There's a saying that HBO is actually very unhappy with Little John right now, after all, they were toyed with like monkeys by Little John for half a month.
During these fifteen days, Time Warner people really wanted to sell HBO to Boss Huang, so later the price kept dropping, and finally it was only sold for 20 billion US dollars.
Honestly, this was a really good price, but Huang He had no interest in HBO. Little John could only feign politeness until the strategy of Jiangnan Group was fully exposed. HBO and Time Warner both knew they had been tricked and were furious, immediately cutting off contact with Little John.
Unexpectedly, in order to maintain his position in the company, Little John still set his sights on HBO.
So the next day, Little John appeared at the entrance of HBO headquarters again, demanding to see Tom, the president of HBO.
When they heard this news, they were all furious. They hadn't gone to trouble Little John, but this guy actually dared to deliver himself to their doorstep.
However, Tom didn't drive Little John away; instead, he had people invite Little John in. It was a joke, an enemy coming to their door, and they wanted to torture him properly and vent their anger, not let the other party run away directly. That would be putting the cart before the horse!
So Tom had Little John called in, but he instructed that Little John be left to wait all day without any tea or food, to let him die of thirst.
Within a few minutes of this order being issued, the secretary rushed in and said, "Mr. President, Little John is spewing nonsense over there. He said he'll only give you three minutes. If you don't see him, he'll leave immediately, but we'll lose a huge fortune and an opportunity to help the TV station out of its predicament!"
"What?" Tom hesitated. He felt that it was highly likely that Little John was lying, but what if this guy was telling the truth?
So Tom secretly went to the door of the reception room. When the three minutes were up and Little John was really about to leave, Tom lazily walked in and said, "What are you here for? Speak quickly, fart quickly. My time is precious, and I don't have time to waste here with you!"
"This is naturally a great thing, a great thing with benefits for both of us!" Little John chuckled and said, "Tom, brother, I've come to you as soon as there's good news. You better remember this favor today!"
"You still have the face to talk about favors with me? Haven't you toyed with me enough these past half a month?" Tom glared at him. Little John quickly patted Tom's back and said indignantly, "Brother, I really didn't screw you over. You know what my status is. That Huang He doesn't trust me at all, and I was treated like a monkey by him too!"
"He deliberately used me to negotiate with you, and he kept me in the dark, all with the aim of making my negotiations more realistic. In the end, he used me to cross the river by stealth. I'm a victim just like you!" Little John said aggrievedly.
"Nonsense. I heard you're about to become the Vice President of Los Gatos Media, a position even higher than mine. You're amazing!" Tom said sarcastically, though his tone was a bit more relaxed.
"That's nonsense. I'm just a Vice President with no real power. Moreover, the entire Los Gatos Media combined is less than 1/5 the scale of HBO. I can't compare to you at all. It's even worse than when I was the Director of the Program Department at CNN, where I at least had some real power!" Little John said with pain.
"Enough, don't talk to me about these irrelevant things. What do you want from me? What's this great benefit you mentioned?" Tom asked impatiently, though his attitude had clearly improved.
"Of course there are benefits. Did you know that Huang He invested 1 billion US dollars in Los Gatos Media in one go, acquiring various film and television resources worldwide to enrich their own online film and television library!" Little John said.
"I naturally know that. Then some people from your side talked to me about these things, but the price was never agreed upon. What, can you get Los Gatos Media to be more flexible with the price?" Tom asked curiously.
"That's right!" Little John nodded, and Tom's interest was immediately piqued. HBO's biggest problem right now is its inability to cover its expenses. Although all failing enterprises have this problem.
The most crucial point is that HBO is increasingly at a disadvantage when competing with four other television stations. Previously, HBO could still maintain its advantage by relying on some high-quality American dramas.
However, after 1997, HBO's American dramas also declined. The entire station had no projects that could be considered outstanding, and ultimately it fell further behind in the competition with the five major television networks.
What's worse is that their parent company, Time Warner, has also had a lot of bad luck recently. Before 2002, Time Warner invested heavily in internet technology, only to encounter the dot-com bubble, and Time Warner lost tens of billions of dollars.
As a result, HBO, which could still provide financial support, became a veritable burden, making Time Warner eager to sell it quickly to recover capital.
