I’m in Hollywood Chapter 584: You are ruthless

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Although the Berkshire Hathaway and Tom Murphy cosmopolitan media companies under Buffett do not have absolute control over ABC TV Network, the two companies ’close to 40% of their shares means that after Buffett privately negotiated with Firefly, they want to lobby Board of Directors to agree to this This transaction will be a breeze.

It's just that ABC TV Network is definitely not a monolithic one. Although Buffett has a tough attitude, it does not mean that other major shareholders of ABC TV Network do not want to conclude this transaction with Firefly, especially when Firefly Pictures has achieved huge profits for many years since its establishment. Even at the end of last year, during the process of Buffett's separate contact with Firefly, some shareholders publicly expressed their dissatisfaction with Buffett's concealment of negotiation information.

After Firefly Pictures released its 1993 financial report, many investment institutions holding ABC TV Network shares are more eager to facilitate this transaction. After all, some benefits are very easy to calculate. With the profitability of Firefly Pictures, even after the merger of the two parties, even The original shareholders of ABC TV Network only have a 30% interest in the integrated company, so as long as the profit of Firefly does not change much, shareholders ’annual profit dividends are almost equivalent to the ABC period, but they can increase from this cash A large amount of capital is used for other investments in equity transactions.

After Firefly Pictures and Buffett negotiations failed to publicly announce the acquisition invitation, ABC TV Network Board of Directors quickly passed a resolution promising to start negotiations with Firefly Pictures.

On February 10, after receiving a formal response from ABC TV Network, Katzenberg and Firefly Pictures ’s lead lawyer Edward Lewis led the acquisition team to New York and began formal acquisition negotiations with ABC.

Because ABC TV Network's equity and debt status is not as simple and clear as Firefly Pictures, Firefly also invited the Morgan Stanley team as a consultant under the lead of Chris.

In the process of acquiring Disney's, the two parties had a very pleasant cooperation. Although the Firefly Pictures at this time has not been the same as before, the rich administrative resources of its own make Firefly no longer rely on Morgan Stanley in this acquisition case. Team, but Morgan Stanley is still very enthusiastic, the whole Wall Street can be seen. This is the intention of Morgan Stanley to show Firefly Pictures.

Because after Firefly negotiations are over, in order to complete the acquisition, a large-scale debt financing plan will definitely be launched, and the issuance of stocks and bonds by agents is the main business of investment banks, and the resulting profits are also higher than the occasional corporate mergers and acquisitions. The case is much richer.

Eric did not rush to New York with Katzenberg. Instead, they communicate with Katzenberg on the negotiation progress by phone every day.

Of course, before Katzenberg left New York, Firefly executives had discussed the acquisition bottom line of Firefly Pictures in detail. After many discussions, Eric authorized Katzenberg to grant Firefly a maximum of 25% of the shares. As for cash, it is relaxed within 10billion USD.

Of course, this data is not randomly determined. Firefly Pictures and ABC TV Station are in a period of very good performance. Therefore, no Swiss will doubt that the merger of the two parties will produce one plus one and more than two. Under the best performance expectations, Once the two parties merge, the profits of Firefly under the powerful alliance will likely reach 2billion USD in the next few years. In this case, the proportion of shareholders with 25% equity will be equal to the annual income of ABC TV Network held at this time, so this data is still relatively easy to be ABC accepted.

Of course. What will happen in the future, in addition to being able to see the future Eric, no one can predict, maybe the revenue and profit of Firefly after the merger will explode again, or maybe after the heavy debt burden of 10 billion USD scale after the acquisition, Firefly will To meet.

Eric individuals have always been very optimistic about this transaction. Although the original Disney merger and acquisition of ABC once fell into a multi-year downturn, but more of them are personal reasons for Michael Eisner. After Michael Eisner stepped down, Disney Group quickly Rejuvenated. Whether it is in scale or profitability, the Time Warner, News Corp and other giants that ranked behind are far away, all of which are enough to prove the correctness of this acquisition.

