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In the afternoon of January 5, at the Jinling Hotel in Nanjing, Gui Zhenyu (Yonako), founder of Mi Man Media, was waiting on the side of the hotel lobby for the directors and partners who had come to the meeting, and the afternoon was a series of tense board meetings and strategic cooperation meetings.
At 18:00 on January 6th, at the table of Zhongshan Hall, Wang Hua (partner of Innovation Factory), Liu Zehui (partner of Legend Capital), Chen Rui (founder of Station B), Wang Jun (president and founding partner of Tianxing Capital), Chen Yuetian (former investment director of Innovation Workshop, partner of CDH Cultural Industry Fund), Liu Xin (COO of Taihe Music), Ouyang Fenqiang (Baoyu actor of the 87 version of the TV series "Dream of the Red Chamber")," and other investors, partners, friends of Gui Zhenyu and employees of Mi man have already entered the table. This is also the birthday party of the second anniversary of the establishment of Mi Man Company. Investors Wang Hua, Wang Jun, Chen Yuetian, and Shangguan Hong all took to the stage to talk about why they would throw rice man.
At 10:00 a.m. on January 7, we had a hasty meeting in Mi Man's office, and Zhao Mingyang, director of cultural and entertainment investment at Tianxing Capital, was also there.
"I don't travel much now, and I stay in the company." Gui Zhenyu rubbed his red eyes from time to time and joked, "I rarely go to other places unless there are some particularly important things." Because I have a baby, I have a good excuse now. ”
The "cultural consciousness" behind the national style
Gui Zhenyu's chess pieces are landing one by one, and will run wild on the road of IPO in the next two years.
On January 6, 2015, according to industrial and commercial information, Mi Man Media was officially registered and established. Before that, Gui Zhenyu got an angel investment of 10 million yuan from the innovation workshop.
In May 2015, Mi Man Media announced that it had received a Series A investment of 63 million yuan from Legend Capital, Station B and Bloomage Group. Approaching the Spring Festival of 2017, the delivery of Tianxing Capital, a new investor of Mi Man, has also been completed.
"The board said that after the Bird's Nest concert, take a round. In fact, we were not short of money, Ming Yang and I have a really good private relationship, and I also recognize this brother. This new round of investment is the main investment of Tianxing, and the investment of Legend. Gui Zhenyu said.
At the annual meeting, Wang Jun took the stage to say that Tianxing has invested in more than 500 enterprises, and has only participated in the annual meetings of two of its investment companies so far, one of which is Miman. Wang Jun had rushed to nanjing Miman from Qufu in Jining, Shandong Province, the night before, where he bought bamboo and brought it to Nanjing, where Wang Jun himself liked to study traditional Chinese culture and had a portrait of the heart scientist Wang Yangming hanging in his office. According to the data, Tianxing Capital was established in 2012 and began to fully deploy the new third board in October 2013. Up to now, Tianxing Capital has more than 60 billion yuan in management and fundraising funds, has invested in more than 500 enterprises, and invested in more than 50 companies in the field of pan-culture and entertainment.
"There is a ceiling for material consumption upgrading, but there is no ceiling for spiritual consumption, and it has always grown geometrically." Wang Jun said that Guofeng music has economic effects and social effects.
Zhao Mingyang is the person in charge of the Investment Mi man project of Tianxing Capital, and from 2015 to the final submission of the case with Mi Man, he met Gui Zhenyu more than ten times before and after. The logic of Zhao Mingyang's persuasion of Wang Jun's investment is that the national self-confidence behind the rise of great powers has also risen, and a group of young fans after the 90s who are highly loyal in the field of traditional culture have gathered. Zhao Mingyang said: "I will take PPT to talk about Mi Man, the first picture is - the awakening of the great powers to cultural consciousness. And Mi Man's ability to get approval for performances in the Great Hall of the People and venues with more political significance this year is also regarded as a kind of "political recognition" and can be supported in national policies.
