Chen Ou: 12 billion yuan was lost in 3 years, but the 300 million yuan purchase project was questioned by Wang Sicong, and now it is the number one in the industry

Text | Cai Tu Shuo

Editor | Cai Tu Shuo

He started his business at the age of 23, and founded Jumei Youpin at the age of 27, relying on "speaking for himself" It became an instant hit.

At the age of 32, he led Jumei to go public and became the youngest CEO of a listed company in the 200-year history of the New York Stock Exchange. The following year, he ranked sixth among the top ten young richest people in Asia with a net worth of US$1.1 billion. At the most glorious moment, his career suffered a setback.

But he did not recover from this. Instead, he stepped into a new trend and spent 300 million to invest in the power bank industry, which was criticized by major Internet tycoons. Even Wang Sicong posted on Weibo to publicly ridicule.

But what is unexpected is that he once again relied on his unique vision to become an industry leader and successfully achieved a comeback.

He is the protagonist of our story today, Chen Ou, who "lives beautifully even if he is bruised and bruised".

In 1983, Chen Ou was born in Deyang, Sichuan. He is still a classic case of "outstanding children from other families". He skipped a grade in junior high school and was admitted to the best local high school. At the age of 16, he received a full scholarship due to his excellent results. He received a scholarship to study at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. Seeing such an outstanding child, his parents hoped that he could continue his studies and eventually engage in academic research and become a leader in the industry.

But Chen Ou’s dream is not like that. He hopes to become a business legend. Of course, he does have this ability and talent.

When I was in college, because I majored in computer science, everyone liked to play games after studying.

Others play games as a hobby, but while Chen Ou is playing games, he is also keenly aware of the business opportunities.

Since Chen Ou’s game playing skills were among the best in Singapore at that time, he used his accumulated 30,000 yuan scholarship to establish a game battle platform - GGgame, and invited top players to compete through the platform.

Such a pinnacle event can naturally attract countless players to watch. With the increase in click-through rate, Chen Ou's platform has quickly gained a reputation. Not only has it gained a large number of loyal users, but it has also made considerable profits.

But as the company grows, various problems arise one after another.

Firstly, as the scale continues to expand, a large amount of funds will be needed. Secondly, after completing his studies in Singapore, Chen Ou will go to Stanford University, a top university in the United States, to continue his MBA. At the beginning, he chose Dedicated professional managers are responsible for company operations.

But after all, the distance was too far, and there was no way to solve any problems in time, so he simply sold his shares and cashed out tens of millions. At that time, Chen Ou was only 23 years old. .

In the summer of 2009, Chen Ou, who returned from his studies, was ready to flex his muscles in the business world and start his second business venture.

He first chose his old profession and continued to make games, replicating his successful experience in Singapore. Unfortunately, after GGgame came to China, it was obvious that it was not accustomed to the local environment, so Chen Ou planned to switch to other industries.

At this time, e-commerce has just emerged, and most entrepreneurs are still in a wait-and-see state. After several months of research, Chen Ou found that the cosmetics market in China’s e-commerce field is still in a state of turmoil. In the blue ocean, the prospects are very promising.

There is no dedicated platform to operate online. Girls can only go to physical stores to buy cosmetics. Not only is the selection space small, the prices are high, and there are many middlemen who make the difference. Therefore, Chen Ou immediately decided to use all his wealth to build a beauty platform.

With his super high academic qualifications and brilliant resume, Chen Ou successfully attracted investors, and just like that, in 2010, Tuanmei.com, the predecessor of Jumei Youpin, was officially launched.

First, high, medium and low-end beauty brands are invited to the platform, and then sold in the form of online group buying. Not only is the cost of this group buying method lower than the single purchase price, there is no middleman to make the difference. , which is equivalent to girls being able to buy the same products on the platform at a price that is about 40% off at a physical store, and at the same time, it can also solve the dilemma of a lack of variety in physical stores.

With its many advantages, Tuanmei.com quickly occupied a place in the e-commerce circle. In just a few months after its launch, it gained 100,000 registered users and its sales successfully exceeded the 20 million mark.

In September 2010, Tuanmei.com officially changed its name to Jumei Youpin, and gradually emerged as the champion of domestic beauty e-commerce platforms. Especially during the anniversary celebrations, the hot scenes and platform The server can't support it.

By March 2011, the total sales of Jumei Youpin successfully exceeded 150 million yuan, and there were countless investments worth tens of millions of dollars. As an ideal choice for girls, Jumei Youpin has unlimited success. .

Unlike other e-commerce platforms that choose celebrities for endorsement promotion, Jumei Youpin is also unique in the choice of spokespersons. The founder, Chen Ou, personally speaks for himself.

In fact, Chen Ou was a little hesitant about being a spokesperson at first, worried that it would affect Jumei's sales.

