Chapter 1177: Collision
The firefly system has a crisp and clear set of punches, directly smashing Microsoft and other Internet companies' attempts against Yahoo's browser.
However, the whole thing did not end with the announcement by the Justice Department on Tuesday that it had abandoned the investigation into the suspected monopolistic behavior of Yahoo!
In the following three days, Firefly Investment Company continued to reduce its holdings in accordance with Monday's announcement. Although the panic selling of the new technology market has eased, it still seriously impacts the fragile Nasdaq stock market.
After the close on Friday, Wall Street media, which was always concerned about the reduction of firefly investment, announced a series of relevant data for the first time.
Affected by the slump in the Nasdaq index this week, Firefly invested in a $3 billion stock worth of shares announced on Monday's shareholding reduction plan, which has shrunk to $2.37 billion after full cash. Only this one, the book loss of firefly investment is more than 600 million US dollars.
However, the entire new technology market has gone down sharply with the Nasdaq index, and the losses are even more devastating.
As of Friday's close, the Nasdaq index has fallen from 3,677 points on Monday to 3,255 points, a drop of 11.5%, and the downward trend is even approaching the July crash. The total Nasdaq stock market losses due to this decline are as much as $370 billion.
After the first weekend in September, although many aspects of capital forces tried their best to mediate, the firefly system did not support the new technology market as a savior-like gesture as last month, and even some people did not expect it. The statement was not issued.
Not only that, but just after the weekend, the firefly system will be shot again.
On Monday morning, Yahoo suddenly filed a lawsuit in the Boston District Court, suing At-Home's search engine business and online advertising distribution business infringing Yahoo's total of 26 technology patents.
Yahoo asked At-Home to immediately stop operating search engine tools and online advertising distribution systems that seriously violated Yahoo's technology patents, and filed a huge $1 billion claim.
Enterprises usually submit higher compensation amounts in the course of patent litigation. However, Yahoo’s $1 billion claim amount is still seen by many people as a lion.
You know, At-Home’s total revenue last year was less than $100 million.
However, the most eye-catching of this lawsuit is not Yahoo's huge claims, but Yahoo's terms requiring At-Home to stop operating search engine tools and online advertising distribution systems.
At-Home's main business is the Internet search engine tool, and online advertising is the company's most fundamental source of revenue.
Now, Yahoo’s request in the lawsuit is not just a bottom-up, it is simply intended to let At-Home close the door.
In response to this lawsuit, the discerning eye can understand at a glance that this is Yahoo’s counterattack against At-Home last week’s attack on Yahoo’s browser.
However, after Yahoo filed a lawsuit, the list of 26 At-Home patents allegedly infringing on the official portal was completely refusing. Among them, patents such as 'web crawling', 'hyperchain analysis', and 'smart sorting' are the lowest level technologies of intelligent search engine tools.
Leaving this, a search engine can only return to the original data retrieval mode, such as keyword-based technology to make the original search without any rules.
Compared to more sophisticated intelligent search engines, this original keyword-matching search technology is bound to face elimination in the competition.
So, after a study of Yahoo’s list of infringing patents and At-Home’s search engine tools that are similar to Yahoo’s Google, many people realize that unless Yahoo! is willing to patent At-Home, With the current federal patent protection regulations, if Yahoo is chasing after it, At-Home really can only go about it.
As more and more people understand this, the Nasdaq market immediately responded with the most direct response.
Within a short period of two hours after Yahoo announced a lawsuit against At-Home, At-Home’s share price plummeted, dropping more than 30%.
At the same time, other companies involved in the search engine business on the Nasdaq market, the stock price fell without exception.
The entire Nasdaq stock market also continued to decline, without any signs of rebound.
Many people have come to realize at this time that at the hearing of the Justice Department last week, Ian Gnell said that it is no exaggeration for Yahoo to maintain sufficient ‘open attitude’ to promote the development of the entire industry.
It is not difficult to see from this lawsuit that it is easy to fight for a company like At-Home that competes with its direct business, with Yahoo's strong technical know-how. However, Yahoo did not do this before.
