"Feng Xiaogang lost", "Feng Xiaogang lost", "Feng Xiaogang lost"... Feng Xiaogang and Huayi Brothers (300027. SZ) VAM agreement has recently sparked heated discussions.
Regarding the incident of Feng Xiaogang's compensation of Huayi Brothers for 235 million yuan of the VAM agreement, it must start from 2015.
At that time, Dongyang Meila Media Co., Ltd. was established, and Feng Xiaogang held 99% of the shares. Two months later, Huayi Brothers issued an announcement that it would spend 1.05 billion yuan to acquire a 70% stake in Dongyang Meila.
According to the VAM requirements in the acquisition agreement, Feng Xiaogang's profit targets for the next five years are: 100 million in 2016, 115 million in 2017, 132 million in 2018, 152 million in 2019 and 174 million in 2020.
Carefully calculated, even if all the compensation is paid, Feng Xiaogang will not pay more than 670 million. After the five-year period, Feng Xiaogang's final report card was to pay Huayi Brothers 235 million yuan, according to the purchase price of 1.05 billion yuan, Feng Xiaogang still earned more than 800 million.
In this bet, Feng Xiaogang did not seem to lose at the beginning.
A "steady profit" agreement
In 1998, Huayi Brothers officially entered the film industry, that is, that year, Huayi Brothers invested in Feng Xiaogang's film "Endless", which was officially released on December 15, 1999, refreshing the box office records of domestic films and imported films released that year.
Since then, Huayi Brothers has established a long-term cooperative relationship with Feng Xiaogang and began to establish a leading position in the film industry with the New Year films that cooperate with director Feng Xiaogang every year.
His co-collaborations include "A Sigh" (2000), "Big Names" (2002), "Mobile Phone" (2003), "No Thief in the World" (2004), "Night Feast" (2006), "Gathering Number" (2007), "Non-sincere Do Not Disturb" (2008), "Tangshan Earthquake" (2010), "Non-sincere Do Not Disturb 2" (2010) and so on.
In November 2015, Huayi Brothers acquired Dongyang Meila Media Co., Ltd., a shareholding company owned by Feng Xiaogang, because Huayi Brothers wanted to deeply bind Feng Xiaogang, and the projects that Dongyang Meila had already reserved and developed at that time included the movies "Mobile Phone 2", "Unforgettable", "Non-sincere Do Not Disturb 3", "Li Ren Xing" and so on.
Before the two sides signed the VAM agreement, Feng Xiaogang's box office influence was not bad, with the total box office of "Private Order" cooperated by the two sides in 2013 was 718 million, ranking fourth in the annual film ranking, and the 2010 cooperation "Tangshan Earthquake" ranked second with an annual box office of 673 million.
In doing so, Huayi Brothers can bind first-line directors such as Feng Xiaogang and the star resources behind them, and it is also a key part of Huayi Brothers' launch of high-quality content later.
The heavy acquisition of Feng Xiaogang's company shows that Huayi Brothers is willing to pay for Feng Xiaogang's personal IP. And whether this single business Huayi Brothers loses money or not depends on the performance of Feng Xiaogang's later works.
five years due,
Why did Feng Xiaogang "gamble and lose"?
Looking back at the five years that Feng Xiaogang "worked" for Huayi Brothers, from the perspective of business performance, Feng Xiaogang still lost. In the 5 years of betting, Feng Xiaogang released three movies, namely "I Am Not Pan Jinlian", "Fanghua" and "Only Yun Knows".
And in these five years, Feng Xiaogang does not seem to be so smooth.
On November 18, 2016, "I Am Not Pan Jinlian" was released, with a total box office of 483 million yuan, a Douban score of 6.7 points, for the box office is not as expected, Feng Xiaogang also posted a small essay on Weibo, denouncing Wanda for "I am not Pan Jinlian" is not enough, affecting the box office of "I am not Pan Jinlian".
