The female assistant was the second person to know about Simon's idea of planning to acquire Bell Atlantic, and the first, naturally, was Janet.

Simon plans to travel to New York after his trip to San Francisco to formally discuss with executives from Westeros and Cersei Capital the feasibility of launching both the MCA and Bell Atlantic acquisitions at the same time.

This trip to San Francisco is mainly for the sake of Igrete and AOL.

The problem with Eaglet is simple, the company is out of money again.

With Carol Butz and Jeff Bezos at the helm of Igrete, Simon's recent work has been quite satisfying.

Egrett continues to consolidate the company's patent barriers in the field of World Wide Web technology through continuous investment in technology research, the software sales business has quickly opened up with Carol Butz's years of experience in the industry, the number of users of the portal has continued to increase, and the Internet advertising business has also been successfully opened, and so on.

However, these all mean a lot of money to be consumed.

Simon is very aware of what it means that Igrete has mastered hundreds of core patents of World Wide Web technology, and that Igrete has developed a complete set of graphical interface browser software, server software, web design software and other application tools related to World Wide Web technology are software products with very solid business prospects, so Simon plans to invest an additional $50 million this time in order to continue the development and promotion of the World Wide Web technology site.

At the beginning of its establishment, the total share capital of Egrett was 10 million shares, of which Westeros accounted for 9 million shares with an investment of $10 million, and Tim Berners Lee held the other 1 million shares. In the last $20 million capital injection, the total share capital of Egrett doubled, and Tim Berners-Lee's stake remained unchanged at 1 million shares, although the shareholding was reduced to 5%.

This time, Simon did not let the professional asset appraisal team intervene and personally finalized the valuation of Eagle at $50 million. For a tech start-up that hasn't yet generated a steady stream of revenue, this figure is a bit high, but Simon believes that Igrete is worth it.

On the other hand, Simon still has no intention of squeezing Tim Berners-Lee's shareholding, and he has always been very fond of the founder of the World Wide Web. Therefore, as he did last time, he offered Li a plan to maintain his shareholding through loans.

However, Tim Berners Lee did not accept it this time either, and he is very happy with his holdings and his current job.

Although Simon plans to give a portion of Igret's equity to the company's executives and employees at the right time, he will not give it to someone for nothing.

As a result, the total share capital of Egrett doubled again to 40 million shares, Westeros' shareholding in Eaglet increased to 97.5%, and Tim Berners-Lee's shareholding decreased to 2.5%, and the number of shares held remained at 1 million.

AOL is mainly about the negotiation of Steve Case's exclusive agreement.

Although Simon plans to buy a telecommunications company ahead of schedule, AOL's pace of development will not be adjusted in the short term. As long as it can sign exclusive agreements with three regional telecom operators, Bell Atlantic, NYNEX and Bell Pacific, AOL's development in the next few years will be twice as effective with half the effort.

Of course, the biggest problem in this matter is funding.

AOL shareholders are not like Tim Berners Lee, who proposed that after the agreement is negotiated, the three companies will be temporarily financed by loans to pay for the buyouts of the three companies for the first year.

The three companies still insist on paying exclusivity fees based on the number of users as a whole, but the exact amount is still negotiable, and eventually the exclusivity fee will be reduced to about $1 per household, as the female assistant predicted at the last breakfast. At that time, the amount of more than 20 million will be completely within the credit line of AOL.

Simon also had a general understanding of the operation of AOL's 100 Internet cafes this time.

Within a month of opening, with excellent promotion in the early stage and the public's curiosity about this new leisure and entertainment venue, AOL's 1 million Internet cafes reached a total revenue of $2.06 million in the first month, with an average turnover of more than $20,000 per Internet café.

Excluding store rent, employee compensation and grid expenses, AOL's Internet café chain generated a gross profit of $530,000 in just one month.

If this business situation is maintained, AOL will be able to recoup its initial investment in about two years.

Because of the exemplary role of these 100 Internet cafes, some people have begun to contact AOL, hoping to open franchise chains.

Moreover, in the previous month, the number of users who received customized network access coupons through AOL's Internet café channel reached more than 2,600 users, equivalent to 5% of the proportion of AOL's Internet users in the same period, which is what Simon values the most.