Now, after the encounter, Yahoo's temperamental behemoth, which is a mild temper, finally reveals its fangs, and immediately hits the opponent's most vulnerable neck.
As if to confirm some of the imagination of many people's minds, in the afternoon, the firefly system is again shot, this time is aimed at Microsoft, which is also a behemoth in the industry.
Firefly Electronics filed a lawsuit in the San Francisco District Court, urging the San Francisco District Court to ban Microsoft from selling the product, citing Microsoft's upcoming Zune music player for allegedly infringing Firefly Electronics' patents on a core digital music player.
With the continued explosion of Fireflyer player sales, the trend of digital music players to become the next generation of portable music players is already very obvious.
According to the industry's conservative expectations for the final global sales of digital music players in the world of 100 million units, even at an average unit price of 300 US dollars, this will mean a huge $ 30 billion consumer electronics market.
In comparison, although it has accounted for more than 80% of the market share in the desktop operating system, Microsoft's current annual revenue of all businesses is less than 20 billion US dollars.
Although it has a high market capitalization and profit level due to its monopoly advantage, Microsoft also needs to continue to expand its business.
A digital music player such as the consumer electronics industry with a market volume of $30 billion is clearly a very attractive cake.
However, in the face of such a big cake, Microsoft has just prepared a tableware for itself to want to eat, the firefly system will mercilessly stick to the cup and saucer in front of Microsoft.
The news that Microsoft has privately negotiated with At-Home during this time is not a secret in the industry.
In fact, At-Home's market capitalization of $7.6 billion before the incident was largely influenced by the good news from Microsoft's acquisition.
Now, a series of events have accumulated, and many people have gradually come up with some clues.
Last month, Yahoo suddenly announced that Microsoft not only gave up the original share subscription contract unconditionally, but also continued to maintain its cooperation with Yahoo! in browser pre-installation, which itself made the whole new technology industry feel very surprised.
With Microsoft's strong style, the outside world simply does not believe that Microsoft will give up a good opportunity to open Yahoo to develop its own Internet business for the pre-installation cost of more than 100 million US dollars.
Some small shareholders even publicly accused Microsoft executives of this decision is simply 'stupid.'
Of course, many people don't think that Microsoft's decision-makers will make such low-level mistakes. They almost instinctively realize that there must be some dark transactions behind this incident.
Then, things went up last week, and companies like At-Home filed a complaint with the Federal Department of Justice about investigating the suspicion of Yahoo's browser monopoly.
This incident seems to have nothing to do with Microsoft, but from the current firefly system after the incident, mercilessly launched a patent litigation attack against Microsoft's target acquisition company and Microsoft itself, the last week's event apparently has thousands with Microsoft. Silken's connection.
So, a little combing, it is not difficult to understand that for some reason, Microsoft had to sign a contract with Yahoo to continue to cooperate on the browser.
However, this kind of thing is placed on any company, it is estimated that it will not be reconciled, not to mention Microsoft, which has a monopoly position in the industry. Therefore, Microsoft obviously does not want to honestly fulfill this contract.
However, it is not appropriate to directly tear up the contract, which will seriously damage the business reputation of a company. As a result, Microsoft has taken a different approach and intends to use administrative means to indirectly force Yahoo to abandon this pre-installed contract for the development of Microsoft's Internet business.
Then, At-Home, which has a close relationship with Microsoft, jumped out with other small partners.
The wish is beautiful, the reality is cruel.
Microsoft’s plan to indirectly tear up the contract was just beginning to be implemented, and it was simply resolved by the Firefly system.
Not only that, but the firefly system made a counterattack without any mercy.
Now, Microsoft has not only failed to get rid of the Yahoo browser pre-installation contract, but also faces the dilemma of being blocked by the Firefly system to the Internet search engine and digital music player.
The industry has not realized the huge potential of the search engine business at this time, but the bright future of the digital music player business is well known.
In the face of the tens of billions of dollars in the huge industry at your fingertips, it is impossible to deal with it. At this time, the outside world has almost always had a strong curiosity about the current mood of Microsoft executives.
