Chapter 827
Beijing, Google Xiaguo product R&D center.
Kai-Fu Lee held a cup of hot coffee and looked at the heavy snow outside the window, feeling warm in his heart. He had finally ended the non-compete agreement lawsuit with his former employer Microsoft.
Although he was embroiled in lawsuits, Kai-Fu Lee's fame spread. After all, there are only a handful of people in the world who can make Microsoft and Google go to court over him.
In fact, Kai-Fu Lee’s abilities are indeed extraordinary.
As a top student, he won numerous awards during his school years. Later, he went to work at Apple, where he quickly made a name for himself. He was then spotted by Microsoft, which offered a large sum of money to poach him.
Later it was proved that Microsoft's poaching was worth it. The famous Windows XP in the history of software was a huge success, and the human-computer interaction designed by Kai-Fu Lee played an indispensable role in it.
Just two years after joining Microsoft, Kai-Fu Lee became Microsoft's global vice president with his talent and achievements. From 2000 to 2005, Kai-Fu Lee directly brought Microsoft at least tens of billions of dollars in revenue, so Google couldn't sit still and offered a higher price to poach him from Microsoft, which led to this lawsuit.
Kai-Fu Lee, who has already achieved success, has become famous both at home and abroad thanks to the lawsuit between Microsoft and Google. Now he is full of confidence and plans to make a big move.
Drinking coffee and singing songs, Kai-Fu Lee was in a happy mood.
"You think I'm exaggerating, I'm just exaggerating because I'm scared. If I'm like wood or stone, will you pay attention?"
Eason Chan's "Fukua" sounded on the mobile phone, bringing Li Kaifu's attention back to reality. He looked carefully and saw that the number displayed on the screen was Lin Bin's.
With a slightly raised corner of his mouth, Kai-Fu Lee looked as if he was thinking, "Life is so lonely like snow," and pressed the answer button: "Hello, Lin Bin, how are you, have you finally made up your mind?"
"Yes, Mr. Li, I have resigned from Microsoft."
"It's good that you've resigned. You're always welcome to come over here. You made the decision quickly this time. I thought I would have to wait a little longer."
Kai-Fu Lee was in a good mood. Recruiting a great general like Lin Bin was like adding wings to a tiger for him.
"Mr. Li, I have accepted Mr. Lu's invitation and joined Maomao Mobile."
“…”
There was a long silence, and the deathly silence on the other end of the phone was suffocating.
"Hello, Mr. Li? Mr. Li, are you still there?"
"I... am here, what did you say?"
Kai-Fu Lee's voice was trembling a little. He just hoped that what he just said was just an hallucination and not real.
Unfortunately, Lin Bin's words shattered his last fantasy: "It's like this, Mr. Li, Mr. Lu came to invite me to join Maomao Mobile a few days ago. You know me well. Although Mr. Lu is very rich and sincere, I actually refused at first. It was not until later that Mr. Lu showed me a product that Maomao Mobile was working on..."
Li Kaifu didn't hear a word of what was said afterwards. The talent he had tried so hard to poach was snatched away by someone else?
For some reason, Kai-Fu Lee felt a little heartbroken. It was not as painful as when he saw the girl he had a crush on fall in love with another boy!
It was as if hundreds of millions were lost in an instant.
Kai-Fu Lee obviously didn't want to let go: "Lin Bin, why don't you reconsider it? Google is a great company. If you come to my side, the future development will definitely be smoother."
"I know that Mr. Lu is also a shareholder of Google."
“… …”
Kai-Fu Lee was so angry that he wanted to smash the phone, but he had to endure it and then discussed with Lin Bin in a gentle voice: "I admit that Mr. Lu is very powerful, but Maomao Mobile is not a well-known company, right? What is its main business? If you join it, can you really give full play to your strengths?"
"Maomao Mobile makes mobile phones. I think it's quite reliable."
"Make...make a cell phone!?"
What the hell is this?
Kai-Fu Lee held his forehead and didn't even have the strength to curse. It was still the era of feature phones, and the word "mobile phone" and "smart" were completely unrelated.
He really couldn't understand why a domestic mobile phone manufacturer would hire a software expert.
"Would you like to reconsider this?"
"I'm sorry, Mr. Li. I have thought it through carefully."
After hanging up the phone, the smile on Kai-Fu Lee's face completely disappeared. Now he just felt that life was so damn difficult.
China Overseas, Maomao Mobile Headquarters.
"Welcome to join our big family of Cat Mobile!"
