Zhou Hongyi'S Struggle: A Man'S "Barbaric" War

　　 Three hundred and sixty Listing, so that some people can not sleep, it is a rapturous investor and 360 employees; 360 listing, but also let some others can not sleep, it is "envy, jealousy, hate" competitors. As one Internet commentator has said, 360 successfully landed at the NYSE, proving that 360 free mode has gained overseas capital. market This is the 360 innovation. ability Affirmation. However, innovation has never been dropped from the sky, but it has been washed away.

People who are familiar with the Internet in China know that Zhou Hongyi, a paranoid and belligerent man, is absolutely a character who has not been around. For many years, he has left and right to protruding, and many enemies have been left. He is a messy businessman in the eyes of his peers. Qian Shu, the first investor in the eyes of investors, is the pioneer of eating free antivirus "crabs" in the hearts of netizens. He cooperates openly with all of them in order to survive, and at the same time he turns his face with authority. Because of his youth, he crosses the cross of "the father of the hooligan software" as early as possible. He is an idealist who does not innovate or die, but also a fighter who does not give up his purpose.

In the early morning of March 30th, New York was cold and chilly in the United States. The new logo and bright five-star red flag of Qihoo 360 were flying in Wall Street. Accustomed to wearing casual clothes, the little boy in Hubei broke into a black suit and tie. Wearing a windbreaker, he stood outside the New York exchange building with a smile and greeted him with photographs. It seems that Zhou Hongyi is in a good mood. In a few hours, the stock of Qihoo 360 company he founded will soon be traded on the long history of the stock exchange.

Under the guidance of investment bankers and staff, Zhou Hongyi ran through the noisy trading hall of the New York stock exchange, and traders expressed their spanactions with ancient gestures. 10 a.m. is the 360 time for stocks to start trading, and 360 will become the first listed company brought out by Zhou Hongyi in the Internet for more than a decade. The company who entered the industry with him at the same time pushed their companies to the market as early as 2005.

Compared with colleagues who could not restrain their excitement, Zhou Hongyi seemed calm, but his voice had been hoarse. He had to attend a number of fund meetings in the road show for more than a week. In fact, he had to spend more time than other domestic peers to describe what kind of company 360 is. Yes, the listed Chinese company has no way to refer to it in the US. Critics at home once worried that foreign investors would underestimate the commercial value of 360 because they could not understand this pattern.

The capital market has indeed failed to live up to the expectations of the Chinese Internet veteran. In the course of the roadshow, Zhou Hongyi felt the enthusiasm of American investors for the innovation capability shown by 360. On the first day of the Hongkong roadshow, 360 of the shares were oversubscribed 3 times. In the US, oversubscriptions reached 40 times. China Investment Corp, Singapore's Temasek and the three sovereign funds of the Abu Dhabi Investment Bureau of the UAE have become 360 heavyweight investors, while Blackstone and Fidelity's world-renowned funds have also actively participated in 360 of the stock subscription.

The first day of Qihoo 360's listing on the NYSE was quite dazzling. Its first day closed at $34 per share, a 134.45% rise in the issue price of $14.50, and the company's market capitalization amounted to $3 billion 956 million. The market capitalization of all the Chinese stocks listed on the market is the top ten, surpassing the industry giants such as Shanda, Sohu, Dangdang and so on, and Zhou Hongyi's personal status has exceeded $700 million.

Since the advent of the 360 security guard in July 2006, Zhou Hongyi and his 360 companies have been the focus of controversy. This programmer born in Hubei seems to be good at turning the competition of enterprises into the concerns of the whole society. Today, the topic of his struggle with the three big mountains of the Internet - the founder of Tencent, Baidu and Alibaba is still being talked about. However, it is puzzling that every struggle seems to lead the company led by Zhou Hongyi to a higher level, so that some people in the industry need to study Zhou Hongyi's way of public relations.

Zhou Hongyi himself sniffed at it. He said that people who believe in relying on public relations war can win their opponents are absolutely idiots. He has been advocating micro innovation and subversive innovation in a high profile, and repeatedly stressed that innovation is the way to win a business. In fact, over the past 10 years and more, Zhou Hongyi has gone through the "three campaigns". The root behind it is its innovation in product and business mode and the subversion of its existing line. In the past 10 years, this has almost been ignored by the outside world. {page_break}

First battle: Pan security war

Participants: CNNIC, Baidu, YAHOO China.

