Tencent "deep network" author Pu Xiang
"Your organization was shortlisted." On April 26, Zhao Ming received an e-mail from Dajiang. The organization represented by Zhao Ming did not participate in a supplier tender, nor was it a 4A company's draft, but For nearly a month, DJI’s US$1 billion financing bid has continued. Many investors have told Deepnet that this type of financing has not been heard before.
Dajiang’s latest round of financing has adopted a new architecture design. In accordance with DJI’s requirements, investors must subscribe for a certain percentage of non-returnable Class D common stock in order to qualify for Class B common stock investment. Class D shares are essentially a There is no interest-bearing debt, no voting rights, and Class B can enjoy voting rights. 'For Dajiang, this kind of financing design is conducive to the selection of investors on the one hand, and on the other hand it is conducive to reducing financing costs.
In spite of this, investors still gathered. On April 3, there were more than 100 investment institutions that wanted to participate in financing bids. Each company paid 100,000 US dollars in margin. The first round of bidding results was completed on April 5, and the amount of each subscription The total sum has exceeded the original plan by 30 times. The first round of the maximum 500 million US dollars (a single investment institutional investment limit) The auction results are the average class D / B subscription ratio of 1.29: 1. April 15, the second round of competition The result is that the average D/B ratio has risen to 1.61: 1.
On April 18th, some sources showed that some investors disliked Dajiu for doing due diligence and changing conditions and gave up the final round of bidding.
On April 20th, Dajiang postponed the announcement of the third round of results. On April 23, Dajiang explained to investors that it would give results within two weeks. On April 26, Dajiang began to notify investors one by one. According to the trend of rising proportions, the third round of auctions, some investors have already increased the ratio of the average price of class D/B to 2: 1. Zhao Ming told Tencent “Shenzhen”, the last average class D/B Class ratios are not disclosed to investment institutions.
For investors, this is a painful decision. The equivalent of investing 3 bucks, only 1 bucks in stocks, the cost of capital is climbing. Before this round of financing, DJI’s valuation is about 15 billion US dollars. This round of financing Later, Dajiang’s valuation may exceed 25 billion U.S. dollars.
The winning bidder will hold Dajiang shares through SPV. In the securities industry, SPV (Special Purpose Vehicle) refers to a special purpose vehicle/company whose function is to purchase, package and securitize assets and to issue assets based securities. Foreign investor financing.
Tencent’s “Shenzhen” was also informed that this round of publicly introducing new investment institutions financing, after the original DJI’s equity was diluted, Dajiang or will be directed to them additional 125 million US dollars. New investment institutions want to Accept this certain increase.
According to publicly available information, Dajiang had previously conducted four rounds of financing with a total financing of no more than US$200 million. Investors include Sequoia Capital China, China Star Star, Yuanzhan Capital, and Maixing Investment. The latest investment from Accel Partners In 2015, the financing amount was only 75 million U.S. dollars. After this one billion U.S. dollar financing is reached, it will become the largest amount of financing in the history of Dajiang.
Investor Zhao Ming confirmed to “Shenzhen” that from 2015 to 2017, DJI revenue reached 5.98 billion yuan, 9.78 billion yuan, 17.57 billion yuan, and net profit jumped from 1.42 billion yuan to 1.93 billion yuan and 43. Billion RMB; In 2017, Djaan’s consumer drone business accounted for 85% of total revenue.
In terms of business growth, in 2017, Dajiang's operating income was 17.57 billion yuan, up 79.6% year-on-year; net profit was 4.3 billion yuan, up 123.2% year-on-year.
However, Zhao Ming did not understand that behind the excellent profits, what was the real intention of Dajiang Financing? During the inspection, he investigated a variety of companies in the UAV industry, including agricultural drones, logistics drones and electricity. After he patrols drones and other companies on the communications line, he finds that there are too few investment targets for the drone industry. Some company founders have bad reviews, some companies have connected transactions, some are plagued by policies, others It is the internal accounting confusion. Agricultural drones are in an industry with very low profit margins and do not meet their corporate investment preferences.