Lu Yiming opened his arms and warmly welcomed Lin Bin's arrival. In the field of software experience, with the addition of such a great talent as Lin Bin, the situation was finally completely stable.
However, because they needed to develop an operating system exclusively for the Maomao phone, as well as various subsequent functional software, more talent was never too much. So after Lu Yiming welcomed Lin Bin, he couldn't wait to ask, "There should be a lot of software talent in Microsoft Asia Engineering, right?"
"Mr. Lu, you are not trying to grab all the talents that Microsoft recruited in Xia Country?"
"Not really. Bill Gates and I are good friends. How could I do something so outrageous? At most I would just poach half of the people. I would leave some room for them so that we can meet again someday."
“…”
Lin Bin didn't know whether to laugh or cry. He felt sad for his former employer. It was really unlucky for the world's richest man to have met a friend like Mr. Lu.
With the joining of Lin Bin, the research and development progress of the Hongmeng system has suddenly accelerated. In the field of scientific research, the role of geniuses is infinitely magnified. The role that a top talent can play is often greater than that of a hundred or a thousand people, and is even irreplaceable.
February 1, 2006, the fourth day of the Chinese New Year.
Lu Yiming received a call from Zhou Hongyi: "Happy New Year, Mr. Lu, are you free? Let's get together."
"Okay."
The two of them met at a restaurant and had morning tea together.
Because it was the Spring Festival, the restaurant was crowded. Lu Yiming walked into the agreed private room and Zhou Hongyi was already waiting inside.
Soon, he ordered a table full of delicious food, including barbecued pork buns, rice rolls, crystal shrimp dumplings, steamed siomai, glutinous rice chicken, custard buns, ginger milk, radish cake, lava buns, and chicken feet.
The two of them ate and chatted, and Lu Yiming asked, "Why are you coming to see me instead of staying at home to rest during the New Year?"
"I must have something to discuss with you, Mr. Lu."
Zhou Hongyi had a flattering expression on her face.
Lu Yiming looked disgusted: "I still like your unruly look before, please recover."
Zhou Hongyi begged for mercy immediately after hearing this: "Please don't, I know I was wrong. Mr. Lu, you are a great man and don't bear grudges. So don't be so petty with me."
"Wrong? What's wrong with you?"
Lu Yiming ate the barbecued pork buns and ordered two bowls of Tianjiu Shark's Fin. Then he happily watched Zhou Hongyi perform in front of him.
Although Zhou Hongyi is a technical expert, he is quite fierce in a fight. He is a very aggressive person by nature and dares to show his teeth to anyone.
Otherwise, there would not have been the 3Q War in history. An antivirus software company dared to go against the prosperous Tencent. Although it failed in the end, there are indeed few people who have his courage.
If it were someone else, Zhou Hongyi might have rolled up his sleeves and turned hostile at this moment.
However, the person who said this was Lu Yiming, her financial sponsor. Even if Zhou Hongyi was upset, she could only be humble and offer Lu Yiming a cup of tea, then admit her mistake and said, "I admit that I was a little arrogant before, but don't worry, Mr. Lu, I have changed my ways now."
After saying that, Zhou Hongyi forced a smile towards Lu Yiming. He had previously thought that with his connection to Yahoo, his meteoric rise to fame was just around the corner, so he had not taken Lu Yiming seriously, and even thought that sooner or later, he would be able to replace him.
But Lu Yiming is not the aging Qin Shi Huang, and Zhou Hongyi is not the young and vigorous King of Chu.
In August 2005, after 18 months in charge of Yahoo China, Zhou Hongyi parted ways with Yang Zhiyuan with a lot of curses, and no one knows how many times she cursed Yang XX in private, saying "Yang XX is an idiot".
18 months! Yahoo wasted 18 months of its best time. Originally, 3721 could still compete with Baidu in the search field.
But after 18 months, 3721 couldn't even break a thousand degrees. How the hell can we reason with this?
So although Zhou Hongyi and Yahoo did not have a direct falling out, they parted ways on bad terms.
It was precisely when he met Yahoo that Zhou Hongyi began to remember Lu Yiming's kindness. Although Lu Yiming's acquisition of 3721 was "robbery", he, Zhou Hongyi, made a profit after all. Moreover, during the operation, he did not not pay but also interfere like Yahoo did.
After all, Lu Yiming respected the opinions of his founder and did not interfere in the company's personnel affairs.