As for the huge debt burden after mergers and acquisitions, Eric did not pay attention to it. The late 1990s will be the period of the most rapid economic development of United States. All economic sectors, including the entertainment industry, have grown substantially. In addition, Eric's layout in the high-tech industry, even if Firefly is really embarrassed, Eric can easily raise sufficient funds from other channels to resolve the Firefly crisis. Moreover, the possibility of this kind of thing is not high.

Starting last year. Eric has repeatedly requested to expand Firefly Pictures 3D Animations Department, but in this era, 3D animation technology has just emerged. Except for Pixar, there is no large-scale 3D animation company in the entire North America or even the world. As a last resort, Eric can only adopt internal training. mechanism. While expanding the scale of Pixar, Disney's Hand-Drawn Animation Department also stopped the recruitment and training of Hand-Drawn Animation teachers, and gradually tried to transform into computer animation.

While maintaining close contact with Katzenberg in New York, the main energy of Eric in recent times has been on its Animation Department. To this end, he personally took the lead in organizing the exchange meeting of the two departments of Pixar and Disney animation.

The "The Lion King" produced by Disney Animation Department has all been completed, and the preliminary publicity has begun. In addition to "The Lion King", Disney Animation also has several animation sequel projects including "Aladdin2". Because the production cycle of the recovery animation is longer than that of 3D animation, these projects have been determined before the acquisition of Disney by Firefly Pictures, but apart from these, Eric has no longer approved the new Hand-Drawn Animation film project, and it is unabashedly stated that if Disney is available The Hand-Drawn Animation teachers are reluctant to accept training in computer animation production. After the Hand-Drawn Animation movie project is completed in their hands, these people can only produce low-cost cartoon projects for the Disney children's channel in the future.

Most of Disney's Hand-Drawn Animation teachers are not too old, plus very skilled drawing skills, it is not too difficult to complete the training of computer animation software. In order to avoid causing a rebound of hundreds of Hand-Drawn Animation teachers, Eric Also promised to give these people enough time to learn and adapt, and fully bear the expenses required during the training.

The Pixar staff who participated in the exchange meeting came out of the Disney animation studio Headquarters of Burbank. John Lasseter, who walked side by side with Eric, said: "Eric, although no one has publicly refuted, but I feel the studio Many people here are still very resistant to this change. Maybe you will have a little trouble. "

Eric is also very clear about this. Disney animation studio has more than 700 Hand-Drawn Animation teachers. Although more than 70% of them are around 30 years old, some of them are even old people in the Walt Disney era. These people are definitely not able to adapt to the new animation production method, so it is almost inevitable to be eliminated in the future. In this case, no one will be left dead. The reason why there was no rebuttal when Eric just spoke. Mainly because the various advantages shown by the Pixar 3D animation are almost overwhelming, and the decision of Eric is also abrupt, many people have failed to respond, and there is no one who will do this without preparation. bird'.

"They all understand the advantages of 3D animation over Hand-Drawn Animation. Both" Toy Story "and" A Bug's Life "have proven these, so this transformation is inevitable." Eric and John Lasseter said while walking: "If not After completing this transformation, Firefly can only cut them off, and I have done what I can do. The existing Hand-Drawn Animation project in their hands can be maintained for at least two years. The time is very loose for them. If it is true Has been abolished. I do n’t think they ’re going to do anything. Every major TV Station needs a lot of Hand-Drawn Animation teachers to produce children ’s cartoons. "

John Lasseter, who has worked in Disney animation for a long time, sighed slightly when he heard Eric. But he is very clear that capital is ruthless. Although Eric is not a harsh Boss, it is not a philanthropist. It is very difficult to achieve this level. If other companies are not optimistic about the prospects of Hand-Drawn Animation, they may directly announce layoffs, and they will never give employees such easy time to adapt.

It's still early. Because of the busy work, John Lasseter and others did not intend to spend the night in Los Angeles. Eric also specially arranged a business jet under Firefly Pictures to send a group of people back to San Francisco.