Zhou Hongyi launched the first battle in China's Internet industry, not only to make him famous, but also to give him the notorious title of "the father of rogue software". All this comes from the specific product of that particular network age - 3721 Chinese Internet service.

Before 1998, China's Internet entered the first rapid development period. The demand of the first generation of netizens surfing the Internet was extremely strong, but slow internet speed and complex and difficult English websites allowed netizens to "excite and curse" frequently. Zhou Hongyi, who was working at Peking University, was keen to catch this demand and tried to persuade leaders to develop corresponding products. Before that, he set out to develop the first free e-mail system in China -- founder flying e-mail system, which is highly valued inside the company. But this time, the product assumption has not been approved by the leadership.

In October 1998, with the dream of "letting the Chinese use the mother tongue to surf the Internet", Zhou Hongyi left the Peking University Founder who worked for 3 years, set up the 3721 website, and launched the Chinese website of the 3721 "real name" in the same year. The essence of network real name is actually building a Chinese addressing system under the English domain name system, which is designed to serve the Chinese Internet.

Because of the accurate positioning, product management, coupled with strong market cooperation and promotion methods, the real name of the network is invincible, and quickly installed in the form of plug-ins to tens of thousands of users of the computer. Two years later, the 3721 biggest success was Chinese Internet users who covered more than 90% of Chinese Internet plug-ins. They used more than 80 million users per day. In 2001, 3721 took the lead in announcing profits in the Internet industry. By 2002, 3721 of sales reached 200 million yuan and gross profit was 60 million yuan, becoming a shining star in the domestic Internet industry at that time. At that time, Ma Huateng, who worked hard, almost sold QQ software to others for 600 thousand yuan.

The "golden egg" in Zhou Hongyi's hands soon attracted the attention of Mao Wei, director of the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC). CNNIC, which manages and maintains China's Internet address system, has obvious official colors. It often releases authoritative statistics from the Internet. No one in the circle dare to offend half of it. In May 2001, the real name of the 3721 network operated for nearly 3 years began to charge, which violated the core interests of CNNIC. The reason is that Chinese Internet service is what CNNIC wants to do.

In the afternoon of the beginning of June 2001, Mao Wei tried to "foster" Zhou Hongyi in the name of "cooperation". But the conditions of cooperation could make Zhou "silly eyes": including technology, registration system, analysis and source code must be handed over, and the operating expenses were all from 3721. Zhou Hongyi only got 5 years of franchise rights, but also contributed a lot of profits, and 3721 became the general agent of work. Zhou Hongyi was obviously unwilling. Since then many consultations have been fruitless. The suspicious Zhou Hongyi survey found that CNNIC was a non official and non commercial organization with no official seal. He suddenly realized that he had decided to give up the negotiations.

In August 2001, CNNIC, which did not receive 3721 support, simply started a new business and launched a similar general web site standard to try to replace 3721 of the network's real name business. Zhou Hongyi, a programmer born without background and background, his first reaction is to use his own technical means to resist CNNIC attack. He let the software unloading procedure become very complex, in order to prevent CNNIC forced to delete 3721 in the user computer. Next, the two sides were arguing and arguing. Finally, they came to the Ministry of information industry (the predecessor of the Ministry of industry and information technology).

In 2003, the Internet industry suffered a severe winter, and Baidu, as the 3721 main competitor, is now plump. With the ripening of web search engine technology, Baidu's traffic increased by 7 times in those days, and Robin Li replaced 3721 of China's search engine companies. The momentum of the rising stars has made Zhou Hongyi feel a lot of pressure. He also wants to do web search. "Just hit YAHOO and turned out to be a white mouse."

The condition of YAHOO made Zhou Hongyi palpitate, and the US company promised to provide him with Google search technology. Zhou Hongyi thought, if you can sit on YAHOO's capital, brand and technology, plus your own channel, client and operation capability, you can not only destroy Baidu, but also even destroy Google.

