hunt hollywood

Simon didn't think about it from the beginning.

Over the years, Hollywood studios have lost too much of the initiative with their stars.

Simon now wants to take back all the power that should belong to the studio. He will not allow Daenerys Entertainment to become passive in front of any star, let alone Paramount in the original space and time, for "Disc The Proceeds of Impossible Spy had a vigorous quarrel with his own male lead, and after the quarrel, he had to start cooperating with the other party again in despair.

Although Cruise's offer of US$600 million this time was obviously showing his favor to Daenerys Entertainment and wanted to resolve some previous entanglements, Simon did not let go, insisting: "Shirley, I know that you and Ke Russ has a good relationship, but this matter is non-negotiable, Daenerys Entertainment will not cooperate with Cruise."

Shirley Lansing knew that she was not qualified to bargain with the young man in front of her, so she could only express regret to Cruise, and said, "Then, I will contact Hanks as soon as possible."

After talking about this matter, Simon changed the subject: "The next script can be discussed after the completion of "A Few Good Men". Also, how did you talk with Brosnan about 007, and the copyright of Spectre?"

Shirley Lansing shook her head and said: "Brosnan refused. Moreover, the Broccoli family means that Timothy Dalton can be cast in a sequel. The copyright of Spectre may be negotiated recently, 300 Ten thousand dollars, the price cannot be lowered.”

The copyright of 007 has always been jointly held by MGM's United Artists and the Blockley family in the UK. Moreover, the shooting rights of the previous 007 series have always been in the hands of the Blockley family.

Pierce Brosnan is 37 years old this year, older than Hanks.After so many years in the circle, it was hard to get popular with "Pretty Woman", and it is true that he will not easily lock himself in the role image of 007.

Simon didn't force it, but said: "Even if Brosnan doesn't want to play the role, the actor still has to be replaced. Dalton's several 007 films are not considered successful, and the most recent "License to Kill" should be the best box office performer of the 007 series." It's a bad one, and it's just a waste of time to continue."

At the meeting in Brisbane, Qintex shareholders and creditors proposed that Simon join the MGM board of directors or act as a consultant to the company, but Simon rejected them.

In this way, Simon has no legitimate name to intervene in the operation of MGM.

However, after personally experiencing the meeting that day, Shirley Lansing knew that even if the young man in front of her wanted to replace herself as the CEO of MGM, it was actually easy, so even if there was a little resistance in her heart, she did not dare to ignore it. Simon's suggestion, said: "I will discuss this matter with the Blockley family when I go back."

After the meeting with Shirley Lansing, Simon sent the other party away and returned to the administrative area to continue the afternoon work.

Until six o'clock in the evening, Simon was flipping through another copy of the copyright information of the novel "The Killing Time" that he had recently obtained. The phone on the desk rang, and the female assistant reminded MCA chairman Lou Vasalman to call in person. Simon A little surprised, but still picked up the microphone.

After chatting for a few words, Simon hung up the phone, summoned the female assistant to come in, and said, "Vasalman invited me to a cocktail party tonight, let's go together later, after the end, let's fly to San Francisco for the night, how about it? "

Jennifer nodded: "Okay, but I won't accompany you to San Francisco after the reception, and I have to work tomorrow."

Simon's trip to San Francisco is on business, and he will probably stay there for two days.

Hearing what Jennifer said, Simon pretended to be dissatisfied and said, "Don't go to the reception, you can go home and rest."

The female assistant's eyes were shining, and she insisted: "I must go."

Simon said with a bitter face, "You see, being so tight will make me feel rebellious, and it seems that this should be Jenny's responsibility."

The female assistant nodded firmly and said with a smile: "Yes, it is indeed Jenny's responsibility."

Ok.

This is also a Jenny.

Seeing that the female assistant walked out stepping on the small high heels after finishing speaking, Simon just smiled and started to look through the information in front of him again, and couldn't help thinking about the purpose of Lou Wassalman's invitation.

