The low-key Gong Hongjia, the popularity and wealth are very mismatched. In the investment circle, Gong Hongjia has many labels, such as "A-share cash-out king", "China's most bullish angel investor", "China's version of Sun Zhengyi" and "security godfather". However, few people outside the circle know about this regular on the rich list.
On the 2022 Forbes Global Billionaires List, the Gong Hongjia family's wealth is $13.2 billion, or about 89 billion yuan, far more than his Hubei compatriot Lei Jun ($11.7 billion), as well as Internet tycoons Huang Zheng, Wang Xing, Liu Qiangdong and so on.
Gong Hongjia's most well-known investment was an investment of 2.45 million yuan in Hikvision in 2001, which received tens of thousands of times the return. In 2015, he began to shift his investment focus to the medical and health sector, and frequently fell behind.
The follow-up story is equally colorful. As of the end of 2021, among the companies he has invested in, there are Hikvision, Fuhan Micro, Zero2IPO, Zhongyuan Xiehe, VeriSilicon Shares, Fanshengzi and so on.
Someone once asked Gong Hongjia if he had an idol, and he thought about it for a moment and said elon Musk , who insisted on going his own way and achieved a dream that authoritative experts thought was impossible to achieve. "Maybe we have similarities on some inner spiritual and spiritual levels."
01. Gong Hongjia's investment territory
Gong Hongjia once mentioned in an interview with China Entrepreneur that the most important criterion for evaluating the "good or bad" of a company is whether it has technical content. This has become one of Gong Hongjia's most important investment principles.
According to incomplete statistics from the city, no less than 7 of the enterprises invested by the Gong Hongjia family have been listed so far. These include security industry chain enterprises Fuhanwei, Hikvision, United Optoelectronics, biotechnology companies Zhongyuan Xiehe and Panshengzi, chip company VeriSilicon shares and investment management enterprise Zero2IPO.
In addition to direct investment, Gong Hongjia has also established a number of investment management companies, such as Tianjin Fuce, which is wholly owned by Wealth Strategy, a wholly-owned enterprise in Hong Kong. His wife Chen Chunmei and brother Gong Chuanjun are also active in the capital market. Chen Chunmei is also a classmate of Gong Hongjia at Huazhong University of Science and Technology.
The most important investment carrier of the Gong Hongjia family is Shenzhen Jiadaogu Investment Management Co., Ltd., as well as equity investment funds such as Jiadao Success and Jiadao Gongcheng, behind which are Chen Chunmei and Gong Chuanjun. With the help of JiaDaogu Investment, the Gong Hongjia family has also become the LP (limited partner of the equity investment fund, that is, the investor) behind sequoia China, IDG Capital, Hillhouse Capital and many other institutions.
According to the Tianyancha App, as of May 17, 2022, Jiadao Gongcheng Equity Investment Fund has invested in 114 enterprises.
Public information shows that the Gong Hongjia family has invested in security monitoring company Hikvision in 2001 and 2004 and Fuhanwei, a security chip company.
Hikvision went public in 2010. After the ban on restricted shares was lifted, Gong Hongjia began to reduce her holdings. According to the announcement and Oriental Wealth Choice data, Gong Hongjia's latest reduction in Hikvision occurred on March 4, 2021.
As of the end of 2021, Gong Hongjia directly holds 10.31% of Hikvision's shares, and his wife Chen Chunmei indirectly holds 1.56% of Hikvision. As of May 17, 2022, Hikvision's total market capitalization was 303.655 billion yuan. According to this conversion, the value of Gong Hongjia's husband and wife's shareholding is not less than 36 billion yuan.
In 2004, Chen Chunmei, Yang Xiaoqi and others jointly funded the establishment of Fuhan Limited, the predecessor of Fuhanwei, at this time Chen Chunmei was the largest shareholder, holding 43% of the shares. In 2014, Fuhan Limited was changed to a joint-stock company, after which Chen Chunmei held 19.96% of the shares, Gong Hongjia brother Gong Chuanjun held 3.74%, and the controlling shareholder, actual controller and chairman of FuhanWei was Yang Xiaoqi.
According to the announcement of Fuhan Micro, in 2016, The shareholders of Fuhan Micro, Jie Zhi Holdings, Chen Chunmei, Gong Chuanjun and Yang Xiaoqi signed the "Concerted Action Agreement", agreeing that from the date of signing the agreement to the date when the parties no longer hold the company's shares, the parties to the agreement except Yang Xiaoqi will act in concert with Yang Xiaoqi.
