Chapter 1115: The Prospects of the E-commerce Industry

Sometimes Zheng Yao wondered what kind of life she would be living now if she had never met Zhao Fusheng.

Perhaps she would have gone abroad.

Whenever she thought about this, Zheng Yao felt a mix of emotions. People often said that life always brings surprises—when the mountains and rivers are blocked and there seems to be no way out, a dark village with bright flowers appears. But she hadn't expected the change to come so quickly.

Maybe that's just the unpredictability of life.

"What are you thinking about?" Zhao Fusheng noticed Zheng Yao was distracted and tapped the table to get her attention.

"Oh, nothing."

Snapped out of her thoughts, Zheng Yao glanced at Zhao Fusheng and was about to say a few words of thanks when she heard him casually complain, "Don't tell me you don't have a boyfriend and spend your days bored out of your mind, spacing out?"

"What?" For a moment, Zheng Yao was stunned. She saw Zhao Fusheng speaking seriously, "Let me tell you, I'm not saying this as your boss or superior, but as someone who was once your student and is now your friend. Although you're a strong woman, you still need a place to call home eventually. Don't worry, I'll definitely prepare a generous dowry for you..."

The corner of her mouth twitched. Zheng Yao knew that Zhao Fusheng meant well, but she couldn't help feeling annoyed.

What the hell was with this tone of a concerned father speaking earnestly to his daughter?

"I..." Seeing that Zhao Fusheng was about to continue, Zheng Yao cut him off bluntly, "Do you still want to hear my report or not?"

"Huh?" Zhao Fusheng was taken aback. Seeing Zheng Yao's sour expression, he blinked and wisely chose to back down: "Alright, go ahead, go ahead."

"I think the development of the internet has become an inevitable trend," Zheng Yao said, controlling her emotions and organizing her words as she spoke seriously to Zhao Fusheng. "Based on the growth in the number of internet users and the普及程度 of home computers in the past two years, we can conclude that the era of the internet has arrived."

Zhao Fusheng nodded: "Okay, continue."

Zheng Yao continued, "In my opinion, the main applications of the internet can be divided into two categories: social and browsing. The former mainly includes social networking sites and instant messaging tools, including the websites you invested in and created earlier, as well as Tencent's QQ. Even online games, I believe, are an extension of social virtual communities."

Zhao Fusheng's expression shifted slightly. He had to admit that Zheng Yao's analysis sounded quite reasonable. Clearly, she had put effort into researching this matter, or she wouldn't have reached such a conclusion.

"As for the browsing category, it mainly involves browsing web pages and websites," Zheng Yao continued. "But with the rise of online shopping in the United States, I think domestic internet commerce will eventually take off as well."

"That's an inevitable trend," Zhao Fusheng nodded, giving affirmative support to Zheng Yao's statement. "When I went to the US before, I also looked into some information on this. It's just as you said—the online shopping craze is taking shape."

He paused and looked at Zheng Yao: "But according to what you're saying, are we going to start our own e-commerce website?"

He was already prepared. If Zheng Yao said yes, he would mercilessly reject her suggestion.

Are you kidding? That would be a money-burning venture. He would never do it.

Not to mention anything else, whether it's online shopping or video-sharing websites, the early stage is all about pouring money, pouring money, pouring money—constantly pouring money. To see returns, you have to wait.

The returns might not be low, but Zhao Fusheng could earn just as much or even more through other means. Why would he throw his money into that bottomless pit?

"Why do we have to build our own website?"

Zheng Yao, upon hearing Zhao Fusheng's words, was full of surprise. She looked at him with some confusion and said, "We could clearly invest through the Future Investment Fund, so why would we want to build our own website?"

Zhao Fusheng was taken aback, then gave a wry smile. He hadn't expected that he himself had been fooled by Zheng Yao.

"Tell me, do you have any specific ideas?" Zhao Fusheng asked Zheng Yao.

Since she had brought it up to him, it seemed she already had a target in mind.

