After heart bypass surgery, Michael Eisner was repeatedly told by his family and doctors to take a break, but at seven o'clock in the new day, he was already sitting in his office at the global headquarters. Because at ten o'clock this morning, Firefly will officially auction off its hand-drawn animation department at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.

Opening the brand-new IBM desktop computer on his desk, Michael Eisner quickly clicked on the pinned link to Yahoo Portal Entertainment again, reading the detailed list of assets in the animation department that was about to be auctioned.

To this day, Michael Eisner vividly remembers the 1986 days when management began releasing Disney's animated classics under pressure at the suggestion of Bill Michanick, then head of the home entertainment department.

Before that, both the industry and Disney internally, the Disney film library with hundreds of films was valued at only $200 million, but then, Disney's first attempt at releasing the 1940 "Pinocchio" videotape, although it cost a high marketing cost of $7 million, the animated film sold 1.7 million boxes in a year, and sales reached $51 million, followed by "Sleeping Beauty" and "Cinderella" and other animated films, all of which exceeded the $200 million valuation of Disney's film library.

Michael Eisner, who witnessed the resurgence of Disney's 2D animated films in the late 80s, feels that he knows the value of Disney animated films better than anyone else.

When Firefly threw out the news that the animation division was being packaged and sold, after making sure that it was not fake news, Michael Eisner's first thought was to take it at all costs, even if it didn't have the box office hit of "The Lion King", Michael Eisner felt that he should do the same.

However, the reaction of Panasonic Group, the parent company of Global Japan, poured cold water on Michael Eisner's head.

The Panasonic Group's desire to enter the entertainment industry has not been so keen from beginning to end. When Sony bought Universal, it was completely worried about being left behind by competitors in the electronics industry.

In recent years, Panasonic has found that the promotion effect of buying Hollywood studios on its electronic products is not so obvious, and the Japanese have also realized that they have been severely cheated by Hollywood from the beginning. Compared with Sony, which still has some illusions, Panasonic has little intention of continuing to run Universal. I won't come up with another dozen or two billion dollars in cash for an animation department.

The reluctant Michael Eisner has flown to Japan three times in a row in the past month, but he has not been able to get any support from Panasonic, but things soon took a turn for the better.

The success of "The Mummy" brought a very beautiful financial report to Universal, and Panasonic planned to take advantage of this opportunity to take off Universal's gloves, and it was very coincidental that the Seagram Group from Canada also expressed its willingness to enter Hollywood, and the two sides soon entered the secret negotiation stage.

At the helm of Universal, Michael Eisner is of course among the negotiators. In the process, Michael Eisner realized that Edgar Bronfman, CEO of the Seagram Group, had a strong interest in the media industry, and took the opportunity to lobby Edgar Bronfman to buy Disney's animation division before taking Universal. Encouraged by the success of The Lion King, Edgar Bronfman agreed without much hesitation.

Time passed imperceptibly, and the secretary's knock on the door pulled Michael Eisner out of his thoughts: "Mr. Eisner, Mr. Bronfman is here." ”

Michael Eisner stood up and straightened his suit. With a professional smile, he greeted him, at the same time. A tall, bearded middle-aged man with glasses walked in.

After greeting each other warmly, Michael Eisner said, "So, Edgar, let's go now." ”

Edgar Bronfman hesitated, "Michael, don't we need to wait for Mr. Ovitz?" ”

Michael Eisner shook his head slightly and said, "Edgar." If you're sure you're going to buy Universal, maybe we'll need to take a moment to talk more about Michael, but today we'll focus on Disney's animation division. ”

From Michael Eisner's expression, Edgar Bronfman realized that the recent news about the breakdown of Michael Eisner and Michael Ovitz, two decades-old friends, was true.

However, after Eisner said so. Edgar Bronfman stopped mentioning Michael Ovitz, and the two drove to the Beverly Hilton Hotel together.

……

After a sweet evening together, Nicole wanted to attend the animation auction with Eric, but had to fly to New York early in the morning with her agent Pie Kingsley to negotiate a film contract. After "The Mummy", Nicole plans to take advantage of the gap before the start of filming of the sequel to "The Mummy" to shoot an art film, hone her acting skills and brush up on nominations, so as to improve her vase image in the hearts of film critics.

Eric thoughtfully put Nicole on the plane himself, and then rushed to the Hilton Beverly Hills.

After getting out of the parking lot, Eric saw Kelly hurrying over with a blue folder and said, "I'm really sorry, Kelly, there is something wrong with the moment." ”

Kelly smelled the faint smell of perfume on Eric's body, and although her face did not change, she couldn't help but say, "You're my boss, there's no need to apologize to me." ”

Eric didn't expect the always intellectual and capable female assistant to have a tasteful little woman, and took a step forward with his index finger, wanting to put his arm around Kelly's waist to comfort him, and a black Cadillac drove into the parking lot very scenicly.

Taken aback by Eric's movements, Kelly took a step back in disgust, and was about to complain when several people from the Cadillac walked towards Eric.

"Eric, long time no see," Michael Eisner walked over, took the initiative to shake Eric's hand, and introduced the middle-aged man beside him: "This is Edgar Bronfman, CEO of Seagram Group in Canada. ”

Eric had already read the information of the bidders, but he was not unfamiliar, and warmly stretched out his hand to greet: "Hello, Mr. Bronfman." ”

"Mr. Williams, it's a pleasure to meet you," Edgar Bronfman shook Eric's hand. With a smile on his face, he felt a little strange in his heart, especially when he called this young man who was twenty years younger than himself, "Mr. Williams", this sense of disobedience was even stronger.

