Jack Ma surpassed SoftBank and Masayoshi Son, but the American version of Jack Ma fell outside the altar
Recently, the topic of Alibaba's largest shareholder has been popping up frequently. According to various ** reports and announcements by SoftBank Group subsidiaries, Alibaba's largest single shareholder has effectively changed hands.
Founder Jack Ma increased his stake to about 5% after increasing his stake in Alibaba by 50 million, while SoftBank Group, which initially held more than 30% of the shares, dropped to 05%。Years later, Alibaba's largest shareholder is no longer Japan's Masayoshi Son, but China's Jack Ma.
However, Son is no longer Alibaba's largest shareholder, but his fame and fortune as a result of his investment in Ali should not be overlooked.
name, this investment is recognized"God operates"When Son invested in Alibaba, the latter was still a start-up, little-known and unpopular small company in China, but he did not expect to become the only two Internet giants in China, with a market value of more than 800 billion, so Son became the world's largest investor.
The profit side has nothing to say, it has already won n times, and it also saved Masayoshi Son and his SoftBank Group at the critical moment. This time short Ali**"Clearance"It is because of the serious losses of SoftBank Investment, which has led to a tight cash flow, similar to some large domestic real estate companies. Only real estate companies do not sell houses"Unfinished building"Unable to save himself, Son waved his hand and sold Alibaba's shares to SoftBank Group, allowing him to obtain huge cash flow and survive.
The reason for this is that SoftBank has not invested in Waterloo in recent years, and has suffered heavy losses, which is regarded as such"New Jack Ma", resulting in heavy investment losses.
Everyone must have heard the story of SoftBank's investment in Alibaba. At that time, Son only gave Jack Ma 6 minutes to introduce Alibaba, but it turned out to be a miracle, and after a few minutes of conversation between the two, SoftBank's tens of millions of investments became Alibaba's start-up capital.
Years later, something similar, even more exaggerated happened again.
In 2017, Son was accompanied by WeWork's founder, Adam Neumann, for a 12-minute tour of WeWork's headquarters"Flickering"Masayoshi Son. After the visit, Son returned to the car, signed the first investment of 4.4 billion yuan, and continued to raise more than 10 billion yuan.
As for why he invested in WeWork, Son gave the answer in one sentence:"WeWork is the next Alibaba, and Adam Neumann is the American version of Jack Ma"。
The picture above is a recent photo of Adam Neumann (founder of WeWork), I have to say that this person seems to be a talent, and this is better than Mr. Ma Yun, he also has the same ability as Ma Yun, his mouth is very good, he can speak well, and his speech ability is extraordinary, maybe Son Masayoshi eats this set, and throws money away under Adam Neumann's beautiful appearance of rushing to the future.
Initially, WeWork's business idea was really appealing, and it caught up with the wave of the sharing economy that was taking the world by storm at the time.
WeWork focuses on low-cost shared offices full of literary atmosphere. In 2010, when the subprime mortgage crisis led to the collapse of many American companies and the emergence of many vacant commercial buildings, WeWork took over the commercial buildings cheaply, then divided them into small and medium-sized offices, renovated them and rented them out to start-ups.
Settled small and medium-sized enterprises can share public resources such as printers and reception desks, and do not need to sign long-term office lease contracts with landlords, which greatly reduces the cost of starting a business. In addition, Adam Neumann has also introduced the concept of a comfortable and free working environment, with an open office area, no need to clock in and out of work, drinks, soft drinks, sofas, fitness equipment, etc., which are very attractive to office workers.
In short, WeWork not only saves small business owners money, but it also makes it easier for them to hire employees.
The broad market space has attracted the attention of global capital, and top investment institutions such as SoftBank and Da Mo have joined this capital feast and sent investment funds to Adam Neumann. After receiving capital support, WeWork's business expanded rapidly, with about 800 office spaces in 39 countries and regions around the world, and many WeWork in China's first-tier cities.