After the successful listing of Fuhan Micro in 2017, Chen Chunmei held 13.47% of the shares and Gong Chuanjun held 2.52%. As of the end of 2021, Chen Chunmei and Gong Chuanjun's shareholding shares have not changed.
(Gong Hongjia)
Around 2015, Gong Hongjia began to turn her investment attention to the field of big health.
According to The Prospectus, in July of that year, Jiadao Gongcheng and other investors provided a total of 70 million yuan in financing for Panshengzi, a cancer precision treatment company that had just been established for two years.
In 2016, Gong Hongjia later became interested in Zhongyuan Xiehe and also invested 100 million yuan in Fanshengzi, and acquired a 5% stake in Fanshengzi held by Beijing Jinchuang Legend for another 23 million yuan. In the end, Zhongyuan Concordia held a 15% stake in Panshengzi. In 2018, Zhongyuan Xiehe transferred its 6.48% equity to Shenzhen Straits Asset Management Co., Ltd. for 125 million yuan. In 2020, Panshengzi was listed on the US stock market.
According to the 2021 annual report of Zhongyuan Concordia, as of the end of 2021, there is still 3.24% of the panshengzi equity held by Zhongyuan Concord. In The 2021 annual report of PanShengzi, the shareholding share of Jiadao Gongcheng was not marked.
At the end of 2021, after two years of operation, Gong Hongjia will be a stem cell technology company Zhongyuan Xiehe "under the command".
Initially, in 2018, Zhongyuan Concord purchased a target shanghai Aoyuan successfully invested by Jiadao by issuing shares, and Jiadao successfully became the second largest shareholder of Zhongyuan Concord. In the same year, Gong Hongjia began to serve as the chairman of Zhongyuan Xiehe.
Until December 12, 2021, Gong Hongjia resigned from all positions such as chairman and director of Zhongyuan Union on the grounds of "optimizing the corporate governance structure" without ending his term.
However, just two days later, Deyuan Investment, the controlling shareholder of Zhongyuan Concord, irrevocably entrusted the voting rights corresponding to the 6.99% equity held by Jiadao to Jiadao. In addition, Jiadao Chenggong also indirectly holds the equity of Zhongyuan Xiehe through the concerted actor Beijing Yinhong Chunhui.
As of the end of 2021, Jiadao Successful holds a total of 17.83% of the voting rights of Zhongyuan Concord (including 6.99% of the voting proxy shares), becoming the controlling shareholder of the latter. Gong Hongjia and his wife Chen Chunmei jointly became the actual controllers of Zhongyuan Xiehe.
Interestingly, less than four months later, Gong Hongjia returned to the board of directors of Zhongyuan Concord. On March 26, 2022, Zhongyuan Concordia held an interim board meeting, at which Gong Hongjia was unanimously elected as the chairman of Zhongyuan Concordia, and was also elected as the chairman of the Strategy Committee and a member of the Nomination Committee. Gong Hongjia's term of office as chairman of the board is terminated on May 18, 2023.
In 2019, Gong Hongjia also invested in chip IP enterprise VeriSilicon through Fuce Holdings. In 2020, VeriSilicon shares were listed on the Science and Technology Innovation Board. As of the end of 2021, Gong Hongjia holds 8.45% of the original shares through Fuce Holdings.
As of the close of trading on May 17, 2022, the total market value of VeriSilicon shares was 21.769 billion yuan, and the value of Gong Hongjia's shares was not less than 1.8 billion yuan.
02, from the security "change lane" health
In Gong Hongjia's investment history, the most proud work is undoubtedly the investment in Hikvision, the global security leader. He once publicly shared that there is a "three noes" principle for his own investment: "What others don't want to do, can't do, and don't dare to do, we can do." ”
This investment also reflects Gong Hongjia's preference for "three noes" companies and unpopular tracks.
In 2001, Gong Hongjia became the major shareholder and co-founder of Hikvision with an investment of 2.45 million yuan, working with college classmates Hu Yangzhong and Chen Zongnian. By the time the company went public in 2010, Hikvision had become a leading enterprise in the domestic video surveillance system market.
When Gong Hongjia invested in Hikvision, the domestic security industry was still in the initial stage of development, and the product was far from popular. At the same time, Hikvision's entrepreneurial team is not only short of money, but also the management and research and development system are not perfect. Gong Hongjia once recalled that the management represented by Chen Zongnian and Hu Yangzhong at that time did not even have the concept of a company's shareholder system.