In November 2003, YAHOO bought 3721 stake in Hongkong with $120 million in cash, and in March 2004, Zhou Hongyi became president of YAHOO China. Zhou Hongyi felt satisfied with YAHOO's offer price. The two sides signed a two-year agreement that YAHOO would pay half of its capital to Zhou Hongyi and other funds to see if he could complete the profit index. This gambling agreement laid the foreshadowing for the conflict between the two sides later.

Although the entrepreneur has become a professional manager, Zhou Hongyi does not seem to regard himself as a wage earner. In the days of YAHOO China, he looked for new opportunities like entrepreneurs. At that time, YAHOO China was still a barren land. Although it has been in China for 5 years, the Americans have been doing nothing. "I can not say that I have no vanity. If others fail to do well in YAHOO China, I can do well, which proves that I am very capable." Zhou Hongyi said his original intention.

In YAHOO China, Zhou Hongyi drastically reforms. He ignored YAHOO headquarters's insisting on the idea of making a portal, decisively cut down the channel that YAHOO was not good at, and pushed the contents of real estate, cars, entertainment, sports and so on for the urban white-collar workers, and concentrated the limited resources on the mailbox and search. The difference between Zhou Hongyi and YAHOO headquarters in the direction of development has laid a "land mine" for mutual suspicion between the two sides.

Zhou Hongyi did a good job in YAHOO. In 2004, YAHOO China turned its losses into one win to achieve a profit of nearly US $40 million and a profit of nearly US $10 million. Not only that, YAHOO's search business in China also surpasses Google China, which has surpassed Sina and become the second industry, and has burned the war to the door of NetEase. However, behind the impressive achievements is the fermentation of various contradictions between Zhou Hongyi and YAHOO headquarters.

In June 2004, YAHOO's only independent search portal in the world was released in China, the main MP3 search, known as "China's largest entertainment music search." The appearance of "one search" is to see Baidu's weakness and seize the minds of users. Even today, the innovation and customer experience of "search" is still amazing. It has a simplified one-stop entry and search results page, free from any advertising interference, without manual intervention, through which it can search the world's 5 billion web page and support 38 languages.

"One search" was successfully launched, and brought new development opportunities to YAHOO China. In fact, when Zhou Hongyi did "search", he did not get the consent of YAHOO headquarters. Instead, he bet directly from 3721 money, which caused dissatisfaction among YAHOO executives. Fortunately, YAHOO China's business development is good, headquarters also had to push the boat, to open a blind eye to Zhou Hongyi, a rebellious and unruly one.

"The basic service should be free, and it should be better than the charging product". This point, Zhou Hongyi had already asserted when he launched the YAHOO 1G email, when the YAHOO mailbox came out of the air, shaking the market structure of the mailbox believed to have been established. Zhou Hongyi believes that to enhance the competitive edge, it must have its own characteristics. The mailbox and search are the most basic services that the Internet should provide. YAHOO will not make money on it.

Before that, Google launched a mass of 1000MB free mailbox in the US market, but domestic rivals did not dare to follow up because they were afraid of wasting bandwidth and not making money. In Zhou Hongyi's view, e-mail will return to the free era. Free email will become the basic service of the website rather than the means of making money, which will become a major trend.

Zhou Hongyi's "Zhou Shi reform" made YAHOO China's business thrive, and YAHOO boss Yang Zhiyuan, who had tasted the sweetness, felt that Zhou Hongyi still had gold to dig. He put forward higher requirements for YAHOO China's work in 2005, but refused to provide any financial support. Zhou Hongyi finally refused to be happy. He strongly urged YAHOO headquarters to increase its investment budget. At the beginning of 2005, many negotiations between Zhou Hongyi and headquarters failed.

On the evening of July 6, 2005, Zhou Hongyi, the CBD Kerry Center in Beijing, wearing a black T-shirt and grey big trousers, brought a very unexpected message to his colleagues. He announced that he resigned as president of YAHOO China in August 31st. "When I entered YAHOO, I agreed with Yang Zhiyuan for one to two years, which is to sell 3721 of after-sales service." {page_break}

The second battle: free security war.

