Chapter 285
Wu Yuan, who was far away in the United States, of course knew the news that "Soul Ferry" had started filming smoothly.
He had high hopes for this TV series.
Although it could not be broadcast on TV, he was very clear about how popular "Soul Ferry" was back then.
It is said that the emergence of the web drama "Yu Zui" made China's web dramas formalized, got rid of the dilemma of low-cost and shoddy production, and began to truly transform into TV dramas as good as TV dramas on TV.
But in Wu Yuan's view, the source of the real popularity of web dramas and the mainstream film and television culture should be the emergence of the nonsensical web mini-series "Wan Wan Expected", which promoted the formation of the web drama market.
Then, under the influence of "Soul Ferry", a well-made and excellent long-form web drama, web dramas really entered the public eye and became an important part of China's film and television culture.
Finally, the emergence of "Yu Zui" completely detonated the web drama market, allowing countless hot money to pour in, and also allowing major video platforms to transform from simply purchasing web broadcast copyrights to making their own TV dramas.
Even after 2018, online dramas have completely crushed TV dramas on satellite TV. The self-produced dramas of the three major online broadcasting platforms each year occupy the list of all TV drama viewers.
Now Wu Yuan has taken out "Soul Ferry" more than six years in advance, of course, hoping that the mainland Internet TV drama industry can accelerate.
This year is the first year of the popularization of mobile Internet. 3G network will be popularized on April 1, and the first generation of iPhone has been released.
Internet broadband has also entered the era of speed increase, and home network will enter the 10M era in the next two or three years.
When "Soul Ferry" is officially launched, the conditions for watching on-demand videos on computers are basically met. Wu Yuan directly took out mature online dramas, skipping the stage of wild growth of online film and television dramas. It is good for the industry.
For the company, it can also occupy the position of industry leader.
These six years of advance are the development period that Wu Yuan has snatched for Guangying Kuaibo.
Whether it can occupy a piece of the pie and maintain its market position in the era of popular online dramas depends on the next six years.
Even if it does not make money, or even makes a loss to gain publicity, Wu Yuan must grab this market!
"Soul Ferry" is just the appetizer to start the show, and there are a series of main dishes to be served later!
The company has signed more than ten actors in a row from the end of last year to this year, and they are not signed as mascots, they must be used!
On the second day after the smooth start of "Soul Ferry", Wu Yuan, who had a routine call with Li Xiaoping, told her: "The company's TV drama business will be busy next."
"Jinsha and Yuan Hong's "Twinkle Twinkle Star"
"Wang Likun and Yan Kuan's "War in Changsha"
"And Zhang Yi, Duan Yihong, Chen Zihan's "White Night Chase"
"In addition to the "Soul Ferry" that has already started, we have to make four TV series in one go this year, which is not easy."
Of course, it is impossible for all four TV series to be broadcast online.
Although it is not a loss for Guangying Times to sell all the dramas to Guangying Kuaibo, it is a real loss for Wu Yuan.
Now, making online dramas is purely losing money to gain market share. The money from selling advertisements on video platforms cannot make up for the cost of purchasing films. For example, "Soul Ferry" is estimated to be a total loss.
If this drama is successfully broadcast online and makes Guangying Kuaibo popular, the video platform can sell the opening advertisement space for subsequent online dramas, but it is unlikely to make money, just from a total loss to a half loss.
How much does online advertising cost now?
If this thing can make money, several currently popular video websites will not lose money every year and need to raise funds every year.
This is because they did not spend money to buy copyrights!
Their annual advertising revenue is not enough to cover the money for renting servers, and they have to go to the investment market to make PPTs and ask investors for money!
Therefore, in the first year of Guangying Kuaibo's launch, Wu Yuan only plans to make two dramas.
One "Soul Ferry" and one "Day and Night Chase" will do.
In their original trajectory, these two web dramas became popular online due to their reputation and plots, and they were dark horses that made a comeback with a low cost.
Wu Yuan conservatively estimated that he would lose 50 to 60 million yuan just by broadcasting these two dramas online.
