I can become stronger by paying salaries. I have one billion employees!

Chapter 335 40 Billion Burned Out? Chen Yansen: Admitting defeat requires attitude. If he wants to fight, then let's continue!
October 31st, autumn is in full swing.

The sky was overcast, and a light autumn rain was falling outside the window. Inside Building 3 of Hangzhou Shuyuan Software Park.

Hu Weiyi had just finished a product development meeting when she pulled Wang Zihao aside to discuss OFO bikes' product pre-launch promotion, resource allocation for the first day of launch, and advertising plans on the App Store, Android app markets, Wandoujia, and Orange App Store.

Wang Zihao sat in his seat, glanced at the scenery outside the window, and couldn't help but sigh inwardly. He couldn't understand Chen Yansen's thinking. He was doing well as the director of Pinduoduo's advertising, but he had to kick him to Hangzhou to be Hu Weiyi's COO.

Does he know anything about shared bikes?
Do not understand.

Does he understand the overall operation of the project?

Do not understand.

But when he went to Chen Yansen with his questions, the other party said, "If you don't understand, go and learn. OFO bikes always need someone to keep an eye on them."

These words made Hao Ge happy for a long time. By the time he realized what was happening, he had already arrived in Hangzhou.

"Mr. Wang, you are most familiar with the heads of projects such as Toutiao, Lingxi Browser, Gaode Map and Kuaipao. We will rely on you for all the cross-platform cooperation matters in the future."

Hu Weiyi smiled and said softly.

She didn't dare to object to Chen Yansen's arrangement, after all, OFO was a wholly-owned subsidiary of Senlian Capital, and she and Wang Zihao were both working-class people.

In reality, Wang Zihao's status is much higher than hers.

Although he is not yet qualified for the position of Chief Operating Officer (COO), Wang Zihao has served as the advertising director of FoxTao and Pinbei Mall. He has an incredibly strong network of connections in the industry and can easily secure resource slots on major portal websites and social media platforms.

With Wang Zihao around, OFO bikes will never lack traffic resources.

Moreover, compared to professional managers, Hu Weiyi wouldn't dare say that she is much more capable.

She needs to adapt to the CEO position, and so does Wang Zihao.

To ensure complete control over the OFO project, Chen Yansen not only temporarily transferred a group of people from Gaode and Kuaidi Dache to support the development work, but also placed his own people in the human resources, finance and legal departments.

Hu Weiyi only has operational rights and some decision-making power!

His permissions are comparable to those of Liao Wei of Yunsu Express and Zhang Yiming of ByteDance.

Chen Yansen was too lazy to test human nature, so he directly started with personnel and finance, bringing them under the unified management of headquarters before he would feel at ease.

Human hearts are fickle!

"No problem, Mr. Hu. Brother Sen gave instructions in advance that once OFO bikes are launched, the daily exposure will not be less than 3000 million in the first week."

Wang Zihao responded with a smile.

Others don't have this confidence, but he does!

The Orange App Store, Toutiao, Lingxi Browser, and Gaode Maps alone can provide OFO bikes with around 2000 million exposures.

In addition, Tencent originally intended to invest in Didi Bike, but after learning that Chen Yansen had launched OFO bike-sharing, Liu Zhiping instructed Lin Chenfeng to immediately cancel the plan and prepare to participate in OFO's Series A financing.

3000?
Hu Weiyi smiled slightly and thought to herself: It feels so good to have a powerful backer. They give you money, people, and resources whenever you want.

Starting a business can be so simple!
It's worth noting that her "Geek Cars" magazine, founded three years ago, has remained lukewarm in popularity, relying entirely on advertising revenue from car manufacturers to stay afloat.

They don't earn much money, and they don't live a comfortable life.

After deciding to take over the OFO bicycle project, she sold Geek Auto magazine to Li Bin of Bitauto, and it is now being incorporated into the company.

“I heard from an investment banking friend in Beijing that Cheng Wei of Didi Bike has been frequently contacting investors recently, probably because he wants to expand the scale of deployment again.”

After finishing her work discussion, Hu Weiyi casually chatted with Wang Zihao.