However, Dajiang’s “Unmanned Drone”, “Technology Innovation Unicorn” and high-tech barriers have positive cash flows. Even if they do not expect to be listed within three or five years, it means that they have little risk and benefit in his mind. This period of understanding is quite representative in this round of more than 100 investment institutions, which has caused a mad rush.
The first-line sales channels beyond the capital level, Tencent “Shenzhen”, learned that Dajiang is cutting prices and clearing the market with high cost performance. After the financing, Dajiang, from the inside out, is about to open a new journey.
After starting its business in 2006, Dajiang continuously surpassed Parrot in France, 3DRobotics in the United States, and made it the world's first in the industry. In a 12-year cycle, Dajiang came to a new node in 2018. From the current business to the future development center, won After the drone’s consumption of more than 70% of the market’s largest market, can it take advantage of this round of financing to properly respond to internal and external changes, challenges and internal contradictions, will affect whether the unicorn can be transformed and truly become a representative of 'China' Technology company that created '.
'Smell smell of blood'
'Everyone played and smelled the smell of blood'. At the beginning of 2018, Andy Yuan, head of sales team at Dajiang, issued a directive to the salesman to set up a 'death squad' and implemented the first consumption level in the history of Dajiang. No one in the industry sales and agriculture. The large-scale assault of machine sales combined for roughly two months, as of March 31, 2018.
Specifically including the purpose of work and the division of labor, work methods, incentives in three parts, focusing on 'dig farmer's channel, do not touch the old channel', 'involved in the local push' and 'the existing agent orders and instigation to opponent's orders are directly to be commissioned '. To pay attention, Andy Yuan, the company's principal, even said to the sales that the client brings in cooperation with visiting peace talks. Regardless of the size of the company, he can directly participate in the reception. 'No nonsense, we must do everything, we wait. Help everyone count bonuses. '
As a drone 'unicorn' with an annual sales value of 18 billion yuan, Dajiang showed wolfiness and aggression.
On April 13, the price cut storm continued. Tencent’s “Shenzhen” was informed that Dajiang issued notices to its agents and severely reduced prices for Jingwei M200 series and Zen thinking Z30. The Matrice 200 agency price dropped by 6,000 yuan. However, at this time, In the price adjustment, this decline is the lowest. The first telephoto zoom head camera in Dajiang can be used with the latitude and longitude drones to provide 30x optical zoom and 6x digital zoom. The price is directly changed from the original 5 digits. 4 digits, the original agent price from the 37,500 yuan diving to the modern price of 9,500 yuan.
'Cleaning the market with cost-effectiveness,' Zhang Gang, sales manager of Dajiang Industry Machinery, told Tencent "Deep Net."
Agricultural drones are the markets that DJI has been developing since 2016. In addition to consumer drones, DJI first launched the agricultural drone MG-1 in March and April 2016, with the potential of large brand potential and original consumption. The market advantage of the market, the first market share.
DJI unmanned aerial vehicles have not completely defeated competitors
In October 2017, after Competitor Extreme Technology released P Series 2018, Dajiang Agricultural UAV launched aggressive price war. The sales price of MG-1S dipped to RMB33,150 from RMB42,150. In the past two years, as long as Feifei released new products. 3. Dajiang initiated a major price reduction.
At the operational level, Dajiang abandoned Shunde in Dongguan in 2017 and won a piece of land there. Some media disclosed that the investment will be no less than RMB 1.5 billion. Some innovative projects, such as unmanned vehicles, robotic arm research and development may be there. Cultivate (there are also people in the industry who claim that this piece of land is actually used by Wang Xi’s tutor Li Zexiang).
