Rebirth Tokyo 1986

Chapter 429 Youth Music

Upon returning to Tokyo, Masato Takeshita first dealt with the accumulated documents, and then went directly to Starsea Capital.

Have all of Netscape's investments been dealt with?

"They're all sold out. Where does the chairman plan to invest the funds?"

"Yes, continue buying stocks of tech companies like Yahoo, Cisco, and Microsoft."

When buying stocks, it's natural to choose technology stocks.

However, thinking of the stock shares, Masato Takeshita quickly added another sentence.

"By the way, the maximum shareholding is 25%."

"Yes, please rest assured, Chairman."

"Ah That's good."

Masato Takeshita had complete confidence in Takamasa Kamoto.

He then steered the conversation toward the Hong Kong and Southeast Asian stock markets instead of continuing.

"The stock markets in Hong Kong and Southeast Asia are very abnormal right now. Let's start to gradually sell off our stocks and try to clear out our positions around the Chinese New Year next year."

"Yes, President!"

Jia Benlong sensed the urgency in his chairman's tone and couldn't help but mentally pronounce a death sentence on Southeast Asia and Hong Kong.

"With the chairman in such a hurry, I reckon there's going to be another stock market crash in Hong Kong and Southeast Asia."

"Could it be that Western countries want to give mainland China a warning?"

As a financial capitalist, Jia Benlong naturally needed to be involved in major domestic and international events. The return of Hong Kong was the only key factor he could think of.

"Alright, stop overthinking. It has nothing to do with us. Anyway, our company never shorts stocks, so guessing the outcome is pointless."

By not shorting or lending, Xinghai Capital can remain invincible forever. Even if other capital wants to attack it, they will have no way to do so.

He had absolutely no trust in the secrecy surrounding Wall Street and the City of London.

If he dares to short sell, he might be targeted by a group of investors at any time.

It's worth noting that the current Nasdaq chairman, Madoff, was involved in a Ponzi scheme.

Masato Takeshita couldn't trust such a guy at all.

However, this is a characteristic of the financial sector.

Either you're a smart person who can provide customers with a decent income.

That way, even if you use tricks, no one will question you.

Madoff is a classic example of a smart person who messed things up.

Either you are an honest person, then someone will choose to help you.

After all, everyone prefers to deal with honest people, especially in the cutthroat world of finance.

Perhaps the more you lack something, the more you crave it.

As for honest and intelligent people, they are a rare breed in the financial field, and everyone longs to find one.

Currently, Masato Takeshita is regarded in the financial world as a typical example of honesty and intelligence. Therefore, both Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley hope to cooperate deeply with him.

In fact, not only developed countries such as the United States and Japan, but also emerging countries such as Singapore are eager to obtain shares of the Starsea Fund.

To save face for them, the Xinghai Foundation will symbolically distribute a few portions to avoid making things too awkward for each other.

As for a larger share, you need to have a dominant position worldwide.

For example, in China, once young people are interested, they will immediately offer a large share.

It won't surpass the United States, but it should be able to keep up with Western Europe and Japan without any problem.

After concluding his inspection of the Xinghai Foundation, Masato Takeshita diligently visited Xinghai Network once again.

It's developing very well here now, and it has already taken the lead in the social, shopping, and search sectors in Japan.

Of course, Masato Takeshita's visit this time was not to inquire about the situation in Japan.

He is more concerned about the development of QQ chat and Starsea Mail in other countries.

"QQ chat is developing very smoothly and currently occupies more than 90% of the market share in the United States and Western Europe."

"Yahoo, Microsoft, and AOL want to compete with us, but none of them are a match for us."

Yahoo, Microsoft, and AOL were the three giants in the early days of instant messaging.

But none of these three companies ultimately succeeded.

Even so, the young man remained very cautious in his words.

"You still have to be careful. All three of them have their own traffic entry points. If you're not careful, you could really crash and burn."

The past life is the past life, and it does not completely represent this life.

These three companies might actually be able to survive against the behemoth that is Xinghai Group.

After all, many company leaders are like Cao Cao: brilliant and resourceful when at a disadvantage, but squander their advantages and lose.

"Yes, I understand."

Yoshinobu Shimada, the person in charge of the QQ chat project, looked stern and quickly put away his somewhat arrogant attitude.

He certainly didn't want to offend his own chairman and lose this rare opportunity to rise to power.

"Okay, could you tell me the specific user data for the major markets?"

