There have been reports of Xu Maodong and litters radical business extension called "Dangerous action"

There have been reports of Xu Maodong and litters radical business extension called "Dangerous action" guidance: from industry spoilers to speculators, litters CEO Xu Maodong is not broken, even in a network survey in 2011, Xu Maodong was considered to be the most likely to be a runaway purchase owner. Two years later, compared to the 24 coupons closed, the founder of the hands of the brutal, litters regiment is not so good, but also not so bad.

The current litters group has transformed the mall, with Xu Maodong said it is able to have millions of yuan per month of continuous profit. Why did the litters group do that amazing "IPO launch", why Xu Maodong said "only one months to be able to IPO success"? Why do you miss the litters group and the future of group buying? This is Sina Technology exclusive interview Xu Maodong Hope to explore the story.

IPO launch of Reverse trend

May 25, 2011, the online only more than a year litters group held in Beijing, "IPO launch press conference." The big red background on the venue of these words, so that the reporters were surprised: in the past, any real to listed internet companies, the listing situation is to avoid the attitude. On the one hand, in order to meet the SEC requirements on the silent period, on the other hand is to avoid negative opinion of the evaluation, affecting the listing process.

More than a journalist was shocked. After the release of the content of the Conference, the Voice of the network questioned the overwhelming. Former Yahoo China general manager Xie is not polite to comment on Weibo litters this radical move is almost crazy, "than the traditional MLM also terrible." Hisense Group Network Products Division of the minister, said that the impetuous than the 2000 internet bubble burst more, and ridicule "listing and street-like".

Xu Maodong can't turn a deaf ear to these sounds, but he believes the IPO launch is imperative.

"Because there were a few companies that had plans to do IPO announcements," he said. Xu Maodong this to Sina science and technology to explain the IPO announcement motive. From a PR strategy, it is easy to understand that the media and the public will be impressed by the "first", and that a similar move by the latter will be understood as a "follow strategy". The effect of PR will be far less than the first.

Moreover, the online litters group for more than a year, in the eyes of the outside world is still a second-rate group purchase site-this point even Xu Maodong also do not mince. Similar to the "first launch of the IPO site" Such a description, no doubt that the media and the public will be litters group and the United States, handle nets and other first-line group purchase site.

"We urgently need to talk to the media clearly about litters's strategy and financing plans and not treat us as a second-rate group buying company," he said. "From the Xu Maodong of this sentence is not harsh out, the original let the industry" IPO conference ", behind the driving force is more public relations needs.

Only one months to be able to IPO

But Xu Maodong denied the IPO was unfounded. According to him, the litters group was indeed ready to make a second secret exchange with the SEC (note: The secret submission of foreign companies to the United States listed companies secretly submitted IPO applications.) After December 2011, the SEC canceled a closed-exchange system, requiring foreign companies to publicly submit applications to the U.S. for IPO applications, not yet in the silent period. The IPO launch, therefore, did not violate SEC rules. In addition, in the case of a clear withdrawal of the IPO application by the hand-holding network, litters has not yet withdrawn his application.

Today, few people will mention litters's IPO, and many still think it is a pure hype. Xu Maodong has always believed that the key to the failure of the litters Sprint IPO was the wrong time to go on the market and one months later.

November 5, 2011, the originator of Groupon in the Nasdaq listing, the issue price of 20 U.S. dollars, the first day closing 26 U.S. dollars. Xu Maodong had planned to push litters to Nasdaq's trading board after Groupon's launch, but Litters's IPO application was still communicating with the SEC, and preparations were not completed.

About two weeks later, Groupon's shares plunged. Bad results also let the market see the decline in the group buying industry attitude can not be reversed. Today, Groupon's share price has fallen to $9 trillion.

History cannot assume that what Xu Maodong can do now is to wait and see. "We have been communicating with the level two market and have been keeping an inquiry with these people, both analysts and investors." Xu Maodong says litters has been watching the window for a long time. Despite the overall rally in the first half of the year, Xu Maodong still thinks the US capital markets are undervalued and need to be revalued.

He is now unable to tell when the window period will appear again, but reveals the amount of funding the litters group expects: 100 million dollars.

Mobile Internet judgment 3 years ago

2013 group buying, is no longer the focus of the Internet industry. Capital to group buying has long been avoided, after shuffling the survivors need to support themselves. The United States network has been profitable, and in the field of O2O some of the vertical direction of exploration, such as movie tickets. Public comments on the group buying business is not an unknown profit. Sticky rice nets are still losing money.

Xu Maodong Mouth of the litters Mall has been able to maintain continued profitability. What he is trying to do now is to push the litters mall into a mobile internet transition.

Xu Maodong founded the mobile marketing company in 2008, which was once the largest mobile advertising company in the country. In 2010 decided to work alone litters Regiment, as chairman of the Xu Maodong had hoped to be litters group, set up group buying division. "When we first got up, it was the CPS (pay by sales) advertising model. I then judged that the future of group buying will be one of the mainstream models of mobile advertising. ”

But the decision was not shared by the board of directors, who argued that group buying and mobile advertising were too far apart, rejecting the Xu Maodong takeover of the litters group. Xu Maodong said his mood had been low for months, but since the board disagreed, he had to invest in the litters group and leave it alone.