If the dramas were a big hit and attracted tens of millions of viewers, the loss would probably be even greater, and it is possible to lose 100 million yuan.
Because the more viewers there are, the more servers you have to rent
It can only be said that being an Internet company is really a money-burning business. If you don't treat money as money, it is common to burn hundreds of millions a year.
Otherwise, Wu Yuan would not be in a hurry to get money from Hollywood. It's really like a landlord who doesn't have enough food to squander.
The establishment of the other two TV dramas is also to make money to make up for the losses on the web dramas.
A romantic idol drama "Twinkle Twinkle Star" and a serious drama "War in Changsha" are both popular and easy-to-sell film and television types on TV stations now. Coupled with the good reputation of Guangying Times, these two dramas can make money as long as they are made.
Wu Yuan, who has always been careful with his budget, can only use this method to control the balance of his funds. At least in the first three to five years of Guangying Kuaibo's start-up, he must grit his teeth and do it himself.
It's not that he is unwilling to raise funds with shares, but he doesn't want to start raising funds too early.
For Internet companies like this, financing is inevitable. Whether it is the three giants or the various taxi-hailing apps, food delivery apps, shared bicycles, etc. that emerged later, they all went through ABCD rounds of financing before they were successfully listed.
The price of doing so is that when the founding team finally goes public, they will not have many shares in their hands, perhaps less than 20 percentage points, and they have lost the final say in the company's decision-making level.
Unlike those industrial companies, the founders can basically retain about 30%-40% of the equity and can basically still grasp the company's rights.
Therefore, Wu Yuan would rather use more of his own money in the early stage to invest in the bottomless pit of streaming media platforms, rather than start financing too early and use investors' money.
It is indeed pleasant to use investors' money, but the cost of comeback is not small at all.
He has more than just Guangying Kuaibo in his hands. Sooner or later, he will establish Guangying Group and include film and television companies, theater companies, and video websites under his umbrella.
And if you want to form such a large entertainment group, you must first ensure that you have absolute control over these companies.
Even if the AB share system is used, with equal shares but different rights, Wu Yuan must have at least 30% of the shares in order to have absolute control over Guangying Kuaibo.
If there are too many financings and too few shares in hand, Guangying Kuaibo will become a company independent of Guangying Group and cannot be controlled at will.
So before the company goes public, he can only raise funds for Guangying Kuaibo 2-3 times at most, and the money must be used carefully.
"I hope this money is enough." Wu Yuan murmured.
From its establishment to its listing, Youku raised funds six times from November 2005 to November 2010, and received $160 million in funds to develop the company.
Even so, after the listing, Youku still lost a total of 1.382 billion yuan in the three years from 2010 to 2013.
This is still a huge loss without the start of the era of self-made dramas and copyrights.
The $600 million profit that Guangshidai is expected to get in the next two to three years is what Wu Yuan is going to use for Guangying Kuaibo's development from 2008 to 2014.
As for after 2014?
Of course, it will start financing and then start the listing process!
Wu Yuan really can't stand the Internet video war after 2014 by himself!
By 2021, Youku will lose 6.118 billion yuan a year, and it will lose 11.446 billion yuan in 2020.
Another giant, Qiyi Video, had net losses of 9.06 billion yuan, 10.28 billion yuan, and 7 billion yuan from 2018 to 2020...
Even if Wu Yuan positioned Guangyingshidai as small and refined, not as big and comprehensive as the three giants, it would at least lose 20 to 30 billion that year, right?
If he really paid to fill this bottomless pit, he would be a sucker.
The Internet industry really doesn't treat money as money!
"These four TV series must be filmed within this year." Wu Yuan told Li Xiaoping on the phone: "Not only TV series, but also movies."
"Zhang Guorong's new movie plan, the company's second phase of the young director support plan, and Li Yang's new movie must all be prepared."
"Although only two movies, Gravity and Li Wen, are released this year, the company must have at least 4 movies released next year, doubling the number!"
"By the way, how are the broadcasts of The Best of Us and Hello, Old Times?"