HBO itself was certainly unwilling to be sold off like this. The entire station was working hard, and the most effective way was naturally to make the station profitable.
So HBO resorted to layoffs, streamlining staff, and producing short, refined riddle dramas, all in an effort to compress costs. In the end, HBO was still about 100 million US dollars short of profitability.
Therefore, when Los Gatos Television proposed to purchase the copyright authorization for all HBO television series for 20 years, HBO was truly tempted.
However, Huang He had already tricked HBO once, making HBO embarrassed to continue negotiating with Los Gatos Media, and the price was somewhat unsatisfactory.
The price for licensing all the television series in a package was only a mere 200 million US dollars. Although this price could already make HBO profitable, selling the television copyright accumulated over decades for only 200 million felt difficult to justify to the board of directors.
So Tom was very conflicted about this negotiation invitation, wanting to sell but reluctant to, always pondering in his heart if only this price could be higher!
And now, Little John arrived like a timely helper.
"How much more can you increase the price by?" Tom asked.
"300 million US dollars!" Little John said very crisply.
"300 million US dollars!" Tom's eyes lit up. This price was very reasonable and could be considered. Moreover, the board of directors would likely be satisfied with this price.
After all, Los Gatos only wanted the authorization to broadcast on the network platform, and they were buying the authorization for all old television series that had already been aired. This seemed like a very lucrative deal no matter how you looked at it.
Just as Tom was about to agree, Little John continued, "But I have two additional conditions."
"What conditions?" Tom asked, frowning.
"First, I want 1 million US dollars!" Little John said directly, which was directly asking Tom for a kickback.
"Agreed!" Tom agreed immediately without a second's thought. Being able to sell for an additional 100 million US dollars by only paying a 1 million US dollar kickback was an extremely profitable deal regardless, and there was no reason not to agree.
Moreover, with Little John bringing this up, Tom actually trusted him more. This Little John must have seen that he had no profit to gain at Los Gatos Television and intended to make a quick escape while also earning some benefits for himself.
And only when Little John benefits would he do his best to facilitate this deal. This was a mutually beneficial good thing, with absolutely no reason to refuse.
"Very well, then the second condition is that besides the original television series, you must also include all rights to a TV series that was originally scheduled to be released next month!" Little John continued.
"What!" Tom was shocked. "Didn't you only want the copyrights of those already aired TV series? Why do you want an unreleased TV series now!"
"It's very simple, I need this TV series as a justification for the increased price!" Little John explained. "Los Gatos Television is willing to spend 200 million to buy all your TV series to enrich its film and television library."
"But these old TV series cannot help our TV station attract more users. Only brand new TV series like 'Misty Journey' can attract a large number of users to subscribe!"
"Look, 'Misty Journey' has already helped Los Gatos Television sell 3 million TV boxes, converting a full 2 million paid subscribers! But now that 'Misty Journey' has ended its broadcast for half a month, the sales of the fourth batch of TV boxes have slowed down. It took two days to sell out, whereas before they were all cleared out within a day!"
What Little John said made Tom want to hit him. What did he mean by selling 1 million TV boxes in two days? Was that a sales speed achievable by humans?
And did they use the word "sell" like that?
That was clearly giving them away! And giving them away to good people?
It was better now. It is said that due to some scalpers hoarding boxes in large quantities, and some people dismantling boxes to extract electronic components, the Jiangnan Group changed its policy for the fourth batch of 1 million boxes. A deposit of 30 US dollars was required to receive the box, and this deposit would be fully refunded upon return.
This was the fundamental reason why they were given away in two days. Otherwise, they would have been given away completely within a day at the previous speed!
Tom grumbled in his heart, but naturally did not voice it.
"So I suggested to the boss that it's because Los Gatos Television has always been broadcasting old TV series and doesn't have any new exclusive dramas, which has led to the slow growth of the TV station's users! We must purchase some of the latest TV series that viewers haven't seen before to continue to expand the market and increase new members."
"The boss greatly approves of my suggestion, but Los Gatos Media has just been established, so where can we get new TV series? This requires purchasing from outside!"
"This is the latest news from a company high-level meeting yesterday, so I immediately came to find you. As long as you are willing to sell all the rights to this latest TV series additionally, then I am confident that the total quoted price can be increased by another 100 million US dollars. How about it, do you agree?"