In 2016, the music production department of Mi Man's commercial cooperation created nearly 200 songs, made more than 6 million yuan in revenue, and the proportion of game music accounted for 70%. In addition, Mi Man began to regularize offline concerts, concerts, tours and comic show activities, and in 2016, it did 20 concerts and invested in a number of domestic animation exhibitions.
In terms of IP, the novels of "Peacock Daming" and "Koi Copy" have begun to be written. The script of "Peacock Daming" is in the pipeline, and the partner is Taihe Pictures. "Peacock Daming" is a personal original music novel launched by EDIQ (Bu Lei), which tells a mythical story about fate with infectious character dialogue and music.
"Mi Man is already a cultural company with complete artist packaging, music production, and performance implementation." Chen Yuetian said, "We will definitely run all the way on the road of IPO, and after the future, we will continue to carry forward the National Style Music, learn from more innovative content and communication methods, and continue to attract more young people to join this group." ”
Restrained frustration and sense of accomplishment
In the past year, Gui Zhenyu has been anxious, confused, painful, and excited.
In the infield of the Bird's Nest, a girl wearing a Hanfu dressed in a white plastic raincoat cried in the light rain, looking about 15 years old, short hair, round face, hand dancing glow sticks, and fierce feelings. The girl's parents sat next to her left and right and looked down at the phone, trance placed in two dimensions.
On September 16, 2016, Mi Man hosted a large-scale National Style theme concert "Heart Time" at the Bird's Nest in Beijing, attracting nearly 50,000 fans. On that day, nearly 50 ancient Chinese musicians: Audio Monster, Qiran, Hetu, Dong Zhen, Yi Auntie, Yin Lin, etc. all went to the live performance. Chen Yuetian was quite emotional, he said that this is the first time he saw in a concert, Liu Zong came (Lenovo Group Chairman Liu Chuanzhi), Li Shu (Chinese Culture Chairman Li Ruigang), Cheng Zong (Tencent Group Vice President Cheng Wu) also came.
"In terms of the execution of the whole scene, everyone is very tired, and the little partner is crying and crying when he is halfway through. How to say it, no one has played before, there are many deficiencies. Gui Zhenyu said that several times he was so anxious that he had no clue, but he still survived.
At the concert, Dai Quan, a veteran figure in the ancient wind circle and the music director of the concert, spoke on the stage: "I can hold a concert at the Bird's Nest, thank you for a person, I don't say this person's name, everyone should know." After the concert at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing in May 2015, Dai Quan also said on the stage that he thanked "one person" for such words, not explicitly, but everyone knew that it was Gui Zhenyu. On two important occasions, Gui Zhenyu did not come to the stage, and his eyes were red in the background.
The bird's nest concert was solemn and climactic, and finally the moming chess team all appeared and triggered the tears of many fans on the scene. However, every large-scale event has details of regrets, including venue layout, lighting and sound, track selection, singer singing skills, and later more and more rain, all of which more or less affect the fan experience.
"Bird's Nest is such a big event, the box office is still very good, better than I expected." Gui Zhenyu said that business channels and experience are still very lacking, and a large-scale event of 50,000 people such as the Bird's Nest should be able to do a better job of attracting investment.
"Why didn't you go to the Bird's Nest in 2017?" We asked Gui Zhenyu. "The fan economy can only be consumed once." Gui Zhenyu explained to Music Finance that fans of ancient music have feelings and cannot consume repeatedly, so they will not go to the Bird's Nest in 2017. This year will choose another more representative venue, the team spent a lot of effort to approve it, the scale of the concert is about 2,000 people, the scale is small, the focus will be on live broadcasting.
The fans in this market are niche, young, and extremely effective, with strong self-esteem and feelings, and the age is mainly concentrated in young people under the age of 25 above junior high school, and the user's activity on social media is extremely high. For commercialization, some fans are extremely opposed, believing that the circle is now chaotic and utilitarian and impetuous, and some fans have a complicated mentality, a post-90s female fan said to us: "Commercialization is no problem, but it is too urgent for no one to be down-to-earth." A doctoral friend of the department of Chinese is a senior fan of ancient wind music, I heard that we want to talk to her about the commercialization of the ancient wind circle, but she politely refused quite strongly, leaving only one sentence: "I don't want to talk about this circle, especially this topic." ”
"There's always someone going to do commercialization, it used to be a hobby, it's a company now." Gui Zhenyu has seen very thoroughly, where there are people, there are rivers and lakes, and his heart is gradually getting stronger, "just think clearly about what you want."
