America: Starting with the acquisition of MGM

Chapter 327 325. Eric's ultimate plan, the road to monopolizing Hollywood

Warner must be acquired, not to mention the many copyrights it holds, and the copyrights snatched from MGM.

DC Comics alone is a big gold mine waiting to be developed, and the wealth that can be mined from this gold mine will not be less than Marvel.

Although according to the situation before the time travel, DC was almost beaten by Marvel, but it was not because of the lack of influence of comics and those superheroes, but simply because of human factors.

Isn't there a sentence that clearly reveals the problem?

DC's biggest enemy is Warner. If you don't make random orders, you won't miss the golden development period of superhero movies perfectly.

So if the copyright falls into Eric's hands, it will be a different picture.

With DC in the left hand and Marvel in the right hand, you can do all kinds of things.

So whether from an emotional or economic point of view, Eric always puts the acquisition of Warner first, and Disney has to step back.

Because half of Disney's wealth comes from the real economy of amusement parks, if we only compare the resources in film and television, Warner is actually better.

Especially now it is 2005, not 2024, without a lot of acquisitions later, Disney is far from being so powerful.

Inside the room, looking at the four people with surprised expressions, Eric continued to say: "Howard Stringer and Barry Meyer are not here, I am willing to talk to you openly."

"I believe you, of course it doesn't matter if you want to remind Barry Meyer, anyway, no one can stop Facebook from going public."

"Similarly, when I launched an acquisition of Warner, Barry Meyer couldn't stop it, because the colonel can't influence the general's decision."

"I will directly launch an acquisition of Time Warner, what do you think the result will be?"

"Is it to sell Warner Pictures and cash out tens of billions of dollars in cash to alleviate its own debts?"

"Or watch this money slip away and continue to be mired in debt?"

Gudong!

The four swallowed their saliva at the same time, because this is indeed a difficult question to judge.

Many people don't know that in fact, although the seven major Hollywood companies seem to be powerful, they control the life and death of hundreds of thousands of practitioners and have a huge influence on the global film and television industry.

But most of them do not exist independently.

Not to mention how many times they have been bought and sold since their establishment in the early 20th century.

As far as the current situation is concerned, only MGM and Disney can decide their own destiny and still maintain their independent status.

Sony Columbia, as you can see from the company name, naturally belongs to Sony Corporation of Japan.

Universal Pictures belongs to Comcast Group, and its parent company is engaged in telephone, cable TV, Internet and other businesses.

Paramount was acquired by Viacom Group more than ten years ago, and 20th Century Fox belongs to Murdoch's News Corporation.

Similarly, Warner Bros. Pictures is a subsidiary of Time Warner Group, which is equivalent to a consortium of multiple subsidiaries.

HBO, Time Magazine, CNN, DC Comics, etc. have the same status as Warner Pictures.

Usually these subsidiaries operate relatively independently, but they are all responsible to the parent company Time Warner.

If Time Warner insists on selling Warner Pictures, not to mention that Barry Meyer's words are useless, the entire Warner Pictures board of directors can only compromise.

Time Warner has not been doing well in recent years, and the reason can be traced back to the millennium.

In early 2000, the emerging Internet company AOL spent $181 billion to acquire the entire Time Warner Group. The two companies merged to become AOL-Time Warner.

This was originally a very promising deal. Time Warner has a large number of film and television entertainment resources, and AOL has powerful Internet resources. It is a strong combination no matter how you look at it.

But human power cannot compete with the tide of the times. In other words, when you are unlucky, even drinking cold water will get stuck in your teeth. The newly merged company ran into the Internet bubble.

Under the sweep of this bubble wave, AOL directly fell from a high-quality company to garbage, and Time Warner was also unlucky.

That scene is equivalent to you suddenly discovering the truth about your wife's family after getting married, a gambling father, a hospitalized mother, a disappointing brother, and a broken wife.

But the legal obligations have been formed, what can you do?

Grit your teeth and carry it together.

By the time Eric came here, it was around May 2002.