At that time, it was the first year of Feng Xiaogang's "part-time work", and Wanda's anger could also be seen that Feng Xiaogang was "selling hard" under the pressure of performance. Whatever the reason, in the end, the film did have a mediocre response, although the market performance was less than expected, but from the performance alone, this work was barely passed.
On December 15, 2017, "Fanghua" was released, and from the Douban score, this drama was better than "I Am Not Pan Jinlian", and the final box office reached 1.423 billion yuan, ranking eighth in the annual box office of the film.
Although "Fanghua" has not become a blockbuster work with a box office of more than one billion, for Feng Xiaogang, such achievements may still find some confidence.
The story after that seems to be the beginning of Feng Xiaogang's film career "Black Swan and Waterloo".
On May 10, 2018, Feng Xiaogang posted a weibo post to announce the concept poster of the film, and announced that screenwriter Liu Zhenyun, starring Ge You, Fan Bingbing, Zhang Guoguo, Xu Fan, Fan Wei's original class all returned, for "Mobile Phone 2", it can be seen that Feng Xiaogang has been preparing for a long time and is full of confidence.
Just when "Mobile Phone 2" was about to be released, Cui Yongyuan named the female protagonist Fan Bingbing's tax evasion problem on Weibo on the "Yin and Yang Contract" incident, which aroused concern from all walks of life. At the same time, "Mobile Phone 2" was also postponed indefinitely, that is, this year, because "Mobile Phone 2" failed to broadcast, Feng Xiaogang naturally failed to complete the performance of the year, and the compensation Huayi Brothers was nearly 70 million.
On December 20, 2019, "Only the Cloud Knows" was released, and this time Feng Xiaogang was greeted by a thorough box office "flutter street", with a Douban score of 6.4 points and a box office of only 156 million.
"Only the Cloud Knows" was released four days after the box office just over 100 million, the next morning Feng Xiaogang sent a long Weibo, he said that he is a "hero old man", just four words, may also reflect the five years of gambling contracts, his up-to-date and helpless.
Feng Xiaogang gambled and lost,
Who is losing?
Regarding the signing of this VAM agreement, in fact, whether it is Feng Xiaogang or Huayi Brothers, both sides have their own calculations.
For Feng Xiaogang, the "VAM agreement" that seems not to lose is confirming the plight of his directorial career in another way.
There may not be a shortage of audiences in the film market, but the preferences of the audience will not remain static. Whether the artistic style of veteran directors has begun to appear in today's film market, and young directors who have just entered the game have begun to relay, perhaps this is Feng Xiaogang's sigh.
For Huayi Brothers, it is not easy to find out the audience's preferences.
According to huayi brothers' financial report, Huayi brothers have lost money for three consecutive years. The company achieved a total operating income of 1.5 billion yuan in 2020, and from 2018 to 2020, the company's revenue decreased by 3.34%, 41.18% and 33.14% respectively, and the net loss attributable to the shareholders of the parent company was 1.169 billion yuan, 3.978 billion yuan and 1.048 billion yuan, respectively.
At the beginning of this year, in Tencent's "Discretionary See" program, Wang Zhongjun, founder of Huayi Brothers, said that Huayi Brothers has not yet come out of the predicament, and in 2020, it has not been tied among listed companies, but it has not yet reached the point of delisting.
Source Company earnings
For Huayi Brothers, in fact, it has been trying to "multi-faceted force", the early "Predecessor 3" cooperated with the young director Tian Yusheng after the 80s to win 1.926 billion at the box office; the cooperative films with Guan Hu, including "Old Cannon" and "Eight Hundred", have also achieved good results; in addition, they have maintained good cooperative relations with Urshan and Feng Delun. The company also supports young directors through various forms and continuously reserves a new generation of talents.
For the Huayi brothers, it may already be known that Feng Xiaogang is not a life-saving straw. And the betting agreement between the two, who loses and who wins, the referee is the market itself at the beginning.
Red Star News reporter Yu Yao intern reporter Liu Mi
Edited by Yang Cheng
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