"What do you think are your flaws?"
"I still have a lot of shortcomings, some places are still quite blind, now it's a little better, I used to do things recklessly." 」 Gui Zhenyu replied that he had indeed been such a person before. If you want to describe yourself as a game character, his answer is "Li Xiaoyao", although he has experienced many things, he is still sunny, active, and can tell cold jokes.
Zhao Mingyang explained: "Mi Man walked well because there was already a long-term accumulation before, if you put it for a long time, after all, Mizi is young and vigorous, the company's commercial operation time is still short, he is very hard, and it is normal to have some problems in the process of groping." ”
Wan Yajie, the chief operating officer of Mi Man, is also a music producer with more feelings, but he is also becoming more and more like a businessman, and in many public occasions, he plays the role of the company's spokesperson. At the second birthday party, he not only acted as the host, but also busied himself with toasting with his partners: "There are many big events this year, and I need the help and support of good friends. ”
Wan Yajie recalled that when he first met Shangguan Hong, the investment director of Legend, he had nothing to do on the plane, and the gua xiang was very good, and the result was really a good fate. After that, Shangguan Hong pulled Gui Zhenyu everywhere to meet people and dock various cooperation resources, and when Gui Zhenyu mentioned "Shangguan Sister", his mouth was full of "gratitude". According to Shangguan Hong, "At that time, I kept telling my partners that Yonako was a real person with great wisdom, and such a person could achieve great success. ”
Interestingly, Wang Jun mentioned a word "face" when talking about investing in Mi man, and it was also at the end of the project that Zhao Mingyang opened the founder's photo after speaking about PPT and let him take a look. Wang Jun explained with a smile: "It's not superstition, I think it's very important to be born from the heart." I saw it for the first time last night, and after seeing it, I found that there was no problem. ”
Gui Zhenyu is tall, has a very high hairline, thick eyebrows, big face, double eyelids and thick ears, and has a natural arrogance when walking, and his speech is between sincerity and directness and extreme measure. In general, he has a bold personality and is prone to worry about gains and losses.
Throughout 2015 after the establishment of the company, Gui Zhenyu has been very anxious and once a little exhausted. Everyone in the team is a brother, can not fight, scold, can not say, the company must establish a system. Now that each department of Mi Man has set an annual target to become a profit-oriented company, "our previous model was to think of a thing and we would do it." Now it's not, set a goal and I'll do it again, to ensure that nothing goes wrong. ”
Caught up with the good times
Under the background of capital pouring into the cultural entrepreneurship industry, gufeng music, as a new force, has never provoked the desire of all interest groups like in the past two years.
Around the Bird's Nest concert in September 2016, Gui Zhenyu's face was haggard and his eye bags were so heavy that he looked at least ten years old in the year. This may be the price of choosing to start a business, and get satisfaction in the torture.
Ten years ago, a song composed by EDIQ fillers and composed of "Sheng Tang Night Singing" was launched on the Internet as soon as it was launched, and it quickly opened up, and even triggered the innovation of the "network two-dimensional", and the musical form of "ancient style" began to receive widespread attention. In 2007, the "Mo Ming Qimiao" group began to attract attention on the Internet, attracting a group of fans.
In 2011, Gui Zhenyu joined the Mo Ming Qimiao team and began to lead the ancient style music to commercialization. Until then, many people who want to integrate this matter are afraid of the question of "how others see", are in a wait-and-see state, or are under the sentiment of this.
