Chapter 654
Main Body
Chapter 654 Main Body
Several powerful companies are secretly planning to invest in Pinduoduo to counter Alibaba. The consensus among them, including Yu Xing, is that Baidu, which terminated its cooperation with Pinduoduo, is causing trouble.
However, Yu Xing then received a message from Pony saying that Li Yanhong denied that the leak was from Baidu.
The matter is somewhat confusing.
Would a sect leader lie about something like this?
Or, even if what he said is the truth, it may only be part of the truth.
After thinking about it, Yu Xing felt that he couldn't rule out this possibility.
In his call with Bi Sheng, he said: "It doesn't matter anymore. It could be Li Yanhong, it could be Wang Xing, or it could be someone with different opinions. But now is not the time to investigate this matter. It's easy for problems to arise when there are multiple parties involved in the cooperation."
"The important thing now is for you to step forward."
"Mr. Bi, this isn't something we're deliberately trying to do to cooperate with Alibaba. It's just that Pinduoduo is raising funds because of its business development needs. Do you understand what I mean?"
Bi Sheng's voice on the phone showed obvious hesitation: "I think I understand."
Yu Xing wasn't sure if Bi Sheng understood, so he made his point clear: "If possible, Pinduoduo's development should still be accelerated before Alibaba reacts. With this news being exposed, you need to stand up and make Alibaba think that you want to go up and challenge us, not that we are a bunch of ambitious people."
“Alibaba is now headed by Zhang Yong, who is different from Ma Chuan.”
"How can a small company compete with a big company? By taking advantage of their arrogance."
"Tencent's arrogance back then was that it thought it could easily defeat WeChat, but WeChat's development speed exceeded expectations, eventually attracting Alibaba's entry, and the situation has deteriorated to this day."
"Mr. Bi, most people can't imagine what they don't see in front of them."
"Alibaba is now even more arrogant than Tencent was back then. Since Zhang Yong has led Alibaba's consumption upgrade strategy and achieved results on Tmall, he will most likely continue to do so. This is his achievement since taking over Alibaba."
"The market segment that Pinduoduo is currently in was voluntarily abandoned by Alibaba."
"You need to get everyone's attention now. Simply put, you need to take the main responsibility this time."
Zhang Yong, Alibaba's current CEO, once made a public statement that revealed his thinking when describing the changes at Alibaba: "We can't go back to selling disposable shoes for 3.9 yuan a pair with free shipping."
Tmall is becoming increasingly branded and high-end, and its outstanding performance is further solidifying Alibaba's consumption upgrade strategy.
The characteristics of different leaders will obviously affect the company's strategic direction. Ma Chuan is decisive, while Zhang Yong is systematic, conservative, and listens to the comprehensive analysis of many senior executives.
In the past two years, Alibaba has not only been driving the consumption upgrade of e-commerce, but also spending money in various fields, which has diverted the company's resources and energy.
This is a rare window of opportunity for Pinduoduo.
At this stage, without a strong threat, even if Ma Chuan were to take over as CEO again, he would need to break the existing structure and interest pattern. It might not be extremely difficult, but it would certainly be quite challenging.
Yu Xing and Bi Sheng talked for a long time until the phone was almost out of battery before ending the call. In addition to communicating with him, Yu Xing also made direct calls to several other companies, including Meituan and JD.com.
Before the news leaked, Pony was trying to push for cooperation. He still wanted to bring Baidu back to the negotiating table and try to strengthen its traffic and resources to compete with Alibaba.
Yu Xing communicated with Liu Qiangdong and Wang Xing one after another. First, he agreed to JD.com's advertising on Douyin. Then, he and Wang Xing jointly denounced Alibaba for making Meituan dependent on it. Finally, he called Pony Ma.
“There’s no need to consider having Baidu continue investing.” He got straight to the point. “Pinduoduo needs funding and traffic, which it already has a lot of. The most important thing is Tencent’s support in social networking. Baidu is very weak in this area. If Pinduoduo’s development speed picks up this year, social capital will be willing to give it a try.”
Pony Ma, always cautious, thought for a moment and then said, "Robin called me on his own initiative and talked about the leak of information, so I think it's still credible..."
Yu Xing interrupted, "That happened yesterday. Whether it was him or not, it's him now. If it wasn't him, it's either me, you, Liu Qiangdong, or Wang Xing. Are we going to keep speculating internally?"