However, at the same time, due to the 9/11 incident and other reasons, the emphasis on security in various countries has risen rapidly, driving the domestic security industry to enter a period of rapid enrichment of product categories and increasing number of players.
Before the industry took off, Gong Hongjia seized the opportunity with a vicious eye and earned back ten thousand times the return.
After Hikvision went public in May 2010, Gong Hongjia served as vice chairman of the company, holding 124 million shares, reducing the shareholding ratio to 24.8%, and his wife Chen Chunmei indirectly held 3.42% of Hikvision.
In the same year, Gong Hongjia and his wife, who first appeared on the Forbes China Rich List, ranked 59th on the list with a wealth of 10 billion yuan.
With the explosive growth of the domestic security industry, as the "first security stock", Hikvision has been listed for two years, and the performance has doubled. Stock prices have also risen all the way.
According to the statistics of the city according to the announcement and the data of Oriental Wealth Choice, since the lifting of the ban on restricted shares in May 2011, Gong Hongjia has reduced her holdings a total of 46 times, and Xinjiang Pukang, which Chen Chunmei holds shares, has reduced its holdings twice.
As of March 2021, Gong Hongjia and Chen Chunmei have reduced their holdings and cashed out by about 28 billion yuan, and have received dividends of more than 6.4 billion yuan.
Roughly calculated, Gong Hongjia's investment in Hikvision that year has returned more than 28,000 times.
In addition to Hikvision, the leader of security video surveillance, Gong Hongjia has also invested in many Hikvision suppliers, analog ISP (image signal processor) manufacturer Fuhan Micro, optical lens manufacturers United Optoelectronics are among them. Fuhan micro has now grown into a simulated ISP leader.
In 2015, Gong Hongjia turned 50 years old.
About the beginning of this year, he "bid farewell" to the preference for the security industry and set his sights on the field of big health.
In 2015, in addition to investing in Panshengzi, Gong Hongjia also invested in Beijing Jiabowen Biotechnology Co., Ltd. through Jiadao Gongcheng.
Kabovan specializes in the recycling of kitchen waste and converting it into an organic soil conditioner. Gong Hongjia said that part of the funds he withdrew from Hikvision were invested in the project.
Since then, Gong Hongjia and its investment management enterprises have also invested in precision medicine company Midland Tyco and gene products company Shanghai Aoyuan in 2017.
In 2018, in addition to the aforementioned Zhongyuan Xiehe, the Gong Hongjia family also invested in gene therapy company Boya Jiyin and tumor immune cell therapy company Tiankeya.
It is worth noting that in 2018, Gong Hongjia obtained the equity of Zhongyuan Concord (successfully and directly held by Jiadao) by selling Shanghai Aoyuan to Zhongyuan Concord, becoming the second largest shareholder of Zhongyuan Concord.
He once said in an interview that he was still suitable for doing something more grounded. For those things that are relatively tall and need to have a global vision to do well, he always feels that there is a gap. "This is what I have been thinking about since I was 50 years old, and maybe it has to do with knowing my destiny."
Gong Hongjia often attributes the success of the investment to luck: "I am the best lucky angel investor in China. I went from college, to working, to starting a business, to being an angel investor, even to marrying a wife, in a very narrow circle. ”
03. Ab surface of the "three noes" principle
Whether it is investing in the security industry or the medical and health field, Gong Hongjia is screening the unpopular tracks that are expected to take off in accordance with the "three noes" principle. In a forum, Gong Hongjia once gave another explanation for the "three noes principle" enterprise: "The uncertainty is very large, and the funds needed are very large. ”
Gong Hongjia has bet on the leader several times - there are Hikvision and Fuhanwei, and among the companies invested after 2015, Jia Bowen ranks first in the field of domestic kitchen waste treatment, and Fanshengzi also ranks in the forefront of domestic genetic testing companies.
However, everything is two sides of the same coin, and the "three noes" allowed Gong Hongjia to reap fruitful fruits, but at the same time missed some opportunities.
The unpopular track avoids the Red Sea competition, but it requires investors and invested companies to work together to spend a period of "hard days" that are not understood, and the "three noes" project has extremely high requirements for investors' vision, and if they are slightly careless, they either miss the project or put the money on the water.
