Reborn Russia As An Oligarch

The San Francisco Bay Area in California, United States, is the famous Silicon Valley.

Between the southern Bay Area and western Santa Clara County, there is a small town called Cupertino. Perhaps most people have never heard of this place.

But here is the headquarters of several world-class companies, the most famous of which is naturally Apple!

However, in 2001, Apple was not a big company, let alone a world-famous company.

You know, this company, which went public in 1980, had a market value of only US$5 billion in 2001, and was even on the verge of bankruptcy...

Apple's headquarters, this will be called "Infinite Loop", a ring-shaped building complex composed of six office buildings. As for "APPLE PARK", of course, there are no drawings yet.

In Building 1 of the Infinite Loop Campus, this building is the core of Apple, where the management and marketing departments are located.

In a conference room on the fourth floor, Gang Leader Qiao and several Apple executives were negotiating with Waite, the representative sent by Gateway Company, and others.

Waite raised his head, without even looking at Gang Leader Qiao, and said in an arrogant tone:

"Our company can value Apple at US$5 billion and acquire it by issuing additional shares. Of course, if you shareholders want to get cash, that is also negotiable. But the valuation cannot reach US$5 billion. It’s so high. As we all know, Apple is about to go bankrupt now. It seems that no one bought the MP3 player you made after it was launched. The company has laid off half of its employees..."

Obviously, the Gateway company represented by Waite wanted to take advantage of the situation and acquire Apple.

Jobs stared at Waite with his sharp eyes, pursed his lips and said nothing.

Apple was founded by him, and it supports his biggest dream in life!

Now that he was belittled to the point of being almost worthless, he was naturally furious, which meant that his rationality had controlled his emotions, otherwise he was afraid that he would curse when he opened his mouth.

Apple's current situation is indeed not ideal. After I returned to the company last year, the IPOD player that I personally promoted did not perform very well after it was launched. Half a year later, the total sales volume is less than 30,000 units...

Coupled with the impact of the global Internet bubble bursting, all investment companies now believe that they are unsafe and have begun to carefully control the scale of investment.

In short, everyone has no money...

In order to save money, Apple had no choice but to carry out large-scale layoffs. Now the Infinite Loop Park seems very deserted.

Almost half of the office space in the six office buildings is vacant. It is extremely depressed and seems to be a bit overwhelming.

Even a strong person like Gang Leader Qiao had to lower his head and face reality, which led to this acquisition negotiation.

In the past, people like Waite and companies like Gateway would not have the qualifications to meet him, let alone make an acquisition. That would be an insult to Jobs and Apple!

Of course, these are also the angry words of Gang Leader Qiao. After all, Gateway company has a big background.

This company's Chinese name is "Jiewei". It was once able to compete with giants like HP in the field of personal PCs, and it was also one of the first companies to engage in the personal computer business.

But even so, Gateway is not qualified to acquire Apple!

Although Apple's market value is not high, only US$5 billion, Gateway's market value is not as high as Apple's, only less than US$2 billion.

Talking about issuing additional shares for mergers and acquisitions, in the final analysis, they just want to stage a farce of a snake swallowing an elephant...

…………

Seeing the serious scene in the conference room, Cook next to him quickly smiled and softened the atmosphere and said: "Waite, your offer is not sincere enough. You should know that our Apple company is indeed facing difficulties and is in urgent need of funds. That’s why we agreed to negotiate with you. In fact, we have no intention of selling the company as a whole, and prefer to reach cooperation through share expansion and financing.”

Although Cook only joined Apple this year, he has already become the right-hand man of Qiao Gang. After all, Qiao Gang just staged a "Return of the King" and does not have many close friends within the company. Now he is also re-establishing himself. When he was on the team, Cook was recruited by him through interviews in person, and he was also a subordinate he trusted very much.

Waite did not appreciate Cook's kindness.

He smiled faintly, still with that arrogant expression, and said: "Cook, you also know what our company does. We are not an investment company! In the past two years, are there any other investment companies in our country? Aren't they all? They’re all dead, haha…”

Although his attitude is still unpleasant, I have to say that what he said is quite realistic.

Everyone knows that investment companies have suffered heavy casualties in the past two years because they are optimistic about the Internet industry.

Every day, there are countless investment companies closing down on Wall Street!

At this stage, it is true that you can no longer find the investment companies that used to wave checks and invest money everywhere...

At this moment, Gang Leader Qiao couldn't bear it anymore. He said coldly: "Waite, which one do you think is more valuable, Apple or Gateway?"

Waite was stunned for a moment. He actually wanted to answer that Gateway was more valuable.

But the problem is that both companies are listed companies, and they are the same type of company. Apple's current market value is US$5 billion, while Gateway's is less than US$2 billion...

This is reality. You can’t deceive others even if you want to lie.

So he could only say honestly: "For the time being, Apple is definitely more valuable, but..."

Before he could say anything "but", he was interrupted by Gang Leader Qiao.

"Either come here with a cash check to negotiate, or get out of the conference room and don't act like a financial liar in front of me!" Gang Leader Qiao said unceremoniously.

After hearing this, the arrogant look on Waite's face could no longer be maintained.

He was a little frustrated. He stood up suddenly, put his hands on the conference table, leaned over to look at Gang Leader Qiao, and said viciously: "Okay! Steve Jobs, I really want to see how much longer your Apple company can sustain." A long time! If you agree to be acquired by our Gateway company, I can also give you a position in the merged company. I advise you not to be ungrateful!"

But Gang Leader Qiao didn't seem to listen to him at all. He stood up, turned around and walked out of the conference room, leaving the rest of the people looking at each other.

Cook could only help him with the aftermath, and smoothed things over by saying that Apple's board of directors still needed to discuss Gateway's offer...