Author | Chen Pei
Source | Lu Jiu Finance
During the downturn in the industry, the major capitals behind Heytea are far more anxious than the founders.
Behind the heytea crisis, perhaps a side effect of capital.
A number of media have disclosed that Heytea involves a large layoff of 30% of employees, which may stem from the poor performance in the past year, and prepare for the listing by streamlining human resources.
With the rumors of layoffs, problems such as excessive overtime, year-end bonus delays, and infighting in the company have gradually surfaced.
Subsequently, Xicha said that the above news is not true, and everything is a normal adjustment.
However, through this incident, this company with an extremely young management team has also exposed a lot of details from the side.
In the eyes of some people in the investment community, this scene is almost similar to the trajectory of of the past Ofo, and the young management team runs wild with the blindfold of capital, perhaps slowing down the pace and thinking about the future will be a better choice.
The crisis is fissioning out of the details
In the past two days, a number of media have revealed that Heytea is implementing layoffs internally, involving 30% of employees overall. Among them, the information security department was all laid off, and the store development department was cut by 50%.
In response to this round of layoffs, the more common view is that Xicha has not performed well in the past year, although it makes money but has negative net profit growth. Forced by the pressure of financial reporting before the listing, by streamlining human resources, you can make the financial report look better.
For the outside world's rumors, Xicha said that this news is untrue and is a normal personnel adjustment.
XiChafang said that there is no so-called major layoff in the company, and a small number of personnel have been adjusted to normal personnel adjustment and optimization based on year-end assessment, "At the same time, the year-end bonuses of employees have also been issued to employees normally before the Spring Festival according to performance performance." ”
Although Xi Cha Fang denied the rumors, it was found in the veins that the relevant discussion had begun years ago. In addition to large-scale layoffs, many problems such as excessive overtime, quality control failure, year-end bonus delays, and infighting in the company have also surfaced.
As early as before the Spring Festival, a certified Heytea employee "@ not too busy Anne is changing the plan" complained that the promise of Heytea when entering the job is far from the actual situation, in the face of poor performance through a large number of layoffs to throttle, "employees handed over their backs to you, but you directly stabbed a knife, this is the corporate culture of Heytea? ”
A former employee complained to a media reporter: "The corporate culture of Xicha is to listen to the emperor of the earth to brag about the history of the family, and most of the people in this company want to be laid off and compensated, and it is true that the executives (directors) change one a year, and the reputation in the industry is stinky." ”
Coincidentally, another tea star enterprise before the Spring Festival, Tea Beauty and Pleasant Color, also had similar management problems.
Several industry insiders analyzed that if the information security department is all cut, the store development department is cut 50%" information is true, it may be a good thing for Heytea, "On the one hand, Heytea as a retail industry, the cost of raising an information security department is too large, it is better to outsource."
On the other hand, the store development department is half-laid off, or may stop the previous crazy store expansion, Heytea really needs to be quiet. An industry insider said.
Chinese food expert Zhu Danpeng expressed the same view, he believes that the adjustment of Heytea is also a normal adjustment, "enterprises at different stages, but also face different challenges, Heytea has previous market accumulation, or is more optimistic about the development of Heytea." ”
The dream of wealth driven by capital
As the pioneer of new tea consumption, Heytea and the founder Nie Yunchen, born in 1991, can be called an industry legend. Previously, the catering and tea industries, which have always preferred to "bury their heads in the car", have also jumped to the cusp of new consumer investment under the stimulation of the successful cases of "Xi Tea".
According to Tianyan, since 2016, Xicha has completed a total of 4 rounds of financing, according to incomplete statistics, IDG Capital, He Boquan, Meituan Dragon Ball Capital, Sequoia China, Black Ant Capital, Tencent, Hillhouse, Coatue (Cotour Capital) and other well-known institutions are among them.
Scale is a hard-core indicator of the catering industry. With the help of these top-notch capitals, Heytea has also begun to expand rapidly. According to the latest public information, the current number of heytea stores has approached a thousand.
In June last year, a number of media reported that the new tea brand Xicha was about to complete a new round of financing, the investors were all old shareholders, the new institutions could not squeeze in, and the post-investment valuation was as high as 60 billion.
However, the other side of this capital "feast of wealth creation" is that Xicha has not yet completed hematopoiesis, and it is impossible to get rid of the embarrassment of capital continuation. For capital, the pursuit of profit is the essence, and how to turn 60 billion yuan of paper money into real money and silver is what they consider.
If the valuation is based on 60 billion yuan and the scale of 1,000 stores, the valuation of each store of Heytea has reached 60 million yuan, which is called a sky-high price.