Subject: rising star, Jinshan, Kabasiji

In March 2006, after being an angel investor for a while, Zhou Hongyi rushed to the forefront of the Internet industry. He once again started his business as chairman of Qihoo. 4 months later, in July 2006, Zhou Hongyi launched the "360 security guard" free software, the flagship of unloading the hooligan software. Baidu, CNNIC, YAHOO aides and so on a large number of deep-rooted plug-in crash has been cleaned up. The software released in the first 1 million months of the year, the software of the bad news was up to 600 thousand per day, of which the number of YAHOO assistants was more than 600 thousand times.

At this point, YAHOO China has been sold to Alibaba, Ma Yun has become the head of YAHOO China, YAHOO Internet assistant is one of its important source of income. Zhou Hongyi directed the anti rogue software directly to YAHOO Internet assistant, which is equivalent to Ma Yun. The first water war on the Internet came into being. Zhou Hongyi and Ma Yun called on their clients not to have business dealings with each other, and they swear each other that they would never invest in the other side of the business and never engage in business dealings with each other.

At that time, almost all Internet commentators stood up to show their position. Only the antivirus software vendors kept silent, seemingly without any connection with them. However, 4 years later, they discovered that the first battle of the Internet means that an earthquake is brewing on the ground beneath their feet. The right to speak of network security is falling from their hands and falls to the 360 security guard's humble and simple safety assistant tool.

No one felt that the Internet industry was surging, and even Zhou Hongyi did not feel it, because the 360 security guard was just a tool he wanted to vent his anger. Since the industry had to buckle the hat of the originator of the hooligan software to his head, he had to kill all rogue software to clean up his own injustice. Zhou Hongyi even defined the 360 security guard as a public welfare product. After the hooligan software was killed, the product will complete its historical mission.

However, starting from killing rogue software, security is no longer the computer virus defined by traditional antivirus software. In fact, once the Internet is popularized, security will be everywhere. For people who often visit the Internet, the most important threat to computers is not viruses, but malicious software such as rogue software, Trojan horses and so on. However, in the view of traditional antivirus software vendors, users are willing to pay for computer viruses, but they are not willing to pay for rogue software or Trojan horses. The lack of material incentives to kill the virus is not very keen on this business, user trust gradually turn to meet their needs 360 security guards.

No one expected that a year later, the software could reach 40 million of the installed capacity. At this time, the 360 security guards are not only killing rogue software, but also have the function of patching the operating system. Coupled with the following functions of garbage cleaning, system recovery, security downloading, killing Trojan horse and other functions, with the increasing number of installed 360 security guards, Zhou Hongyi quietly redefined network security - not just computer viruses, but universal security including rogue software and Trojan horses.

Rising, Jinshan and other traditional antivirus software vendors have no incentive to do anything in the pan security field, and soon Zhou Hongyi's second battle hit their home. In the era of antivirus software charging, Rixing has stepped up its domestic anti-virus software market. Data show that as of December 31, 2008, rising users exceeded 80 million, the market share in China's anti-virus market is 38%, and all indicators are ranked first in the market. However, the current rising star has become a thing of the past.

In 2008, when 360 of the free antivirus started early, all manufacturers in the field of anti-virus safety regarded it as a heterogeneous group, and criticized it for a lot of bombardment. Rising in a day, 4 articles are published in a single day. From all angles, the theme of "free goods is not good" is advocated. It advocates "free antivirus and no future theory". Some senior executives use free words such as "pure free can not exist" and "free safety and no protection" to attack free drug killing.

In addition to rising star questioned 360 of the free antivirus, a considerable number of people also have doubts: if they do not sell antivirus software, then what will they make to earn money? For this problem, Zhou Hongyi created the three stage business logic: "as long as everyone needs to use Internet services, it should be free; only a few people need to be able to charge; once a certain number of user groups are available, the value-added services can be launched." He believes that traditional Internet Co do not understand security, and traditional security companies do not understand the Internet. He wants to create a new business mode, not in China, nor in the world. Zhou Hongyi regrets that people like him are heroes in the Silicon Valley, but they are not understood or even attacked in China.

In fact, in August 2008, the free antivirus software produced by 360 was a completely failed product. At that time, 360 introduced a foreign anti-virus engine, after a simple Sinicization into the market. As a result, the feedback from users is disappointing - the product is too bad, even if no money is needed, users are reluctant to use it. This is a vivid lesson for 360 of the team. If the Internet product is not well done, even if it is free, it will not open the door to the situation. Users are not idiots. They only choose products that can solve problems.

