Chapter 611: Who came up with such a cheap plan?
Ji Qi returned home in a daze, with the conversation with Lu Yiming just now echoing in his mind. He hardly slept that night, so when he returned to the company for a meeting the next day, he had no energy and was distracted several times.
Seeing this, Liang Jianzhang asked, "What's wrong with you? Are you feeling unwell? You've been working too hard recently. Why don't you go home and rest for a few days?"
Ji Qi yawned and said, "It's okay, continue the meeting, don't worry about me."
After more than an hour, the meeting was finally over. After everyone had dispersed, Ji Qi found Liang Jianzhang and said, "Mr. Liang, I do have something that I want you to help me with."
Liang Jianzhang still highly respected this capable entrepreneurial partner and immediately smiled and said, "Oh? What's the matter?"
Ji Qi said: "According to the company's strategic plan, we will go public in the United States in the future, right? If the listing is successful, will there be any changes in the seats on the board of directors?"
Liang Jianzhang's expression changed slightly, and he asked, "Why do you suddenly ask this?"
Ji Qi's face was calm, making it hard to tell what he was thinking: "It just suddenly occurred to me, so I asked."
Although the words were euphemistic, they were actually meant to test whether Liang Jianzhang was aware of the situation and whether he really intended to demolish the bridge after crossing it and kick him out of the company's board of directors.
As expected, Liang Jianzhang, who was "raided", was somewhat evasive and said ambiguously: "Well, after the company goes public, the board of directors will definitely change accordingly, after all, those investors will enter the market, but you don't have to worry, these changes are normal."
If it was in the past, Ji Qi would not have thought about this. Even if he did, he would be relieved after Liang Jianzhang said this. But after all, Lu Yiming had analyzed it from the root cause, so he would not be fooled so easily. He asked, "Is that so?"
Liang Jianzhang said seriously: "Of course, we have known each other for so many years and started a business together, how could I lie to you?"
Then, he persuaded her, "I don't know why you suddenly thought of this. I think you didn't get enough rest. Go back and have a good rest. If there is anything, it won't be too late to talk about it after you have recovered."
After Ji Qi left the company, Liang Jianzhang looked gloomy and picked up his mobile phone to call Shen Nanpeng.
The two then met in a cafe downstairs from the company.
Shen Nanpeng asked curiously: "Why did you suddenly call me to invite me for coffee? Shouldn't this be an evening activity?"
Liang Jianzhang said: "Ji Qi has become suspicious. This morning, he asked me about the changes in the board of directors after the company went public."
Shen Nanpeng was a little surprised and asked, "Why did he suddenly think of asking this?"
Liang Jianzhang said depressedly: "How should I know?"
"Old Shen, do we really have to kick Old Ji out? Old Ji has made great efforts to make Ctrip develop so smoothly in the past two years."
In terms of friendship, Liang Jianzhang and Shen Nanpeng have known each other since they were thirteen years old. Therefore, compared to Ji Qi, the two of them are the most staunch allies among the four gentlemen of Ctrip.
Therefore, only Ji Qi and Fan Min were kept in the dark about the company's plans after its listing, while Liang Jianzhang himself was one of the insiders.
Shen Nanpeng shrugged slightly and said, "It's not me who wants to kick him out, but the capital that wants to kick him out. What can I do?"
He has been dealing with capital for so many years that he is no longer surprised by such things. Capitalists will not talk about feelings with you, everything is based on profit.
Liang Jianzhang is different from Shen Nanpeng. He is not in the financial field, so he can't help but feel a little resistant to this kind of thing. He sighed heavily when he heard it.
Seeing Liang Jianzhang's expression, Shen Nanpeng quickly persuaded him: "Lao Liang, we have been friends for many years, so I remind you not to fight against capital. If Ctrip wants to have a better future, it must embrace capital. In many cases, in order to get something, we have to give up something. Do you understand?"
China Overseas, Lu Family Garden.
Lu Yiming sat in the study, looking at the information he had collected.
