In many domestic Internet-related industries, competition is always inevitable to have one or two dominant companies in the end, such as Didi in the field of travel, Meituan and Ele.me in the takeaway industry, or Hello and Meituan in shared bicycles, and basically Tencent and NetEase in music. Therefore, when we set our sights on the video field, we feel a little surprised, in addition to Youaiteng, LeTV, Sohu and Douyin watermelon videos can also get a piece of the pie.
However, since the end of last year, the long video industry has also had a lot of turmoil, such as iQiyi was exposed to the news of large-scale layoffs, and membership fees have become the highest in China. Under the operation of Ali's left hand and right hand, Youku also transferred all its equity to tudou network not long ago, which made people wonder whether Youku also had a big move. At the same time, LeTV was sued by many investors at the end of the year, claiming 4.571 billion yuan.
The originator of the copyright in the long video industry, the listed market value is as high as 150 billion
Perhaps seeing that LeEco was also claimed 4.5 billion yuan, many people's first reaction was that LeEco had not yet gone bankrupt, so it seems that many people ignored LeEco's former strength. Founded in 2004, LeTV, in the domestic long video platform can be said to be a pioneer, a few years earlier than today's Youaiteng three, and at the beginning, LeEco bought a large number of copyrights, you know at that time, Storm, fast broadcast and other software rampant, in the country basically no copyright fees.
With the law of "early birds have insects to eat", LeTV bought a lot of copyrights at a low price in the early days, becoming the earliest long video platform in China to invest in film and television copyrights, and from the performance of LeTV, in 2007, it already had a net profit of 14 million, and in 2012, it rose more than ten times, reaching 194 million yuan. Although it does not seem like much, in contrast, iQiyi has been in a state of loss since its establishment, and you know how rare LeTV's profits were at that time.
And because of Jia Yueting's various capital operations, LeTV's stock price has risen steadily after its listing, and its market value in 2015 was as high as 150 billion yuan, which was even worse than the storm that was previously called a demon stock. Compared with the same period, Youku potatoes are equivalent to RMB, and the market value is less than 30 billion yuan. However, the peak of LeTV also seems to stop here.
Building mobile phones and making televisions was eventually dragged down by the dream of building cars
Judging from Jia Yueting's entrepreneurial experience, he can be said to be a person who can grasp the market trend, such as the field of smart TV, LeTV has laid out early, and even won the first place in the market in April 2016, pressing a number of traditional TV manufacturers. At the same time, LeTV in the matter of making mobile phones, although it later made a joke of "ID without borders", but in the case of entering the industry in the case of entering the industry in the case of entering the industry in the case of entering the industry in the case of entering the industry in the case of entering the industry with an annual sales of 20 million units in more than a year, and the price war was even more fierce than xiaomi.
But it is always inevitable that something will be pulled when the steps are bigger, and LeEco has made a super car after having a super TV and a super mobile phone. And the lineup of the car-making team is very strong, including the former general manager of Infiniti China, and the co-founders also have Ding Lei, the former vice president of SAIC. In addition to BAIC and Aston Martin, everything shows that Jia Yueting's car is real.
Although LeTV has always been profitable in 2016, the net profit of several hundred million yuan per year is thrown into the car industry, but it is like a stone sinking into the sea. So since 2017, LeEco has fallen into a huge loss, with a loss of nearly 14 billion yuan a year. In general, LeEco was dragged down by Jia Yueting's car-making dream.
After years of hibernated employee salary increases, they now face a huge compensation of 4.5 billion
While many people are watching Jia Yueting flee to the United States and continue his dream of building a car, LeTV is facing huge pressure to survive. In the capital market, LeEco has been terminated by the Shenzhen Stock Exchange in 2020 because its net profit and net assets have been negative since 2018. At the beginning of last year, LeEco also added "12.2 billion yuan" to the hot search because of the video APP icon, but according to Lerongzhi's new CEO Zhang Wei, LeEco has no new debt since 2018.
At the end of last year, when Kuaishou, Mushroom Street, iQiyi and other companies have reported layoffs, LeTV's Weibo has issued two posters of "We do not lay off employees" and "We have raised salaries", which is enough to prove that LeTV's operation is gradually improving, but this does not mean that LeTV's future life will be better.
Just a few days ago, 2,000 investors filed a lawsuit against LeEco and related securities institutions and accounting firms, claiming 4.571 billion yuan for LeEco's IPO documents and some of the false information in the annual report, and some professionals pointed out that this lawsuit will have a high probability of winning. For LeEco, it may be more fortunate that there are another 20 co-defendants this time, and the amount of compensation will not be all pressed on LeEco, but it may be a little late to the day when LeEco turns over.