Chapter 180 There is no difficult business in the world
"Hello, Mr. Olsen, I was very excited after receiving your email. I didn't expect you to come here in person."
About thirty years old, a ring-bald man with a hooked nose extended his right hand very eagerly. While shaking hands with David Olsen, he also introduced the young brown-haired woman beside him to David: "This It's my wife and the treasurer of the company."
"Welcome to come." The young lady also extended her hand.
"Hello, I'm just here to see how your company works." Facing the friendly and welcoming couple, David didn't hold it up. After shaking hands and saying hello, he followed the other party's arrangement and got into the house.
The housing prices in Seattle are a little lower than in Los Angeles. The house the couple lives in is already in the suburbs.
As soon as he entered the house, David, who started his career in real estate, saw the classic decoration style of the 1950s and 1960s. Specifically, it is naturally the simplicity of the old people of the previous generation!
The walls are whitewashed with lime, and have been slightly yellowed due to the increase in age. The ceiling with a white background and blue edges is like an old photo, covered with a layer of time. As it continues to deepen, the floor under the feet It was also creaking, and when David followed the other party into the study and saw the neatly arranged bookshelves and the books on the bookshelves spread out on the left and right, the traces of cracked skin proved that the owner of the house had been in the study for a long time. Reading or working.
Of course, the most conspicuous thing is not the big-ass desktop computer on the desk, but the spray-painted text written in blue spray paint on the wall on the right-hand side of the entrance—'Amazon.com'.
That’s right, it has only been in business for two years, so far it has only invested in Yahoo and bought IMDb’s Shouwang Venture Capital. The cooperation offer it received was from Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, and David was interested in it. Yes, that is Amazon.
Sit down at the invitation of Bezos, took the coffee handed by his wife Mackenzie with a smile and thanks, David cleared his throat, and went directly to the topic, "I have read the company introduction you sent me. , I am very interested in your business model. Putting the process of business cooperation online is indeed a good way to save labor costs, but I want to know why you start with products like books? Will there be other categories added?"
Amazon was originally an e-commerce company, wasn’t it?
What David is interested in is actually e-commerce itself.
As a real estate businessman, he has been working offline for a long time, and he is naturally very clear about things like increasing income and reducing expenditure.
What is the most expensive thing to do as an entity in America?
Isn’t it human cost?
The clothing products under the name of the Olsen sisters are all outsourced. David, who is in real estate, has no plans to buy land and build a factory by himself, because the workers' union thing is really annoying.
Selling products in Wal-Mart is also due to personnel cost and site considerations.
Capitalists, they are all profit-seeking, they only hope to let the machine make money for themselves, who is willing to send the money out?
Ah, that's not right... Chuan Jianguo, a fellow from a capitalist background, is going to send money.
One thousand yuan per person! Much older!
It is precisely because of this idea that when David saw Amazon's e-commerce model, he became interested.
If his products can be sold online, wouldn’t it mean that he only needs to recruit a few customer service personnel to deal with a large order?
In Hollywood, which can only be driven by manpower, Roland can play Warcraft Film and Television as a shell company, so why can't he try to move the offline store online? As long as it can save money, this model must be very successful!
"You are right. The e-commerce model can indeed save the labor cost in front of the stage." Bezos agreed with David very much, and said with a smile: "Although we are a start-up company, we are full of confidence in the future."
"As for why you asked me why I started with books, this actually has something to do with the market. The annual sales of the book industry is 19 billion, but our largest book chain store can only occupy 12% of the market. In addition, books are a necessity in many people's lives. They need to study when they go to school and after work. However, the prices of books in physical stores are high. We buy directly from the store's warehouse, and the cost and price can be reduced accordingly. So...those students, will favor us even more.”
"Our main target at the beginning is actually college students who need to buy professional books in various universities."
Just grab any American student and ask, and you will know how expensive the books here are.
Going to school here, the average full-time undergraduate student spends more than 1,200 dollars on textbooks and school supplies every academic year, and it is normal to spend 600 to 700 dollars on books.
It is precisely because books are just needed that Bezos will start here.
Since he is looking for financing, the world's richest man in the future and the current 'poor' boy will not hide it, and directly share the company's operating ideas. He not only told David his customer group, but also The reasons for locating the company in Seattle are made public—not only because Washington State, which is sparsely populated, can be taxed less, but also because it is very close to the Oregon warehouse of Ingram Books, a large channel distributor.
