventually, but if they were imprisoned, they would lose everything.

It's currently the National Day holiday and the market is closed, but it's easy to imagine that in six days, Huayi Brothers and even the entire film and television media sector will see a decline.

This case has severely damaged public confidence in investing in the film and television sector.

On the fifth day of the holiday, Xu Fan made his first public appearance, stating that he would weather the storm with his family and once again admitted his mistakes and apologized. Meanwhile, netizens revealed that Xu Fan has begun selling real estate and some of Feng Xiaogang's art collection in hopes of raising funds.

Let's see if we can scrape together 20 billion yuan in cash by skinning and dismembering Feng Xiaogang's entire family.

But Feng Xiaogang probably doesn't need to pay the bulk of the cost.

Let's not worry about how others raise the money; let's just look at the film market during the National Day holiday.

"Li Cha's Aunt" earned 1.06 million yuan on its opening day, leading the box office, thanks to the brand name of Mahua comedy. However, the film's quality was widely questioned by the audience, and its daily box office revenue continued to decline during the holiday, eventually being overtaken by "Project Gutenberg".

The highly anticipated film "Shadow" captivated audiences with its unique black-and-white ink-wash aesthetic.

You can say that Zhang Yimou can't tell a story, but when it comes to photography and art direction, he's truly unparalleled.

Li Qiutang got up early to go to work that day, but seeing his wife half asleep and still lingering in bed, he gently kicked her butt twice: "Are you really not going to work?"

"I told you I wanted a long vacation, I wanted to rest."

"Even when you're resting, find something to do. Staying home all day won't make you feel restless."

"Who said I have nothing to do? I made plans to go swimming and get a beauty treatment today. Where are you going so early in the morning? Isn't the company on holiday?"

"I'm not lying, I'm going to earn money for you to go swimming and get beauty treatments."

Seeing that Li Qiutang had finished dressing and washing up and was about to leave, Liu Yifei sat up and asked her husband for a kiss: "Give me a kiss before you go."

"No kiss, you haven't even washed your face."

"You're making me angry first thing in the morning."

Despite his teasing, Li Qiutang still leaned down and kissed his wife on the lips.

"Don't sleep, get up and help your mother with some chores." These were the last words Li Qiutang said before she left.

Liu Yifei lay down, deciding to take a nap.

Li Qiutang is going to meet with several executives from Tencent today to discuss some matters.

LeEco is undergoing bankruptcy reorganization, and many investors are eyeing its video platform and its copyright library.

Autumn Films is undoubtedly the most important potential buyer.

one!

There are plenty of buyers with stronger financial backing than Qiutian, so Li Qiutang is not confident of winning.

iQiyi, Youku, and Tencent Video are all eyeing this piece of meat, but according to the information currently available, they are only interested. They have their own development strategies and will not rashly reach out to outsiders. Li Qiutang brought people to talk to Tencent today to persuade them to abandon LeEco and instead cooperate with Qiutang to form a joint acquisition team to take over LeEco.

"Your platform is already big enough, taking LeEco is useless." Unlike iQiyi and Youku, Tencent Video is an independent company; it is a business unit within Tencent Group.

Tencent's real aim is LeEco's copyright library, but the copyright library isn't sold separately; it must be bundled with the platform.

"You don't need to spend such a large sum of money; it's not worth it."

Tencent has certainly taken this into account, which is why it is only somewhat interested in acquiring LeEco.

When they approached Tencent Penguin Alliance in the fall, they didn't intend to license LeTV's copyright library to Tencent Video after their success.

Because there's no such great deal in the world that penguins can take advantage of.

“We will form a new company to make the acquisition. The new company will be a new platform to enter the market competition. You will be shareholders and will benefit as well.”

Penguin has invested in many competing companies in the same industry, which is nothing special.

In fact, Li Qiutang had guessed Tencent's concerns. If Autumn successfully acquired LeEco, LeEco would possess the largest film and television copyright library in the country—and this "largest" truly meant the largest, far surpassing all other competitors. The combined film libraries of iQiyi, Youku, and Tencent Video might not even equal Autumn's combined library with LeEco's. Furthermore, the new platform and company would be backed by the most powerful film and television group in the country in terms of production and distribution.

This is the outcome that iQiyi, Youku, and Tencent Video least want to see.

However, there are also problems. Qiutian has no experience in internet operations or video platforms. Even if the acquisition is successful, Qiutian may not be able to operate it well.

This is also a concern for Li Qiutang. Both Autumn Pictures and Century Autumn are traditional film studios, and they are indeed not up to the task when it comes to playing with internet platforms.

That's why Li Qiutang sought cooperation with Tencent.

The conditions are simple and clear: the benefits of penguins collaborating with autumn outweigh the drawbacks.

Of course, if Tencent refuses, Li Qiutang will seek cooperation with Sunac. Sunac is a shareholder of LeEco, so it would be more convenient to cooperate with them. However, Mr. Sun does not understand film and television or the Internet, so cooperating with him would not be of much help to the operation of the new platform.

For Qiu Tian, ​​forming a joint acquisition team is not difficult; the key is finding someone to cooperate with.

Li Qiutang was busy all day, and in the evening she went back to the company to have a meeting with the publishing team.

Because the distribution department made a suggestion to Li Qiutang—to re-release "In Time" to generate buzz for "The Wandering Earth".

This was a strategy that Li Qiutang hadn't considered before, but she felt it had potential, so she listened to the distribution team explain it in detail.

"In Time" gave Chinese science fiction a brief glimmer of hope. Although it did not promote the development of Chinese science fiction films at the time, "In Time" can be said to be the first truly significant Chinese science fiction blockbuster.

"The Wandering Earth" marks Li Qiutang's return to science fiction after seven years since "In Time," and its significance is equally extraordinary.

"We plan to re-release it in mid-January for about 10 days. We won't trouble Liu Ye and the others. You and Yifei will have to work hard and attend two events. This will be a good way to warm up for 'The Wandering Earth' on the first day of the Lunar New Year."

Li Qiutang thought it was a good idea and agreed to the proposal to re-release the film without much thought.

Unexpectedly, the distribution department asked him again, "Do you need to re-edit a version? Many people want to see your director's cut." After "In Time" finished its theatrical run, Li Qiutang said that a lot of material was cut from the theatrical release, "If I have the opportunity in the future, I will edit an ultimate complete version for everyone to see."

But this promise hasn't come true in seven years.

Li Qiutang thought for a moment and said, "Forget it, let's not cut it. The theatrical version almost didn't pass censorship back then, making a director's cut would only cause trouble for ourselves."

But then he said, "I'll edit a behind-the-scenes documentary and put it online for free, as a way to give back to my fans."

"Okay. Then we'll get started on applying for a re-release and film restoration."

"You guys just keep an eye on this."

(End of this chapter)