On the evening of January 21, Douyu (NSDAQ:DOYU) announced the reason for CEO Chen Shaojie's disappearance.
According to the announcement, Chen Shaojie was arrested by Chengdu police around November 16 last year. However, Douyu has not yet received any official notification of the investigation into Chen Shaojie or the apparent reason for his arrest. This incident could have a material adverse effect on Betta's reputation, business and results of operations.
In the previous month, Chen Shaojie, chairman of the board of directors and CEO of Douyu, was reported missing for nearly three weeks, which attracted widespread attention.
At that time, industry insiders speculated that his disappearance may be related to gambling. According to public information, in January 2021, the live broadcast room of the Douyu anchor "Changsha Rural Death Squad" was suspected of gambling, with an income of up to 177 million yuan and a single-day turnover of 13.1767 million yuan. This incident was called "the largest casino in betta" by netizens.
As the first local internet company in Hubei to go public overseas, Douyu was once China's largest online game live streaming platform.
However, in recent years, it has faced challenges and pressures from within the industry. The decline in game market data and the strengthening of supervision have brought a lot of impact to it. According to the latest financial report, Douyu's current revenue was 1.392 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of about 24%, and there has been a year-on-year decline in revenue for many quarters.
For this incident, I think Betta needs to take more proactive measures to deal with the current predicament.
First of all, the company needs to strengthen internal management, improve operational efficiency, and reduce costs. Secondly, Douyu needs to re-examine its business model and strategic direction to find new growth points. In addition, the company also needs to pay attention to industry development trends and policy changes, and adjust its development strategy in a timely manner.
At the same time, for industry regulators, they need to strengthen the supervision of the game live broadcast industry to prevent the recurrence of similar incidents. For anchors and platforms, they need to be more self-disciplined and regulate their behavior to avoid bad behavior and illegal activities.
In short, this incident has brought a lot of impact and challenges to Betta. However, as long as the company can respond positively and take effective measures to improve its own situation, it is believed that it can still return to the top in a highly competitive market.