Because of the difference in the identities of the buyers and sellers on both sides today, Michael Eisner and Edgar Bronfman were the first to leave.

looked at the figure of the two of them leaving with their entourage. A smile tugged at the corner of Kelly's mouth as she said to Eric, "You can always make people who meet you for the first time feel very uncomfortable. ”

Eric knew that Kelly was talking about Edgar Bronfman's reaction, and just smiled. The Bronfman family, which owns the Seagram Group, took advantage of the business opportunities brought about by the American Prohibition in the twenties and thirties, and although it still runs the brewing business, it has developed into a diversified conglomerate, Edgar Bronfman is the third generation of the Bronfman family, in charge of the family's tens of billions of dollars of business, but in front of Eric. This 'rich third generation' can't find any sense of superiority at all.

Remembering Edgar Bronfman's appearance, Eric asked curiously, "Is Edgar Bronfman a Jew?" ”

"yes," Kelly nodded, "Bronfman, the standard Jewish surname." ”

"Seagram hasn't taken Universal yet, so he has started the Disney animation department, and the two together will probably require $10 billion in cash, and Panasonic and Firefly will only accept cash payments." Eric spoke, his tone becoming mysterious. Leaned in front of Kelly: "Hey, do you think there will be some Freemasonry or something like this behind this that is trying to invade Hollywood?" ”

Kelly gave Eric a blank look and said, "The Seagram Group bought DuPont in 1981.24 3% of the shares, in April this year, DuPont launched an equity buyback agreement, which eventually bought Sigram Group's stake in DuPont for $9 billion, which is the source of funds for their acquisition of Universal and Animation. ”

Eric looked at his watch. Led Kelly to the elevator in the underground parking lot and said, "$9 billion, it's not good to do something, it's stupid for this kind of outsider to buy a film company." ”

Kelly disagrees with Eric: "The average annual growth rate of the film market is 9%. After Seagram buys Universal, even if it can't do it, it can make a profit by changing hands. ”

Eric thought about it and thought that what Kelly said made sense.

I remember that in the original time and space, a few years after Seagram bought Universal, he sold Universal again to the French Vivendi Group due to various problems. However, although it failed to make any outstanding results, Universal did not fall into the dilapidated situation of MGM at that time, and now that Michael Eisner is in control, Seagram will not be able to play at that time, and it seems that it will really not lose much.

However, if Seagram forcibly takes over Disney's hand-drawn animation division with a huge amount of money at the beheaving of Michael Eisner this time, the situation will definitely be different in the future.

Universal and its parent company, MCA, are and will likely be foreign-owned, and according to federal law, the mere fact that foreigners cannot own American television stations limits the path of Universal's development into a comprehensive media group. This means that Universal's resilience will be far weaker than that of large groups such as Firefly, Paramount and Time Warner. If you get the hand-drawn animation department that is destined to get into trouble, Universal will have almost no suspense in this area in the next few years, and with the music record industry will be hit by the Internet, it is not impossible for Universal to fall into a predicament like MGM.

Kelly seemed to think of a piece of art with Eric and asked curiously, "Eric, which company do you want to get the animation department today?" ”

"Paramount, I don't want Warner to decline so quickly, I still hope Warner can continue to fight the Fireflies for a few more years. Of course, whoever gets to the hand-drawn animation department in the end is a good thing for Firefly, which means that one of our competitors will be in big trouble because of this baggage. ”

As they spoke, they quickly arrived at a conference room at the Hilton Hotel. Katzenberg, who was about to preside over the auction himself, was holding a document and reading words, and when he saw Eric and Kelly enter, he just nodded and said hello.

Eric chatted with Frank Wells and several other executives for a while, and it was nearly ten o'clock. Eric and the others left the conference room and walked into the auction hall, where more than half of the hundreds of seats were seated, even though the press was kept out of the auction hall.

Eric greeted the Hollywood giants who had come to participate in the auction or just join in the fun, and then took Frank Wells and others to the back row.

At ten o'clock, Katzenberg walked to the auction table in high spirits, and when the whispers in the audience quieted down, Katzenberg said into the microphone: "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to today's auction." As we all know, the 2D animated movie "The Lion King", which was released on June 24 this year, has now achieved 6 in the world. The astonishing box office of $700 million is a very exciting news for the whole of Hollywood, which means that the Hollywood animated film market will once again usher in a new era. However, due to the strategic development considerations within the Firefly Group, we regrettably decided to sell our hand-drawn animation division as a whole. ”

After a brief opening statement, Katzenberg continued: "Although you have been provided with a detailed inventory of assets, I would like to give you a brief introduction here, in addition to the assets that have already been listed to be auctioned, the Firefly Group has also made a temporary decision to extend the original one-year payment date to three years in order to reduce the financial pressure on the buyer in the short term as much as possible. ”

As soon as Katzenberg's words fell, the hall that had been quiet immediately buzzed.

The news was so sudden that none of the bidders expected the Firefly to do it.

Of course, it is not difficult to guess the purpose of Firefly to do this, leaving enough time for buyers to pay, which means that these buyers will be likely to offer a higher price.

An old voice quickly drowned out all the whispers and rang out at the auction: "Jeffrey, I am asking for the auction to be suspended, I need to discuss it with my team. ”

Everyone turned their heads together and found that the speaker was Viacom's CEO, Somer Leishidong.

Katzenberg did not refuse, and said with an unchanged smile: "Of course there is no problem, Mr. Lei Shidong, then, the bidding time will be delayed by half an hour, and everyone can do their own if they need to discuss urgently." (To be continued.) )