It took Li Mu three hours to make Zhong Xinhua fully understand why he wanted to acquire Hikvision instead of investing in it.
Zhong Xinhua treated Hikvision as his own child, so it wasn't easy to make him understand why he wanted to adopt Hikvision's child under his name.
In the beginning, when Zhong Xinhua heard the word "acquisition," he immediately declared to Li Mu, "Hikvision will never accept any form of acquisition!"
Acquisition meant giving up the controlling stake, and at the same time, selling his hard work to someone else. It wasn't just Zhong Xinhua, no one in Hikvision would agree to it.
However, Li Mu managed to convince Zhong Xinhua bit by bit with his way of thinking of integrating resources, building a complete industrial chain, and building a complete closed loop of technology.
Li Mu's strong ability in integrating resources also made Zhong Xinhua realize that as Hikvision's biological parents, whether it was Zhong Xinhua, Hikvision, or 52 colleges, none of them had the ability to raise Hikvision well.
Everything was afraid of comparison. Raising a child himself, he felt that it was good enough to ensure that the child had enough to eat and study. However, after comparing himself with someone with ability, he realized that he didn't have the money to feed him well, dress him well, nor did he have the money to give him the best education. He didn't have the money to send him overseas to study, and he definitely didn't have the money to give him a good starting capital to start his own business.
Although Hikvision would be extremely powerful in the future, it hadn't even been a year since Hikvision was formed. They didn't have the foresight and confidence to realize how powerful they would be in the future. If Hikvision's team hoped that this child would be mediocre in the end, he could choose not to accept his suggestion. However, if he hoped that this child could become an outstanding person, the only chance he had was to pass the child to him. This was because Hikvision could satisfy whatever Hikvision couldn't.
In order to make Zhong Xinhua willing, Li Mu directly pointed out their biggest sore point. "You lack money for research and development, and even more so for hardware. You don't even have the ability to produce front-end camera equipment. How are you going to provide complete solutions to the users in the future? If a competitor can provide complete solutions, how are you going to defend yourself in the market? "
This really hit Hikvision's biggest sore point. They were short of money, and they were short of a lot of money!
It would have been better if Li Mu hadn't mentioned the entire solution. The moment he mentioned this concept, it happened to poke at the most depressing part of Zhong Xinhua's heart.
The entire Hikvision hoped to become an industrial chain, and Zhong Xinhua even dreamed that the Hikvision would have its own camera equipment production company. However, the Hikvision did not have the ability to get involved in the production of camera equipment at the moment. The capital required was too high, and neither the Hikvision nor the 52 Institutes could afford it.
It was precisely because they didn't have the money to invest in hardware that Hikvision had initially chosen "coding and decoding technology" and "back-end storage products" — two fields with relatively low research and development costs — in order to overtake other competitors. However, it wasn't easy to overtake a car with insufficient horsepower. Stepping on the accelerator, the engine roared, but it just couldn't increase the speed. It was a very painful feeling.
Li Mu struck while the iron was hot and said, "If Hikvision is willing to accept the merger, I'll invest 200 million in the new company in the future. 100 million can be used to buy a camera equipment production company with a certain level of strength, and the remaining 100 million will be used for joint research and development. Strive to come up with a complete set of software and hardware solutions! As for the subsequent marketing and sales, you don't have to worry at all. I'll unconditionally import all my resources into the company, and it won't be included in the valuation. "
Zhong Xinhua was tempted.
The speed at which he was tempted was much faster than Li Mu had expected, and he didn't even try to hide it.
Zhong Xinhua wasn't a businessman, nor was he a capitalist. He was a researcher. Although he had left his career, his habits of doing research had not changed after so many years. He didn't pursue too much profit, and all his pursuits were actually to make Hikvision develop better and come up with more industry-leading technology and solutions.
For someone who was deeply rooted in research, having sufficient research funding was simply unimaginable. However, today, Li Mu had given him a solution that would allow him to get hundreds of millions of R&D funds in one go. Zhong Xinhua couldn't wait to immediately make the decision and agree to Li Mu's request.
Li Mu saw a different kind of fanaticism in Zhong Xinhua's eyes. This kind of gaze was very similar to the fifth episode of the third season of Breaking Bad. When the big drug lord Gus brought Lao Bai to the drug production laboratory he had built for him, Lao Bai's excitement and fanaticism when he saw all kinds of ultra-high-specification drug production equipment.
He firmly believed that people like Zhong Xinhua were the so-called so-called "craftsmen" that were most lacking in the future society. It didn't matter how much money he promised him, how much money he could give him, how much he could focus on his own research, and how much he could improve and promote his research. This was what attracted and moved him the most.