"Although the market for shared bikes is large, the profit margin is low. With Didi Bike helping us cultivate the market in the early stages, we can actually save a lot of manpower and resources. Starting early does not guarantee victory. Mr. Hu, we must have confidence in our product."

Wang Zihao said dismissively.

He had been working with Chen Yansen for over two years, experiencing numerous business battles, big and small, and never took Cheng Wei seriously.

He knew very well that besides Didi Bike, a whole host of competing apps would emerge.

Unless they follow the example of companies like Kuaidi and Didi Chuxing, relentlessly burning money to expand their market share, offering discounts of up to 14 yuan three times a day without distinguishing between new and old customers, thus deterring competitors from entering the market.

The speed at which Kuaidi and Didi Chuxing burned through cash was something no entrepreneur or venture capital firm dared to follow.

While the two were talking, hundreds of kilometers away in Yanjing...

Li Yanhong stared at Didi Chuxing's financial statements in silence for a long time, his eyebrows furrowed tightly together like a pretzel.

Didi Chuxing used up more than 90% of its 12 billion yuan Series E funding in just one month, leaving only 50 million yuan in its accounts.

Xiang Hailong canceled the old customer subsidy program in North China and East China three days ago, and the subsidy per order for drivers was also reduced from 5 yuan to 2 yuan. Currently, only the first order discount for new customers remains.

Seeing this, Cheng Weixing changed the discount for existing customers of Kuaidi Dache back to the previous lucky draw red envelope system, with amounts ranging from 5 to 12 yuan. Existing customers could receive 5 to 8 yuan, while new customers could receive 9 to 12 yuan.

Drivers' order-taking subsidies have been reduced to 3 yuan to prevent Didi Chuxing from launching a counterattack!

Both sides tacitly suspended the subsidy war!

从10月1日到10月27日，快的和嘀嘀打车总共砸了22亿华元，硬生生把用户的叫车习惯给培养出来了。

In cities like Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, Nanjing, and Lu'an, taxi drivers simply cannot get any orders if they don't download ride-hailing apps.

Since ride-hailing apps came along, who still stands miserably on the roadside in the cold wind, waving their arms to flag down a car?

Nowadays, passengers often call a taxi before they even leave the building, and the driver arrives just as they reach the entrance of the community.

"On October 28th, Didi Chuxing's daily average order volume reached 856,000!"

"On October 29th, Didi Chuxing's daily average order volume reached 856,000!"

"On October 30th, Didi Chuxing's daily average order volume reached 856,000!"

Once the subsidies stop, the relationship is gone.

Li Yanhong took a deep breath and forcibly suppressed his frustrated emotions. At the current rate, in less than half a month, Didi Chuxing's daily order volume would drop to 60 or even less than 50.

Although Baidu Maps has improved its ride-hailing order business, it only generates a few hundred thousand orders per day.

If Didi Chuxing's orders really drop below 50 in half a month, the daily gross profit will likely not be able to cover labor costs.

Moreover, with Kuaidi Dache eyeing the market covetously, it's virtually impossible for Didi Dache to make a profit.

"It's time to talk."

Li Yanhong rubbed his dry eyes, raised his head, and muttered to himself.

In his opinion, Chen Yansen probably couldn't hold on any longer either.

Thinking of this, he picked up his phone from the table and dialed Liu Zhiping, the vice president of Tencent.

At the last Internet conference, he asked Ma Wenteng to mediate, and later he took the initiative to break the verbal agreement of "not fighting a subsidy war". Therefore, Li Yanhong could not save face, so he wanted to use Liu Zhiping to convey the meaning of "seeking peace" to Ma Wenteng and Chen Yansen.

Although Chen Yansen's behavior of using third-party apps to conduct subsidy activities was extremely unethical, it was Li Yanhong who first restarted the subsidy war on ride-hailing apps.

To some extent, it was indeed Li Yanhong who broke the rules first.

However, in Ma Wenteng's eyes, neither of these two people was any good, and he didn't give them any face at all.

They say nice things and are willing to accept mediation, but then they turn around and use all sorts of tricks to treat his words like dirt.

