Chapter 106 A mission

In such a back-and-forth confrontation with "The Sun", its effect is not only to increase the popularity of the Woaw website, but also to increase the circulation numbers of both "The Independent" and "London Evening News". Of course, since "The Sun" is so "cooperative", it is also because they have also gained popularity.

It’s no wonder that after the rise of short video live broadcasts, many Internet celebrity anchors fought all day long on the surface, but secretly they may all belong to an MCN company...

"In the Cavendish Building project, we will use steel structures for construction. This construction method is now relatively mature and has advantages in terms of efficiency and environmental protection."

The bidding for the Cavendish Building has been completed and construction is about to begin. Amber, who is responsible for the entire process, also reported the specific situation to Barron.

As he said, there are already many buildings using steel structure construction methods, which can be regarded as a trend in building construction.

The main reason is that in addition to being more environmentally friendly than reinforced concrete structures, steel structure buildings are also faster to construct.

For example, in Barron's previous life, China used steel structures and standardized modules to build a 60-storey building in 19 days.

When Barron heard the news for the first time, he was quite surprised and wanted to know more about it.

This is not an exaggeration, because the so-called 19 days is only the time to build those standardized modules, and the time for these modules to be produced in the factory is much longer than this - if the production time is added together, then It will be more than a year...

It's just that at this time, steel structure buildings still mainly exist outside of China. The buildings built in China still use reinforced concrete structures.

The reason for this is naturally that the cost of steel structure buildings is much higher than that of reinforced concrete structure buildings.

From the perspective of the Chinese project team, their labor is much cheaper than abroad. During the construction, they can hire more construction workers. In this way, even a reinforced concrete structure building will consume less time. In terms of price, it won’t be much more, but in terms of cost, it will be much cheaper.

But in Europe and the United States, the labor cost of construction workers is very high, so there are good reasons for them to choose steel structure buildings. It can not only use fewer workers, but also save time. In this way, steel structure buildings Structural buildings are a good choice.

But even so, it will take 6-7 months until the Cavendish Building is completed and ready for use...

"Mr. Sheehan, there is something you need to do personally next - I'm afraid you need to go on a business trip for a while."

After hearing Barron's words, Amber knew that since he said this, it must be a very important matter, so she immediately answered:

"No problem, Your Highness the Duke, what is it?"

"I hope you will go to Johannesburg, South Africa, talk to the South African newspaper industry, and buy the shares of a Chinese company they hold. The name of this company is Penguin."

Amber Sheehan previously helped Barron's acquire independent newspapers at PwC. Now he is also in charge of the industrial investment department of DS Capital, because it is most appropriate to leave this matter to him.

Last year, affected by the bursting of the Internet bubble, HK Little Superman, who had invested in Penguin and held 20% of its shares, intended to sell his shares in Penguin.

The South African MIH Group bought these shares at that time. They currently hold 46.5% of Penguin's shares, and South African Newspapers is the parent company of the South African MIH Group.

At the beginning, Superboy's Digital Pacific and the American venture capital firm IDG invested a total of US$2.2 million in Penguin, each holding 20% ​​of its shares.

Last year, Superboy sold 20% of its shares to the South African MIH Group for US$12.6 million, earning more than 11 times its initial investment; at the same time, due to the Internet bubble, Disillusioned, IDG, which did not have much confidence in the future development of Penguin, also sold more than 13% of the 20% of Penguin shares it held. For this reason, the South African MIH Group paid a total of less than 21 million US dollars to acquire Penguin. 33% of the shares.

Next, in June this year, the South African MIH Group acquired 13.5% of the shares from other founders of Penguin. So far, they hold 46.5% of the shares of Penguin, spending a total of about US$32 million. Approximately more than 20 million pounds.

So at this time, Barron is preparing to try to buy the shares of Penguin he holds from the South African newspaper industry - you know, at its peak in the future, Penguin's market value will be close to one trillion US dollars, even if After counting subsequent financing and the decrease in shareholding ratio, at that time, the value of Penguin shares held by the South African MIH Group exceeded US$300 billion!

"According to my research, North and South Newspapers now holds 46.5% of Penguin's shares. They paid about US$32 million for this. I hope you can try to buy these shares. I am willing to pay up to twice the premium. Of course , being able to buy these shares at the lowest price is the best.”

Amber couldn't help but be secretly surprised when she heard that Barron was willing to pay such a high premium to buy Penguin shares. You know, the Internet bubble crisis has just passed, but there are still no signs of recovery...

Nasdaq's technology stocks, which have been trending steadily, have experienced another decline since September. Their DS Capital took advantage of this period to complete the establishment of positions in all technology stocks.

Although it can be seen from this step that his boss is optimistic about the future recovery of technology stocks, at this time, being willing to buy shares of this company called Penguin at a double premium still shows that he is not interested in this company. Generally optimistic.

Therefore, Amber decided to collect information about Penguin Company after returning, make sufficient preparations, go to Johannesburg, try his best to buy the shares of this company from the hands of the South African newspaper industry, and complete the task assigned to him by the boss.

As for whether the South African newspaper industry is willing to sell Penguin at this time?

If it were later, it might not be possible to succeed, but at the current time point, it is still very possible.

Because the first investment in Penguin Company was due to the optimism of the vice president of the Chinese business of the South African MIH Group. If you go to negotiate with the Chinese branch of the MIH Group, I am afraid that you may not agree; but if you give the other party enough income, go to them directly. It is still possible to negotiate with the parent company of South African Newspaper Industry.

You know, from the name South African Newspapers, you can see that this company was originally a newspaper company - they are the largest media company in Africa, but later in 1997, the new CEO Cus Becker took office. After that, it expanded its business scope and shifted to the technology field, such as TV station business and telecommunications operators.

Investing in Penguin was their first venture capital investment in the Internet. Before that, they had no experience in the venture capital business.

It can be said that they were extremely lucky and won a big prize on their first investment - but also because of this, it cannot be ruled out that they are willing to exit the investment after obtaining satisfactory returns.