According to some sources in the circle, Panasonic's acquisition team has started formal contact with MCA management these days.On Simon's side, Daenerys Entertainment, Cersei Capital and Raybould Law Firm have also formed an acquisition team of about 60 people.

With the development of the matter now, it is unlikely to keep it secret.

Presumably, Lou Wassalman should have received the news that he planned to join the battle group early in order to raise MCA's bidding price.

In my memory, Panasonic's acquisition of MCA was very unsuccessful. In order to prevent MCA's stock price from skyrocketing to an unacceptable level, Simon did not plan to make a move in advance, but planned to wait until the negotiations between Panasonic and MCA reached a stalemate, and then consider the right time to propose an acquisition offer.

Even if the acquisition negotiations between Panasonic and MCA are no longer as bumpy as in the original time and space, but smooth sailing, Daenerys Entertainment can also cut off before MCA shareholders vote on the acquisition.

Still, tonight is going to have to find an excuse to put Vassarman on the back foot.

Simon quickly remembered another thing he was considering recently, and it was also a plan he would start after flying to San Francisco tomorrow.An acquisition, also involving billions of dollars, may serve as a temporary shield.

In short, MCA cannot be allowed to use itself as a bargaining chip to raise its stock price and intensify competition.

After making up his mind, Simon turned his attention back to the "Killing Time" material in front of him.

"A Time to Kill" is a crime thriller about racism and justice that was published last year, similar to the very famous "To Kill a Mockingbird."

The original "Killing Time" movie was released in 1996, starring Samuel L. Jackson, Matthew McConaughey and Sandra Bullock. It also achieved very good box office results and Oscar recognition.

More than that, John Grimson, the author of the novel "The Killing Time", has two other works "Assassination of Gannets" and "Sugar-coated Trap", both of which were blockbuster films in the 90s.It’s just that the original novels of the latter two films have not yet been published. When Daenerys Entertainment bought “Time to Kill” this time, it also signed priority rights to John Grimson’s other two novels.

However, Simon has no intention of casting these projects in the short term.

Only next year, blockbuster projects related to Daenerys Entertainment, including self-produced and external cooperation, already include "Toy Story", "The Silence of the Lambs", "Scream 3", "A Few Good Men", " Batman: The Dark Knight, The Terminator and The Fugitive, these seven blockbusters are expected to exceed [-] million at the box office.

Although the annual box office in the United States has exceeded 50 billion US dollars earlier than the original time and space, this box office is limited after all, but these films may form internal competition in Simon's view, not to mention that there will be "Lightning" next year. Heroes", "007: Goldeneye", "Captain Hawk" and other key projects of the studio.

In order to avoid too fierce competition, Simon has recently decided to transfer "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2" to 1992. Some blockbuster projects that were originally planned to be launched in advance have also been temporarily shelved, and he is already considering extending the first phase of the DC movie universe. Make rhythms.

The 90s in the original time and space was a period of great movies, and Simon did not want this market to be occupied by various action blockbusters and superhero movies prematurely.Only when a hundred flowers bloom can we maintain prosperity for a longer period of time. Too much focus on blockbuster commercial films is actually very detrimental to the long-term development of Hollywood.

Chapter 363 Exclusive Scheme (Revised)

San Francisco.

Inside a villa in the Woodside Mountains on the western outskirts of Palo Alto.

The sky had just dawned, and when he noticed the movement beside him, Simon subconsciously reached out to fish for it, grabbed a slender waist and brought it into his arms.

Jennifer, who had just picked up a small vest and wanted to put it on, was embraced by Simon and pressed against the man's chest. Knowing that he liked this feeling, she didn't resist. After snuggling for a while, she whispered softly like a child: "Put it on." Can you drive me? Prepare breakfast for you, and you have to go back to work later. "

After attending the reception of MCA chairman Lou Vasalman last night, the female assistant originally said no, but was abducted by Simon to San Francisco.