Behind the sales mobilization order is the 'iterative dilemma' that Dajiang’s drones have to face. Image-class consumer products used in aerial photography can deviate from a pile of model aircraft competing products. Mainly relying on technology upgrades and rapid product iterations. However, after occupying more than 70% of the market share in this market, time passes, and the past iterations of fast iterations may cause their products to fend off and become 'his own lives'.
The players noticed that the Dajiang Wizard 4 Pro version came out and the battery life was 35 minutes. The shooting quality was clear. However, the advantage of this product was chosen to give way after the miniaturized product's royal series came out. Some players could hardly buy the elf. 4 Pro. From the point of view of life, the miniaturization of new products is actually not strong before the Wizard 4 Pro.
The slowdown in the growth of consumer-grade products has become a difficult problem that Dajiang has to deal with. Dajiang breakout points can be roughly divided into two categories. One is to continue to enrich and improve consumer-grade products, while the other is to security, agriculture and power industries. Application direction development.
For the first category, Daji aimed at some pocket-sized, lightweight drones and soon introduced the Mavic Pro Royal Series, which is lighter and lighter. It weighs 743 grams, is small and foldable, and is priced at 5,000 yuan. In addition, Dajiang established another subsidiary, Ruichi Technology, to create a sub-brand Tello. The unmanned aerial vehicle for the children's toy market is 699 yuan, which is mainly for the unmanned market. At this point, Dajiang builds. Consumer product and price matrix.
The real challenge comes from agriculture. In 2015, Dajiang launched the agricultural drone market and began shipping in early 2016. Tencent’s previous report “Darjeong Dynasty and its Undead Enemies” presented Dajiang Agriculture. Drones are challenged and pressured.
In a nutshell, consumer-grade products have won the magic weapon 'Rapid Iteration', which is difficult to duplicate in the field of agricultural drones. Dajiang failed to realize the agricultural product + service model. Farmers and flyers (users) prefer to maintain product value. Iteration.
After Dajiang’s competitors took a look at the actual situation, the agricultural drones were designed in a modular way, and batteries and medicine boxes can be replaced. At the end of October 2017, when Pfeiffer released three P series machines, Xiao Tingfeng told Tencent “Deep Net” that Dajiang also had related personnel to take the initiative to come and participate in the conference.
Dangjiang sales personnel have repeatedly suggested to R&D, should meet the needs of industry users, develop products with stronger drone life ability, or make improvements on existing products. However, R&D for sales lectures responded, 'If I It is sales, to see customers, customers think we have short battery life, then I will explain this to the customer: You don't feel like holding the remote control and carrying your head to fly for tens of minutes or even an hour. Are you tired? ' R&D response to this Sales staff including Zheng Hai have nothing to say.
Lessons learned from the market soon arrived. In 2017, some users and agents began to switch to competitors. Ultimately, Wang Hao said internally that in the short term it will focus on agricultural machinery.
'The sharp opposition to the power of hindering organizational iteration'
The external pressure on the drones of Dajiang Agriculture was quickly transmitted to the interior: The compensation for the drone sales department in the corresponding industries in Dajiang was greatly adjusted at the end of 2017. Some people adjusted the previous month's salary to 15,000 to 30,000 yuan, after adjustments. Became 8,000 yuan + commission. Some well-paid headhunting employees, originally promised 6 to 9 months of year-end bonuses have not been honored.
Dajiang’s flagship store clerk welcomes consumers in lineup
The direct trigger to trigger this adjustment, as viewed by Zhang Gang, salesman in Dajiang Industry, originated from an unsuccessful reception task of Liu Ye, Sales Director of Dajiang Industry.
According to Zhang Gang's description, a friend of Wang Hao took the project to the company for a visit. Wang Xirang let Liu Yong receive the reception. Liu Ye was responsible for the sales of the industry. He just got sick on that day. He arranged for the following two employees to receive Wang Hao’s Friends. However, during the reception process, one of the employees actually fell asleep.