Moreover, people also found that the consistently strong Microsoft, in this collision with the firefly system, obviously fell completely.
At-Home's share price fell by 46% in the final avalanche during the first working day of the week, leaving only $2.7 billion in market capitalization.
At-Home's share price has fallen more than 65% compared to the highest market value two weeks ago.
Moreover, in the face of Yahoo's lawsuits, At-Home's board of directors and management have collapsed like their company's stock price, and nothing has been done to deal with it all day.
On the other hand, Microsoft issued a statement at the first time, arguing that the audio format used by the Zune player is completely different from that of the Fireflyer player. The player operating system also uses Microsoft's own software core, so it does not recognize the Zune player infringement. The software patent of Firefly Electronics.
At the same time, Microsoft also questioned whether the patented technology of the digital music player hardware architecture listed by Firefly Electronics is legal and effective.
However, Microsoft's seemingly well-organized and well-founded rebuttal is, in the eyes of those who are familiar with the rules, a mere defense without any conviction.
After all, the technical principles of digital music players are simply too simple.
Because it is simple, it is more susceptible to full patent control.
This is like a shackle that is easy to defend and difficult to attack. As a pioneer, Firefly Electronics built a thick city defense on this narrow cornice in advance. Then, whether it is Sony or Microsoft, even if its own strength is stronger, but as a latecomer, unless Firefly Electronics is willing to let go, it can only be blocked from the mouth.
Due to a series of continuous transactions, Eric remained in New York for this time.
The Williams Trust Fund and the charity fund for two women have been completed.
The establishment of the Williams Trust Fund is very low-key and there are currently no assets placed. The media and the public are clearly more concerned about the long-standing charity fund Eric Joanna-Viconia Williams Fund.
Although it is inevitable to ridicule, but in a few months, the outside world has basically been accustomed to the relationship between Eric and Joanna and Viginia.
It must be said that when a human rights and wealth reach a certain level, the world is particularly tolerant to them.
Many behaviors that are sure to be criticized and blamed on the average person happen to the rich and powerful, and the public tends to subconsciously produce a certain kind of emotion.
Even some media have talked and guessed who will be the next lucky girl to give birth to a Williams family.
Of course, this kind of news is not without aim.
Cindy Crawford’s sudden fading out of the pre-production of the National Supermodel Contest, and the signs that have accumulated over the past few months, have been confirmed by many media, the first consecutive year in the Forbes supermodel income rankings Pretty stunner, fortunately pregnant with the child of Eric Williams.
However, with the last lesson, this time, whether it is traditional media or an open Internet platform, reports on the Cindy pregnancy incident are cautious.
So far, there haven't been any photos that prove that Cindy is pregnant. Most of the media are just sneaking a few words with a sneak peek.
Eric is closely watching the firefly system's counterattack against Microsoft, and other things are steadily advancing.
After meeting with the founders of IMG Group for a week, it was easy to hear that other shareholders of IMG Group had agreed to sell the IMG Group shares held by them.
Although there are some objections to some of the acquisition details, these shareholders have already accepted Eric's $1.5 billion offer.
When things develop to this stage, the news can no longer be concealed.
Eric’s upcoming acquisition of IMG Group news soon appeared in the media.
However, the most direct impact of this incident is reflected in the IMG Group's most direct competitor Elite.
John Casablanca contacted Eric at the first time he heard the news, to test his intentions to do so, and whether he was interested in acquiring Elite.
Eric also did not conceal his own ideas that are of interest to both brokerage firms.
Subsequently, in the face of the IMG Group, which is about to merge with the powerful Firefly system, Elite shareholders are clearly no longer optimistic about the prospects of the company, not to mention, Eric's offer to Elite is also very attractive.
After several meetings, John Casablanca quickly informed Eric that Elite was also willing to accept the acquisition of the Firefly System.
So, suddenly, the outside world was surprised to find that the two major brokerage companies with the most beautiful and beautiful objects in the world belong to Eric Williams in the blink of an eye.