Upon hearing this, Pony added, "Then let's create a group chat and chat with Mr. Liu and Mr. Wang."
Yu Xing said, "I spoke with them last night, and they basically agreed to Pinduoduo's financing this time. There were some disagreements about the valuation before, but I talked with Mr. Bi again this morning. Now we're going to push it forward to $10-12 billion."
Bi Sheng had previously insisted on a valuation of $15 billion, but now a valuation at 6.7-8% of that has almost cleared away any obstacles. Pony Ma has fallen silent again.
After a long pause, he said, "Young people are quick to do things."
Yu Xing waited a while before hearing this, and said irritably, "I thought you had some golden advice. The most regrettable thing now is that Tencent's market share in the social field is not large enough. If WeChat could dominate the world, the effect would definitely be better."
Pony was speechless for a moment, then asked, "So, Mr. Yu, whose problem is this?"
"Of course, it's because Tencent is too arrogant," Yu Xing said calmly. "It can't even beat a fledgling entrepreneur. It deserves its current state. Now is the time to test whether Alibaba is arrogant. Let's see if it deserves it."
Pony wasn't angry. Instead, she retorted, "Mr. Yu, there's a reason your short-selling activities were exposed. You deserve it."
Yu Xing laughed: "That's right, even the things that exposed my identity were made by my own company. I deserve it, I only have myself to blame."
Even through the phone, Pony could sense the arrogance of the king of short sellers.
It can only be said that there are reasons why the other party could accelerate the cooperation, given that they have become a major short seller.
The leak of information about the conspiracy naturally caught the attention of Alibaba, who even held a meeting to discuss it.
Meanwhile, the revelation that Yu Xing and Pony, who had a sharp confrontation back then, may have secretly joined forces has sparked different opinions in public opinion, with many financial bloggers using this incident to criticize Yu Xing's stance.
“Yu Xing started out by criticizing Tencent, and now he’s teaming up with Tencent. This proves that he’s just a person who pursues profit.”
"Whether he's called Guo Shanfeng or Bai Xiaosheng, Yu Xing just likes to stand on a moral high ground and point fingers at others. He has long forgotten the predicament he faced when he was making WeChat. If Alibaba hadn't taken over, he would have gone bankrupt long ago!"
“If someone frequently uses morality to attack others, then you should be careful.”
"Those who follow the righteous path will find many supporters, while those who stray from it will find few. A businessman who made his fortune by shorting his peers and domestic companies will not go far. When people encounter a snake, they don't know whether it is poisonous or not; their first instinct is to avoid it and kill it."
The appearance of Yu Xing and Pony in the news is perhaps due to the latter's consistent low profile, while the former has been embroiled in a constant vortex of events recently, with almost all the media firepower from the Baidu and Alibaba camps being directed at him.
Furthermore, boycotts of silicon carbide vehicles have even emerged on the social media platforms of these two companies.
Just as Silicon Carbon Group was releasing its February car sales figures as usual, the 9518 units sold due to the Spring Festival holiday once again excited some people.
While a delivery volume of 9518 vehicles, which is in the 300,000-level range, is still quite impressive, the fact that the Carbon Silicon Group has maintained a sales volume of over 10,000 units for three consecutive months since November last year, and that it is now maintaining this figure just before the company goes public, has led to an immediate surge of pessimistic comments.
Range-extended vehicles are just a transitional technology!
—Once the subsidies are phased out, the silicon carbon group will be finished!
—The current market value of Silicon Carbon Group is still in a bubble!
This time, the voices of the automotive industry and short-selling institutions were added to the public discourse.
When Bi Sheng of Pinduoduo witnessed this sudden surge of public opinion, he considered how to assume the main responsibility and finally realized that what President Yu meant was that he wanted Alibaba to focus its attention on him.
As for how to attract attention...
Bi Sheng looked at Baidu, his former employer, which had previously over-commercialized its Tieba forum.
To be fair, I had a pretty good relationship with Robin Li when we were in the company, but we gradually drifted apart due to work-related reasons, both professionally and personally...
From a public standpoint, of course, we must stand with the vast majority of users. From a private standpoint, we cannot watch Baidu decline like this. From a public standpoint, we must take responsibility for Pinduoduo's rare window of opportunity for development. From a private standpoint, Brother Yu is the real brother.
After much deliberation, Bi Sheng decided to be a candid friend of his former employer and talk about the evils of Baidu.
(End of this chapter)