…
The next morning, in the Hikvision conference room.
Zhong Xinhua said to everyone in an excited tone, "This is 200 million in cash, my comrades! Li Mu said that this money would be directly transferred to Makino Vision's account within ten working days after the contract was signed in the form of corporate funds! That is to say, as long as we agree to Makino Vision's merger, we'll immediately transform from a situation where we can't even pull in a few million yuan of investment, into a tycoon enterprise with 200 million yuan of usable funds. Although our shares will be much smaller, there are so many things we can do with 200 million yuan! "
For the current core team of Hikvision, their professional skills were more in scientific research than in capital. Originally, they didn't want to accept the merger, but under the shock of 200 million in capital, they were immediately crushed.
At the beginning of this year, Hikvision wanted to sacrifice 20% of its shares in exchange for 3 million in cash at a valuation of 15 million, but it was rejected by many investors. This was a huge blow to the group of geniuses from the National Research Institute. At that time, they realized for the first time that the rules of the capital market were very cruel. People only pursued profits, and basically didn't pay for their education and qualifications.
In the end, Hikvision was able to struggle out of the clutches of death with the help of a newly developed video processing board. However, because there was only so much space in the industry, it could be said to be a revival. In other words, they had just struggled out of the line of death, but they still could not truly survive the crisis period.
For a team that couldn't even get a few million in cash, suddenly having 200 million at their disposal felt like throwing a refugee who had struggled in a famine for a long time into a high-end and sumptuous buffet. For refugees who only wanted half a hard bun, they were so happy that they didn't know what to do with so much delicious food.
As a whole, the founding team of Hikvision was an entrepreneurial team that focused on intellectual property rights and core technologies. For their entrepreneurial approach, the most important thing was sufficient financial support. Therefore, the 200 million yuan promised by Li Mu was extraordinarily attractive to the whole team. It was like an extraordinary magic.
Chen Enchao, the person in charge of Hikvision and also the core figure of the whole team, couldn't hide his excitement at this moment. He asked Zhong Xinhua, "Li Mu, can our team make the decision for this 200 million? Or rather, how much can we make the decision? "
Zhong Xinhua said, "At least 50 million. We can make the decision."
Chen Enchao asked him, "Why 50 million?"
Zhong Xinhua said, "Li Mu wants to take out about 100 million to buy a camera equipment manufacturer. Together with Hikvision's technical accumulation in the middle and back end, we can directly open up the entire video surveillance industry chain!"
As soon as this sentence came out, everyone was shocked.
Li Mu wanted to buy a camera equipment manufacturer and merge it with the future Muino Vision? That's great news! One had to know that this was the hardware field that Hikvision had always wanted to enter as soon as possible! However, they didn't have the strength, so they could only struggle in the middle and back end.
At this time, Zhong Xinhua added, "Also, Li Mu promised that we can make the decision on which camera equipment manufacturer to buy!"
Chen Enchao's eyes widened. "Did Li Mu really say that?!"
"Absolutely!" Zhong Xinhua nodded and said, "Li Mu also said that after the acquisition, the rest of the money will be used for research and development! That's close to 100 million, comrades! Using all of it for research and development, where else can we find such boldness? Now that other people have invested two million in us, there are clear requirements for our performance, but Li Mu directly gave us 100 million as research and development funds. Even if we have to split the money with the front-end equipment manufacturer, there will still be about 50 million research and development funds that will eventually fall into the hands of Hikvision's team. Who would have dared to think of so much research and development funds in the past? After we get this money, how much can we do? How much research can we do? "
Truly ingenious people would never put profit first. This was almost an unchanging truth, because the most important thing in the minds of craftsmen was the quality and reputation of their products, not pure profit.
In the next decade or so, Hikvision might continue to be commercialized, but at the beginning of a company like this, ingenuity was definitely the most important thing for the entire team. The dozens of researchers at Hikvision were the same. Right now, they were thinking about how to develop better technology, better hardware, and better overall solutions. They didn't care as much about money and capital.
Chen Enchao was silent for a moment, then suddenly stood up and said, "50 million is almost double the actual valuation we expected, and we have enough research and development funds, as well as the strong support of Li Mu's entire ecosystem. This is the most suitable soil for us to do big things. You guys go back to work first. Xinhua, accompany me to the institute and have a good chat with them!"
Zhong Xinhua was overjoyed, and subconsciously asked, "President Chen, you agree?"
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