"Do you know that during the millennium, SoftBank invested in a domestic website? In May of last year, they spent a hundred million to establish an online shopping and trading platform," Zheng Yao said slowly to Zhao Fusheng.

Zhao Fusheng was startled, feeling that what Zheng Yao was talking about seemed somewhat familiar.

"SoftBank?" Zhao Fusheng looked at Zheng Yao suspiciously and asked, "How much did they invest?"

"About twenty million US dollars," Zheng Yao replied quickly, evidently having done her research. She then said, "In February of this year, that company raised eighty-two million US dollars from several top-tier investment institutions, making it the largest private equity financing in the domestic internet sector."

"Their boss wouldn't happen to be called Ma Xiaoyun, would he?" Zhao Fusheng blinked and asked Zheng Yao.

This was fucking Alibaba!

Although Zhao Fusheng was not very familiar with Taobao's development history, he vaguely knew some things, such as SoftBank's investment, the later private equity, and Ma Xiaoyun's establishment of a new Alipay company to break free from SoftBank's control. He just hadn't expected that Zheng Yao had set her sights on Ma Xiaoyun at this time.

But speaking of it, Zheng Yao's judgment was really good. After all, if he waited until the company went public, it wouldn't be so easy for him to get a piece of the pie.

"Yes, Ma Xiaoyun is a very capable person. At the very least, I have high hopes for him." Zheng Yao was not surprised that Zhao Fusheng knew Ma Xiaoyun's name; after all, the guy must have his own sources of information, otherwise how could he know about so many promising projects. This was a consensus among Dong Chenxi, Zheng Yao, and others, and it was something everyone tacitly accepted.

"But the problem is, he's already raised so much money. How do we get in now?" Zhao Fusheng nodded and glanced at Zheng Yao as he spoke.

That was the crux of the issue. Many times, it wasn't that no one knew a project was profitable, but that there was no way to get a piece of it anymore.

Take Hong Kong, for example. In 2017, the list of the top ten richest people in Hong Kong was released, and apart from the fourth and fifth places swapping, it hadn't changed much in the past decade. The tycoons monopolized like a giant web, covering every link in Hong Kong's food chain. The Kwok brothers controlled Kowloon Motor Bus, Li Zhaoji (Four Uncle) held a controlling stake in Hong Kong and China Gas, 'Shark-fin Tung' owned two bus companies—New World First Bus and Citybus—and 'Shipping King' Pao bought the Star Ferry and Hong Kong Tramways. From 1994 to 2017, the number of taxi licenses in Hong Kong never increased, and public light bus licenses had been frozen since 1976. Walmart and Carrefour were deterred from Hong Kong, and after the millennium, no well-known internet companies emerged in Hong Kong. The descendants of the tycoons no longer needed to earn their first pot of gold; Hong Kong's real estate, ports, electricity, and supermarket industries were firmly controlled by their families.

Capital overshadowed everything, and young people basically had no opportunities left.

So, this era was Zhao Fusheng's last chance, because he knew very well that in another five years, perhaps he wouldn't even have the opportunity to rise.

Because the upper space had been completely sealed off.

"Simple: cooperate with SoftBank." Zheng Yao looked at Zhao Fusheng and said slowly.

Zhao Fusheng was taken aback, then laughed: "You mean, let me cooperate with SoftBank Asia, the one I screwed over before?"

After all, on the Xiaonei.com matter, he had really taken SoftBank Asia to the cleaners. Ono Masao was probably still stewing over how Zhao had tricked him. At the time, Ono thought Zhao was bringing in Sequoia Capital to negotiate their acquisition of Xiaonei.com, but in reality, Sequoia Capital ended up buying Zhao Fusheng's shares in Shengda Technology.

Ono Masao, upon learning this news, probably ground his teeth to dust.

It wasn't like SoftBank Asia lacked money. If Ono Masao had known earlier that Zhao Fusheng was planning to sell his Shengda Technology shares, he would have been crazy to refuse.

And now, Zheng Yao actually wanted him to cooperate with SoftBank. Zhao Fusheng thought the woman must be out of her mind.