Chapter five hundred and ninety-ninth sowing discord
After discussing with a group of shareholders, Zhang Yida directly called Singer over and gave him instructions.
"Mr. Singh, after discussion by the board of directors, we agreed to the terms of your loan to purchase 20% of BBPay's shares. But I still want to say some ugly things up front."
Singer couldn't hold back his joy, raised his hand and said, "If you have anything to say, Mr. Zhang, just say it."
Mr. Zhang looked at Singer who was dancing with joy and said: "The price of these 20% shares is US$1.4 billion, but before the loan is repaid, these shares must be pledged to our original shareholders.
If during the company's operations, there are problems such as a decline in valuation, major mistakes in strategic direction, harm to the interests of shareholders, etc.
We have the right to terminate the agreement early and require you to repay the US$1.4 billion loan and interest, or take back the 20% shares."
Singer calmed down a little and knew that such a large amount of equity was not easy to obtain.
"Stop the agreement early~"
Singer pondered, "I need to see the specific content of the agreement before I can give an answer."
"It's natural."
Zhang Yida would not deliberately create any "contract trap". After all, after Singer became a shareholder, everyone would gain and lose.
However, Singh did not get mad and agreed directly, which still showed the shrewdness of the Indian elite.
After all, India has a population of 1.3 billion. Not all of them are stupid, but there are also some who are smarter.
The contract is still being drafted and needs to cover all aspects and comply with local company management regulations in India.
Zhang Yida did not stay at BBPay all the time, and went to invest in Ola, Zomato, Byju’s and other companies.
These companies were all established around 2010, which is about the same time that China’s mobile Internet giants were born.
It’s just that the size is still far behind. Byju’s is equivalent to India’s good future, with a valuation of over 4 billion U.S. dollars, and Penguin has participated in the investment.
Ola is the Indian version of Didi, with a valuation of nearly US$5 billion. Penguin, SoftBank, and Flipkart, the Indian e-commerce platform owned by Walmart, have all participated in investments.
Zomato is the Indian version of Magnesium Group, with a valuation of over US$2 billion. Ali is the largest shareholder, and SoftBank also participates in investment.
The same is true for several other unicorns invested by Ruixiang. In addition to investment from Ali, Penguin, and SoftBank, there are also some venture capital funds from China participating in investment.
Zhang Yida is more restrained. In addition to early investment, he will follow up on one or two rounds of investment as appropriate, maintaining a shareholding ratio of 5%-20% and not increasing it any more.
SoftBank and Ali are more aggressive, vowing to occupy all areas of e-commerce, mobile payment, and local life.
At this point, Ruixiang's investment style is somewhat similar to Penguin's, and the desire for control is not that strong.
Ali's domineering style has naturally caused dissatisfaction among some Indian startups. For example, Pankaj Chadha, the founder of Zomato, really wanted Zhang Yida to make an additional investment in order to check and balance the major shareholder Leech Financial Services.
Panka, who has dark skin and a big beard, said calmly: "Mr. Zhang, BBPay has always been our strategic partner.
Now that Leech Financial has invested in us, it has always wanted to remove BBPay from the shelves and only keep Paytm as a payment option for users.
I think this is very inconvenient for users and very harmful to the friendship between Mr. Zhang and me.
I righteously rejected the investment representative of Leech Financial, but I also offended Leech Financial.
I hope that Ruixiang Group will give us another investment to weaken Leech Financial’s shareholding in the company, and at the same time ensure that our cooperation with BBPay will be more stable."
Zhang Yida couldn't tell whether this was true or not for a moment. Ah Li wouldn't be so classless, right?
Unlike Southeast Asia, India has had minor frictions with China from time to time since the Doklam standoff the year before last.
Zhang Yida has always been cautious about investing in India.
The most important thing is that Ah San's economy is not good. Internet companies have burned money, can they make it back like Chinese companies do, and how long will it take? These are all questions that he has some doubts about.
The company's valuation is rising steadily, but like many Chinese unicorns, it is a bubble.
At present, the e-commerce track is basically dead, and mobile payment is still ranked second in the Indian market. Some investments in local life are to find partners for BBPay and expand scenarios.
Zhang Yida also wants to dominate these local lifestyle companies, but taxi-hailing and food delivery industries are too expensive, and they are not in his own country, so investment security is a problem.
He finally held his nose and released the penguin, and Ahri entered the scene.
Penguin did not promote mobile payment in India, but instead put its hope in the instant messaging software Hike. This company is also a unicorn and has Penguin's investment.
Zhang Yida guessed that he might want to copy the WeChat payment red envelope attack on Pearl Harbor and wipe out ten years of hard work of Leech Financial Server in one week.
But just think about it, it is the largest instant messaging software in India, with more than 300 million monthly active users in India, and Xiao Mazi is ambitious to integrate a mobile payment service on it.
This is something WeChat taught well, and Xiao Mazi also saw the business opportunities in it.
However, the Indian government has not allowed the launch of mobile payment, probably because it is afraid of monopolizing the market.
Most of Penguin's investments in India are financial investments, only holding a small stake in companies, and not focusing on creating business synergies with its invested companies.
In China, because of WeChat, we can open traffic portals.
In India, Penguin can only look at Paytm and BBPay, which are ranked number one or two in the market. Because of the lack of a flagship product, investment can only be sporadic.
Therefore, there are still some conflicts between Ruixiang and Leech Financial Services, mainly in the Indian mobile payment market.
Focusing on the usage scenarios of mobile payments, Ali, Leech Financial, Ruixiang, and SoftBank have invested in a series of unicorn companies.
Many of them are jointly invested by Ruixiang and Leech Financial Services.
But everyone has always been in peace, and Leech Financial Services has not started any trouble. All taxi-hailing and food-delivery apps support Paytm and BBPay.
Although Zhang Yida has not communicated with Jack Ma, the Internet market in India is very different from the Southeast Asian market.
There are local giants like Reliance Group and Tata Group here, and American giants like Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Walmart are also watching.
If the Chinese conglomerates fight among themselves, others will only take advantage.
Therefore, there is a tacit understanding between Ruixiang and Ahri, and there is no quarrel between them.
Thinking of this, Zhang Yida became a little wary. I'm afraid he couldn't believe the words of Ah San in front of him.
“Panka, I thought about it, Ruixiang’s shareholding in Zomato is already high enough, and with Ali, the Chinese share is almost over 50%.
In view of some political considerations, Ruixiang is not suitable to increase its shareholding, but I can recommend Mr. Son Zhengyi to invest in you."
Zhang Yida decided to use Masayoshi Son as a shield, considering that SoftBank has stakes in Paytm and BBPay.
Even if Ahri really wants to cause trouble, Son doesn't want to see the two companies fighting infighting to harm his own interests.
Panka also knew something about the relationship between Ahri, Softbank, and Ruixiang, and knew that they were dealing with Xini again.
"SoftBank, they already invested in a round last year. I don't know if they are willing to continue investing."
Zhang Yida nodded and smiled, "I'm sure I am willing. You know China's Magnesium Group, which has a market value of tens of billions of dollars. How can Zomato be valued at 2 billion US dollars?"
Panka smiled and saw that Zhang Yida had no intention of increasing his shareholding, so he did not continue the topic.
Seeing this, Zhang Yida became more and more sure of his suspicion. This guy just wanted to sow discord.