But investor Xu Xiaoping told him:

After constant discussions, the two finally decided on Jumei’s main advertising copy as “I am Chen Ou, and I speak for myself. ”

Unexpectedly, this slogan became popular all over the Internet as soon as it was released, and the popularity it brought to Jumei Youpin was beyond imagination.

Netizens have followed suit. A large number of "Chen Ou Ti" appeared on the Internet, and the slogan "Even if you are bruised and bruised, you still have to live a beautiful life" has aroused the outrage of countless women. Ming also made Chen Ou an outstanding model for the post-80s generation, with a large number of loyal fans.

In the summer of the same year, Chen Ou, who had reaped the benefits, launched the "I Speak for Myself" ad version 2.0, inviting Han Geng to be another spokesperson. This dual endorsement model became even more popular among fans. With an advertising investment worth only 10 million yuan, Jumei Youpin's monthly sales soared to 80 million yuan, and Jumei Youpin has completely gained a place in the online shopping market.

In 2014, Chen Ou ushered in the highlight of his career. Jumei Youpin was successfully listed on NASDAQ in the United States, and Chen Ou became the youngest CEO of a listed company in the world. In the following year's list of Asia's top ten richest young people, he ranked sixth with a net worth of US$1.1 billion.

After becoming famous through the "I Speak for Myself" advertisement, in order to maintain popularity, Chen Ou has participated in several variety shows, including the job search program "It's You" and the talent show. You can see Chen Ou's outstanding performance in the program "Happy Girl".

Chen Ou became a CEO at a young age, with a high degree of education and good looks. At that time, Chen Ou was exactly like the male protagonist in a romance novel, and more and more fans liked him.

And his identity has also changed from a simple group CEO to an "Internet celebrity", with a platform account with 40 million fans.

As the first-generation "Internet celebrity", Chen Ou's ability to bring goods is unquestionable. With just one promotional Weibo post, he can sell two to three million yuan in just a few minutes. Today's Wei Ya and Li Jiaqi are worse.

It’s just that the way he brought goods at that time was different from the way the anchors lead goods today. Chen Ou directly put his own label on the large platform of Jumei Youpin. While promoting himself, he also put his own label on it. The company pushed it out.

As it continues to become popular, Chen Ou, who is in the spotlight, has become one of the outstanding representatives of young entrepreneurs in China, while Jumei Youpin has also emerged on the e-commerce platform and has become the only company in vertical projects. Large, sales continue to rise.

At that time, as long as everyone wanted to buy cosmetics, the first thing they would think of was Jumei Youpin.

Unfortunately, Chen Ou, who was so proud at this time, still didn’t know that a crisis was coming quietly.

In July 2014, Yipeng Hengye Company was exposed for manufacturing and selling counterfeit goods. After investigation, it was found that most of the fake goods produced by this company were sold on Jumei Youpin.

As the number of “skin-picking posts” continues to increase, relevant insiders pointed out that more than 90% of the products sold on Jumei Youpin are fake.

For a time, Jumei’s reputation fell to the bottom, and it became synonymous with “low-quality fake sales platform”. After this matter was exposed, many investors entrusted American law firms to initiate class actions against Jumei Youpin.

In desperation, Chen Ou could only cancel the third-party business and change all brands to self-operated.

As a beauty platform, Jumei Youpin relies on the transaction volume of third-party businesses. Such operations will only cause Jumei’s sales to plummet and users’ purchasing power to continue to decline.

What is even more incomprehensible is when consumers went to Chen Ou’s Weibo to question him and asked him to give an explanation. Chen Ou not only did not choose to apologize to consumers at the first time, but instead defended the brand and emphasized that his platform had never sold fake products.

This irresponsible approach has increasingly led to the continued decline of Jumei’s image, and more and more consumers are choosing to leave Jumei out of disappointment. At this critical juncture, major e-commerce platforms are stepping up their plans to launch their own online beauty businesses. In line with the principle of “killing you while you are sick”, JD.com also announced at this time that “there will be absolutely no fakes on the entire platform.” " slogan.

The customer base that Jumei Youpin has accumulated over the past three years was divided up by several major platforms overnight. What followed was a drop in the stock price. Only half a year after its listing, the market value evaporated. Nearly 60%, falling directly from the peak of US$5.5 billion to US$1.9 billion.

Jumei Youpin, which was in a state of decline, no longer has the ability to compete with several major platforms. It gradually faded out of the public eye and completed its delisting in April 2020. It was also because of Jumei Youpin After a series of disastrous defeats, Chen Ou "lost" 12 billion in just three years.

If other people were faced with such a huge blow, they might not be able to recover, but everyone has forgotten that Chen Ou is the kind of person who "lives beautifully even if he is bruised and bruised."

He did not immerse himself in the failure for a long time. He immediately cheered up, looked for new business opportunities, and targeted the mother and baby market. After all, women and children make the best money at any time. Even though shareholders were opposed to getting involved in such areas that they had never touched before, Chen Ou still decided to invest 372 million yuan in the then loss-making maternal and infant brand BabyTree based on his own analysis of the market.