Now Wu Yuan's mind is full of how to make money, and he also remembered the two company-made dramas that he had forgotten.
Li Xiaoping on the other end of the phone heard Wu Yuan mention this, and her voice was also a little bit smiling: "The Best of Us" has been broadcasted simultaneously on Mango TV and Jiangsu and Zhejiang TV."
"Two TV stations bought together for one episode, and sold a total of 46 million."
"The second round is expected to be sold to more than a dozen TV stations, and it can also sell for 50 or 60 million."
"If the response after the broadcast is good enough, there may be a chance to sell the third round."
Now is the golden age of TV series sales, because the upper level has not yet issued a restriction that a drama cannot be broadcast by more than three TV stations at the same time.
Although during the first round of broadcasts, powerful TV stations mostly adopt the first round exclusive form, for some popular dramas, two TV stations will also premiere simultaneously, and for some TV dramas with large investments and high prices, TV stations will adopt the method of four TV stations purchasing together.
But at most four TV stations will premiere together.
When it comes to the second round, the situation is different, because the price has dropped, there will be as many as a dozen TV stations buying and broadcasting together.
When "Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils" was broadcast, at the peak period, 17 TV stations (including terrestrial stations) broadcast it at the same time, achieving the grand occasion of the same drama being broadcasted in the prime time of the evening.
Every summer vacation, there are often more than a dozen TV stations broadcasting "Journey to the West" or "My Fair Princess" during the daytime.
This makes these TV drama production companies very profitable. Although the selling price of the second, third, fourth and fifth rounds is cheap, they can't afford to buy enough TV stations, and the profit created is not less than the first round.
By 2010, this situation was curbed. Even in the second and third rounds, only 3 TV stations could broadcast it at the same time, which greatly hit the situation of selling more than one film.
The advantage is that the audience will no longer switch back and forth when all TV stations are broadcasting the same drama. The disadvantage is that the cost of purchasing films for TV stations has begun to soar.
Since it is not possible to broadcast on multiple channels, the price of the first round of broadcasting will naturally increase.
Scarcity makes things valuable! Production companies are unwilling to suffer losses.
"The Best of Us" is still in talks with the film purchasing departments of major companies. Now the most likely to win the first broadcast rights of this TV series are Anhui Satellite TV and Oriental Satellite TV."
"It was also purchased by the two companies together. Because the leading actors are Yuan Hong and Guan Zhibin, both of whom have acted in movies, the price is higher. The two companies sold a total of 55 million."
Hearing these two sets of figures, Wu Yuan's face was full of smiles.
The cost of this kind of campus drama is the lowest among all TV dramas. The cost of the two TV dramas combined is less than 30 million. This way, more than 70 million in profits are earned.
In addition, if the subsequent second and third rounds can be sold, there is still a profit of 150 million.
This money can at least make Guangying Kuaibo lose money on one or two web series!
"Good, good, good job!" Wu Yuan praised cheerfully: "Keep up the good work, now is the blue ocean of the TV industry, the opportunity period can not be missed."
From 2000 to 2014, it was the most glorious and prosperous era of TV stations, because TV was completely popularized in rural areas, and there were 700 million to 800 million TV viewers in the country who watched the prime time every day in front of the TV.
The advertising revenue of major TV stations alone can add up to tens of billions of revenue a year, and most of this money is used to purchase films, and only a small part is used to make variety shows.
As long as Guangying Times can get a few percentage points of profit from it, it will be a lot of money.
"My "Pirates of the Caribbean 3" is about to be released, and I don't have time to return to China for the time being. I will leave the company's affairs to you."
Wu Yuan said to Li Xiaoping on the phone in an encouraging tone: "I am at ease with you doing things!"
The TV industry is really making money at this time, much more than the film industry.
In the late 1990s, "Kangxi's Secret Visits" was able to sell 200 million yuan in advertising.
In 2010, the box office revenue of mainland movies exceeded 10 billion yuan, but the revenue of radio and television was nearly 200 billion yuan (of course, not just advertising revenue)
When I checked this data, I was also shocked.