Chapter 695: Remove Wanda from the Roster

This matter ends here. Chairman Mo will return to seek instructions; it will take a few days. The institute's location is at the foot of Xiangshan.

The land is free—directly allocated—and the scenery is beautiful, perfect for moon viewing, and very quiet.

Construction will be handled by China Construction according to blueprints; they have specialized institute blueprints and can finish quickly. For now, researchers can start in one large building.

Once construction is complete, move into the new facility. Equipment will consist of processors, graphics processors, storage, and other hardware—use Chang'e Technology's Data Center for now.

That Data Center is fast and runs like a beast!

At this stage, "Yifei Xianju" doesn't need high processing speed—it's more than enough for them.

But Fang Hong needs a top-tier HR talent. Without HR, how do you persuade those scientists? Without HR, how do you optimize team composition?

Chang'e Technology's HR is inadequate. Chang'e Technology replaces hierarchical control with information transparency: whatever you do, your capabilities, management can see through data.

Talent is built internally, never recruited externally—those with ability rise, those without remain stuck in place.

But "Yifei Xianju" isn't an educational institution; it must recruit talent externally, and it must find high-education talent—you can't just hire a large batch of graduates to test their abilities.

You must find people from schools and society who already have achievements and potential.

For now, this matter can only proceed slowly—keep scouting. After all, many people already know about "Yifei Xianju"; Fang Hong shouted it loud enough at first.

Aside from those three, some scientists came because of its reputation—for example, one of Hu Yuanming's students is coming for an internship.

He is the future founder of the Taiji Programming Language, though he's still in school and graduates next year.

The outside world knows little about "Yifei Xianju"; only Fang Hong's initial loud announcement reached them.

What happened afterward? No one knows. To draw attention, you need results.

Otherwise, people will say the Principal is just a loudmouth—blowing smoke.

Meanwhile, Wanda Cinema Line's severance of Tu Piaopiao's ticketing system had already spread, reaching many in the film industry and top executives' ears.

Lao Wang Zong is truly resolute—completely uncontrolled by the Principal, far more decisive than those two brothers were.

But no one understands what's going on with those two brothers—they're shouting for the Principal like they've swallowed gunpowder. Aren't they sworn enemies?

They don't understand the traitor's psychology: once a traitor switches sides, they rush to prove themselves—just like collaborators. Only then do they believe they're right, that they have value.

Zheng Zhihao, CEO of Tu Piaopiao, reported to Fang Hong: "Principal, Wanda Cinema Line has cut off Tu Piaopiao's ticketing channel. Our system can no longer connect to their theaters."

"Perfect. Convene a shareholder meeting. Remove Wanda from the roster, revoke its shareholder status, and demand compensation for losses." Fang Hong didn't hesitate—he clearly had a plan ready.

"Is that feasible?" Zheng Zhihao was startled.

Wanda has been a longtime shareholder of Tu Piaopiao, investing from the start and providing cinema access. You could say Tu Piaopiao's rise owes part of its success to Wanda.

"Nothing's unfeasible. They've cut off your system—what's the point of keeping them? For the New Year?" Fang Hong was ruthless.

"Understood!" Zheng Zhihao could only accept the order—he couldn't interfere, only obey.

Thus, Lao Wang Zong, sitting at home, received a lawyer's letter from Tu Piaopiao.

"Bang!" Lao Wang Zong slammed his fist on the desk, trembling with rage.

"Lao Wang Zong, what's got you so agitated?" Zeng Maojun was startled.

When had Lao Wang Zong ever reacted like this? He was usually calm, commanding with authority.

"That brat wants to expel Wanda from Tu Piaopiao—and not only that, he demands we compensate Tu Piaopiao for losses. I caused losses to Tu Piaopiao? That's hilarious! Tu Piaopiao was built up with my support!" Lao Wang Zong laughed bitterly—he'd been completely broken by the Principal.

Recall when Tu Piaopiao had no money—he funded it. When Tu Piaopiao had no resources—he gave them access to Wanda Cinema Line's channels.

Now they claim he caused losses, want to expel him, demand compensation.

This… this is something a human would do? Even a dog would be more loyal!

As a shareholder of Tu Piaopiao, Wanda had an obligation to provide resources—this was stipulated in the original agreement and remains valid.

But Lao Wang Zong never thought deeply about it. When someone asks you to invest, they mainly want resources.

Over the years, though there were tensions, both sides maintained restraint—only minor moves, never a complete rupture like this.

Now, Wanda Cinema Line has completely severed Tu Piaopiao's system—this is a breach of contract, failure to fulfill shareholder obligations, i. e., failure to provide resources.

Indirectly, it caused losses to Tu Piaopiao, so compensation is demanded. That's the logic.

But now Fang Hong doesn't even want to pay—he wants to expel Wanda entirely. That means Wanda's original investment may vanish entirely; years of investment and support will be lost.

This is worse than raising a dog!

"Lao Wang Zong, calm down. The Principal can't kick you out so easily—he'll have to bleed." Zeng Maojun soothed.

Tu Piaopiao's market cap is over thirty billion. Without twenty or thirty billion, it's impossible to remove Wanda.

