When you see advertisements such as "Buy a TV set-top box, you can watch a large number of foreign programs without going over the wall" and "Enjoy free viewing for life with one purchase", will you be tempted?From 2016 to 2021, Xu Li and others illegally sold more than 190 set-top boxes that could receive foreign TV programs, with a sales amount of more than 700 million yuan, knowing that China had strict laws and regulations on the introduction and broadcast of overseas television and radio. On April 6, 2023, the case of Xu Li and others' illegal business operations, which was prosecuted by the Huaiyin District Procuratorate of Huai'an City, Jiangsu Province, was tried in the court. On October 24, the court sentenced Xu Li to one year and eight months in prison and a fine of 20 million yuan for the crime of illegal business operationZhang Peng was sentenced to one year and three months in prison, suspended for two years, and fined 1 million yuanShi Jie was sentenced to six months in prison, suspended for one year, and fined 20,000 yuan.
With this set-top box, you can watch overseas programs
One day in 2014, Xu Li, a native of Fujian, brought back a set-top box from Hong Kong with his son Xu Hua (who is on the run) from Hong Kong.
Ordinary people have a curiosity mentality, and they always want to watch foreign TV programs freshly, and this business will definitely make a lot of money. Xu Li and Xu Hua hit it off and decided to do set-top box business. With the idea of "becoming bigger and stronger", the father and son used "Antuo" as the brand to establish Antuo Global Company in Shishi, Fujian. At the same time, Xu Hua arranged for someone to connect with Zhang Peng, the owner of a company specializing in the production of set-top boxes in Guangdong, and the company processed and produced Antuo brand set-top boxes.
At first, there were only more than 50 foreign programs that could be watched through the set-top box, and the picture was unstable, coupled with the low brand awareness of Antuo, the sales of the set-top box were not optimistic. In 2016, Xu Li met and recruited Li Bo (a fugitive from criminal detention) who had experience studying in the United States and was familiar with Internet technology.
Li Bo set up a "BMW" Internet team overseas, the team leased servers overseas, collected more than 1,000 TV signals through technical means, and entered the MAC address of the Antuo brand set-top box into the overseas server in the production process, so that users who purchased the Antuo brand set-top box could access the server leased by Li Bo and others, and then could watch more than 1,000 overseas programs.
At the same time, Xu Li relied on Li Bo's network resources for marketing, and in WeChat Moments, QQ** advertising, and also under the guise of selling remote controls, data cables, power adapters, etc., covertly sold set-top boxes on online shopping platforms. With the increase in the number of programs and sales channels, the sales of Antuo brand set-top boxes have skyrocketed hundreds of times, with 280,000 units sold in 2016 alone.
Establish a huge sales network
In order to get more sales, the "upgrading" of products is put on the agenda. Li Bo contacted a software company and entered the mass-produced special MAC address into the Antuo brand set-top box, and as a result, the sales of the set-top box increased year by year.
Antuo Global has recruited more than 40 people, and established 6 departments, including marketing department, art department, maintenance department, sales department, customer service department, and service department, forming a business model of "production-sales-delivery-after-sales maintenance", and the team size is becoming increasingly large. Merchants from all over the world are even more admiring and have asked for the sale of Antuo brand set-top boxes.
The best businessmen around the country not only promote on online platforms such as the Internet, WeChat Moments, QQ groups, etc., but also sell set-top boxes through their own physical stores, and an omni-channel ** sales network covering online and offline has been formed. Xu Li and others set up a special regulatory department to control the sales of distributors around the world, and once it is found that there are first-class merchants selling set-top boxes at low prices, they will be fined to avoid low-price sales.
Xu Li knew that his business was illegal, but the huge interests made him unwilling to give up. On the surface, he issued various regulations to stop domestic sales, but behind the scenes, he allowed the company's staff and businessmen to trade secretly.
In 2020, Anto Global issued regulations prohibiting dealers from selling Antuo brand set-top boxes to China, but the regulations were not strictly enforced. After receiving the domestic order, some ** merchants directly sent the mailing information to the staff of Antuo Global Company, and the staff turned a blind eye, as long as the ** business paid, they immediately arranged to mail the set-top box.
Xu Li also stipulates that domestic dealers are not allowed to sell Antuo brand set-top boxes on online shopping platforms, and can only sell them through online methods such as WeChat Moments and QQ. However, he privately arranged for the company's personnel to set up a **, in the name of selling remote controls, data cables, power adapters, etc., Antuo brand set-top boxes, and many dealers also paid for the goods through the **.
Among the more than 1,000 programs collected by Xu Li and others, a considerable number of them are pornographic programs, and in order to avoid being investigated and punished, Xu Li and others set up a backstage setting so that domestic purchasing users can only watch it through the "circumvention" method. However, some first-class merchants have gained a large number of domestic users by providing sales methods such as "set-top box + 'over the wall' router".
Paper can't contain fire after all
I bought a set-top box from the seller Shi Jie, and when I watched TV, I found that there was *** in it, which was really unsightly. "In July 2021, Huaiyin** received a report from citizen Xiao Zhang. According to the appraisal of the Huai'an Municipal Bureau of Culture, Radio, Television and Tourism, the TV set-top box with the surface marked "Antuo Technology" purchased by Xiao Zhang is an illegal overseas TV network receiving equipment.
After searching for clues and collecting evidence, the public security organs determined that this was a major case involving the illegal operation of set-top boxes, and finally locked down Xu Li's company headquarters in Shishi, Fujian Province, and Zhang Peng's production factory in Guangdong. On September 12, 2021, the public security organs carried out arrests in two places and arrested 7 people, including Xu Li and Zhang Peng.
I was very nervous and thought about moving my company abroad. Xu Li confessed that the reason why he put the company in China is that on the one hand, the company has established a complete production and sales network in China, and it requires high costs to migrate abroad, and on the other hand, because the TV programs they collect are protected by international copyrights, and once they are found by other countries, he will face huge fines and severe criminal penalties.
After investigation, from 2016 to 2021, Xu Li purchased more than 190 sets of Antuo brand TV set-top boxes from Zhang Peng at about 170 yuan per unit, and then sold them at least 500 yuan per unit, with a sales amount of more than 700 million yuan, Xu Li made a profit of more than 10 million yuan, and Zhang Peng made a profit of 3 million yuan. **Shang Shijie sold 344 set-top boxes, with a sales amount of more than 210,000 yuan and a profit of 20,000 yuan.
After being brought into the case, all three were able to truthfully confess the facts of their crimes, voluntarily admit guilt and accept punishment, and voluntarily withdraw their illegal gains. With regard to Xu Li and Zhang Peng's company employees, the procuratorate found that they had played a minor role in the joint crime, only received fixed wages, were accomplices, and the circumstances of the crime were minor, and they met the conditions for relative non-prosecution, so they made a relative decision not to prosecute these people.
[**Procuratorate**Justice Network].
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