In 2014, Chen Yuetian watched a lot of animation projects, and whether it was painting style, aesthetics or values, it was an imported product from Japan. In the middle of 2014, the first meeting was in Wuyi Lane, Nanjing, "I remember that at that time, I found Yonago and asked him if he could operate this matter through commercialization and capitalization, and he was very hesitant at the time, he asked: Everyone has been friends for so long, why do they have to talk about business and contracts?" I said no, as long as things can be made bigger and bigger, let everyone make life better and better, rather than things getting smaller and smaller, and finally there is no more. ”
Gui Zhenyu thought about it for more than 1 month, and finally made up his mind, ran to Beijing, and under the recommendation of Chen Yuetian, met with Kai-Fu Lee and Wang Hua before finalizing the investment.
Gui Zhenyu's tens of millions of angel investment in the innovation workshop has undoubtedly changed the pattern of ancient music since then.
When it comes to the fragmented ancient wind music circle at that time, there are so many clubs and people, why do they come together with Gui Zhenyu? Chen Yuetian once mentioned that entrepreneurship is not creation, and it is necessary to be able to balance the relationship of interests.
In 2014, Gui Zhenyu and Chen Yuetian said that they would hold a 10th anniversary concert at the Bird's Nest two years later, because at that time, the Bird's Nest was a difficult venue to enter and it was difficult to fill the seats. At that time, Chen Yuetian felt, "Are you talking to me big?" But later Chen Yuetian found that the development speed of Mi Man was unexpected.
"Every time I went to Nanjing to chat with Yonako, I was surprised, and I made a three-month plan, and then I came back three months later to see it, and found that he had done all the things that the company had to do for half a year." Chen Yuetian said.
"Get the investment, first have fans", innovation workshop partner Wang Hua in 2014 began to look at the new culture, the second dimension, found that most of them are Japanese culture, although there was no Mi Man this company at that time, but Wang Hua felt that there will definitely be China's own two-dimensional culture out, "Mo Ming Qimiao was already a leading group in the ancient wind circle at that time, I saw Zhenyu's eyes lit up, the team is very energetic." It can open a concert of 10,000 people, and there are excellent artists and music. ”
Earlier, Wang Hua was still a little worried, because there was no problem with Mo Mingqimiao's existence as a group, but could Gui Zhenyu make a company? "I remember that AKB48 went from a small house to the Tokyo Dome, it took 6 years, but Mi Man went from Nanjing and the Great Hall of the People to the Bird's Nest in two years, from the niche to the mainstream, Zhenyu has a very strong learning ability, step by step."
In fact, before the registration of Miman in January 2015, the team had already explored some experience in commercial operation. The first 1,000 performance tickets held at sparrow was quickly robbed, and according to the price of 60 yuan, the ticket revenue was 60,000 yuan. This is the first time that the ancient style music fans and the Mo Ming Qimiao team gathered on the Internet for many years have come offline, and I did not expect that the performance scene would be so hot, which made Gui Zhenyu keenly aware that ancient wind music can open up a commercial road of its own.
After the Sparrow Washe, the team came up with a commemorative album of "five or six anniversaries", when Gui Zhenyu ran a lot of record companies in Beijing and were rejected, and later Haidi Music helped publish this record, but the cost was borne by himself, and Gui Zhenyu raised enough money for 20,000 physical albums. In June 2013, the new album "Destiny Winds" was snatched up as soon as it was launched, and the strong effect of the fan economy surprised the veteran record company, Sea Butterfly Music.
The good results of the album further strengthened Gui Zhenyu's idea of commercialization, he began to gradually integrate the resources of the ancient wind music circle, signed the ancient style singer, held a four-day "two-dimensional carnival" in Nanjing, and then went to the Great Hall of the People in Nanjing to hold two ancient style concerts and a "Mo Ming Qimiao" celebration concert, and held China's first animation music festival at the National Exhibition Center in Nanjing, with 30,000 participants, and at that time, the team only had more than ten people, and there was still a community state where everyone was alive and working together.
In 2014, the team kicked off with the "Decade of Ancient Style" original concert tour. "Ten Years of Ancient Style" has held a total of 15 performances in 12 domestic markets such as Beijing, Shanghai, Wuhan, Chengdu, Xi'an and Guangzhou. From 2011 to 2015, the team held a total of nearly 100 performances, large and small, and a series of performance activities expanded the influence of the ancient music circle to the real world, which not only trained the team, opened up upstream and downstream channels, but also quickly attracted the attention of capital.
