Byte Dance with Guizhou Maotai
“Nice to meet you. This is Eugene.”
A few days after meeting Ivanka Trump, Eugene welcomed guests from China.
“This is Zhang Xiwei. thank you for the invitation.”
The first person to greet me was a man with an impressive sharp eye.
“This is Xu Yang Tian. Thank you for your interest in me. And that’s why you invited me like this.”
“This is Zhang Yiming. It is an honor to be able to see Chairman Kang, who has such a great reputation.”
Afterwards, both of them politely thanked the invitation.
Zhang Xiwei, who greeted him for the first time, had a polite and somewhat stiff attitude, while the two had a much more formal attitude.
Not surprisingly, all three are young entrepreneurs who achieved great success in their early 30s, but unlike Jiang Xiewei, who has a very large background in the Chinese government, the other two are just self-made ventures with no background.
Apparently, in the perception of the Chinese, it was taken for granted to humble oneself when working with people involved in the regime.
What’s more, the companies they founded all accept Eugene’s funds to a lesser extent, and Eugene owns a considerable stake, so this is inevitable.
“I am very happy to be able to meet in person the wonderful people who will lead the future of China’s economy. We have reserved a place for three people. Come this way.”
Eugene prepared a very fancy dinner for the three of them.
For the Chinese, an invitation to a meal is more than just a friendship.
The more luxurious and expensive the food served, the more the face of the inviting party lives and the more the invited party stands.
For that reason, formal meetings are usually ostentatious, sometimes with a ridiculous table setting in which the ingredients and the price of the food are far more important than the taste.
Many of the ingredients used in Chinese food are so diverse and rare, partly because the Chinese enjoy the delicacy, but also because the purpose of the Chinese food is to show off their skills by using expensive ingredients that are difficult to obtain.
However, what Eugene prepared for the two of them was not such Chinese cuisine, but representative dishes from around the world, including the United States.
“This is a great dinner. Hainan fingerpan is Singapore’s representative food, Indonesian rendang, Japanese sushi, coq au vin, masala… … Is America still chicken? It’s a fun dish.”
Zhang Xiwei shared her feelings about the first award.
Dozens of dishes filled the table, too big for three people to sit on.
“In China, since ancient times, it has been said that Mananjeonseok is the best banquet dish. I imitated it once. Originally, it would have to last for several days, but since we have busy people, we ask for your understanding.”
“It’s a decent stone. If it is done in a modern way, it must have inherited the spirit of the Great Jeonseok.”
Manchurian stone signifies a banquet table where Manchu and Han Chinese cuisines were served together by the Qing emperor established by the Manchus.
Although the royal family and nobility were occupied by the Manchus, it meant that they wished for harmony with the Han Chinese, who were ruled.
The award presented by Eugene is not a collection of the best dishes from each country, but only the dishes loved by ordinary people in each country one by one.
“I believe that their work will have a huge impact on billions of people, not just in China, but around the world. In the end, I thought that they would be a bridge between China and the world, and I created a space. First of all, let’s have a light drink.”
“This is a 1945 Romanet-Conti.”
When Eugene finished speaking, the sommelier who was waiting took the bottle, showed it to the guests, and opened the lid.
“To be able to drink the legendary Romané-Conti myself, I would have regretted it for the rest of my life if it hadn’t come today.”
Looking at the wine poured by the sommelier, Zhang Xiwei said with a satisfied face.
It is because they are well aware that the amount that is poured into the glass now is enough to make a one-year salary for any Wall Street dealer.
“I was lucky enough to get Romané-Conti from Sotheby’s. I heard that General Manager Jang has a deep knowledge of wine. I thought it was a good opportunity and prepared for it.”
Chinese people who like luxury are now turning their eyes to wine, and it is said that most of the world’s most expensive wine is consumed by Chinese people.
Not only wine, but also luxury goods that cost tens of millions of won per bag are loved by the Chinese and are growing relentlessly.
It would not be wrong to say that the reason the price of Chanel goes up every year is all because of the Chinese.
“I enjoy wine, but I have never tasted a wine of this level.”
Holding the wine glass that the sommelier had poured out, Zhang Xiwei answered, unable to take his eyes off the red liquid in it.
Zhang Xiwei, the CEO of a venture company that is called the hidden double heart of the current Chinese president and is making considerable investments around the world, does not seem to have been able to obtain a 45-year-old Romanet Conti.
Of course, it is not without money. The Chinese love for sake so much that the most expensive alcohol in the world is not 100-year-old wine or whiskey, but only 30-year-old Maotai.