Simon walked around the female assistant with his big hands, and said, "Sleep with me for a while, Alison and the others will prepare breakfast."

"But, I want to prepare it for you myself."

"Ok."

Feeling Jennifer's insistence, Simon had no choice but to let go. He watched the female assistant get out of bed and walk to the bathroom after putting on her tank top and shorts. He also sat up quickly.

In the early 90s, the Woodside Mountains were not as bustling and crowded as it was after the Internet era. At the end of August, because it is also in the Mediterranean climate area, the surrounding area is still full of business.

The female assistant was preparing breakfast in the kitchen, and Simon changed into a set of sportswear and left the house, jogging on the asphalt road in the mountains with lush green trees and few people.

This kind of unfettered freedom of movement opportunity is a bit rare for Simon now. Malibu, where he usually lives, is relatively densely populated, and his every move will attract attention. He can only exercise in the villa gym on weekdays. If he goes to New York, This is even more the case.

While running, a black Mercedes car suddenly slowed down and approached, the window was pulled down, and a middle-aged man said to Simon through the window: "Dude, there are two people behind you..." Halfway through the sentence, the middle-aged man said to Simon. The young man recognized Simon, surprised and surprised, and a little uncertain, and asked, "You are, um, Simon Westeros?"

Understanding that the middle-aged man was kindly reminding himself that two people were following him, Simon stopped, nodded with a smile, and said hello, "Good morning."

The two bodyguards jogging with Simon also stepped up vigilantly to catch up.

The middle-aged man knew that he had made a joke, and got out of the car to greet Simon. It turned out to be an executive from Oracle, and he left a business card before leaving.Handing the business card to Neil Bennett behind him, Simon continued to jog and returned to his residence after more than ten minutes. The female assistant had already prepared breakfast.

Without asking the two girls AB who came together this time to help, the two brought breakfast into the restaurant by themselves.

While eating breakfast, the female assistant talked about last night's cocktail party: "Vasalman has discovered our layout, what are you going to do next?"

At the cocktail party last night, Lou Wassalman straight to the point said that he already knew that Simon was preparing to acquire MCA, and also took the initiative to reveal to him some progress in the negotiations between Panasonic and MCA, and expressed his welcome to Daenerys Entertainment very bluntly. Bid with Panasonic for its own company.

Of course, Simon would not immediately join the acquisition negotiations according to Vassalman's wishes, but just pretended and perfunctory.

At this time, hearing what the female assistant said, Simon said: "Do you remember the plan submitted by America Online a month ago to buy out the three regional telecom network platforms of Bell Atlantic, Bell Pacific and NYNEX to develop the Internet?"

In the famous ATT spin-off case in 1983, Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company, which once monopolized the entire American telecommunications market, was split into national ATT and seven other regional telephone companies, the three that Simon just mentioned , happened to be three of the seven Bells back then, and they were also regional telecommunications companies in more than a dozen states on the east and west coasts that AOL planned to focus on.

America Online is currently conducting business. Except for a small number of self-built line networks, most of them can only rent the line network platform of the traditional Bell system.

With the prospect of the Internet industry optimistic, Steve Case submitted a plan to Simon at the end of last month, hoping to buy out the exclusive rights of Internet access services of the three companies including Bell Atlantic, and pay a certain fee to the three companies every year. This will not only prevent other Internet service providers from entering the business territory of AOL, but also obtain more support from the three operators in Internet access services.

If the heads of the three regional telecommunications companies could see the future like Simon did, it would be impossible to agree to the plan proposed by AOL in any case.

You should know that once the 20-year exclusive contract proposed by Steve Case is signed, not only other Internet service providers, but even the three telecom companies themselves cannot carry out ISP business independently.

However, the reality is that because the entire Internet industry in the United States has just emerged, and America Online only has more than [-] users, such a number is completely trivial in front of traditional telecom giants, and it is not worth entering the venue in person. If you can Why not do it to get an extra income by selling off the platform?