Traditional antivirus software vendors began to laugh at 360, saying that 360 had to put a satellite, and the result was a dud. Therefore, they firmly believe that the feasibility of free antivirus is a truth, and they will lay down their hearts and continue to sell antivirus software in a safe way. Facts have proved that this is a huge mistake. In October 2009, after more than a year of hard work, 360 free antivirus came back. After a long period of careful polishing, it was more powerful and more firepower. 4 months later, the rising star was lifted from the throne of the first market in more than 10 years. Six months later, 360 free drug killing billions of dollars, completely changed the pattern of the security industry.

The campaign has a long span. The war of words is different. Zhou Hongyi not only wants to meet rising stars, but also faces Kingsoft, Kabasiji and all other vendors who rely on sales software to earn their income. In January 2010, the so-called "back door" battle broke out between rising star and 360, which is not only the climax of free security war, but also meant that the former market leader was pushed to the corner of the market by 360 free security strategy.

Even at the end of 2010, after the Kingsoft Corp announced that they were all free, the rising star still mocked Jinshan as a second-class company and was unable to change the market structure. However, at the end of March 2011, during the silent period before IPO was 360, rose finally surrendered to free and safe disarmament, announcing that all personal safety products under the banner were free. {page_break}

The Third Battle: opening war

Object: Tencent

Before and after the Spring Festival in 2010, Tencent chose to promote the safety software of QQ doctors in two or three and lower tier cities. Dr. QQ quickly occupied about one hundred million computers in China, with a market share of nearly 40%. The Tencent's forced promotion took place again in June of that year. During the Mid Autumn Festival, the "QQ software management" and the "QQ doctor" that were attached to the QQ software were automatically upgraded to "QQ computer housekeepers", and no hints were found in the installation process.

This directly became the trigger for the 3Q war at home and abroad.

In October 29th, the Qihoo 360 announced the launch of the "buckle bodyguard". The most difficult thing for Tencent to accept is that Zhou Hongyishi had a "killer trick" and banned the QQ commercials with technical means, which broke the Tencent's way of financing, which is like a sharp edge to the core business interests of Tencent.

In the evening of November 3rd, Tencent announced through the QQ pop-up, "before the 360 company stopped the QQ infringing and malicious slander, we decided to stop running QQ software on the computer with 360 software." This is the so-called "tough decision" that has been popular throughout the country. After the Ministry of industry's high-profile intervention in mediation, this business dispute involving hundreds of millions of people and the sensation of the world can be temporarily subsided.

"There are three things that can't be done in the Internet: birth, death, and Tencent." This is a popular phrase in the Internet industry.

According to Zhou Hongyi's statement, Tencent is in accordance with this strategy to consolidate its position: first, other small companies first explore the mode, and Tencent finds it fast to catch up; second, containment strategy, Tencent is built on the QQ, and it fears that if there is a client installed on the market, it will launch instant messaging products and threaten the core product of Tencent QQ.

The most powerful tactic of Tencent is forced binding. "QQ software bundles more than 30 components, and gets a good percentage of the shares overnight through bundling. This is much more frightening than monopoly. With the help of bundling, Tencent has no disadvantage from instant messaging to media (portals), Finance (Q coins), entertainment (games) and community Qzone." Zhou Hongyi concluded that he thought so.

Zhou Hongyi defined the battle of 3Q as an open and closed dispute: the business mode of Tencent is that all businesses have to do their own business, and it is a closed system, and at the same time, using their user capacity and binding ability to curb the development of competitors, and thus become the universal enemy of the Internet. Over the past 4 years, 360 have grown from scratch to 300 million users. This makes Tencent feel that 360 has threatened the status of its client.

Zhou Hongyi firmly believes that 360 is an open business model, which is to promote the establishment of an ecosystem conducive to the healthy development of the entire industry. "The squeeze of Tencent on 360 is the squeeze on the entire Internet industry, which is to maintain Tencent's monopoly in the Internet industry".