Li Yiwen was there too. He saw Ji Qi's photo and resume and curiously asked Lu Yiming, "You seem to be very optimistic about him?"
Lu Yiming smiled and said, "Of course, this guy can be said to be an entrepreneurial genius."
If a person who has founded three billion-dollar unicorn companies in a row is not an entrepreneurial genius, then there are no geniuses in the world.
There is no doubt that Ji Qi has an extremely keen vision in the business field. He has accurate judgment and is a man of action who acts decisively and efficiently.
It’s a pity that as an entrepreneur, Ji Qi is successful, but when facing capital, he is a complete loser.
He started a business three times and was eliminated twice. He didn't understand equity design and was completely manipulated by the capital. The empire he had worked so hard to build was wasted on others.
Of course, Li Yiwen didn’t know all this.
He was somewhat skeptical about Lu Yiming's old trick of sowing discord among the people and directly poaching Ji Qi.
"I think you are being a little fanciful this time. The four gentlemen of Ctrip are quite famous in the industry. You actually want Ji Qi to change jobs and leave Ctrip, which he founded? This is unlikely, right?"
Putting aside personal feelings, although Ctrip's development is not booming now, it is also smooth sailing. When the time comes to introduce Wall Street capital and go public in the United States, it will make a lot of money anyway. If you change jobs now, wouldn't that be stupid?
Asking himself honestly, Li Yiwen felt that if he were Ji Qi, he would not do such a stupid thing.
Lu Yiming smiled and said, "As long as the price is high enough, there is nothing that cannot be broken. Besides, Ctrip is not a monolithic entity. I told you a long time ago that businessmen can have a bottom line, but they must not act on impulse."
Li Yiwen retorted: "But you always act on impulse."
Let’s not talk about anything else, just the recent few times, when they saw Li Jiahuang running the eel scam, they couldn’t bear to see those people being defrauded and losing their fortunes, so they squeezed out Li Jiahuang and others and took over themselves.
Although according to Lu Yiming, he saw that eel farming could make money, but in Li Yiwen's opinion, all of Lu Yiming's previous investments were in the direction of high-tech and the Internet, and he had never been involved in aquaculture and rural areas. He did not believe that this matter had no selfish motives.
Lu Yiming said calmly, "I never thought of myself as a businessman ."
Li Yiwen raised his eyebrows and said, "Then what are you?"
Lu Yiming said: "According to that Chen Jinlan, I am a prophet."
"cut."
Just at this moment, Lu Yiming's cell phone rang.
The call was from Ji Qi, and his tone was a little weak: "Mr. Lu, do you have time? Come out and chat?"
Lu Yiming smiled triumphantly and said, "Have you thought it through?"
"Um."
Lu Yiming laughed: "Then let's go to the place where we had dinner last time. We can talk about the rest when we meet."
After hanging up the phone, Lu Yiming shook the pager in his hand and said to Li Yiwen: "See, isn't this done?"
Li Yiwen asked: "Who called?"
"Ji Qi."
Li Yiwen immediately perked up and asked in surprise, "Why did he call you? Could he really be that idiot who finally managed to get Ctrip listed, and then ran away before making any money?"
Lu Yiming laughed and said, "What do you mean by idiot? He is seeing the situation clearly and cutting losses in time."
"What kind of magic potion did you give Ji Qi? You actually broke up the Ctrip Four Gentlemen?"
Lu Yiming smiled complacently and said, "I just told him the facts and reason. It was not me who convinced him to change jobs, but the greed of capital."
Lu Yiming met Ji Qi at the old place. Compared with the last time, Ji Qi was in much worse spirits, with a tired and haggard look, and it seemed that he had not been able to sleep well for many days.
During these few days, taking advantage of his vacation time, Ji Qi privately consulted many financial professionals about Ctrip's equity structure, and the conclusions he came to made him very uncomfortable.
According to Ctrip's equity structure, the capital that holds a large amount of equity can replace the founder at any time if they want.
And he has no countermeasures at all. For Ctrip, which he founded, he has gone from being a co-founder to an insignificant senior employee.