Therefore, all three companies expressed interest in Steve Case's proposal.

It's just that the parties have been dragging their feet for a month on the specific terms of cooperation, but they haven't reached an agreement yet.

The three companies believe that since AOL wants to buy out their line network, they need to pay according to the overall number of users, rather than according to the specific number of Internet access users proposed by AOL.

According to AOL's plan, it is willing to pay each user $20 per year to the three companies. Based on AOL's overall 8 users in August, the annual payment to the three companies is only $15 million.

Although US$300 million is not much, but considering the rapid growth of AOL users in recent months, this figure is actually very impressive as long as the number of AOL users reaches the million level in a year or two.

On the other hand, if the plan of the three companies is followed, although they are willing to reduce the cost of a single user to one-tenth of the price quoted by AOL, that is, two dollars, but multiplied by the three companies in more than ten states on the east and west coasts, it is close to 2000 million. The total number of users, AOL just needs to pay a huge fee of 4000 million US dollars per year at the beginning.

Moreover, the three companies also retain the right to renegotiate the price every two years during the contract period.

A few days ago when America Online injected capital to seize control of Westeros, the overall valuation was less than 1 million US dollars. Obviously, the three companies dared to speak so loudly because they must have seen Simon, the big money maker behind the scenes.

Fat sheep are not slaughtered for nothing.

Not only that, considering Simon's own optimism about the Internet industry, the three companies also requested a stake in AOL.

In Simon's view, if he could sign this exclusive agreement, even if he really paid 4000 million US dollars immediately, he would be extremely happy.When the Internet industry begins to explode, the three companies will definitely find out what a big mistake they have made.

However, of course, this kind of thinking cannot be revealed, and it is even more impossible for Simon to agree to the three companies' shares in AOL.

So, this matter has been entangled for a month, and there is still no result.

Jennifer obviously remembered this, nodded and said: "I think, if the three companies of Bell Atlantic can reduce the price of a single user to 1 dollar, it should be more cost-effective to pay according to the overall number of users. However, what does this matter have to do with our acquisition of MCA?" relation?"

Simon said: "My previous plan was to let AOL initiate the acquisition of these traditional operators when AOL develops to a certain scale and the federal telecommunications regulations are relaxed. Triple play, remember I said this Thoughts?"

"The Telecommunications Act introduced during the split of AT&T in 1984 restricted long-distance telephone companies, regional telephone companies, and cable TV companies from entering each other's territory. It should be very difficult for the federal government to deregulate telecommunications," the female assistant skillfully said. As he spoke, he suddenly understood, and said, "Are you planning to initiate an acquisition from a traditional operator now?"

"Bingo," Simon tapped lightly on the porcelain plate with a fork, and said, "You can start collecting information about these three companies when you go back today, including their asset market value, operating conditions, management information, and industry-related information. legal documents, and remember to keep them confidential.”

"I'll do it myself," the female assistant nodded and said, "However, in this case, we may have to raise a lot of money. Besides, it's impossible to buy these three companies at once. Which one do you plan to choose? "

Simon blurted out, "Bell Atlantic."

It is impossible for the current Westeros system to swallow up three companies at once, both financially and legally.

Therefore, among the three companies, Simon's real target is actually Bell Atlantic.

Bell Atlantic is the predecessor of Verizon, the second largest telecommunications operator in the United States after AT&T many years later. Its business areas are also in the densely populated states of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Washington, D.C., and Virginia in the eastern United States. The regional population exceeds five in the United States. one-third.

Of course, Bell Atlantic also has the highest market capitalization of the three companies.

Even with the outbreak of the Gulf War and the continuous decline of the US stock market, as of the close of last week, the market value exceeded US$56 billion.