In January 2015, Mi Man Culture Media was formally established, becoming a content company around the layout of "ancient style music", taking the "hugging group mode", quickly formed a music production team, established the company's copyright library, accumulated more than 2,000 music copyrights, also in the year of the company's establishment, Gui Zhenyu felt that the "ancient style" was not big enough, network cover singing and ancient style filler words will limit the development of this music type, he began to consciously emphasize the concept of "national style music", hoping to combine the most popular trends at present. Incorporate more elements of modern music to produce a contemporary two-dimensional culture with a richer Chinese style.
"If all goes well, I hope we can be listed on the Growth Enterprise Market in 2018." Gui Zhenyu said, "I do things that belong to really desperate to play, we set a goal is really to do it desperately, so everyone is more or less contaminated with this crazy demon state." ”
"After the bird's nest monster is down, what is the next one?" Chinese young culture is the most dynamic culture in the world, and other young cultures, whether in Japan, Europe or the United States, have been solidified and aged, in my opinion, not as vigorous and tense as the young culture of Chinese. In Wang Hua's view, after the Guofeng Music Taimiao Concert, Mi Man will open the concert to the Musikverein in Vienna and the Rockefeller Center in New York.
Wang Hua said: "In the past few years, All Japanese culture has been transported to China, so why can't Chinese culture be exported to the world in reverse?" ”
What used to be a community-to-community is now a competition between companies and companies. The power of the rise of emerging societies cannot be ignored, and there are already dozens of original societies on the Internet, and there are also high-heat societies emerging. For example, in the YY community, the "full seat of Manhan", this music team is very fast, taking the "idol economy" route, there are many newcomers, the popularity is high, and a group of loyal fans have been accumulated on major platforms, and the fan activity is also very high.
"Mo Ming Qimiao usually does not have any big moves, and everyone who is safe and stable can do a concert of 50,000 people." Mi Man must speed up while carefully guarding the barrier. Gui Zhenyu responded: "We are also considering doing idol economy, we definitely need to combine the two models, and now I am already looking at some good seedlings." ”
For Gui Zhenyu, he used to be particularly entangled, but now he has completely become a businessman, responsible for the company and investors. For Mi Man, he hopes to become the company with the oldest qualifications, the strongest strength and the most resources in the two-dimensional field.
Music Finance once visited Gui Zhenyu's father at the Jinling Guqin Museum in Wuyi Lane on the Qinhuai River in Nanjing, and Gui Shimin, the representative inheritor of the Jinling Qin School of national intangible cultural heritage guqin art. This is an old artist who has persisted in the field of guqin all his life, and he initially hoped that Gui Zhenyu would inherit his mantle, spread guqin culture, and live a more stable life.
Gui Shimin did not understand the specific operation of Gui Zhenyu's company, but he was very supportive of gui Zhenyu's later concept of "national style", combining traditional culture and modern culture, and Gui Shimin believed that the entire cultural field was sick and too eager to make quick profits. "I hope they can feel and appreciate how to convey Chinese cultural elements in the best form of expression."
"Now the second dimension is still a particularly scattered and chaotic state, the skin is very thin, and it is necessary to make money in a measured manner." But capital enters this market too quickly, and sometimes it worries that it will not be able to stabilize this market. I want to build a truly benign development ecosystem and be the guardian of the two-dimensional culture. Gui Zhenyu sighed, "But you want me to say what I personally like to do the most, or write songs, I also want to write novels, and accompany the baby at home, but every day is too busy to stop." ”
Perhaps to grow up is to be infinitely close to the real self and to deal with the relationship with oneself. Gui Zhenyu should have already figured out what he had gained and what he had lost. After all, capital is ultimately profit-seeking. At a time when mobility seems to be rampant, everyone is choosing some things, firmly holding on to some things, and embracing some things.