Gong Hongjia is no stranger to the "hard days" of mutual support with enterprises.
In the early days of Hikvision's establishment, the company was once caught in a tight situation of capital flow, and Gong Hongjia contacted many parties to hope to raise funds for Hikvision. However, the market is not cold to this "three noes" project.
According to Gong Hongjia, when he approached a well-known domestic financial VC, the other party said that Hikvision at that time was only 600 million yuan in size, "I will calculate a number for you, let us invest in such a company." Is there a problem with the head? ”
In the end, Hikvision could only survive this difficult stage independently. At this stage, Gong Hongjia also did her best, not only to pay but also to contribute, bringing the latest video codec technology to Hikvision.
In 2001, the domestic communications market was still in the 2G era, and the corresponding digital video codec standard used was MPEG4. The newer generation of H.264 technology is still in the draft stage. Under the same conditions, the quality ratio of H.264 compressed images is 1.5 to 2 times that of MPEG-4. If it can be ahead of H.264 technology, Hikvision has an absolute leading technology capital.
It was in this year that Gong Hongjia met Wang Gang, a codec technical talent, and Gong Hongjia "prepaid" Wang Gang's funds by funding research and development, allowing the latter to fully carry out software research and development based on a new generation of codec standards.
Fortunately, Wang Gang lived up to expectations, developed the relevant software in the same year, and locked in the exclusive operation of the technical achievement before December 31, 2006. Subsequently, the technology was exclusively licensed to Hikvision.
According to Gong Hongjia's recollection, by the third year of its establishment, Hikvision's net profit has reached 20 to 30 million. At this time, there is no need for the company to raise funds. Therefore, until the listing, Gong Hongjia's equity in Hikvision was not diluted.
After surviving the difficult years, Gong Hongjia and Hikvision cast a good story in the investment circle.
The "three noes" principle also has another side.
In 2010, Wang Xing of the Meituan group had found Gong Hongjia in the hope of obtaining an investment of less than 10 million US dollars, but at that time, Gong Hongjia believed that Wang Xing had an introverted personality and was not suitable for a new type of group buying, so he failed to invest, and the project was finally won by Shen Nanpeng.
Afterwards, Gong Hongjia bluntly said that if he had invested, he might have been able to harvest the second project with a return of ten thousand times in his life, however, "investment is an art of regret."
If this is the case, I am afraid that the "really powerful investor" in Wang Xing's mouth is not Shen Nanpeng, but Gong Hongjia.
The same plot is also staged in the investment in DJI. Around 2015, Gong Hongjia refused to participate in DJI's investment because of the "unimaginable" flying machine flying everywhere in the domestic sky.
Counting the cases that Gong Hongjia successfully captured and missed, his investment personal style is extremely strong, especially relying on feelings and instincts, and the preferred enterprises will often carry out a comprehensive investment layout for different industrial links.
In an interview in the early years, Gong Hongjia once confessed: "I make decisions based on intuition, by personal refinement of information, and by colliding with other people's ideas. ”
"Some funds ask me: Can your judgment and decision-making ability be improved through learning?" I said that this has something to do with people's thinking, and it is not something that can be mastered through study. It gradually becomes your instinct in the midst of business practice. ”
As he said, for more than 20 years, driven by "instinct", Gong Hongjia has repeatedly "shot" accurately invested in the industry that is about to take off, which is a thrill, but now the target has been converted from security to great health.
Gong Hongjia believes that for an angel investor, it is not only that you have earned thousands of times the return on a project, but that you find yourself with unique insight to choose a project that was once unpopular, a team that was not optimistic at the time, and finally achieved incredible success.
"This is equivalent to unearthing a huge gold mine that no one else has excavated, and it is also a kind of value creation." He said.
Twenty years later, Gong Hongjia continues to dig his gold mine.
Resources:
"Exclusive Gong Hongjia: Every investment, I don't mind waiting for 10 years", the investment community
"Gong Hongjia: After Hikvision, I put more energy into investing in the field of big health", Securities Times Network Li Mingzhu
"Li Zhu dialogue with Gong Hongjia: In the entrepreneurial ecology, there are only two kinds left, the winner is king and the leftover is king", maker cat Xiaolan
"55-year-old Gong Hongjia: I always want to do what others think is impossible", the investment community
(Except for the separately marked source, the above picture is from Visual China)
(Author 丨 Dong Wenshu Editor 丨 Lei Yanpeng)