But he didn't dislike Chen Yansen at all; on the contrary, he admired him even more. After all, what's the point of talking about credit when you're a businessman?

Especially between Kuaidi and Didi Chuxing, both have already burned through billions of yuan, so burning through another billion won't hurt. It's a winner-takes-all situation!

With an average of 1000 million orders per day nationwide, who wouldn't want to have all the business to themselves?

the other side.

Liu Zhiping was sitting in Ma Wenteng's office, talking about the recent shared bicycle project.

"Cheng Wei is quite talented. He has a keen business sense. He started a ride-hailing service and then moved on to bike-sharing," Liu Zhiping said, taking a sip of his tea.

"It's a pity that we failed to secure Didi Bike's angel round funding, allowing Li Fukai of Innovation Works to get a bargain."

Ma Wenteng commented with a light laugh.

With over 280 million registered users and over 100 million daily active users, WeChat has undoubtedly made the right bet and successfully secured the gateway to the mobile internet.

His investments in Pinduoduo, Kuaipao, and Kuaidi Dache brought him considerable profits, naturally putting him in a great mood.

"If you missed out on Didi Bike, there's still OFO, right? Instead of investing in Cheng Wei, you should continue to bet on Chen Yansen."

Liu Zhiping put down his teacup and said firmly.

"This kid is like he's got a cheat code. What young man can earn 500 billion US dollars in assets at the age of twenty? I heard that the media in Europe and America have been praising him to the skies, regarding Zuckerberg as the American version of Chen Yansen."

Ma Wenteng picked up the teapot, refilled Liu Zhiping's cup with tea, and then said with a smile.

Zuckerberg? The American version of Chen Yansen!
Liu Zhiping choked on his saliva and quickly covered his mouth and nose, coughing a few times as he turned to the side. His face turned bright red, and it took him a while to recover before he said, "Zuckerberg is eight years older than Chen Yansen, right?"

"Who told Chen Yansen to be wealthier than him?"

Ma Wenteng shrugged, recalling Song Yuncheng who was with Chen Yansen, and sighed inwardly: This kid is quite suitable to be a son-in-law, but it seems he has a girlfriend.

“Buzz buzz—!”

Just as Liu Zhiping was about to speak, his phone rang in his pocket. He took it out and was immediately surprised.

It wasn't that he was surprised Li Yanhong called him, but rather that the call came so late.

According to his and Ma Wenteng's estimates, Li Yanhong should be unable to hold on until mid-October.

If it were someone else, they might have fought Chen Yansen for several more rounds and burned through billions of dollars. But Li Yanhong is different. He has extremely low tolerance for a new project. If it doesn't turn a profit within six months, the project and its person in charge will be eliminated.

This is also the main reason why Liu Zhiping was certain that Li Yanhong would admit defeat.

"It's Li Yanhong on the phone," Liu Zhiping explained to Ma Wenteng, placing his phone flat on the table.

“Robin can’t take it anymore, let’s answer and see what he has to say.” Ma Wenteng adjusted his glasses and pushed them up, replying without hesitation.

Liu Zhiping hummed in response, pressed the answer button, and then pressed the speakerphone button.

"Martin, I need to trouble you with something," Li Yanhong said directly, without beating around the bush.

In his logic, as the third largest shareholder of Kuaidi Dache, Tencent naturally wants to end the subsidy war as soon as possible, which would be a good thing for everyone.

"Robin, you tell us first," Liu Zhiping asked, feigning ignorance.

“I want Mr. Ma to act as an intermediary and sign a formal agreement with Chen Yansen to end the subsidy war,” Li Yanhong replied.

"Robin, firstly, the legal effect of this agreement is questionable; secondly, what if a new ride-hailing app emerges after Kuaidi Dache and Didi Dache end their subsidy war?"

Liu Zhiping countered with a question.

The best way to resolve the conflict between the two companies is to merge; he knew this, and Li Yanhong knew it too.

Everyone was playing dumb, waiting for the other person to speak first.

"Does President Liu mean we should continue burning through 12 billion yuan a month at the current rate?" Li Yanhong asked.