Now there's zero room left—they're cutting ties completely.

Lao Wang Zong said nothing—he was too angry. All talk came back to the Principal's attempt to expel him. Even if he had to leave, he'd take something back!

Like Guangxian did—cash out twenty billion and walk away!

News of the Principal's plan to expel Lao Wang Zong from Tu Piaopiao reached Tencent too—they're also shareholders and received notice of the shareholder meeting.

"This Principal is truly a nightmare. Lao Wang Zong's in for a rough ride!" Tony Ma said.

They invested in Tu Piaopiao together. All these years, it was like raising a child—and now the child denies its father. It's disheartening.

But business is like this: Alibaba invested in Meituan first, yet was forced out, while Tencent picked up the advantage.

"Who's to blame? Blame his son—he insulted them, even their wife. Who could tolerate that?" President Liu Zhiping said.

"True," Tony Ma said.

If Xiao Wang insulted his family or daughter, he wouldn't let Xiao Wang off either.

He'd do just like the Principal—crush Xiao Wang into the abyss, send him home to be a rich second-generation.

"What do you think?" Tony Ma asked for his opinion.

"Chang'e Yutu is growing too fast. Douyin is rising. We must stay vigilant. Lao Wang Zong isn't our threat—the Principal is." Liu Zhiping analyzed, passing the ball back to Tony Ma to decide.

They weren't interested in the film industry rivalry between the two sides, but were extremely wary of Chang'e Technology's growth.

Chang'e Technology poses a threat to Tencent—many shut down WeChat to scroll Douyin. WeChat is just a messaging app, with short online time.

But scrolling Douyin endlessly steals away users' time.

In other words, there are only 24 hours in a day, and aside from sleeping, 8 out of every 10 hours are spent on Douyin — it has stolen their users' time.

The major internet companies are now in a transitional phase, shifting from competing for users to competing for their time.

"You're right!" Tony Ma nodded.

The film and television circle has little to do with them — altogether they only have a handful of movies — but the development of Chang'e Technology forces them to be on guard.

Games and social video both keep them on edge.

While the various parties were each nursing their own thoughts, and while Yu Tu and Wanda were locked in fierce battle, Jack Ma also seized the moment to ramp up investment in Taopiaopiao, with a flood of user subsidies and marketing campaigns blanketing everything overnight.

Ele. me, Weibo, UC and others all carried Taopiaopiao's movie discount coupons.

They were also leveraging Big Data for push notifications.

After the holiday, Captain America 3 opened with 180 million on day one, then jumped to 248 million on day two — simply terrifying.

Meanwhile, "Lucy 2" still held steady at the box office, pulling in some forty to fifty million.

When they subsidize and market, they will certainly discriminate — they definitely won't favor "Lucy 2."

But Taopiaopiao never said it would pull "Lucy 2" either. If it dared to pull it, the other theaters would have a bone to pick with it — they were already relying on these few movies to make money, and if it pulled them, they'd all switch to the Tutopiaopiao system.

It could only secretly use Big Data to pull some tricks behind the scenes, tilting more traffic toward Captain America 3!

One could say this movie single-handedly revived Wanda — with Taopiaopiao rising on the momentum, they no longer had to rely so heavily on Tutopiaopiao.

Of course Tutopiaopiao's market share is still number one; when two giants compete, it's the small fry that get squeezed out.

"Lucy 2" also opened in North America on Friday, May 6, earning 26.32 million dollars over its opening three-day weekend.

A bit stronger than the previous one, simply because the previous film had some international name recognition too.

But a bit worse than the previous life — in the previous life this film earned over forty million dollars in its North American opening week, a million or two less.

A result like this is already not bad — it proves that internationally, Liu Tianxian is still quite popular. Of course, it's also possible that this film's overseas audience could understand it, follow it clearly, and found it mind-blowing.

Every movie Liu Tianxian makes for overseas audiences, the viewers can follow it — it's not that abstruse.

Abstruse films all carry a certain cultural specificity; once you load that on, people can't understand it.

It's just that some viewers wondered: "Seems like it has nothing to do with the previous film's plot!"

Not only overseas viewers had this doubt — domestic viewers did too, and added: "This shouldn't be called Lucy 2, it should be renamed 'God Body' — it's two completely different stories."

Even so, it was still thrilling to watch.

And "Lucy 2"'s international reception was also mixed.

Among them, the New York Times criticized: "The film's scientific premise is absurd, oversimplifying the pseudoscientific concept of brain development; the plot advances through jumpy logic; the characters are flat and lack depth."

"In trying to fuse philosophy with popcorn entertainment, the film loses its balance, and the abstract expression in the second half feels abrupt, weakening the overall coherence," reported IndieWire.

Even the scientific community criticized the film as pseudoscience that misleads viewers.

Of course there were also praises — Hollywood reported: "Bold sci-fi; the female lead is calm yet powerful, and full of maternal love — especially that part at the end with the monkey."

Variety reported: "An imaginative crowd-pleaser!"

Reception was polarized — any controversial film is like this — and "Lucy 2" would continue to roll out across 49 countries worldwide.

(End of chapter)