David is very interested in e-commerce, so he has done enough homework before coming here, and after discovering that the ideas Bezos expounded are the same as his own blueprint, he is already very happy in his heart.
However, before investing with Roland's funds, he still has two questions that he would like to know.
First, of course—
"I want to know, after the category of books is stabilized, what is your next category going to be?"
"Our next category is entertainment audiovisual productions."
"Reason? This is not just a need."
"That's right, it's not just a need, but like books, entertainment audio-visual products are placed on the webpage, which is very easy to display. Just looking at the pictures and text introductions, customers can have intuitive feelings in their minds, which is different from other products. Entertainment audio-visual products and books do not require us to promote them, and merchants who want to sell them will actively transmit the concepts, so even if this product does not belong to people’s rigid needs in life, it is still easier to sell than other consumer goods.”
Hearing this, David nodded in agreement.
Although he pins his hopes on e-commerce and hopes that this emerging thing can help the company reduce personnel expenses, he will not rashly test the waters until the whole business is done. Cooperation, then the gain outweighs the gain, other than that, the second...
"I also want to know, why did you choose us?"
When this question was asked, David suddenly changed his sitting position.
He who was sitting upright suddenly leaned back, and fell on the chair with his whole body crossed at the same time.
If you light another big cigar, it will be a bit like a gangster...
Well, in front of Bezos, he is indeed a big boss now.
It's just that Roland and him are used to laughing and joking, so they don't think so.
After hearing this question, Bezos, who was having a good conversation with David, was taken aback for a moment, then shook his head with a smile, unbuttoned his neck, and said, "Mr. Olsen, it seems that you have know me..."
"If you ask this question as soon as we meet, how can I introduce the company's operating ideas to you in a blunt manner?"
"We are all our own people, what's the point of saying these useless introductions?"
That's right! This Amazon, whom Roland has been thinking about, or in other words, Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, is actually a guy in the trenches with him!
Bezos' mother, who conceived him at the age of sixteen, was young and rebellious and ignorant. When he was two years old, his parents divorced, and when Bezos was four years old, his mother married him. So, Bezos is actually his stepfather's last name.
As life gradually got on the right track, Bezos was lucky enough to have a childhood that normal people should have. Not only that, but because his maternal grandfather was a former rocket research and management expert at the Federal Atomic Energy Commission, he was exposed to things that others could not match since he was a child. Engineering experiments, so that when I was studying, I ran in the direction of scientists.
After graduating from Princeton University, he worked in a technology company in New York. Within two years, he switched to a trust company to manage computer systems worth 250 billion U.S. dollars. He became the bank at the age of 25. The youngest vice president ever at a trust company, then, at twenty-six, jumped ship to join financial services firm D.E. Shaw, where he co-founded the most advanced and successful hedge fund transaction management firm in the world.
Of course, Bezos’ personal experience is not the point. The point is that he is a young man who jumped from D.E.Shaw to start a business.
Where is the company D.E.Shaw?
Wall Street.
Who is the founder of D.E. Shaw?
David Shaw.
As a Ph.D. in computer science at Stanford, David Shaw became a professor at Columbia University when he was less than 30 years old. However, within a few years, he found the professorship boring and joined Morgan Stanley, doing computer-based automatic stock trading, debt, and foreign exchange. Unfortunately, due to his excellent grades, he was squeezed out by his peers in less than two years, so he started his own hedge fund company, D.E. Frequent statistical arbitrage.
And Bezos is his deputy.
In just a few years, David Shaw became the leader of the upsurge of quantitative analysis on Wall Street. In 1994, he was recruited by the current commander-in-chief and appointed as a technology consultant. He stood on the same level as Ronald Perelman. together.
In the same year, Bezos chose to resign and start a business, and founded Amazon.
so…
The point of intersection is here.
Although Bezos resigned to start a business, he still maintains a good relationship with David Shaw, and asked the other party many times if he is interested in his e-commerce company, and he is willing to accept investment from the other party.
But David Shaw, who was playing with a big M & A boss like Ronald Perelman, was not interested in these things, but he still helped the other party to ask in the circle, and this question, Isn't it a coincidence?
As an emerging industry, the Internet, even with Netscape in the lead, its prospects are still unclear.
As bigwigs in the financial field, they can easily cash out from the financial market, so no one wants to gamble on the Internet.
