I’m in Hollywood - Chapter 663

[Chapter six hundred and fifty seventh sudden news]

After the heart bypass surgery, although Michael Eisner was repeatedly told by his family and doctors to pay attention to rest, it was just seven o’clock on the new day, and he had already sat in his office at the global headquarters.

Because at 10 a.m. this morning, Firefly will officially auction off its hand-drawn animation division at the Beverly Hilton.

Turning on the brand-new ibm desktop computer on his desk, Michael Eisner quickly clicked once again to the top link in the Yahoo portal entertainment, and read the detailed list of assets in the animation department that was about to be auctioned.

To this day, Michael Eisner vividly remembers how, in 1986, at the suggestion of then-head of home entertainment Bill Michanick, management began to release classic Disney animated films under pressure from all sides.

Prior to that, Disney’s library of hundreds of films had been valued at just $200 million, both in the industry and within Disney, but then Disney’s first attempt at releasing a videotape of 1940’s “Pinocchio”, although it cost $200 million. Lost $7 million in high marketing expenses, but the animated film sold 1.7 million boxes in a year, with sales reaching $51 million, followed by sales of animated films such as Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella All of them 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 1980s, felt he knew better than anyone the value of Disney’s animated films.

When Firefly threw out the news that the animation division was packaged and sold, and after confirming that it was not fake news, Michael Eisner’s first thought was to win it at all costs, even if it didn’t have the box office hit of “The Lion King”, Michael Eisner Sner felt he should do the same.

However, the response of Panasonic Group, the parent company of Universal Japan, poured cold water on Michael Eisner.

Panasonic’s desire to enter the entertainment world has never been so eager.

When Sony followed suit and bought Universal, it was completely out of fear of being left behind by a competitor in the electronics industry.

In recent years, Panasonic has found that buying Hollywood film companies has not been so obvious in promoting its electronic products, and the Japanese have also realized that from the beginning, they have been slapped by Hollywood.

Compared with Sony, which is still holding some fantasies, Panasonic has no more thoughts of continuing to operate Universal.

Not to mention another ten or two billion dollars in cash for an animation department.

The unwilling Michael Eisner flew to Japan three times in a row in the last month, but failed to get any support from Panasonic. However, things soon turned around again.

The success of “The Mummy” brought a very beautiful financial report to Universal, and Panasonic planned to take this opportunity to take off Universal. Coincidentally, Seagram Group from Canada also expressed its willingness to enter Hollywood

. It is about to enter the stage of secret negotiation.

As the helm of Universal, Michael Eisner is of course also in the negotiation.

In the process, Michael Eisner realized Edgar Bronfman of Seagram Group’s strong interest in the media industry, and took the opportunity to persuade Edgar Bronfman to buy Disney before taking the Universal animation department.

Inspired by the success of The Lion King, Edgar Bronfman agreed without much hesitation.

Time passed unknowingly, 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 tidied up his suit .

She greeted him with a professional smile, and at the same time.

A tall, bearded middle-aged man with glasses walked in.

After greeting each other warmly, Michael Eisner said: “Then, Edgar, let’s go now.”

Edgar Bronfman hesitated: “Michael, don’t we need to wait for Austrian Is Mr. Weitz?”

Michael Eisner shook his head slightly and said, “Edgar. If you are sure to buy Universal, maybe we need to take some time to talk about Michael in detail, but today we still focus on On Disney Animation.”

Edgar Bronfman learned from Michael Eisner’s expression that the recent news about the breakdown of decades-old friends Michael Eisner and Michael Ovitz was real.

However, after Eisner said so.

Edgar Bronfman stopped mentioning Michael Ovitz, and the two drove to the Beverly Hilton together.

…

a sweet night together, Nicole wanted to go to the animation department’s auction with Eric, but had to fly to New York with agent Pie Kingsley early in the morning to negotiate a film appointment. .

After “The Mummy”, Nicole plans to take advantage of the gap before the “Mummy” sequel to shoot an art film, hone her acting skills and brush up the nominations, so as to improve her image of the vase in the hearts of film critics.

Eric thoughtfully and personally put Nicole on the plane before rushing to the Beverly Hills Hilton.

After getting out of the car in the parking lot, Eric saw Kelly who hurried over with a blue folder and said, “I’m so sorry, Kelly, there are some temporary things.”

Kelly smelled a faint light on Eric’s body. Perfume, although his face did not change, he couldn’t help but say: “You are my boss, there is no need to apologize to me.”

Eric did not expect that the always intelligent and capable female assistant also has a tasteful little girl. On the woman’s side, her index finger moved and she stepped forward, wanting to wrap her arms around Kelly’s waist to comfort her, and a black Cadillac drove into the parking lot in a very unpleasant manner.

Kelly, who was startled by Eric’s action, took a step back angrily, and was about to complain when a few people who got up and down from the Cadillac walked towards Eric.

“Eric, long time no see,” Michael Eisner walked over, took the initiative to shake hands with Eric, and introduced the middle-aged people around him: “This is Edgar Bronfman, Canada Seagram Group Yes

.”

Eric had already seen the relevant bidder’s information, but he was not unfamiliar, and warmly greeted: “Hello, Mr. Bronfman.”