After this incident happened, the R&D department came to challenge the sales department and questioned the actual data from the back-end aircraft to reach the user's real data. 'Zhang Gang said. In DJI, R & D because of past achievements and founder's technical genes, belongs to a strong sector Problems often end up being solved through technology, so that internal employees sometimes talk to each other. 'You can't? You can't let R&D personnel do it.'
After the pressure was transmitted to the final stage, Liu Yan’s management department’s flexible salary became a pressure relief port. On the one hand, it mobilized the enthusiasm, on the other hand, it reduced the hard cost and gave it to the R&D department.
However, the sensitive salary adjustment at the end of the year has finally led to a rebound in employees. The guaranteed salary adjustments have made it difficult for employees who plan to live and consume on the basis of their original income to get into trouble. Some employees express dissatisfaction after they know the truth, and then transfer to Dajiang. Intranet, triggered a great discussion involving organizational structure and the values of Xinjiang, corporate culture.
This discussion ended with the reply of the founder Wang Hao:
'The internal bottlenecks of DJI have been undergoing constant reforms and recasting processes... Some of the departments that I did not manage before, have not passed this kind of process baptism, and the development stage is still relatively early (the number of iterations, the intensity is not enough), the sales department It is at this stage. The current sales department needs more bottom-up organizational change iterations. In addition, we need more reliable personnel to emerge through the waves and have more direct communication with me. Welcome Everyone volunteered...'
After the direct leader of the agricultural drone, Cao Nan, resigned in November last year, the sales personnel of Dajiang also changed and adjusted accordingly. Liu Ye sent He Guoqing to replace Cao Nan. Andy Yuan then arranged another person and Cindy is responsible for consumer drones.
At the same time, Dajiang sales staff learned from Huawei, and once in a while, they moved to internal regions and exchanged personnel between regions. However, salesperson Zhang Gang believes that 'consumer products can do this, and it can prevent employees from consuming The distributors collude with one another. However, users of the industry machine, such as the public security bureau, the fire brigade, and a sales employee, spent half a year and managed to establish contact with customers.
However, Wang Xi does not think so. His famous saying goes: 'Our experience proves that a young man who is fledgling doesn't go to the bar, not opportunistic, but if he does something practical, he will be successful.'
In Wang Hao's opinion, rapid iterative genes cannot be lost. He hates some of the unspoken rules even more. 'We want to take a clear-cut stand against several forces that hinder the organization of iterations: the power to stop the circulation of actual situations, such as whitewashing data, blocking messages... All sorts of deviations from small business groups that solve practical business management problems...'
From the start of entrepreneurship on the university campus to becoming the technology company with the highest market share, from a dozen individual teams to over 10,000 employees, the difficulty of management has increased. These are a challenge for the founder Wang Hao. Like any one becoming huge Like organizations, Wang Hao is worried that management is out of control, organizations are losing vitality and internal factions are everywhere.
Now Dajiang's main structure is roughly divided into R&D, production and sales. The core strength of research and development staff is about 3,000; sales work is actually in charge of Andy Yuan; Procurement, production, etc. President Luo Zhenhua is responsible for more. Because the founder Wang Hao respected technology. The forces of change, some internal employees also think, 'must recognize that DJI today has 90% of its research and development credit.'
However, over time, Wang Xi’s preference for the R&D department became a recessive enterprise culture in Dajiang, and it’s difficult to make early conclusions about its advantages and disadvantages.
Where to go next?
Sales 'bleeding', plus agricultural drones, where Dajiang is favored by investors to fly next? These need to provide an answer.
According to business and industry information, Wang Ji is the chairman of the board of directors of Dajiang. The outside has long misunderstood the chairmanship of Dajiang as a professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Li Zexiang is a professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. .
In 2016, Li Zexiang had an exchange with the author of Tencent's “Deep Net”. At the beginning of the venture, Li Zexiang considered many places and found that the Pearl River Delta has the most complete manufacturing system in the world that has been left for the West after its founding. Now it has become an advantage. Buy parts, molds, open molds, etc., three to ten times faster than in the United States, Europe, 'Speak to the master in the evening and get it tomorrow. 'This has become an important advantage for DJI to beat competitors.