The new company announced its first quarter financial report, with a loss of more than 54 billion US dollars.

How much was MGM worth at that time? Its assets and debts were less than 3 billion US dollars, and it lost 18 MGMs in one quarter.

And AOL-Time Warner's losses in 2002 reached a record high of more than 98 billion US dollars.

What does it mean?

It was equivalent to the GDP of Chile and Vietnam at that time.

Later, although the Internet bubble gradually passed and market confidence recovered a little, it was still in the red.

In other words, Time Warner Group still has a huge debt.

If Eric remembers correctly, this debt was not completely paid off until 2009.

A failed transaction almost buried the entire Time Warner.

When Facebook goes public, with tens of billions of cash thrown in front of Time Warner, Eric doesn't believe they won't be tempted.

From the moment he came here, he never thought of relying on MGM to acquire other film and television companies. He is not stupid enough to do that.

From the beginning to the end, he planned to use the Internet unicorn to do this business.

Relying on a film and television company? Then you will be acquired by others sooner or later.

"Eric, what do you want us to do?"

When asking this question, Howard Stringer felt his throat was very dry, but he obviously drank a lot of water.

"Cooperate with me, especially when facing antitrust investigations, Disney will definitely not sit idly by and watch Warner being acquired. I will need your help at that time."

"Similarly, you can enter the power of Lionheart Network. I can promise each of you 7.5% of the shares, which will be redeemed within 3 months."

"Think about it, following Howard Stringer and Barry Meyer, the six of you will share 40% of the shares, and Disney and Warner will definitely take the majority."

"You four will probably only get 20%, that is, 5% each, and now I will give you 7.5% each."

"Guys, turn your brains around and see who is the real generous person and who is causing you to lose money."

The four looked at each other, and no one spoke, but everyone had different ideas in their hearts.

Money, it's all money. Although what came out of Eric's mouth were words, these words could be redeemed into gold soon.

Snap!

After clapping their hands, the crisp sound woke them up, and the four people's attention returned to Eric again.

"In addition to Lionheart's shares, you can also invest some money in the stock prices of my companies such as MGM and Facebook to ensure a steady profit."

"Of course, after enjoying such great benefits, I also hope that you are willing to pay a little in return."

"Eric, what else do you want?" Brad Grey asked.

"It has little to do with Paramount. As for Universal, I hope to take back the copyrights of the Hulk and Namor."

"Money is not a problem. Anyway, the Hulk has been ruined in your hands, and Namor has not been trusted until now."

"For Fox, I hope that the copyrights of X-Men, Fantastic Four and Deadpool can return to Marvel."

"Then there is Sony. MGM is willing to give you a satisfactory price for the copyrights of Spider-Man series characters and Ghost Rider."

As soon as Eric finished speaking, the three related companies shook their heads.

Universal may be following the trend, but Sony and Fox are really shaking their heads.

"Eric, you should be able to see the value that X-Men has created for Fox. This is a gold mine. We signed a contract with Marvel."

"And Spider-Man, Peter Parker is more valuable than X-Men. Although the box office of Spider-Man 2 did not meet expectations, the global box office has exceeded $600 million."

"We have planned Spider-Man 3, and the project will start soon. How can I explain to everyone if I sell it to you?"

"Eric, your request is too outrageous."

He was so thirsty that he took a sip of the water cup. The cold feeling in winter was refreshing.

"It's outrageous because your minds are not open. We can have two Spider-Mans."

"Sony develops Sony's, and Marvel develops Marvel's."

"What?"

"You continue to work on your Sam Raimi and Tobey Maguire versions of Spider-Man, and I will work on my Marvel version of Spider-Man. We don't interfere with each other."

"How can we not interfere with each other? What will the audience think? Two Spider-Mans, who is the real one? Who is the fake one?" Howard Stringer stared speechlessly. He had never heard such a ridiculous idea in his life.

"They are all true, nothing is false, they just belong to different universes."

"Sorry, I'm not paralyzed yet, so I don't understand your scientific point of view."