After two or three years of development, O2O has become a hot trend under the mobile Internet tide. Xu Maodong's judgment began to be partly corroborated. This in mobile advertising more than 10 years of people, the PC-side group called "Detours": "Buy three years before you do not have to do the PC end." ”

In order to promote the mobile transformation, litters has set up two business departments, one in the research and development of business-oriented mobile authentication receipt Terminal "Service", is currently in the testing phase. The business of another division is rather mysterious, Xu Maodong declined to disclose. It is understood that this division of the product will be a separate app, "litters the most important future is to make life Service category killer application." ”

Xu Maodong Dictation:

IPO Conference

It is understood that the IPO launch of the litters group is speculation. Litters did launch the listing at that time, and there is a domestic company with us almost before and after the table, but in fact, litters is still the earliest. Our CFO was litters in preparation for a long time. Later, some people said that he left the job, actually not.

At that time the background is this: litters to enter than the industry a whole year late, this year litters do a lot of things, the industry does not understand. It is generally accepted that litters is a regular group buying company, or a second-rate group-buying company. Many people think I saw the opportunity to buy, that I am good at doing mergers and acquisitions, is not to play the concept of listing to make quick money, listing and then do the next thing.

These readings are understandable, as there is a lack of communication. Litters at that time the press conference actually announced two things, people are often more interested in the second thing. First we announced the Mall of the strategy, group buying is our engine, is a breakthrough point. Litters to do is the life service E-commerce platform, this is our release of a strategy.

The second issue of our financing plan and listing plan. In the first round, I had a couple of two institutions that were mostly private, but we didn't publish them. This round of the leader of the Ding Hui is officially announced. At that time, the outside world knew that litters took a large amount of money, there are many rumors.

So, the first announcement is the litters strategy, which shows that we are not a simple group buying company, the second litters financing and listing plan. But the second thing is that the media and the public are more interested: A group buying company is on the market so soon, so it will become a hot spot. But litters's intention is not that we have an IPO launch, not that, but rather a strategic IPO launch.

I learned that several companies also had plans to launch IPOs. At that time litters in everyone's understanding, or a second-line group buying company. We urgently need to communicate with the media to clarify the litters strategy and our financing plan, and we can no longer treat us as a second-rate group buying company.

We invited the head of Nasdaq Asia to attend the meeting. At that time litters not to the silent period, this we very clear. This is the first time we've had a close, because the SEC will have three or four secret sessions and change the file back and forth. At that time we were still between the first and second close, so there was no risk of a silent period being violated.

The effect of this Conference, in general, is worth affirming. The meeting was very good to our communication with the media effect, but there are negative effects, it is inevitable that some people think we are hype.

The handle withdrew the IPO application, litters has not withdrawn, has been waiting. We have been and two level market to maintain communication, inquiry, see each other feel litters is not allowed to go out. We will generally raise the amount of 100 million dollars. Although the volume is small, but the IPO to the company brand, the future financing convenience is very important. You can always finance, issue debt, and then you don't have to pay too much money to raise money. Then you are the public distribution, and the other way can only be private placement, private placement sometimes the conditions may not be your ideal, the return of investors may not be able to reach a consensus.

Group buying will become the mainstream mode of mobile advertising

I do group buying based on the judgment of the future of mobile advertising. I think the mode and type of group buying is one of the mainstream models of mobile advertising in the mobile end. The initial stage of group buying is an advertising service, and then the payment method is based on the turnover of the ledger. You sell 1 million you may divide 60,000 yuan, this is actually the CPS mode of Internet advertisement.

On the mobile phone is one thing, the CPS on the phone is actually become a mobile phone advertising cps, is such a logic. But the end of the cell phone will be more lethal, practice also proved that the phone end of all aspects of the data from the PC. For example, whenever and wherever consumption, from litters data to see 24 hours of consumption accounted for 80%, this is the phone, the past in the PC single week to spend only to 80%.

You see we've had a lot of interviews for 2010 years and we basically say that. But people's judgment on the mobile internet is not quite the same, so it is not very well understood in the past.

Another background is that the first day of the litters group was not meant to be an independent company, but instead it was placed on the other side of my project. It was the largest mobile advertising company in China. A mobile phone advertising company set up a group buying division, which was originally my original intention, but the proposal was rejected by the board of Directors.

The first time to integrate with the original founders of the litters, it was the hundred-point call and they signed a framework agreement, I did DD (due diligence) when the board of directors, the board said "NO". The board believes that group buying and mobile advertising are too far away. The main point is that at that time (2010) The input is in the PC side, the smart machine does not rise. The real outbreak of the mobile Internet was last year, when the entire traffic rose 10 times times, and the smart machine doubled. Because this change in the mobile internet last year has led to changes in many industries or business models.

But it was a bit far away from the theory of mobile advertising to explain group buying. It now seems that group buying has been around for two or three years at the PC, but at the time I was not able to convince the board. So I was depressed and I thought I finally found a big thing on the mobile ad, but the board couldn't understand. Now that the board disagrees, I'll do it myself. I was an angel investment, money is not a problem, so later I voted for myself.

