Rebirth of England

"The scenery of the West Lake is really beautiful."

"It happens to be the National Day holiday now, so there are a lot of tourists here. If it were normal times, there would be much less."

At this time, Barron had already left Shenzhen City with Wang Wanting and his bodyguards and came to Hangzhou.

As for the purchase of shares in Penguin Company, it was completely left to Amber Sheehan. On this trip to China, he mainly focused on visiting and getting to know some entrepreneurs here. As for the specific matters, naturally Leave it to my men to handle it.

In addition, with the increase of DS Capital's business in China, DSIIC is also preparing to set up a China office in Shenzhen City, which will make it more convenient to handle future business related to China Investment.

After arriving at the West Lake in Hangzhou, I saw that the place was indeed packed with people, also because they happened to catch up with the Golden Week of China's National Day.

Since 1999, China has implemented the May Day and National Day Golden Week policies, so now, traveling during the National Day holiday has become the choice of many people. There are also many tourists in famous scenic spots like West Lake.

It was also the first time to see so many tourists. Barron's two white bodyguards were frightened at first. They almost suspected that the entire population of London had come to the West Lake...

This also caused great trouble for them, because they needed to do their best to protect His Royal Highness the Duke and his personal assistant, but among such a dense crowd, this job was indeed very challenging.

Fortunately, Barron did not make things too difficult for them. He did not get into the crowd, but admired the beautiful scenery of the West Lake from a distance.

Similarly, Barron and his group also attracted the attention of many Chinese tourists. After all, there were so many foreigners, and there were two strong men in black suits and black suits with cold faces. They were obviously bodyguards. Next to that handsome young man, it was easy to guess that he must be a big shot.

As for the young man, in addition to an extremely beautiful Chinese woman, there was another man who was not tall and looked a little... peculiar, with a confident smile, and was chatting and laughing. At this time, almost all The tourists just find it interesting, but they don’t know that that person’s appearance, many years later, can only mean one thing, and that is “rich”!

Yes, the person chatting beside Barron at this time was Alibaba’s founder, Boss Ma.

At this time, although Alibaba had received a US$20 million investment from SoftBank Group, it was still not well-known.

This year, Alibaba's B2B business has just started to make profits, and it has not even started to build a personal business website, which will be Taobao in the future.

It can be said that when Boss Ma's reputation is relatively high, it will have to wait until he completes Yahoo's business in China. As for most ordinary people to recognize this face, it will have to wait until he becomes the richest man in China.

As we all know, Boss Ma is a person who is very good at "fooling". This can be seen from the fact that many talents who have come into contact with him give up their high salaries and join him.

Moreover, he is also very good at seizing opportunities.

For example, in the 1980s and 1990s, as a student, Boss Ma often went to West Lake to translate for foreigners and practice his oral English. By chance, he met his good friend Ken from Australia.

In 1985, Ken gave Boss Ma 200 yuan to invite him to travel to Australia. With this money, Boss Ma was able to go abroad. It was also this trip abroad that changed Boss Ma's view of the world and opened his "window to the world."

In 1994, Boss Ma went on a business trip to the United States as a translator. This trip to the United States exposed him to computers and the Internet, which laid the seeds for his future Internet entrepreneurship.

When Barron and his party came to Hangzhou, it was already widely spread that DSIIC, a company owned by a British Duke, bought Penguin shares from the South African MIH Group at an astonishing 100% premium. The entire Chinese Internet circle.

It can be said that at this time, when the Internet industry was struggling, Barron's image in the eyes of others was no different than a "big dog", and he was still the kind who had no shortage of money.

Therefore, as soon as they met, Boss Ma showed great enthusiasm for the young and handsome Duke.

In the process of accompanying him to visit the West Lake, he was describing the grand blueprint of Alibaba Company to him both inside and outside the words.

In fact, at this time, although Alibaba's B2B business had just begun to make profits, they were indeed short of funds - they received US$20 million from SoftBank in early 2000, more than two years ago. Almost three years.

2000 was the year when the global Internet bubble burst. The turmoil in the stock market interrupted the booming Internet industry, and many Internet companies also went bankrupt.

Alibaba was no exception. By 2001, there was only US$7 million left in Ali's account, which could last for at most half a year. The even worse news was that investors said they would no longer invest money. Faced with such a severe situation, Alibaba quickly transferred its overseas assets to The expansion strategy shifted to China itself.

"Mr. Ma, you said that your mission is to 'make it easy to do business in the world'. I appreciate this very much."

Barron smiled and said to Boss Ma beside him:

"What I admire even more is that you have the courage to stop all your previous profitable businesses and return to serving small and medium-sized enterprises. In this period of Internet winter, few people dare to do this."

It was not until Boss Ma hosted a banquet for Barron at the Louwailou next to the West Lake that Barron talked to him about Ali Company at the dinner table.

"Yes, Duke Barron, this decision was not easy. At that time, almost everyone did not understand why I did it, including the company's investors, but in the end I convinced them. Now, our B2B business has also It started to make a profit and has already earned 500,000. Although this number is small, it is a good start."

"So I wonder how much investment Boss Ma needs now? How many shares can he provide?"

Barron asked directly.

Hearing his question, although he didn't show anything, his heart was racing rapidly.

"I hope to get an investment of US$20 million and give me 15% of the company's shares."

Soon, Boss Ma replied to Barron like this.

After hearing his words, Barron smiled and said:

"Mr. Ma, as far as I know, SoftBank invested US$20 million in Alibaba and got 30% of the shares. But now the global Internet is in a cold winter. You have doubled Alibaba's valuation all of a sudden. Will you? It made me feel very insincere.”

However, Boss Ma’s quotation is also very interesting. Perhaps it is because he knows that Barron’s acquired Penguin shares at a 100% premium, so he made his quotation a 100% premium based on the original SoftBank investment price...

Don't read the many articles later that said how optimistic Sun Zhengyi was at first about Alibaba. He invested 20 million US dollars and then successively added more, and he held it until it was listed before starting to sell it.

In fact, Son Zhengyi is very casual when it comes to investment. It can be said that SoftBank has invested in so many companies, and only one Alibaba has emerged. According to the investment success rate, it is still very low - it can be said Almost all the money he earned from investing in Alibaba was lost in other investments.

And when he originally invested in Alibaba, it was actually Sun Zhengyi who invested in many projects in China at the same time, almost all of which gave him US$20 million. This amount, for him, was more of a test of China's Internet investment.

Just like last year, when Alibaba was in urgent need of funds again, SoftBank rejected Boss Ma's request for additional investment.

It was not until 2004, when Alibaba's B2B business had become China's leader, and its Taobao business was also developing rapidly, that I once again participated in Alibaba's financing.