"Have you never read comics? Whether it's DC or Marvel, there are countless universes in comics, and the same group of people exist in each universe."

"For example, the Sony version of Spider-Man is the Earth of Universe 1, and the Marvel story takes place in Universe 10."

"Different universes will have different stories. Even if they are all Spider-Man, their appearance, life experience, personality, etc. are all different. Do you understand?"

"The same, whether it's X-Men or Hulk, they can all be explained by this theory."

"Genius!" Brad Grey suddenly said after a while.

Then he sighed: "Eric, you are really a business genius, a super genius, this theory works."

"How do you know it works?" Howard Stringer asked back.

"Because my son pestered me to tell these stories, you are the general manager of Sony in the United States, at least you should know about the little hen that lays golden eggs under your company."

Click!

The door was suddenly pushed open, and Michael Aeneas and Barry Meyer walked in again.

Seeing them, Eric stood up and left: "That's all I have to say. Think about it carefully and contact me when you have made up your mind."

After that, he left the villa under the suspicious eyes of the two.

His goal this time was to win over the four companies to deal with Disney and Warner.

At that time, as long as Warner can be swallowed up in one go, Hollywood will actually form a superpower and many strong companies, similar to the dominance of Disney more than a decade later.

It is worth paying for 30% of Lionheart's shares for this purpose. These shares are not enough to affect his control of the company.

And these 30% of the shares are current. They will definitely be diluted when they go public, but they can also make a lot of money.

It doesn’t matter if you don’t want to be diluted, then you have to continue to increase investment, and increasing investment is equivalent to being more firmly tied to Eric’s interests.

On the premise that it does not affect their own decision-making, the more firmly they tie themselves to themselves, the more at ease they feel.

At least it can slow down or eliminate the possibility of their own streaming media competing with Lionheart.

If it can swallow up Disney, then it will be swallowed up. However, if the acquisition of Warner can pass the antitrust test, it is hard to say whether it will acquire Disney again.

If you can't swallow it, destroy it, and at the same time launch acquisitions of New Line, Lionsgate, Lucasfilm, and DreamWorks, and collect as much as you can.

Use three years to form a de facto control structure.

At that time, although Sony, Universal, Paramount, and Fox will still be independent, they will inevitably bow their heads due to the intertwining of interests and power.

If this step can be achieved, although an absolute monopoly cannot be formed, the relative monopoly status has been achieved.

According to the development rules of later generations, the Paramount Act will be loosened during the mask era, and the integration of film and television companies and theater chains is advocated by many lawmakers.

Find an opportunity to try it yourself, start with John Adams, and see if you can unbundle this bill in advance.

Once this is achieved, all aspects of film and television production, promotion, distribution, and screening will return to the hands of one company, just like Hollywood in the last century.

Whatever I shoot, the audience will see.

Even if what I photograph is a pile of poop, the audience must see it!

Because I don’t have a choice. I have all the theaters in my hands. How do you choose?

What is a monopoly? This is called monopoly!

The Wrangler was speeding on the way back, and Judy stepped on the accelerator hard: "You are too fast. Fortunately, I didn't go too far."

"Negotiations are not about gossip. I set out the conditions and they have to consider them."

"If you accept it, you will contact me naturally. It's that simple."

"That's still too soon. I thought you were going to have lunch together or at least have a drink."

"I'm not interested in eating and drinking with those old guys."

"Yes, there are no beautiful women among them."

Eric rolled his eyes: "In your eyes, am I an animal that only knows how to mate?"

"Tsk tsk. It's almost the same, but I hope you won't mate as fast as this time."

"Humph! If I'm not happy, ask Gadot and the others. Everyone can testify for me. How can I serve several of them at the same time without two brushes?"

"No need to ask her, I can verify it myself."

"Um?"

Tsk!

"Yi? Why are you taking off my pants?"

"Don't move, I'm driving!"

"It's okay, I'm driving too."

"Hey, this scene looks a bit familiar."