After Dajiang entered the right track, Li Zexiang, who only had a small amount of shares, became a company director. Now more energy is not on Dajiang. 'The main thing is to help them train people and find people. The company's specific operations have always been their own management. Ask me questions, I will give suggestions. 'Li Zexiang said. In 2015, Dajiang entered agricultural drones. Li Zexiang was very optimistic about its transformation of agricultural production methods.
However, returning from studying abroad, preparing for the University of Science and Technology of the South was unsuccessful. He is even more interested in promoting the development of the Chinese robotics industry in a way that is driven by education and industry chains. The base was selected in Songshan Lake. As Li Zexiang, born in 1961, he has returned overseas. The "ideal color" of the scholars' industry to serve the country. However, the young people in Dajiang think more about the "duck" of the drone sector and get closer to this category.
Wang Hao himself expressed for some time that he was wearing a pair of round glasses, a mustache, and a golf cap on his head. He said he appreciated Apple’s founder Steve Jobs’s ideas and said he did not really admire anyone. The product concept of Dajiang came partly from Apple. With the help of the blue sky and the fly, it had its own world. “Uniquely, flying freely” became a place where DJI’s innovative spirit attracted young people.
'Cool, independent innovation' and other words are used to describe Dajiang products. Da Jiang itself has been exploring new business possibilities.
In 2015, Dajiang hired Darren liccardo, the head of Tesla’s automatic driving. There was media coverage of a 'secret base' in Shekou, Shenzhen. In the same year, Dajiang cut into the agricultural drone industry.
For the drone applications in the security, fire-fighting, forestry and communications industries, Dajiang has also been groping. DJI is doing some smart charging stations with a robotic arm. After the drones fly past, the robotic arm will automatically Remove the battery and replace it with a battery. If these constitute a network, it will be a big business.
According to the “Investment Project Summary” of Dajiang, the potential market of 100 billion U.S. dollars exists in three major directions: medical imaging AI market (the annual market size is 5 billion U.S. dollars+), education (technical courses over 3 years old, annual market size 100). Billion U.S. dollars +) and emerging industries (artificial intelligence and advanced manufacturing, robotics, etc.)
A senior person in the drone industry told DeepNet that there are still many new areas, such as logistics drones, 'this is a general direction. The future of UAV logistics is a rigid ultimate application of drones. Sooner or later, the policy will become more and more relaxed, and the low altitude will become more and more open to drones. 'The person told Tencent's "Shenzhen." He also believes that DJI financing does not mention the listing. In fact, it is also partly because of the rounds of financing in Xinjiang. As for the original consumer-class UAVs, the demand is not rigid, and its own valuation has been quite high, not much worse than the listing financing. Now Dajiang needs to break through the bottleneck.
However, Dajiang does not think so. According to DJI’s “Summary of Investment Projects”, the initial valuation of this round of financing is US$15 billion. The average price-to-earnings ratio of comparable companies in the secondary market is 57.7 times, Parrot (Parrot, listed in France) , Sunny Optical, Hikvision is the same for all three, and the current round of valuation of DJI corresponding to a price to earnings ratio of less than 50% of the average, 'subsequent growth is huge'. And with Uber, Xiaomi, Didi travel, Compared with unlisted unicorns such as today’s headlines, Dajiang believes that “P/E ratios are also clearly at low levels”.
However, the space reserved for the development of Dajiang is also becoming obstinate. Agricultural drones encountered opponents such as Extreme Flying, and Corbett followed communications and high-speed rail patrols. Logistic drones, SF, and JD Build a team, Suning and YiWat unmanned aerial vehicles explore cooperation, large companies, large capital, will make Dajiang face a stronger challenge in the future.
Obviously, this time, through D/B stock design, it is wise to get enough ammunition for yourself.