In the first half of 2011, a series of dazzling movements launched by 360 had to be convinced that 360 of the opening was indeed the case. In the eyes of the industry, the 360 advocated openness is not a moral commanding point, but a business logic.

In February 2011, 360 launched an open platform for group buying. At present, the group buying website that joins 360 group buying platform includes handles, beauty group, glutinous rice, 24 coupons and so on more than 200, the daily group buys the total number of goods to exceed 20 thousand, covering the whole country more than 130 cities. Through the establishment of an open platform for group buying, 360 hopes to establish a win-win system with group buying websites.

At the moment, the larger the layout of Zhou Hongyi's open platform is, the more he has launched 360 desktop, 360 game browsers, and 360 speed browser open platforms. Through the client aggregation software, games, websites, applications, and the introduction of third party open application extensions, the products can be made more and more abundant.

Now, after the first world war against Tencent, 360 is not only famous but also its open strategy. Zhou Hongyi said that 360 of the opening is something to do. 360 group buying open platform accommodates many group buying websites, but 360 insists on not buying group purchase; 360 open platform for web games accommodates many online games, but 360 insists on not playing games; 360 speed browser open application expansion platform, 360 itself insists on not expanding similar applications.

If there is something wrong, maybe it will dispel the doubts of the partners and cooperate with each other.

As the first big client and the second largest client, will Tencent and 360 become the eternal enemies in the future? Zhou Hongyi seems to have finally found a strategy to deal with Tencent. That is the opposite: Tencent is closed, and the 360 must be open. Today, Tencent also claims to be open. So, where will the future client structure go? {page_break}

Disruptive innovation: the business logic of "360 free mode"

For a long time, the industry has been questioning one thing: 360, how to make profits free? Zhou Hongyi sometimes joked that it was necessary to thank competitors for giving them 360 opportunities for development, because they did not understand 360 of the business model. It seems that until the 360 issue of prospectus, many people in the industry suddenly realized that 360 wanted to make money like this.

It is not easy to tell investors clearly about the 360 mode, because unlike many domestic companies calling themselves "China's Google" and "China's FACEBOOK", Zhou Hongyi can only talk about "China's unique 360". To Zhou Hongyi's delight, it is not only easy for investors to understand 360 of the story, but also easy to accept the 360 mode, and more than 40 times the subscription is enough to explain everything.

In the free mode created by 360, network security is the foundation and the core of the success of this mode. In 2006, rogue software wreaked havoc on the Internet. At that time, traditional security vendors based on charging mode were keen on anti-virus, and turned a blind eye to hooligan software, which gave Zhou Hongyi the opportunity to make efforts. At that time, the 360 security guards dedicated to killing rogue software became the leading force of Qihoo to cut into the security market. The next free antivirus business brought a subversive impact on the entire security industry.

On the basis of core safety, the second level of the 360 business mode is to build a multi-faceted access to meet the needs of users. 360 many browsers didn't realize the importance of browsers when they first started browsers. Now browsers have become an important area for Internet companies to compete for. After the security browser becomes the Internet user's entrance, the flow of massive users can be realized: 360 browser home page has a search box, embedded Google search, 360 can be divided into search engines, and 360 security URLs on the front page. The advertisement location is also one of the important sources of 360 revenue.

In addition to browsers and navigation sites, a month before the Qihoo listing, 360 security desktop products began trial operation. This is a user interface similar to iPhone on the operating system. Users can install and use some popular Internet applications and services. This is another 360 move to compete for PC entry. The industry rated this desktop as "more advanced navigation or traffic spanfer station", but 360 considered it a way to re organize PC and Internet resources, and is the practice of "long tail theory".

There is no doubt that the entry products such as browser navigation stations have provided considerable revenue for 360, but the 360 "big profit" in the future will be third tier products built on core safety and entry products. During the roadshow, Zhou Hongyi focused on 360 of the joint venture business of web games to institutional investors. He said that the revenue growth of this part would be higher than that of Web site navigation.

Before the listing, 360 released a group buying platform. Users can purchase and purchase all the group buying websites with one station through service as long as they register a 360 account. Then 360 released the open platform of extreme browser application, providing platform services to third party software developers. Obviously, the platform can generate more business models, and in the future cloud computing era can become a platform level company, and it is also the key that 360 can best impress investors.