Chapter 2865: Hundred People Meeting

For BlackBerry now, the mobile phone business is a hot potato, and it is impossible to advance or retreat.

What to do?

The best way is to sell it.

However, the mobile phone business is the soul of BlackBerry. Without great courage, who dares to take action on the soul?

If the soul business is sold, a new soul must be reshaped.

Zhou Buqi didn't know Cheng Suizong before, but he dared to take action on BlackBerry's mobile phone business right away, which shows that he has extraordinary courage and a very unique business vision. The mobile phone business has now become a huge burden for BlackBerry. If it doesn't get rid of this ambition and break the fantasy, it is impossible to revive morale, let alone revive the business.

"Do you know this person?"

"Cheng Suizong?"

"Yes."

Zhou Buqi nodded.

Zhou Shaoning said: "I have dealt with him several times. He is very capable and has personal charm. Do you know a famous Chinese organization called the Committee of 100?"

"The Committee of 100?" Zhou Buqi had a vague impression of him and thought for a while, "Oh, it seems that they invited me to join and offered me the title of honorary president."

Zhou Shaoning smiled and said: "Yes, it is this committee. It has a huge influence in the Chinese community. It is full of famous Chinese with great social influence, entrepreneurs, economists, scientists, writers, doctors, musicians, and Nobel Prize winners. Cheng Suizong is the current president of the Committee of 100 and has led the committee to visit China many times."

"Yes, that's why I rejected it." Zhou Buqi is wary of these overseas NGOs. Or it's not that he is wary, but that the domestic authorities are very cautious about such foreign organizations, just like Zhu Yuanzhang, who was born as the "Little Ming King" and served him well. The first thing he did after becoming emperor was to ban such folk superstitious activities. "I didn't change my nationality. This association is not suitable for me."

Zhou Shaoning said: "Cheng Suizong has an extraordinary resume. In the past 20 years, he has joined many technology companies as a firefighter. He has not achieved any remarkable results, but he has successfully turned the tide. He has successfully led the company in crisis to overcome the crisis and successfully transformed. This is probably why BlackBerry asked him to be the CEO this time."

Zhou Buqi said, "So he wants to completely give up BlackBerry's mobile phone business?"

Zhou Shaoning said: "It seems so. We have to wait and see for details. We'll talk after the interview. See if he wants to completely divest the mobile phone business or just give up part of it. There are many valuable assets in BlackBerry's mobile phone business. "

"What assets?"

"For example, BlackBerry's mobile phone brand, although this brand is a bit niche, it still has a great influence."

"Brand?" Zhou Buqi couldn't help laughing, "What are you doing? Are you still interested in BlackBerry's brand? You haven't dug out the brand value of Motorola yet? Can BlackBerry compare with Motorola?"

The Motorola brand now belongs to Esda.

However, compared with its former heyday, the current Motorola brand value has shrunk significantly, and many people don't recognize it. It is also based on this factor that Esda downgraded "Motorola" when conducting strategic planning, only making some mid-to-low-end phones, and transformed into the king of cost-effectiveness.

BlackBerry's mobile phones are very expensive, and they are directly competing with the iPhone.

In terms of pricing, it is also aligned with the iPhone.

BlackBerry's brand does not bring much benefit to Asda. After all, Asda's high-end mobile phone brand Aster is very popular in the market, with sales reaching 22 million units in the past year, which is basically the same as Samsung's GalaxyS series.

However, as high-end mobile phones, Aster and GalaxyS combined are not as good as iPhone.

BlackBerry is also impacting high-end mobile phones, which is even more impossible.

Zhou Shaoning said: "The BlackBerry brand is indeed not of much value to us, but BlackBerry still has many excellent assets, such as BlackBerry's mobile operating system, such as BlackBerry's excellent designers and engineers, and BlackBerry's valuable intellectual property. Intellectual property is particularly important. Today's smartphones basically continue the design ideas of the iPhone. In the patent confrontation of product design, everyone has to avoid the iPhone, only BlackBerry is not. It is the iPhone that has to avoid BlackBerry, because the iPhone copied many of BlackBerry's designs and has suffered many lawsuits for this."

Zhou Buqi took this seriously, "Well, that's very important!"

Zhou Shaoning said: "If BlackBerry really wants to give up its mobile phone business, then I think as long as conditions permit, we should try to take over this part of the assets. The BlackBerry brand is of no use to us for the time being, but many other assets can make up for some of Estar's strategic and business deficiencies."

"Okay, then I'll meet him!"

Zhou Buqi also wanted to see who Cheng Suizong was. After all, there are too few Chinese business elites who can reach the level of CEO in the United States.

...

BlackBerry is a Canadian company.

So Cheng Suizong had to fly over from Canada. After landing, Zhou Buqi invited him to have lunch together. He did not hide from the outside world and went directly to a restaurant on the back street of Stanford University. With people coming and going, it is estimated that the news of the meeting between the two sides will spread quickly and then be quickly reported in the newspaper.

Cheng Suizong is not young, he is almost sixty years old, but he gives a good impression.

His ancestral home is Liangxi. Later, for some special reasons, his family fled to Hong Kong Island, where he was born and raised. At the age of eighteen, he went to the United States to study in college, and then entered the technology industry. He was unstoppable and had a huge reputation in the industry. He served as chairman and CEO of many large companies.

As soon as they met, both sides spoke Chinese.

Very enthusiastic.

It’s a pity that Cheng Suizong’s Mandarin is not very good, and many complex sentences and words cannot be said. He speaks fluent Cantonese, but Zhou Buqi does not understand Cantonese. In the end, the two sides can only communicate in English.

Neither side was in a hurry to talk about BlackBerry. Cheng Suizong first extended an invitation to Zhou Buqi to join the Chinese 100 Committee. The purpose of this committee is to promote friendly relations between China and the United States, resolve cultural differences and value differences between the two sides, and play a bridge role.

Zhou Buqi declined, "I did not change my nationality. I hold a Chinese passport."

Cheng Suizong hesitated for a moment and said kindly, "Science has no borders. Changing your identity can allow you to enjoy great convenience in many aspects, whether it is overseas investment or life."

"That's good."

Zhou Buqi smiled slightly and was embarrassed to say it directly.

For most people, even at Cheng Suizong's level, it is true for them. Changing to an American or Canadian identity makes many things very convenient. People from Europe and the United States go abroad with their passports. People in China have to work hard to apply for a visa to go abroad. Every time I go through customs, I see foreigners just holding the stamp on their passport cards and passing through smoothly and conveniently, while Chinese people need to take their time to check their visas, which makes me feel uncomfortable, as if I am being discriminated against. When I go to some small countries, I even have to put a few US dollars under my visa, otherwise they will find faults and refuse to let me go.

However, there are always some special ones.

Zhou Buqi is the special one.

If he flies between European and American countries, he doesn't even need to go through customs. After the plane lands, he gets in the car and leaves the airport directly. There is only an electronic notice, and he doesn't even need to go through security checks on his luggage.

If he flies from some non-visa-free countries to Europe and the United States, at most he will ask his secretary to check his passport and luggage for security checks. He himself will get in the car and leave the airport directly, and he will not waste time on such inspections.

The so-called inspection is actually distrust.

Boss Zhou has an incredible reputation guarantee, and mainstream countries will give him the green light for travel and visits.