After investing for a long time, BabyTree had no better development. Just when the company’s shareholders and senior management were anxious about this, the national second-child policy was fully liberalized.

The maternal and infant field suddenly became a hot industry, and BabyTree also took advantage of this shareholder trend to grow rapidly, becoming the largest maternal and infant community platform in China with the largest number of registered people, with a net profit of 138 million. When BabyTree was launched in 2018, the value of Chen Ou’s investment exceeded 600 million.

However, Chen Ou did not make this success public to the public, but completed everything silently. After all, he is no longer the unbridled and sharp-edged young man he used to be.

Although Chen Ou had achieved victory in the maternal and infant field, Chen Ou was not satisfied. He turned around and invested in the film and television cultural industry, established Jumei Film and Television Company, prepared the film and television drama "Warm Strings", and served as The position of producer.

Later, in order to build momentum for "Warm Strings", Chen Ou participated in the variety show "First Grade" in the name of casting.

Due to the good pre-publicity, Hunan Satellite TV bought the first broadcast rights of "Warm Strings" before it was aired.

Although the reputation was not very good after the broadcast, the number of views still exceeded 200 million. Taking advantage of the popularity, Jumei used "Warm Box" as an advertisement to combine the plot with the brand. , and achieved considerable benefits.

After tasting the sweetness, Chen Ou followed his previous practice and appeared in the online variety show "Wonderful Food Light" as a youth mentor and post-80s entrepreneur, in an attempt to use his own traffic to drive the popularity of Jumei .

After wandering around the entertainment industry, Chen Ou discovered new business opportunities and launched two air purifiers in April 2017.

Although the advertisement is very popular, not many viewers buy it. People do not think that a beauty e-commerce company can produce serious air purifiers.

No matter how fanciful Chen Ou’s words were, sales just couldn’t increase, and this investment could only end in failure.

However, failure is not something unacceptable to Chen Ou. After some research, he set his sights on a new field that had just been discovered - the enjoyment economy. .

Seeing the success of ***share bikes, Chen Ou found that our Chinese consumers seem to be very interested in ***share bikes.

As various types of enjoyment economies crazily flooded into the market, Chen Ou took a fancy to the enjoyment power bank, which was in a blue ocean at the time.

As soon as he said it, Chen Ou went to Shenzhen alone. He spent a month inspecting the factory and production line of ***Xiang Power Bank, and then consulted with specialized manufacturers. After drawing five conclusions, After concluding that there would be no major breakthrough in mobile phone battery technology within this year, Chen Ou directly spent 300 million to acquire Street Power, the first power bank company, and personally became the chairman of the board.

Not only were the company’s shareholders opposed to Chen Ou’s decision, but even Ma Huateng and Yu Minhong publicly expressed their disapproval after learning of the matter.

Wang Sicong even directly posted on Weibo to ridicule: "If ***Xiang Power Bank can make me happy, I will post a post to prove it."

Of course, from now on, the streets and alleys are full of people. When *** enjoys the power bank, we know that Chen Ou has won again.

As young people become more and more dependent on mobile phones, mobile phones have become indispensable in everyone's daily life. Not to mention that the mobile phone is completely out of power, even if it still has 20% of the power, it is enough to make people feel sad. Anxious.

Seizing the opportunity, Chen Ou led Jiedian to take the lead in occupying the market, and acquired the core patents of ***Xiang Power Bank at a high price, while increasing production capacity and expanding the marketing team. No matter it is a few tier cities, as long as it is It is a shopping mall with dense traffic, and street electronics can be seen everywhere.

By 2018, the total number of users of enjoying power banks in the country exceeded 196 million, while Jiedian, with 107 million users, 40.5% user share, and coverage in more than 300 cities, has steadily Ranking first in the industry.

In 2020, according to relevant data, the market size of ***Xiang power bank is as high as 40 billion. Although many people are badmouthing ***Xiang power bank, saying that mobile phone battery technology will definitely undergo reforms. By then, the prospect of enjoying power banks will be worrying.

Chen Ou has already predicted this. If battery technology cannot break through for at least five years, the future of ***Xiang Power Bank will still be promising.

If mobile phone batteries are successfully improved in the future, I believe Chen Ou will also find new industries that are more worthy of investment and development.

I don’t know what Wang Sicong, who once publicly mocked Chen Ou, felt when he saw the street power banks now available in every Wanda store.

Over the years, Chen Ou has worked in many industries, experienced entrepreneurial success, and reached the top.

Although there have been failures, I have always been able to get up wherever I fell, becoming a leader in new industries again and again.

This may be like what Chen Ou said:

Chen Ou, who has experienced all kinds of ups and downs, is not yet in his forties. In the future, what new fields will he create? ? What new heights can be created? Time will give us the answer.