Today's situation is that some products, patterns have to start from the PC side, you must start from this, this bend you are not open. I think in the fourth quarter of next year, if someone says that litters is a mobile internet company, or that litters is a mobile company, I would totally agree. By then, I think the litters from the mobile end would account for more than 60% of the total, now 30%.

Today litters clients are still on the PC side of the ordinary extension, not too much creativity. We have two business departments that focus on moving the end of things, one is the service pass, the other is temporarily confidential. Service is like a smart terminal on the merchant side, it is an important link of O2O closed loop. We have thousands of units in the two or three-line city, in the test. Another division, the development of an independent APP,O2O direction, specifically what is not convenient to say. Mobile internet to have enough patience to do a good job upfront investment and layout, to improve the merchant user experience is fundamental.

I'm not a speculator.

Litters just entered the time, many people said litters is a spoiler, shell companies, others say I am a speculator. I spent ten years in mobile advertising, and few people can do that, is this speculation? I actually do things is quite insistent, very insistent. I don't think there are many people in the wireless field-let alone 10 years in mobile advertising. I started to touch Wireless in 1998, when China Mobile had no corporate messages. I went to China Mobile Enterprise SMS, they said no, how to do, did not do, this is the first reflection, and then I found the first party mobile companies, all have short message ZTE companies to contact, we have taken the interface over to develop their own short message to the enterprise.

2002 Air Network IPO. Air network It came in for a short time to do MMS. We have been doing that for so long, people come in for a short time to IPO, we have to reflect on our direction is not wrong. Finally, we still adhere to focus on providing services for enterprises, do not touch personal business. All the way over, now you see China to do wireless that group of people, in fact, there are not many like us to stick in this field. A lot of people are diverted to do online games, but we still stick in the wireless field, until the second half of last year, the outbreak of mobile internet.

Then I used to do the offline supermarket for ten years, my understanding of the needs of merchants may be more than the average internet practitioners a little deeper. We feel that group buying is a promising market, using the way of mergers and acquisitions. But litters's turnover comes from less than 10% of mergers and acquisitions, in which we integrate teams, not their income.

At that time, there were more than 300 group buying companies in China, of course, 5,000 of the media, 5,000 are not very accurate data. Starting around May of 2010, I almost took over 300 group buying companies, including the four or five in top 10 today.

October litters approach, we found that some companies into the two or three-line market, the choice of local group buying company to eliminate. The reality is, often played for three or four months without effect, because people are local team, the local merchant consumers know very well, you go to fight it is difficult.

At the time, no nationwide group buying company was able to succeed in the second-tier cities. Litters not with the local most cattle group buying company as the enemy, we have adopted a cooperative approach. How to cooperate? I will first give you some money to take up 51% of your shares, and then if the two sides of the values of the culture of good, then I change the stock or the way to issue options, in exchange for another 49%.

This in many two or three-line city litters very easily accounted for the first, and then back to occupy the North wide market. Today, there are 6 general managers from the litters in 14 national regions. Because I am an angel, I have some experience in the judgment of the team.

Reflections on the Lessons of litters Group

In the past litters had quite a lot of experience and lessons. Three years of the top of the internet for group buying. In the past group buy impetuous big environment inside, litters not very good to do alone. We are expanding too fast, we should be hold, in recruitment, for example, we just do not control the rhythm. Especially in 2011, our team did not form the T team, the staff did not form a structure. The 6-month entry and the 12-month and two-year period should have a reasonable structure to form a new situation in the old belt, not all new.

Our craziest time is more than 6,000 people, then we press 1:3 equipped, compiled 20 people allow you to recruit 60 BD. You will have to pass the horse race for a while, 60 people to pick 20 people. This is very cruel, because at that time your most distressed is how to get BD, good BD, excellent BD, you can only go to tactics, go to the horse race to pick. We now have more than 2,600 employees, of which BD is 2000.

The second reflection is that we are in the rhythm of the IPO arrangement, that is a subjective error, that is, the capital market of the pre-judgment error. Only one months, if we are one months early, we can barely go up. Groupon goes public, we decide to give up. The communication with the SEC has not been completed, and that time is not up to date. As early as one months, Groupon has just one months and two months to go. We were going to rob that time, but you're ready to work. It has a limit, there is no way to do it.

On the words may be the same as the only product will be said to bleed into the market, but the brand effect is very good. In the United States, there is no other than the company, is Groupon. Your mall model is not clear, at that time you do not have the ability to talk to investors clearly about your mall model, of course, today is much better.

One person who met an investment bank on a plane said that in the US market today, China stocks do not have a problem of window-opening, but rather a revaluation, since the criteria for valuation have changed. In the past with China two words, you expect very high, your growth rate is very high. Like 360 Ah, a lot of companies. Adding two words to China today may not necessarily be an added bonus. Some of the world's capital flows away from China to the United States, the big environment is so, so I think the listing also need to undergo a long adjustment period. Does not mean that the window is open back to 2009, or the first half of 2010 years, is still very early.