Not only is his salary low, but his shares are only a few percent, and will be diluted again before the listing. By then, it can be said that the company has nothing to do with him at all.
Ji Qi obviously couldn't accept this kind of thing.
The reason why he quit his job and started his own business was to avoid working for others. However, after working hard for most of the day, he ended up being an employee again. Who can stand this?
Although Ji Qi's mental state was much worse when he met Lu Yiming this time, his eyes were more determined, because at this moment, he had already made up his mind to start over again.
Although he was deeply hit by the betrayal of his business partner, he came from a poor family and had been tempered by life, so his will was as strong as iron.
After Lu Yiming sat down, he said, "Boss Ji, you don't look good. You have dark circles under your eyes. Are you thinking too much and can't sleep?"
Facing Lu Yiming's slightly teasing words, Ji Qi said seriously: "Mr. Lu, I have thought it through. I want to leave Ctrip and start a new business."
Lu Yiming smiled and said, "So what is your new entrepreneurial direction? Are you going to start a new company like Ctrip, and then defeat Ctrip and stage a comeback as the king?"
Ji Qi said: "I have this idea."
After all, isn't the purpose of life to prove oneself? Now that Ctrip is kicking out Ji Qi, the founder, of course Ji Qi wants to prove himself to everyone.
Lu Yiming applauded and said, "You have great ambition! So how do you think your new company can compete with Ctrip?"
After pondering for a moment, Ji Qi expressed his thoughts.
"I think so. Now that Xiaguo has been reforming and opening up, and even the negotiations to join the WTO have entered the final stage, the business atmosphere will definitely get better and better in the future. As a result, there will be frequent personnel flow, business negotiations, business trips, tourism, etc. The demand for food and accommodation will be very strong."
"Ctrip provides air ticket booking and hotel reservation services. I have worked with many hotels before. I think cheap express hotels have broad development prospects."
"When people travel to other cities, they can't stay in luxury hotels that cost hundreds of yuan per room. That's not something that every ordinary person can afford."
"So, I plan to provide a cheap hotel accommodation service that ordinary people can afford."
I have to say that Ji Qi's vision is indeed unique.
As Xiaguo joined the WTO and gradually became the world's factory, the domestic economy developed at an astonishing speed.
In this strong business atmosphere, whether you are doing business abroad, a corporate employee on a business trip, or a salaried worker who has money and wants to travel, convenient and clean accommodation is essential.
In this field, domestic development is quite backward. Apart from the expensive big hotels, there are only various small hotels of varying quality.
Not only do the accommodation conditions in small hotels are extremely poor, but safety is often not even guaranteed.
If we can seize this opportunity and fill the market gap, there is indeed a good chance of creating a unicorn company with a scale of over 10 billion.
Lu Yiming said approvingly: "Your idea is very good! I have also thought about this issue. Not long ago, I talked about this issue with the hotel tycoon Chen Zefu. He does high-end business and is not aimed at ordinary people. We can do this."
Seeing that his idea was praised by Lu Yiming, Ji Qi was very happy: "Mr. Lu also agrees with my idea?"
Lu Yiming took out his checkbook, wrote down a number, and said with a smile, "Not only do I agree with your idea, I also want to work with you. People who know me know that when I invest, I only invest money and give suggestions, and I never interfere with operations. Here is 30 million, give me 50% of the shares, take this money, and you can let go and do it."
Ji Qi was shocked by Lu Yiming's generosity. He didn't even have a plan, just an idea, and he got 30 million in angel round financing?
Even after taking the check from Lu Yiming, he still felt a little dizzy.
But he soon came to his senses again and did not accept the check directly. Instead, he looked at Lu Yiming with caution and said, "Mr. Lu, to be honest, I have suffered losses in equity before. Mr. Lu, you are so generous this time. How can I be sure that after several rounds of financing, I will not be kicked out again?"
It is said that every failure makes one wiser. Before Lu Yiming's rebirth, Ji Qi lost control twice before he finally woke up. But now, under Lu Yiming's reminder, he has learned his lesson in advance.