Industry insiders say that companies like Heytea and Nesher are difficult to simply think of as traditional catering companies. The growth model, marketing means, financial data, user operations and many other aspects of these two companies are more or less of the taste of the Internet, which is very in line with the appetite of the capital market.
However, at the beginning of 2022, the entire venture capital industry is undergoing subtle changes. The role of corporate war investment seeks to be repositioned, which is not good news for Heytea.
At the end of last year, Tencent, the "king of investment", issued about 460 million shares of JD.com equity held by it to shareholders in the form of interim dividends. The incident is also seen as a major signal that corporate investment (CVC) is about to enter the "twilight", and the change in Byte War Investment further testifies this judgment.
Previously, there were "not bad money" Internet manufacturers taking over, making the projects like drumming flowers, and each increase in valuation benefited the investors in the previous round. Often passed to the end, the "takeover man" is the enterprise war investment. When the "takeover man" becomes prudent, the business will also return to the basic logic.
For the tea of the friendly businessman Naixue, the good villain has been crowned the title of "the first stock in the industry", and investors have also obtained corresponding returns. At a time when the basic logic of investors returns to rationality, Xicha, which has not yet landed in the capital market, is also transforming its anxiety into management appearances such as layoffs and infighting.
In other words, the major entrenched capital behind it should be more anxious than the founders at present.
The fate of HiCha and Ofo is divided
In the eyes of some people in the investment community, the scene staged by Xicha today is almost similar to the trajectory of the former star startup ofo xiaohuangche. The same founder of the post-90s, after catching up with the wind outlet, the power of the rapid expansion of the company; and also after a certain scale, encountered problems such as layoffs, and staged power dramas such as standing in line and infighting.
An Internet person close to Xicha said that Nie Yunchen hopes to see the achievements brought by the core team in the short term, and after failing to achieve the goal, he always changes the senior management team quickly.
"And the Internet startup I used to work for, the state is very similar." The person said that the reason is that the boss has a huge amount of money in his hands after completing the financing, and he finds that it is far faster than selling milk tea cup by cup. The main idea is on capital operation, and the rest is hoped to be done through professional managers.
For professional managers who are the icing on the cake, they are well versed in the psychology of "market feedback is not important, the boss is happy is important", often through short-term strategies to quickly meet the expectations of the boss, it is unlikely to calm down to the long-term layout. In this case, competition for performance, infighting, and taking sides have become the norm.
The various ills of this short-term stimulation are emerging, and a netizen who is certified as a Heytea employee complains on the pulse that Heytea is basically a direct store, and the poor quality is mainly poor quality control. "Some stores have been open for two or three years only to find that the filter water is wrong, and the ice machine is directly connected to the tap water, so the tea you drink may be made with tap water."
In addition, in September last year, Heytea was also on the cusp of food safety because employees mistakenly took drink display props to customers, causing customers to wash their stomachs.
At that time, the focus of Xicha was still seeking the long-sleeved good dance of the capital market.
After getting a new round of financing in June last year, Xicha, which holds a huge financing, began to transform into a VC, and began to frantically "sweep goods" in the tea industry - in just 4 months, Heytea completed five investments, and the heat of investment has far exceeded the launch of new tea products and the opening of new stores.
On February 8, Tianyancha showed that Suge Fresh Tea Affiliate Company, Guangzhou Biding Catering Management Co., Ltd., underwent industrial and commercial changes, and the new shareholder Zhuhai Suge Investment Partnership (Limited Partnership) was added.
The equity penetration chart shows that Nie Yunchen, the founder of Xicha, is the executive partner of the above-mentioned partnership.
"Can investing in so many tea companies in a short period of time really form a synergy?" Many people in the industry have doubts, in their view, this is Xicha, which cannot support a valuation of 60 billion yuan, and is seeking a new capital story.
However, whether this story can help its sprint IPO is still unknown, after all, the listing of Heytea is also its main business itself, and has nothing to do with the invested companies.
Today's Xicha, the fate may have long been out of Nie Yunchen's control, but those investment institutions that hold the lifeblood of Xicha. Once the capital expectations cannot be fulfilled, Nie Yunchen may become an outcast at any time.
As Ofo David said in an interview, The A round of financing of Zhu Xiaohu in the Jinsha River is of great significance to him, but in the later stage, Zhu Xiaohu shouted for him to merge Ofo and Mobike to obtain the greatest benefits.
David also admired, admired and thanked Cheng Wei at the beginning of his business, but in the later stage, Cheng Wei became the antagonist and the person who wanted to control the entire field of travel.
For the current Xicha and Nie Yunchen, the capital behind them, and what kind of role do you want them to appear?