But the problem is that Roland Allen, who also just entered the circle, is just playing on the Internet!
Not only that, Shouwang Venture Capital under his name also invested in Yahoo!
How did Amazon get started?
Isn't it because Yahoo included Amazon's URL?
So...
The bigwigs who had just received Roland's help unceremoniously set up a bridge and let Bezos go directly to David Olson.
In their view, since Roland is interested in Yahoo, he is probably willing to take a look at e-commerce like Amazon.
This is not about repaying Roland at all, but that they have too many resources and no place to share their time, so they just make a phone call to help matchmaking. It is better to make money.
Anyway, the business is tens of millions. If Roland loses money, the next time he does hedging, bring him an extra one to earn back, wouldn't it be over?
Because of this, Bezos, who is far away in Seattle, Washington, sent a cooperation email to Shouwang Venture Capital in San Francisco, California, because for both parties, it was just an exchange of news from the big guys behind it.
"If you have clearly explained your information in the cooperation intention from the beginning, then I will not come here." After listening to Bezos' explanation, it has also been found that Ronald Perelman is the matchmaker David laughed cheerfully.
If it wasn't for the other party, no matter how much he loves e-commerce, he wouldn't come here in person.
"If I reveal my identity from the beginning, what do you think I'm a liar?" Bezos also put away his official dead fish face, stood up with a smile, and shook hands with David again.
And after talking about it, things are even simpler.
Negotiations with their own people did not talk about anything vain, 8 million 15%, and it was stipulated in the contract that when the company conducts the next round of financing, they have the right to continue to invest and obtain at least as much as the current equity New shares in equal proportion.
As for the day-to-day operations of the company?
Since Bezos is the king of quantitative analysis backed by Wall Street, what else does David need to care about?
With those who are interested in finance, the company can be saved even if it dies a hundred times!
Roland, who was freezing with Kate Winslet in Berlin, never imagined that the things he was thinking about were often not so troublesome at all. When he really knocked on the door that everyone wanted to enter—
There is no difficult business in the world.
Why learn from Sun Zhengyi and get 30% of 130 million?
With these bosses around, he who only plays on the Internet in his circle can get all the bonuses!
What ability is too small for fear of being squeezed out?
With these guys watching, the cakes from Angel Wheel can be automatically fed to Roland's mouth, okay?
Those who engage in finance don’t use the Internet?
right!
They don't play the Internet!
But since there is a guy in their camp who plays the Internet, when they get the resources, it is natural that the fat and water will not flow to outsiders!
To them, it was nothing more than leaving a little oil in the crevices of their fingertips, letting Roland, who had helped them a lot and was also interested in the Internet, play slowly...
It's just this pile of oil, for Roland, the extra size seems a bit big!
He hasn't found anyone to take the blame for it yet!
Remember his own people have delivered Amazon to your door!
"Ah...open your mouth..."
"burp~~~"
Note: ① Bezos’s maternal grandfather was a lieutenant commander in the Navy, and was later transferred to the Atomic Energy Commission, which is now the Advanced Research Projects Agency of the US Department of Defense. Bezos himself said that when he was with his grandfather in childhood, the other party took him to do physics experiments. If there is no computer revolution, he will definitely study rockets. He founded Blue Origin because his grandfather watched the movie "Star Trek" with him with a line that moved him, 'the universe is the final frontier'. ② Behind Bezos is David Shaw. It was David Shaw who gave him the idea of Amazon when he asked him to sort out the growth rate of Internet users and collect industry information. But David Shaw was not interested in his project, so he resigned and started it himself. However, this Amazon, which went public after only one round of financing, took its own money, and the first million was from Bezos. It was provided by his parents, relatives and friends. Later, when the general Atlantic Investment Group wanted to invest in him, he refused. Bezos said that the company was worth 100 million. Zoss accepted the investment from KPCB introduced by his friend Nick Hanauer, with a valuation of 60 million. In investing in this kind of thing, many times it is not his own people who can't get in. ③Amazon is indeed made by Yahoo. ④David Shaw is the king of quantitative analysis. He became an adviser to Clinton in 1994. During the 1996 general election, he helped the opponent stand together with the bald Ronald. Of course, David Shaw is also a Jew. At that time, he was also the adviser of the other party. In the end, I felt that finance was boring, so I went to biotechnology.
(end of this chapter)