Although he already had the relevant data in his office, Masato Takeshita still wanted to confirm it personally.

In this way, it will be less likely to be deliberately misled by a few individuals at headquarters.

You should know that there will never be a shortage of extremely greedy people.

In case the company encounters problems someday, then

If a bribed secretary deliberately shows him false data praising his achievements, wouldn't he suffer a huge loss of money and business reputation?
Yoshinobu Shimada was prepared for his chairman's inquiry and immediately took out his notebook to report on each point.

"Currently, the United States has the largest number of users, with over 2000 million registered accounts and over 50 concurrent users."

"Japan ranks second, with over 1300 million registered accounts and 35 concurrent users."

"Third in Western Europe, with over 1100 million registered accounts and 30 concurrent users."

……

"Is the growth rate really that fast?"

Takeshita Masato was somewhat surprised. He remembered that instant messaging companies in his previous life hadn't developed this fast.

"It's mainly thanks to the chairman who helped us advertise extensively in internet cafes, newspapers, magazines, and television."

"That's it, I understand."

Masato Takeshita immediately understood the reasoning behind it when he thought about the early history of Apple's iPhone.

Even renowned companies like Apple, which pioneered a new era of mobile phones, didn't see their phones become bestsellers right away.

The first-generation iPhone sold over 1 million units, and the second generation just over 10 million.

the reason is simple,
At that time, Apple was a newcomer to the mobile phone industry, lacking its own brand awareness, sales channels, and production channels.

Xinghai Company is different; it has internet cafes as a powerful promotional tool.

At the same time, QQ is also very suitable for internet cafes, and it immediately gained the support of countless netizens as soon as it was launched.

Many people even chat about it all day long, like game enthusiasts, wishing they could spend 24 hours a day on it.

However, this data is not enough to make young people lower their guard. ICQ and Yahoo, both with hundreds of millions of users in their past lives, still declined just as quickly.

With only tens of millions of registered QQ accounts, we can't afford to let our guard down.

It's important to know that registered accounts don't represent real user data; at least half of it is lost.

After all, account registration is free, so many people will register multiple accounts.

"We can only say that we have a slight advantage, but it's not a big one."

"We must optimize and innovate the software functions, such as copy and paste, screenshot, offline file upload, and offline file download. None of these functions can be omitted."

"Also, add the custom profile picture and stuff to it."

The reason why QQ was able to defeat Yahoo and MSN, which were at their peak overseas, was mainly due to the innovation of software applications.

Of course, the advantage of going first is equally important.

Because Tencent was an early adopter, it quickly created a snowball effect, much like the current situation of Xinghai Group.

"Oh, and don't forget to find people to criticize them online. Call them shoddy imitators, mindless plagiarists." Don't think that plagiarism is only criticized domestically; there are actually many more like it abroad.

It's just a chat app; when people have a choice, they will naturally prefer the genuine product.

In this way, those software programs tainted by plagiarism will be even less of a match for QQ.

"Yes, I understand."

Yoshinobu Shimada's eyes lit up as he listened, never expecting his chairman to have so many brilliant ideas.

The idea of ​​criticizing both companies for plagiarism online was absolutely brilliant.

"Okay, just remember that."

Masato Takeshita nodded, then tapped his finger on the table as a reminder.

"But don't forget that even the best advertising requires technical support. QQ needs to maintain its leading position in terms of simplicity in its application so that its competitors will despair and not be tempted to engage in large-scale competition."

"Yes, President!"

After learning about QQ chat, Masato Takeshita contacted Shigeru Oshima, the president of Seikai Mailbox.

Same problem, same formula.

However, compared to QQ's absolute monopoly, the email market is a highly competitive arena with many players vying for dominance.

While Xinghai Mail has achieved rapid growth through its free strategy, its paid email services are also thriving.

It is estimated that Xinghai Mailbox will not be able to establish its advantage until next year.

There's nothing we can do about it; Xinghai Group was the pioneer of QQ Chat, while Xinghai Email Group was the challenger.

In terms of difficulty, they are not even in the same league.

Furthermore, email is inherently unsuitable for monopolization.

No matter how well Xinghai Mail develops, it will be difficult for it to occupy more than 50% of the market.

After inspecting the two companies, Masato Takeshita found a restaurant that looked decent to him and ordered a beef set meal.

He felt that he had an air of superiority about him, which needed to be balanced by the down-to-earth nature of ordinary people.