Simon's original purpose in proposing the opening of an Internet café was to guide people to familiarize themselves with and access the Internet.

More than 2,600 new users were brought in just the first month, which was much faster than AOL had initially anticipated. It is conceivable that with the continuous improvement of the Internet Explorer content and the further increase in the service functions that the Egrete portal can provide, more people will definitely prefer to access the Internet in their own homes.

Now that this goal has been achieved and will continue, AOL has no intention of holding the 'Internet Bar' subsidiary in its hands anymore.

Two years is still a long time to go back to the basics.

Palo Alto USA AOL Headquarters.

At the end of the meeting to discuss the progress of the negotiations on the exclusivity agreement between the three telecom operators, Simon and Steve Case were left alone in the conference room, and Steve Case talked about the Internet Bar.

"We've been in contact with several Wall Street private equity firms, and three of them have taken an interest in Internet Bar. AOL has a 50% stake, and the highest one has made an offer of $10 million, and I think it should be able to talk about $15 million in the end. If we cash out early, we will be able to cover most of our fees for the first year of our exclusivity agreement with the three Bell Atlantic. ”

Since he didn't plan to make money with these 100 Internet cafes in the first place, Simon actually has no objection to cashing out.

However, if you are in a hurry to sell it after just opening for a month, you must have suffered a loss.

Whether it's $10 million or $15 million, it's just an offer for a 50% stake in the existing 100 Internet cafes. If you are patient and develop Internet Bar into a larger chain management system for a year or two, the value of this company will definitely increase significantly.

Simon waited for Steve Keys to finish and asked, "What about IBM?"

"IBM intends to continue to hold its shares, but they are not opposed to us selling their shares. When we launched, the IBM team could instead take over the Internet Bar. ”

IBM, a behemoth with a recent market capitalization of more than $50 billion, would not care about a small start-up company like Internet Bar, to be precise, it was only IBM's venture capital arm that participated in the investment last time. Every Big Mac will have a similar department.

Compared with AOL, which is in dire need of funds, IBM's investment team understands that there is still a lot of room for appreciation in Internet Bar, so naturally there is no need to be too eager to choose to cash out.

Simon understood why Steve Keys was impatient in this matter, and the AOL team was worried that he would continue to spend money to dilute the shareholding of other shareholders, and after thinking about it for a moment, he didn't insist, saying, "Since you think it's appropriate, then sell it." However, it is important to make sure that Internet Bar works with AOL in terms of user outreach. ”

Steve Case saw Simon's relief, immediately nodded, and said, "I understand, in fact, this matter was in the negotiation conditions of my contact with those private equity funds from the beginning. By the way, Simon, if Cersei Capital is interested in Internet Bar, $13 million will do. ”

AOL only invested $3.5 million in the Internet café project, and even if it was $13 million, it would be able to get a return of nearly 300%.

Simon shook his head, he had already discussed this matter with Janet.

Cersei Capital is a very important layout of Simon on Wall Street, unless necessary, he does not plan to let Cersei Capital intersect with too many businesses under Westeros, so it is easy to have conflicts of interest and cause criticism, and there is no need to take advantage of the small bargain of $2 million.

"Cersei Capital is not involved in this matter," Simon refused, and then said: "Let's talk about another thing, you should know that I have made a lot of money overseas in the past two years. ”

Steve Keys secretly breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Simon's refusal, $2 million is nothing to Simon, but AOL really needs to take care of every penny of expenses now.

Then listening to Simon's words, Steve Keys nodded, waiting for him to continue.

Simon continued: "The recent decline in the federal stock market due to the Kuwait war has led to a good time to expand. My recent idea is to acquire a regional telecommunications company, with the initial target being one of the three AOL is negotiating. ”

The look of surprise on Steve Case's face calmed down after a moment and said with a smile: "Simon, I thought you would use that money to buy a big Hollywood studio, after all, the foundation of Daenerys Entertainment is not as deep-rooted as the seven major studios." ”

Simon knew that this was probably what many people thought, and said with a smile: "A lot of things are still uncertain, this time I just said hello to you first, I will go to New York tomorrow, and I will officially discuss this matter with James and them." Also, even if you buy a regional telecom company, the whole process will take about a year, so it's business as usual on AOL's side, and what you have to do is negotiate that exclusivity agreement by the end of September if possible. Also, remember to keep it a secret. ”

Steve Case nodded solemnly, but he couldn't help but wonder which company Simon was targeting.