Eric had planned to send John Lasseter and others to Santa Monica airport in person, but just came to the parking lot. Eric saw Elizabeth with the toad mirror coming down from a red BMW car, waving at Eric, and came over.

"Eric, I think we have to go to Santa Monica ourselves," John Lasseter smiled and said to Eric when he saw the slim figure of Elizabeth. The others laughed lightly.

Eric and other Elizabeth came over and took the initiative to introduce the two sides. Looking at the girl ’s expression, Eric had to dismiss the idea of ​​sending John Lasseter and others. Fortunately, John Lasseter and others were not too concerned about these details Caring, after saying goodbye to Eric, they got on the bus and left.

When everyone left, Eric and Elizabeth walked to the red BMW, smiled and reached out to knock on the hood, and asked, "New car?"

Elizabeth brought the toad mirror back again, raised his chin and teased: "I bought it half a year ago. In the eyes of you guy who never cared about others, it is not wrong to say that it is a new car."

Eric looked around for no one, reached out and pinched the chin of Elizabeth, and laughed: "Do n’t you think that if you have something to ask me, should you put away the little paw?"

Elizabeth Pā opened the hand of Eric, and looked straightforward, saying: "We have completed the acquisition of Miramax."

As soon as it ’s off work, Eric does n’t want to be watched by anyone, pulls the car door and sits in the red BMW, smells the faint fragrance of the woman in the car, and asks the following Elizabeth: “Oh, how much did it cost?

Elizabeth launched car and slowly opened the parking lot, saying: "100 million USD acquired 90% of Miramax, Weinstein Brothers retained 10% of the shares, and continued to control Miramax's business."

"It's a little expensive, but let Weinstein Brothers keep some shares is a good choice, otherwise Miramax will not have much value if the two of them leave."

Elizabeth said: "If the two of them left Miramax, they would have no value anymore, and with the entire News Corp as a backer, the brothers who are profitable will not leave so easily."

Eric said: "Weinstein Brothers had suffered from the shortage of funds in the past few years. Of course, it will be very pleasant to cooperate with 20th Century Fox in the first few years, but everyone has ambitions. After you ca n’t bear the ambitions of these brothers , Everyone will shoot twice. "

Elizabeth personally participated in the negotiation of the acquisition of Miramax, and of course she knew exactly what the brothers were like: "If that's the case, just go if you want to go. Fox can't always let them be anti-guests."

Eric watched Elizabeth turn the highway with the steering wheel, and then remembered and asked, "Where are you going to take me?"

Elizabeth said in a fearless tone: "The company ’s senior management has decided to let Weinstein Brothers personally serve as" Braveheart "Producer. This project is your first choice, so everyone has a dinner and talk about it."

Eric was "shocked" by Elizabeth, and asked weakly: "This, Firefly and Fox are competitors after all ... Am I doing this as a rival?"

"Count!" Elizabeth nodded vigorously: "If you don't want it, the woman named Sophie Marceau will go back and forth."

"Okay, you are ruthless."

"Hum ..."

The meeting place is selected Beverly Hills A fine French restaurant in Zhuang, see Eric arrival, Weinstein Brothers Seems very enthusiastic, while Mel Gibson It looks much colder, Eric I can also feel that this guy has either lost his nature by success, or his emotional intelligence is too low. But Mel Gibson That name Ed Limato of manager Behaved very eagerly, Eric This person happened to be in my memory, it seems to have been in the early 1980s Ed Limato Just one Mel Gibson of manager , Until his death, fully served Mel Gibson Over twenty years manager , Ed Limato ratio Mel Gibson Twenty years old, the relationship between the two is like father and son. It ’s just not in my memory. Ed Limato The exact date of death, if Ed Limato Just died with Mel Gibson The dates of career decline coincide, then Mel Gibson versus Tom Cruise The experience is so similar. At the same time, it once again proved that a good manager How important it is. (To be continued. If you like this work, you are welcome to come to the starting point to vote for recommendation and monthly tickets. Your support is my biggest motivation. For mobile phone users, please go to m. To read.) (To be continued.)