In 2019, WeWork was valued at $47 billion, more than double the valuation when SoftBank paid for its first investment. At this point, Son is still quite convinced, and the next Ali seems to be just around the corner.
The good times didn't last long, and after the heat passed, the market found a very critical problem - WeWork doesn't make money.
From 2016 to 2018, WeWork lost 4300 million. 300 million and 2 billion, and the loss is increasing year by year. What's more, the co-working model doesn't look like it's going to be profitable in the future.
Although Adam Neumann has built WeWork into a high-tech company comparable to Tesla and Apple with his excellent flickering ability, a calm analysis will show that WeWork is a second-hand landlord and has nothing to do with high-tech. WeWork's main assets are leased commercial office buildings, but the main assets do not belong to the company, but are leased or subleased in the form of short-term leases, and the company cannot afford to bear the risks once the risk comes. WeWork's main assets are commercial office buildings, but none of these assets belong to the company.
Dressed in the cloak of the sharing economy, the second landlord is still the second landlord, there is no underlying technology, no moat, how can there be a valuation of nearly 50 billion? In fact, the capital is no longer invested in money, and WeWork's ability to spend money is too strong, and it didn't take long for the financing to get a large amount of money to spend.
Adam Neumann had no money to burn, and he decided to take the risk and get WeWork to go public early, unexpectedly"Life-sustaining change"became"Life-threatening change"。
As a public company that raises funds from the public, it is natural to publish more information, so Wall Street** has revealed the true face of Adam Neumann. The man had very poor self-discipline, drug and alcohol abuse was commonplace, and his employees were often thrown overboard.
Adam Neumann allows employees to drink at work, but calls them for a meeting in the early hours of the morning; He encourages employees to take illegal drugs and promote sex**, while"Enjoy the freedom"The price is 20 hours straight after the madness.
If all of the above is just a matter of the personality and company culture of the founder, not a moral one, then the practice of false advertising completely exposes the true nature of Adam Neumann.
In 2019, WeWork changed its name to WE Company, whose trademark ownership originally belonged to Adam Neumann, that is, WEWORK paid 5.9 million to its founder, Adam Neumann; What's even more exaggerated is that after Adam Neumann mortgaged his shares in WeWork, borrowed money to buy a property, and then rented the house to WeWork, he rented it to his own company as a landlord, making hundreds of millions. He also used the company's money to buy private jets, mansions, and let his wife run various side hustles under the banner of WeWork to make money.
The company is losing money, investors don't know when they will be able to recoup their money, and Adam Neumann's personal pockets are getting bulging. Isn't this the typical rich abbot in a poor man's temple? Professionally, the assets of a public company are transformed into private wealth through interrelated transactions.
Years of huge losses, the founder is not a man, the business model of the second landlord is dressed in the coat of technology, and the three major drawbacks have led to WeWork falling quickly after the listing, and the company's stock price is only 40 million after 90%. In November 2023, WeWork, whose stock price was less than 1, was delisted from the U.S. stock market, and WeWork accumulated a loss of 152 from its listing in 2019 to its delisting in 20233.2 billion .
Alongside WeWork was Masayoshi Son, who had intended to create a new Ali, who had to step in to remove Adam Neumann as a majority shareholder and publicly apologize to investors for turning a blind eye.
In fact, Son has seen his mistakes more than once; In his decades-long investment career, there has been no shortage of failures, but Ali was too successful this time to hide the nature of Son's failures.
Lao Sun is different from Warren Buffett, he is a radical and ruthless person, either he doesn't make a move, and once he does, it is a matter of life and death. This style of investment can work wonders, such as investing in Alibaba, but the unlucky ones will soon lose all their money, and the money they make will go back and forth, as evidenced by the current situation of SoftBank.
Finally, we go back to Adam Neumann, from the company he started that was swept away after a $1.6 billion damage, to the new venture, still family-centric, but from office to residential, focused on starting a company for young people and tackling rental inequality. Adam Neumann, with his unique ability to package new ventures and secure financing at a billion-dollar valuation, is looking for a new Son and wondering which villain will take the bait.
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