“Mr. Williams, nice to meet you,” Edgar Bronfman shook hands with Eric.

With a smile on his face, he felt a little weird in his heart, especially when he called this young man 20 years younger than him ‘Mr. Williams’, the sense of disobedience was even stronger.

Because of the differences in the identities of buyers and sellers on both sides, Michael Eisner and Edgar Bronfman left first after a brief chat.

Looking at the figure of the two leaving with their entourage.

Kelly smiled and 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 just now In response, just smiled.

The Bronfman family, which owns the Seagram Group, took advantage of the business opportunities brought about by the American Prohibition Order in the 1920s and 1930s. Although they still operate the winemaking business, they have developed into a diversified comprehensive group. Ed Jia Bronfman is the third generation of the Bronfman family after making a fortune, in charge of the family’s tens of billions of dollars in business, but in front of Eric.

This ‘rich third generation’ can’t find any sense of superiority at all.

Thinking of Edgar Bronfman’s appearance, Eric asked curiously, “Is Edgar Bronfman Jewish?”

“Yes,” Kelly nodded: “Bronfman, a standard Jewish surname. ”

Seagram has not yet won Universal, so he started thinking about the Disney animation department. The two together will probably require $10 billion in cash. Both Panasonic and Firefly will only accept cash payments. “Eric said, his tone became mysterious.

Leaning in front of Kelly: “Hey, do you think there might be some organization like Freemasonry behind this that is trying to invade Hollywood?”

Kelly gave Eric a white look and said, “The Seagram Group was founded in 1981. Bought a 24.3% stake in DuPont. In April this year, DuPont launched an equity repurchase agreement and finally bought the shares of DuPont held by Seagram Group for $9 billion. This is their acquisition of Global and sources of funding for the animation sector.”

Eric looked at his watch.

Taking Kelly to the elevator in the underground parking lot, he said, “$9 billion, it’s not good to do something. For this kind of outsider, buying a film company is really stupid.”

Kelly didn’t agree with Ari .

Ke’s point of view: “The average annual growth rate of the film market is 9%. After Seagram buys Universal, even if it can’t continue, it can still be profitable by changing hands.”

Eric thought about it and felt that Kelly said quite reasonable.

I remember the original time and space, after Seagram bought Universal a few years ago, because of various problems, he sold Universal to the French Vivendi Group again. to General Electric.

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 Really won’t lose too much.

However, if this time Seagram, under the pressure of Michael Eisner, forcibly took over Disney’s hand-drawn animation department with huge sums of money, the future situation will definitely be different.

Universal is still different from companies like Paramount and Time Warner. Universal and its parent company may now and in the future be foreign capital. According to federal law, the mere fact that foreigners cannot own American TV stations limits Universal’s ability to not own TV stations. A possible path towards a comprehensive media conglomerate.

This also means that Universal’s ability to resist risks will be far weaker than that of big groups such as Firefly, Paramount and Time Warner.

If it gets the hand-drawn animation department, which is destined to be in trouble, Universal will have almost no suspense in this area in the next few years. Coupled with the impact of the Internet on the music and recording industry, it is not impossible for Universal to fall into the predicament of MGM.

Kelly seemed to have thought of something 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 soon, I I still hope that Warner can continue to compete with Firefly for a few years. Of course, whoever gets 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. ”

The two said, and soon came to a conference room in the Hilton Hotel.

Katzenberg, who was about to host the auction in person, was holding a document and muttering. When he saw Eric and Kelly come in, he just nodded and said hello.

Eric chatted with several executives such as Frank Wells for a while, and the time was approaching ten o’clock.

Eric left the conference room with everyone and walked into the auction hall. Although the media reporters were blocked from the auction hall, there were still more than half of the people in the hall with hundreds of seats.

Eric greeted the Hollywood giants who came to participate in the auction or simply 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. When the whispers under the stage quieted down, Katzenberg said into the microphone: “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to today’s auction site. Everyone. We all know that the 2D animated film “The Lion King” released on June 24 this year has already achieved an astonishing global box office of 670 million US dollars. This is very exciting news for the entire Hollywood. It means that the animation film market in Hollywood will usher in a new era. However, due to the strategic development within the Firefly Group, we regretfully decided to sell our hand-drawn animation department as a whole.”

After a simple opening speech, Katzenberg continued: “Although everyone has obtained the detailed asset catalog, here, let me briefly introduce to you, in addition to the listed assets that are about to be auctioned, Firefly Group has temporarily decided , in order to reduce the short-term financial pressure of the buyer as much as possible, we will extend the original one-year payment date to three years

. The hall hummed immediately.

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

Of course, it is not difficult to guess the purpose of Firefly doing this, leaving sufficient time for buyers to pay, which means that these buyers will likely charge higher prices.

An old voice quickly overwhelmed all the whispers and sounded at the auction site: “Jeffrey, I ask the auction to be suspended, I need to discuss with my team.”

Everyone turned their heads together and found that the speaker was Viacom’s Summer Redstone.

Katzenberg didn’t refuse either, and said with a constant smile: “Of course there’s no problem, Mr. Redstone. Then, the bidding time will be delayed by half an hour. If you need to discuss urgently, you can do it yourself.” (To be continued. .)

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[End of this Chapter]