I'm in the county town, and you say I'm a big shot?

Chapter 428 Let's not be the so-called Eighteen Arhats of Alibaba, but true brothers!

"I'm absolutely against it!" Kang Jia said vehemently, "Alibaba's intentions are obvious to everyone; they'll definitely kick us aside in the future! I ask you, are you willing to let go of the food we've worked so hard to build?!"

"It doesn't really matter," Deng Ye said while eating barbecue. "We can use the money to start a new business."

"So that's how it is, Deng Ye. You've had ulterior motives all along, you idiot!" Kang Jia stared wide-eyed at Deng Ye sitting opposite him.

"What do you mean you had second thoughts?" Deng Ye was displeased. "I've been away from home for 360 out of 365 days this year, and I've barely seen my girlfriend. Why? Because I was hungry!"

"If that's the case, why did you agree to sell Ele.me?! This is the culmination of our hard work! Have you forgotten the oath we made?!" Kang Jia pressed aggressively.

“I haven’t forgotten!” Deng Ye argued. “Selling Ele.me to Alibaba would have led to better development!”

"A hammer of development!" Konka retorted bluntly. "Look at the companies Alibaba acquired or controlled—which one has fared well? Yahoo! China, Taobao Jianghu, Koubei? Aren't they all finished?!"

"Alright, alright, you two stop arguing!" Wang Yuan quickly stepped in to mediate, acting as peacemaker: "What's the point of you two arguing? The final decision doesn't belong to you or me, it belongs to Fang Qingye! He has the final veto power!"

After Wang Yuan said this, neither of them said a word, one drinking beer and the other eating barbecue.

"Do you think Fang Qingye will agree?" Zhang Xuhao, who had been silent until now, finally spoke up.

"Definitely not!" Kang Jia put down his beer glass. "Fang Qingye has huge ambitions. I think he's aiming to go head-to-head with Alibaba. How could he possibly be someone else's stepping stone?!"

"What?! You're saying Fang Qingye wants to go head-to-head with Alibaba?!" The other three were stunned, with Zhang Xuhao especially eager: "Fang Qingye told you that?"

"Hammer, how could that be? If anyone were to tell, it would only be Wang Chenyang. This is just my guess!" Kang Jia continued, "Although Fang Qingye started relatively late, look at how much he has accomplished in just a few years. Not to mention Ele.me, he has invested in Dajiang, acquired a controlling stake in ByteDance, and wholly owned Tomorrow Cube. I heard he just acquired a bank as well."

"We already have finance, investment, and internet information distribution. And then there's Ele.me. According to Fang Qingye, we want to build it into an instant e-commerce platform that integrates catering, hotel accommodation, tourism, department stores, pharmaceuticals, and other transaction categories and fulfillment services—a 'everything delivered to your door' platform. How big do you think his ambition is? How can we not challenge Alibaba? Even if we don't have that capability now, what about in the future?!"

Everyone remained silent and ate their barbecue in quiet.

“Anyway, I really admire Fang Qingye. He has courage and determination, and more importantly, he doesn’t try to seize power! Look at Alibaba, think about Sun Tongyu’s fate. If Alibaba had acquired Ele.me, we would have ended up like him,” Kang Jia said.

Everyone fell silent again.

Everyone has certainly heard of the name Sun Tongyu.

Sun Tongyu, the former president of Taobao and one of Alibaba's 11 founders, led Alibaba's B2B company to a successful IPO in 2007. However, on the eve of Singles' Day that year, Sun Tongyu suddenly received a notice to immediately step down as CEO of Taobao and "go to London Business School for further studies," ultimately being forced to leave Alibaba.

Outsiders interpreted it as Ma Yun "discarding the millstone after it has served its purpose," while industry insiders believed that the two had serious disagreements about the development of Taobao, forcing Ma Yun to drive Sun Tongyu away.

However, what they didn't expect was that a few years later, Sun Tongyu invested in Pinduoduo again, and it eventually surpassed Taobao, making a triumphant return.

Now, when people mention Sun Tongyu, it's hard not to feel a sense of shared sorrow.

Especially CEO Zhang Xuhao, will he become the next Sun Tongyu?!
“If we reject Alibaba, how about contacting Tencent? Although Tencent doesn’t do e-commerce, its QQ and the now-popular WeChat have huge user bases. If they invest, it would be very beneficial for us,” Zhang Xuhao said.

After hearing his words, everyone understood that he was also prepared to reject Alibaba's offer.

“We can raise this issue at the board meeting tomorrow,” Kang Jia immediately agreed.

Wang Yuan naturally had no objections.

Seeing his three partners' attitude, Deng Ye nodded. "Come on, let's have a drink." Kang Jia raised his beer glass, looking at everyone meaningfully: "I hope the four of us won't be like Alibaba's so-called Eighteen Arhats, but true brothers! Cheers!"

"Dry!"

The four beer glasses clinked together.

The next morning, the six members of Ele.me's board of directors gathered in the company's conference room to discuss Alibaba's acquisition plan, and they unanimously agreed to reject Alibaba's acquisition.

Now we face a problem: what to do with the remaining funding after rejecting Alibaba?
“Chairman Fang, can we contact Tencent? In terms of strength and user base, Tencent is comparable to Alibaba,” Zhang Xuhao said.

Fang Qingye gave a wry smile. "To be honest, I've already contacted Lin Haifeng, who's in charge of strategic investment at Tencent. Tencent's current investment focus is on the digital entertainment industry, and they're not interested in lifestyle e-commerce for the time being."

Fang Qingye's words immediately chilled everyone's hearts.

Kang Jia couldn't help but complain, "What a joke! They're just too afraid to go head-to-head with Alibaba."

"It's not that bad," Fang Qingye said with a smile. "Don't worry about me finding the financing; it definitely won't delay Ele.me's business development."

Since Fang Qingye said so, no one said anything more. After the meeting, Wang Chenyang went to Fang Qingye's office.

"Mr. Fang, which company are you planning to contact?" Wang Chenyang asked.

“Actually, we don’t need to look for anyone. Tuofang Technology can handle this 800 million investment,” Fang Qingye said with a smile.

"what?"

"Just kidding. I know this round of financing is not just about funding, but more importantly, it's about strategic support for Ele.me. That's why we value Alibaba and Tencent so much."

Fang Qingye was very frank. "Tuofang Technology, including the several companies I have invested in and controlled, does not yet have this capability."

"But there's one more."

"Which one?" Fang Qingye asked.

JD.com.

“JD.com? JD.com? But it’s much smaller than Taobao,” Wang Chenyang said.

"That's still traffic, it's better than nothing. I'm quite optimistic about JD.com. Although it can't compare to Alibaba overall, it can definitely compete with the latter in the e-commerce sector."

“Alright, I’ll go to Yanjing tomorrow. Do I need to tell Zhang Xuhao and the others?” Wang Chenyang asked again.

“I said, this time we don’t need to hide it from them,” Fang Qingye said.

The next day, Wang Chenyang led his assistants away from Shanghai and headed to Beijing.

Fang Qingye was not in a hurry to leave Shanghai. Besides Ele.me, she also needed to keep an eye on Tomorrow Cube.

Three days later, Wang Chenyang called from Yanjing, saying that JD.com was willing to invest in Ele.me and provide an entry point to JD.com.

(End of this chapter)