"Mr. Li, you need to understand one thing: the major shareholder of Kuaidi Dache is Chen Yansen." Liu Zhiping didn't respond and passed the buck back to Li.

Seeing that the other party was not responding, Li Yanhong pondered for more than ten seconds and then smiled bitterly, saying, "President Liu wants to broker a merger between Kuaidi and Didi? Is this President Ma's idea or Chen Yansen's idea?"

If that's Chen Yansen's idea, the subsidy war in the ride-hailing industry could end if he agreed.

"As for whether Mr. Chen will agree, I can't guarantee it. Of course, if Didi Chuxing's valuation is reasonable enough, I think Chen Yansen won't reject the merger proposal."

Liu Zhiping said slowly and deliberately.

The implication is that if Li Yanhong is willing to bleed money, he will go and talk to Chen Yansen.

"Didi Chuxing raised 12 billion yuan in its Series E funding round, valuing the company at 80 billion yuan." Li Yanhong understood Liu Zhiping's meaning, his face darkened, and he squinted as he spoke.

He has no objection to the merger!

But Chen Yansen shouldn't try to bully people too much; he can't give up a single cent of the 80 billion yuan valuation!

"Mr. Li, Didi Chuxing's valuation is inflated; half of its value is burned through subsidies."

Liu Zhiping frowned, looking displeased, and cursed Li Yanhong inwardly for not seeing the situation clearly.

half?
Cutting 40 billion in one go?
Li Yanhong gasped, his anger rising within him.

Didi Chuxing's Series E funding round of 12 billion yuan was solely invested by Qiandu.com. Including the 8000 million yuan from Series D, 1 million yuan from Series C, and 3000 million yuan from Series B, not counting the investment in human resources and traffic resources, the total financial investment alone reached 14.1 billion yuan.

With a 44.4% stake in Qiandu.com and a valuation of 40 billion yuan, the company can only cash out 17.6 billion yuan. After working hard for half a year, the company only earned 3 million yuan.

Li Yanhong was extremely dissatisfied!
"President Liu, this price is utterly insincere. If Tencent and Senlian Capital want to continue this fight, Baidu will fight to the bitter end." Li Yanhong's face was cold, and a ruthless glint flashed in his eyes.

If all else fails, we can just invest more and keep going with Kuaidi Dache!

Liu Zhiping snorted coldly and relayed the information directly: "This is Chen Yansen's offer, Robin. Losers should have the awareness of losers."

"Did Didi Chuxing lose? I don't think so!"

After saying that, Li Yanhong hung up the phone aggressively.

"He's clueless and can't see things clearly. Robin is technically skilled, but his management skills are terrible. Over the years, apart from search and Baidu Tieba, Baidu hasn't produced any decent products."

Ma Wenteng's lips curled down in disdain. He then picked up his teacup, took a sip, and gave a nonchalant evaluation.

"Then I'll call Mr. Chen back."

Liu Zhiping said.

Ma Wenteng nodded, offering no objection.

Liu Zhiping picked up his phone and dialed Chen Yansen: "Li Yanhong refused."

"He wants to admit defeat, maintain his dignity, and make a quick buck, but he refuses to lower his offer. He's dreaming! I understand, Mr. Liu, thank you." Chen Yansen said speechlessly.

If Baidu doesn't raise more investment, Didi Chuxing's market share will drop below 10% in another half month. Perhaps then Robin Li will finally realize the reality.

If Li Yanhong invests more, we can just play for another month!

He had already made arrangements with companies such as Tencent, Ali, Goldman Sachs, DST, and Huazhong University of Science and Technology, and could launch a Series C funding round at any time.

How can Baidu, going it alone, compete with the combination of internet capital, state-owned capital, and foreign capital?

at the same time.

Cheng Wei, who was ousted by Li Yanhong, is at the peak of his career. IDG Capital led the Series A funding round for Didi Bike, with Sequoia Capital and Think Capital participating. The round raised 3 million yuan.

It has quickly become a leader in the shared bicycle industry!
　Godfathers, please vote for me!
　　
　
(End of this chapter)