Although Simon is based on the West Coast, Case doesn't think it should be Bel Pacific.

The name Bell Pacific may sound more atmospheric than Bell Atlantic and NYNEX, but it is actually the smallest of the three companies, and probably the smallest of the seven Little Bells, and its business is limited to two states, California and Nevada.

NYNEX contains abbreviations for New York and New England, and several states in the northeastern United States, such as Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts, are small in size and are known as New England for historical reasons.

NYNEX, one of the Seven Little Bells, also operates in these two areas and shares the Boston-Washington metropolitan area equally with Bell Atlantic.

Because Pennsylvania and Virginia, where Bell Atlantic is located, are continents in terms of area and population, they are slightly larger than NYNEX.

Steve Case felt that, with Simon's appetite, the only acquisition targets would be two companies on the West Coast, NYNEX and Bell Atlantic. And more likely the latter.

However, since Simon didn't reveal more to him, and Steve Keys didn't get to the bottom of it, any of the three potential target companies would be behemoths for AOL. The multi-billion dollar acquisition is not something he can participate in.

Of course, if Simon's goal does make headlights, Steve Keys can imagine how much that would help AOL. During this time, he racked his brains to sign exclusive agreements with the three companies in order to gain access to their telecommunications networks.

The huge buyout funds are not just for the sake of a simple empty exclusive agreement.

As long as the plan is reached, the three companies open their network permissions to AOL, and AOL does not need to invest a huge amount of money to lay its own network lines, but only needs to complete the construction of backbone cables and servers, access the networks of the three companies, and then install modems in the homes of telephone users covered by these networks, which can realize the user's access to the Internet very conveniently.

After finishing the AOL incident, Simon also went to Cisco headquarters.

Westeros has completed an increase in its stake in Cisco, bringing its stake to 57.5%.

Because the U.S. stock market has been affected by the Kuwait war recently, Cisco's IPO plan has slowed down, and Simon has not asked Cisco's team to completely stop preparing for the IPO, after all, no one knows better than him how long this economic downturn will last.

It's Thursday in the blink of an eye.

Wake up early in the morning, go for a morning run in the Woodside Mountains, and plan your flight to New York after breakfast. Because of Simon's schedule, Janet stayed over there, planning to spend the weekend together on the East Coast.

Shuttling through the cool mountain roads, passing a three-way intersection, a middle-aged man also wearing a tracksuit followed from the other side.

Simon glanced at the other and greeted with a smile, "Morning, Larry." ”

Larry Ellison knew from Simon's smile that the young man had seen through his deliberate presence here, but fortunately he was thick-skinned enough to see nothing unusual on his unshaven hairy face, but responded enthusiastically, "Morning, Simon." ”

The bodyguard who followed Simon saw that the two knew each other, and slowed down a little further.

The two jogged side by side for dozens of meters, and Larry Ellison took the initiative to speak: "Simon, Westeros' stake in Oracle has recently increased to 15%, do you still want to buy it?"

Simon said: "Oracle's recent stock price is so cheap, if you can buy more, you must make a move, I am very optimistic about this company." ”

Larry Ellison didn't know if Simon was laughing at him.

Oracle's stock price has been very low in recent months, compared with the highest price of $28 per share last year, it has recently slipped to about $8, a decline of 70%. The market value has also fallen from a high of $3.6 billion to $1 billion now, which is miserable.

Because of the continuous decline in the stock price, many shareholders have continued to sell Oracle shares during this time.

However, the last time Westeros declared its shareholding, it bucked the trend and increased its stake in Oracle to 15%, increasing its stake by 4% in just one month.

If he buys it like this, his Larry Ellison's control of Oracle will be in jeopardy.

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