Considering the acquisition premium of about 30%, Simon needs to prepare at least US$80 billion in capital if he wants to win Bell Atlantic.Counting the US$70 billion prepared for the MCA, the total amount of funds that Simon needs to use this time will reach US$150 billion, most of which will need to be obtained through loan financing.

The acquisition of Reynolds Nabisco that was completed at the beginning of last year has turned into a complete disaster one and a half years later. After the outbreak of the US debt crisis at the end of last year, there have been few corporate mergers and acquisitions exceeding US$10 billion in this year. .

Once the news of this large-scale acquisition of the two-line operation in Simon's plan comes out, it will definitely detonate the media of the entire Federation.

Speaking of which, if there is enough time, Simon actually wants to make a living every step of the way.

However, right now is the period when the U.S. economy is at its lowest in the 90s. Once the United Nations forces resolve the Gulf War cleanly next year, the federal economy will recover quickly.At that time, if Simon wants to get Bell Atlantic again, the price he pays may exceed tens of billions of dollars, and there may even be bidders.

In the longer term, if Simon waited until the peak of the new technology wave in the 90s, and then promoted the expansion of AOL according to the original plan, by then, large-scale mergers and acquisitions involving hundreds of billions of dollars, but the obstacles at the government regulatory level would be ten times higher than now above.

Now that many things have changed, it is undoubtedly the best choice to start the expansion of the Westeros system in the telecommunications field in advance, taking advantage of the abundant funds that can be used at the moment.

Chapter 364 Cashing Out (Revised)

The female assistant was the second person who knew about Simon's plan to acquire Bell Atlantic, and Janet was the first.

Simon intends to rush to New York after finishing his trip to San Francisco, and formally discuss with the high-level executives of Westeros and Cersei Capital the feasibility of launching the dual-line operation of the MCA acquisition and the Bell Atlantic acquisition at the same time.

This trip to San Francisco is mainly for the affairs of Igret and AOL.

Ygret's problem is simple, the company is out of money again.

After Carol Bartz and Jeff Bezos jointly took the helm of Igret, the recent work results are quite satisfactory to Simon.

Eaglet continues to consolidate the company's patent barriers in the field of World Wide Web technology through continuous investment in technology research and development. With the help of Carol Bartz's many years of work experience in the industry, the software sales business quickly opened up the situation, and the number of users of the portal continued to increase. At the same time Also successfully opened the Internet advertising business, and so on and so on.

These all mean a large amount of capital consumption.

Simon is very clear about the meaning of the hundreds of core patents of World Wide Web technology that Eaglet has mastered. Eaglet has developed a complete set of graphical interface browser software, server software, and web design software based on World Wide Web technology. Applications are software products with very solid commercial prospects.

Therefore, Simon plans to invest an additional 5000 million US dollars this time in order to continue the development and promotion of World Wide Web technology.

At the beginning of the establishment of Eaglet, the total share capital was 1000 million shares, of which Westeros took 1000 million shares with an investment of 900 million US dollars, and Tim Berners-Lee held the other 100 million shares .The last capital injection of US$2000 million doubled Eaglet's total share capital, and the number of shares held by Tim Berners-Lee remained unchanged at 100 million shares, but the shareholding ratio was reduced to 5%.

This time, Simon did not let a professional asset appraisal team intervene, and personally finalized the valuation of Eaglet Company to be 5000 million US dollars.For a start-up technology company that has not yet formed a stable revenue, this figure is a bit high, but Simon believes that Eaglet is worth this valuation.

On the other hand, Simon still has no intention of deliberately squeezing Tim Berners-Lee's shareholding ratio. He has always been very fancy about the founder of the World Wide Web.Therefore, as last time, Li was provided with a plan to maintain his own shareholding ratio through loans.

However, Tim Berners-Lee also did not accept this time. He is very satisfied with his holdings and his current job.

Although Simon plans to reward the company's executives and employees with a part of Eaglet's equity at the right time, he will not give the equity to someone for nothing.