The luxury goods market in China has many aspects that are difficult for foreigners to understand.
The price is not determined by the value of the product, but people who want to brag that they can buy it because the price is high spend generously.
Cigarettes used by ordinary people can be bought for only a few hundred won, but expensive cigarettes cost tens of thousands of won.
It’s not because the flavor of cigarettes is special, but because they are expensive cigarettes, so they use it to show off their wealth to others.
In the case of Maotai alcohol, the cheapest is hundreds of thousands of won, sometimes over 1 million won.
When it first appeared on the market, it was around tens of thousands of won, but the management, realizing that the more expensive, the more people bought it, and the management kept raising the price, and now it is to the point of surpassing the high-priced wines that are decades old.
As a result, Guizhou Maotai, a liquor producer that produces Maotai, has grown remarkably, becoming the world’s largest liquor company in the next few years, and even reaching number one by market capitalization of Chinese companies.
Eugene has already made significant investments in Guizhou Maotai. I have been buying stocks steadily since last year, and I expect to earn at least 10 times more in just a few years.
Even Eugene himself still did not understand why a liquor company with only 20,000 employees had so much value that it once surpassed Cheil Electronics.
That is why they only think that there is no end to the Chinese people’s desire to show off.
“Eat two minutes. If you don’t like wine, we also have mao tai.”
The food is a dish loved by the common people, but only the best drinks are prepared.
“It’s a wonderful place. It is worthwhile to come here to receive such hospitality.”
“Romane-Conti is a wonderful drink. Especially if it is a drink with historical value like this, I can’t resist.”
All three of them had nothing to regret financially, so they emptied their cups without burdening themselves while expressing their joy at serving hundreds of millions of won a bottle.
For a while, Eugene talked about miscellaneous things, recommending food and drinks to the people he invited.
Of course, he mostly talked to Zhang Xiwei, who was close to Zhu Bin.
The other two knew that he was close to the regime, so they were trying not to offend Jiang Siwei as much as possible.
Jiang Shiwei’s identity has not been confirmed with certainty. Even the future Eugene didn’t know what kind of person he was.
Although Eugene had worked for a long time with a global group in New York, it was not enough to know the secrets of key figures in the Chinese regime.
It’s just that there is a strong possibility that he and the current president are related by blood.
However, he is aware of the fact that a global investment firm with an ambiguous name, Pacific International, which he manages, runs a significant number of key figures in the Chinese government, and that he is often referred to as Zhongnanhai, the center of Chinese politics.
“These days, Dowooin’s momentum is so dazzling.”
After talking with Zhang Xiwei for a while, this time he gives the other two a chance.
Zhang Ming, one of the three invited by Eugene, was busy making an announcement about the SNS application launched last year to the world.
“I am working hard. I was looking forward to it, but I didn’t expect it to be this popular.”
It was a humble expression, but Zhang Ming’s face showed a clear sense of pride.
ByteDance, founded in 2012 by Jiang Ming, has built a reputation as a news curation business using artificial intelligence.
It is the very short-form video platform that will receive absolute support from teenagers and 20s around the world under the name of TikTok in the future.
In its heyday, billions of people around the world spent countless hours on this fun video SNS, making it a powerful product that halved the SNS market represented by Facebook and Instagram. until you reach the rank of sign.
“This year, we plan to focus our efforts on targeting the global market, including the US, with our achievements in the Chinese market.”
However, despite its explosive growth, Dowooin, which was released less than a year ago, still had an uncertain future.
It does not seem difficult to establish a firm position in the Chinese market, but considering the internal circumstances of China, it is inevitable to realize that the Chinese market share is equal to a pavilion of history.
Like many dictatorships, the Chinese government is always watching the spread of new media such as social media to the public.
This is because, in general, a new means of communication can be a means of gathering the will of the people.
The Jasmine Revolution, which led to the democratization fever in the Arab world, also played a significant role in SNS such as Twitter, so the Chinese government completely blocked overseas SNS from operating in China.
It is considered illegal for Chinese people to use American social media such as Twitter and Facebook, which could result in a prison sentence.
The suppression of such SNS is the same for products developed in their own country.
Companies that service SNS are obliged to censor all conversations sent and received through their applications, and to report any inappropriate content to the authorities immediately.
Even that is not enough, the situation in China is that if a large number of impure content is found, the service itself may be in danger of being shut down at any time.
Therefore, it was not enough for ByteDance’s new product to succeed in China.
This is because if you are always looking at the government authorities and do not listen to what is being demanded or demanded, you will have to close the door overnight.