But it was different at Yahoo. Zhou Hongyi was nominally the president of Yahoo Xiaguo, fully responsible for the strategic formulation and execution of Yahoo and 3721. However, during his tenure, whether it was the launch of "Yisou.com" or the 1G free mailbox and other businesses, they were constrained by the head office.
If you want to use a little more money, you have to report to the higher authorities first and then wait for approval. This process often takes several weeks or even one or two months.
The efficiency of the Internet is calculated on a daily basis, or even every second counts. Zhou Hongyi really can't stand Yahoo's efficiency.
So after working for eighteen months, he just quit.
After Zhou Hongyi left Yahoo, he changed his career to become an angel investor like Lu Yiming, relying on the money he had. He even joined IDG as an investment partner and invested in Xunlei, Discuz!, Kugou and other promising Internet companies.
But how can it be as exciting as watching others start their own business?
Zhou Hongyi, who couldn't stand loneliness, now had a new idea, so he ran from the capital to Baiyun to discuss it with Lu Yiming.
"Mr. Lu, I have a bold idea."
"Old Zhou, our Xia country also has a complete criminal law. The situation now is different from before. The Internet is not a lawless place."
“…”
The corners of Zhou Hongyi's mouth twitched, but he was unable to refute Lu Yiming's teasing. After all, if he did those things in the past, he would probably really go to jail if he did them now.
The reason why I didn’t go in is because the law is not as good as before.
Seeing Zhou Hongyi's expression of being about to choke to death, Lu Yiming said with a smile: "Okay, I was just joking. Tell me, what new ideas do you have?"
Zhou Hongyi then said : "It's like this, I think the domestic anti-virus software market is too chaotic, so users don't know what to do. Didn't you say before, Mr. Lu, that you wanted to work with me to make a free anti-virus software? I think this is a great idea, and now is the most appropriate time."
"I remember you used to sneer at free antivirus software, didn't you?"
"Ahem, I was too superficial at the time, but now I have figured it out. Free antivirus is the future, and this project is very promising!"
Zhou Hongyi really thought so. The reason for his change of mind was mainly because the number of Internet users in Xia Country increased sharply, which made him see huge business potential.
What's more, Taobao and QQ have become so popular by relying on their free model, gaining a large number of users and thus becoming the dominant players in their respective industries.
Zhou Hongyi then came up with the idea of developing free antivirus software. Although it would be very expensive and risky in the early stages, the number of Internet users in China has now exceeded 100 million, and the proliferation of viruses and Trojans on the Internet has made antivirus software a necessity.
However, the anti-virus software on the market costs tens or even hundreds of dollars, and its anti-virus capabilities are very limited, and it cannot keep up with the speed at which new viruses are generated.
If there is an antivirus software that is easy to use and free of charge, the number of computers that will install it will definitely be astonishingly large!
In the Internet industry, having users means having unlimited business potential.
This time when she came to see Lu Yiming, Zhou Hongyi was well prepared and explained the antivirus mode and ideas to Lu Yiming one by one.
It is obvious that Zhou Hongyi had realized the truth in advance and was preparing to establish Qihoo 360.
As the pioneer of domestic rogue software, Zhou Hongyi really knows a lot about Trojans and viruses, so his 360 anti-virus software is really powerful and is a model of "fighting poison with poison".
Lu Yiming smiled and looked at Zhou Hongyi: "After you finished your meal, you are now bashing the pots of other colleagues. Do you think this counts as murder and arson and then being recruited?"
Zhou Hongyi smiled awkwardly and replied, "Boss Lu, this is what we call a prodigal son returning home. From now on, I, Zhou Hongyi, will absolutely be a law-abiding citizen."
"Okay, your project is good, I'll invest in it."
"Thank you, Mr. Lu!"
Zhou Hongyi's face was flushed. Although he had just had morning tea and didn't drink any alcohol, he had successfully obtained angel round funding from Lu Yiming and was now a little tipsy.
This is what is called "wine does not make people drunk, but people make themselves drunk; people feel refreshed when they are happy!
Soon, Zhou Hongyi used Lu Yiming's investment and his own money to establish Qihoo 360 Technology Co., Ltd., and served as the chairman of Qihoo 360. He then announced that he would promote a revolution in the antivirus software industry through a free business model.
For a moment, there was an uproar in the country, and everyone thought Zhou Hongyi was crazy.
In particular, leading domestic antivirus software companies such as Rising and Jiangmin were completely confused. They had no idea what the "free antivirus" scheme was.
