The mobile Internet trend began in 2010. Rice, Magnesium Tuan, and iQiyi were all born in this year, also known as the "10 Entrepreneurship Gang."
In the following years, the trend intensified, with various Internet wars and subsidies burning money.
But this year, everything has hit the pause button.
On the one hand, the national financial strategy strictly controls risks, uses top-down leverage, and introduces "the most stringent new asset management regulations in history", which reduces market liquidity.
The difficulty of raising funds has been the number one problem for major investment institutions since the beginning of the year.
On the other hand, this year is another big year for the collective IPO of leading projects.
Project valuations in the primary market were artificially high, the secondary market plummeted, and prices in the primary and secondary markets were upside down.
Chinese concept stocks went to the United States and Hong Kong for listing, but suffered breakouts one after another.
Exiting has become a big problem again.
Unable to raise funds and unable to withdraw from the invested projects, the number of major investments has undoubtedly decreased.
This impact is transmitted to the market, which means that a large number of start-up companies cannot raise funds.
Small startups die silently, quasi-unicorn companies lay off employees and cut salaries, and unicorns no longer give away money.
Everyone has the same goal, to survive first.
Startups are short of money, and non-leading VCs/PEs are short of money, but big companies like BATJ are not short of money.
So not long after Ruixiang expressed his intention to "sell off unicorns", major manufacturers immediately began to send people to contact him.
In addition, several leading domestic PEs and foreign PEs came to see if they could find something good.
These institutions have big businesses, and even in today's environment, they are still much richer than small and medium-sized investment institutions.
Mr. Wu from CDH Investments looked at the sales list provided by Ruixiang and asked: "Why aren't there Shangchao Technology, Queshi Technology, and Yitu Technology?"
Zhang Yida smiled and said, "These companies have in-depth cooperation and are not for sale."
Representatives of several other companies also laughed, which was what they expected. It was naturally impossible for Zhang Yida to go crazy and sell the shares of the invested companies with business synergies.
Those put up for sale are naturally companies with little business connection and that have been "contaminated" by Ahri and Penguin.
In addition, except for the third of the four AI tigers with relatively high technological content, hardware companies DJI, UBTECH, Horizon, Royole Technology, and several online education companies are not on the sales list.
Various investment institutions and major manufacturers made their selections and formulated their own intentions and goals.
Ahli chose Manbang Group, Huitongda Co., Ltd. and several other companies with "connections";
The penguins are similar, picking out the daily fresh food and looking for a house with shells;
Goudong merged Goudong Daojia with Dada and bought all the small share of equity that Ruixiang obtained.
Several PE companies, including CDH Investments, New Horizon Capital, and Hony Capital, are interested in unicorns such as Singularity Auto and Ucommune.
After the target is selected, the controversial point returns to the price.
Zhang Yida was not interested in bargaining with them, and Lan Lan was away, so he handed over the negotiation task to Lin Zhenyang.
…
"Mr. Zhang, Mr. Zhu from Medical Graphics Technology, and Mr. Yin from Queshi Technology called me and expressed their hope to repurchase our shares."
Lan Lan called Zhang Yida with a serious tone.
Recently, she has been busy contacting Digital Domain shareholders, and it is almost over.
As a result, at this juncture, a fire broke out in my backyard.
"Repurchase? Haha, I'm afraid Ahri is behind it!"
Zhang Yida shook his head. Ahli had stakes in both companies, and this was not the first time they had flirted with each other.
He thought that it would not be easy to apply AI, and one more Ahri would mean more usage scenarios, so he kept turning a blind eye.
Ahli didn't drive away Ruixiang. After all, they didn't want to acquire a company like this that burned so much money in one fell swoop.
Once the two companies have achieved results and have a bright future, it will not be too late for them to move forward.
At the same time, Ahri itself has not stopped exploring related technologies such as computer vision, which can be regarded as a long-term bet.
The facial recognition technology that Jack Ma showed to German Chancellor Merkel in 2015 came from the Face++ open platform owned by Questyle Technology, and its level is among the best in the world.
Today, Queshi Technology’s revenue has increased from more than 60 million in 2016 to more than 300 million in 2017, and then to more than 600 million in the first half of this year, a growth rate of several times.
It seems that the revenue is not much, but in fact it has reached the Hong Kong Stock Exchange's "different rights for the same shares" listing threshold. The market value is not less than 40 billion Hong Kong dollars, and the revenue in the most recent fiscal year is not less than 1 billion Hong Kong dollars.
As long as Queshi Technology passes this year, it should meet the listing conditions of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and is expected to become the first artificial intelligence stock in China.
The situation was great and the fruit was ripe, so Ahri started to use his crooked brains.
"In the equity structure of Questyle Technology, Ahli holds nearly 30% of the shares and is the largest shareholder, let alone that."
Zhang Yida asked with some confusion, "What's the situation with Ke Yi Tu?"
Lan Lan smiled bitterly, "I don't know either. Yunfeng Fund invested in them. Logically speaking, their relationship with Ah Li is not as close as that of Kuaishi."
Yunfeng Fund is an investment fund co-founded by Jack Ma and Yu Feng, the founder of Juzhong Media. Liu Yonghao and Nao Platinum have both invested in it. It is similar in nature to Zhang Yida's Huayi Capital.
Zhang Yida sighed, "Forget it, let's sell their shares too, it's not sweet to force yourself.
Later, we will focus our resources on Shangchao Technology and fully support them in implementing applications."
AI companies are all big spenders. Take Shangchao Technology as an example, it has conducted a total of 10 rounds of financing, with a financing amount of more than 3 billion US dollars.
The reason why there is so much financing is that AI research and development requires too much investment in the early stage and lacks hematopoietic ability.
In the past few years, Rui was not as rich as BAT. It could only invest an early amount to occupy a niche and establish a certain cooperative relationship.
Touronghui's face recognition authentication, Yimin company loan review face recognition, Eagle face recognition payment equipment... these technology applications all have the participation of Shangchao Technology.
While Yitu focuses on medical imaging, Kuesi focuses on retail and logistics, and there is relatively little cooperation with Ruixiang.
If you think about it carefully, it is not difficult to understand why the two CEOs chose to embrace Ahli.
The next day, Xu Li, CEO of Shangchao Technology, called Zhang Yida.
Zhang Yida was a little stunned. Wouldn't this company also betray the company?
"Mr. Zhang, people from Ahri contacted me...but I refused. I think every partner should be respected.
So let me ask you, do you want to sell the shares of Shangchao Technology?"
Xu Li was very direct. He told Zhang Yida that Ah Li's people contacted him, advised him to expel Ruixiang, and promised various benefits.
"No, we will not sell the shares of Shangchao Technology. On the contrary, if financing is needed, we can make an additional investment."
Zhang Yida was very confident when he said this. He had no money before, otherwise there would be no chance for Ali to get involved.
If he hadn't been unable to judge the future direction of Shang Dynasty's science and technology, he would have wanted to expel Ah Li.
Thinking about it carefully, it's actually not necessary. Ahri is still too greedy.
If there were an AI bubble, Ahri would be miserable.
Hearing Zhang Yida's words, Xu Li felt very happy, as long as he didn't sell his shares.
Ahri and SoftBank have both invested in their company, and together with Ruixiang, the shareholding ratio among the giants is fairly balanced.
He neither wants Ahri to quit nor Ruixiang to stop cooperation.
The best thing is to maintain this balance without being broken. All giants provide their companies with resources and channels for the implementation of AI applications.
Now it's a fight between gods and gods, and mortals like them can only survive in the cracks.