Lu Yiming joked, "No wonder they say that teaching a disciple a lesson will make the master starve to death. Mr. Ji is learning and applying what he has learned directly to me."
"Mr. Lu is joking."
Although Ji Qi felt embarrassed, it involved his own career and future after all, so he would never give in on this matter.
Facing Ji Qi's doubts, Lu Yiming was not annoyed. He immediately said to Yu Jiayi, who had been standing next to him without saying anything, "Senior, please recommend a shareholding structure plan that suits Mr. Ji."
Then he said to Ji Qi: "This is my senior sister, she just graduated from university and I hired her to be my secretary."
Yu Jiayi studied law and has recently been self-studying professional knowledge in the financial field. With Lu Yiming's advice, she can now be said to have gained some initial experience.
Yu Jiayi looks very young. Although she tries to dress like a mature professional woman, her college girl temperament is still very eye-catching.
So Ji Qi was a little bit distrustful of her. She was so young and a woman. Could she really solve a problem that even she herself was scratching her head against?
However, Ji Qi soon understood what it meant to "don't judge a book by its cover" and "you can't measure the depth of the sea".
Yu Jiayi began to introduce to Ji Qi seriously: "Mr. Ji, first of all, I suggest that you set up a family company as the main body of the investment company. The nature of this company must be a limited liability company with a registered capital of 100,000. The number of shareholders is recommended to be more than two, and you can ask your family members or relatives to serve as shareholders. The main purpose is to reduce risks."
"Then, you will set up a limited partnership for financing, with the family company acting as the general partner (GP) with full decision-making power, and other shareholders acting as limited partners (LP) with only the right to dividends but no decision-making power. In this way, you can effectively separate power from money, without having to worry about the loss of control due to equity dilution."
When Yu Jiayi said this, Ji Qi's original suspicion had completely disappeared, and his eyes widened bigger than copper bells. It was the first time he knew that equity could be played in this way.
So sexy! So sexy!
Before Yu Jiayi finished her words, she continued seriously, "Finally, you need to set up a main company to operate the business and make money. The limited partnership will hold 100% of the shares, or at least more than two-thirds of the shares, to ensure absolute control over the main company."
Ji Qi is also a smart man. He didn't pay attention to the equity issue before because he had never been exposed to this knowledge. He also never thought that his partners, Shen Nanpeng and Liang Jianzhang, would actually cheat him, so he was deceived.
Now that he is on guard, he will naturally understand the relevant legal provisions of the Company Law.
Taking the equity structure design plan from Yu Jiayi, Ji Qi read it carefully several times.
"With this arrangement, all investors are concentrated in the limited partnership, so they cannot directly participate in the company's decision-making. As long as I can ensure that there is no problem with my control over the family company, then I can ensure that the control over the main company is as stable as Mount Tai! Wonderful, it is really wonderful!"
Lu Yiming smiled and reminded him: "More importantly, this can effectively reduce risks. Even if the main company goes bankrupt and owes 1 billion yuan, we will only have to bear limited liability of 100,000 yuan in the end."
It must be said that the equity structure plan proposed by Yu Jiayi was a perfect example of corporate law. After reading it, Ji Qi exclaimed that he was an expert and could not help but ask, "Who came up with such a sinister plan?"
Yu Jiayi smiled softly, and although she didn't answer, her eyes fell on Lu Yiming.
Ji Qi was stunned and quickly changed the topic, "Mr. Lu, was it you who designed such an excellent equity structure plan?"
Lu Yiming did not shy away from it and said, "Yes."
This tactic has long been played out in later Internet companies. However, in the current Xia Kingdom, both entrepreneurs and investors are still relatively "simple" and have not yet discovered as many tricks as those of later generations.
After Ji Qi was shocked, he burst out laughing: "There is no false reputation under a great name. Mr. Lu really deserves the title of genius."
He was really shocked. They both started their own business from scratch. Lu Yiming hadn't even graduated from university and majored in computer science, but he was better at corporate law than Lu Yiming.