Only in this way will he not lose his way in life.

"Indeed, the warmth and simplicity of everyday life are what truly touch the hearts of ordinary people."

Listening to everyone's noisy chatter, Masato Takeshita smiled happily.

He came from a lower-middle-class family, so naturally he couldn't forget his roots.

This is why he sent his daughter to a regular kindergarten and a primary school with a good learning environment, but which is geared towards the average citizen.

Being too detached from the general public will inevitably lead to problems sooner or later.

After lunch, the young man found a hotel to take a nap before setting off for Xinghai Music, a place he hadn't visited in a long time.

He had something he wanted to discuss with Masato Matsuura, the president of Seikai Music Company.

After a brief greeting, Takeshita Masato then inquired seriously.

"Matsuura-san, do you know the Backstreet Boys?"

"Yes, I've done some research. It's mainly known in Europe."

The Backstreet Boys are an American boy band formed in 1993.

But their album released last year didn't make a splash in the US; instead, it made it into the top 100 in the UK.

Therefore, they decided to switch their focus to Europe, hoping to achieve different results.

Great decision, the Backstreet Boys are already showing signs of becoming a hit in Europe.

“I think this will be a trend, a trend of teen top music.”

Teen Pop music, also known as youth pop music, is primarily aimed at young people.

The Korean groups that later generations of Chinese people are familiar with follow a similar model.

Male singers need to be handsome, cool, and dashing, while female singers need to be beautiful, sexy, and cute.

In short, as long as they are handsome men and beautiful women.

"trend?"

"Yes, the global music market is currently lacking in the youth segment."

The Backstreet Boys' rise to teen pop music was undoubtedly a trendsetter around the turn of the millennium.

Westlife, NEXT, Spice Girls, Britney Spears...

These are all super groups that have contributed to the rise of this youth fashion trend, as well as global superstars.

The entire East Asian society was also deeply affected by this trend.

Japan produced Asian superstar Ayumi Hamasaki, and South Korea followed this approach to develop popular boy and girl groups such as H.O.T., TVXQ, and Girls' Generation.

As for the Chinese music scene, S.H.E. is a similar group.

"So, does the president mean we should form boy and girl groups too?"

"Yes, not only in Japan, but I also hope that the company can take advantage of this wave to achieve development in the United States."

Masato Takeshita wanted to buy a global record company, but he didn't want to be cheated by Americans like Sony Pictures did.

So he plans to acquire a small to medium-sized record company to familiarize himself with their workflow.

It would be even better if the company could achieve a leap forward by leveraging this wave of youth pop music.

When it comes time to acquire a giant company, they can gain more say in the deal.

"Develop in the United States!"

Matsuura Masato was shocked, but also excited.

After all, which musician wouldn't want to have a place in the global music center, the United States?

"Yes, I think this is a very good opportunity."

"Is this really possible?"

Matsuura Masato, a musician who was usually fearless and full of pride, couldn't help but feel uneasy.

America, he only thinks about it in his dreams.

"Of course, even if we fail, it won't affect us."

"Okay, let's do it."

After thinking about it, Matsuura Masato realized that this was indeed the case.

The group has money, so even if it fails in the United States, it will not have any impact.

However, considering the excellent situation the company is currently in, he hesitated.

If the US fails to capitalize on this opportunity, and China also misses out on this development opportunity, wouldn't that be a huge loss?

"Um, if I go to America, what will I do here?"

"No, no, no, you need to stay. It has to be in the United States, specifically the US mainland."

Masato Takeshita would naturally not let Katsuto Ura go to America unchecked.

Because in its previous life, Avex, which is now Seikai Music, established its leading position in the Japanese music industry in just a few years.

Missing this opportunity would be an unbearable loss for Xinghai Music.

After all, if Xinghai Group wants to expand globally, it can achieve this by acquiring international record giants.

As for Japan, once they miss this opportunity, it will be very difficult to have another chance.

"Ah, then what should I do?"

Matsuura Masato was a little dumbfounded, feeling that it didn't matter whether he was told or not.

"You arrange for someone to acquire a record company, and then find more promising talents."

"I understand."

"Don't worry, there will be times when I need your help."

Masato Matsuura has a great talent for business. He turned a small company into the number one in Japan with just one Komuro Tetsuya craze.

Once given a bigger stage, they will definitely shine even brighter.

(End of this chapter)