Chapter 233: The Asian Leader

On May 7, 1993, in Central, Hong Kong, atop the bustling Phantom Building. This 68-story tower had half of its floors owned by the Phantom Group, and Phantom Company had just moved into the 48th floor not long ago.

In the spacious and bright chairman’s office on the 48th floor, Xiao Ran stood with his hands behind his back, gazing intently at the surrounding skyscrapers, with Wei Dongling by his side. Although their floor wasn’t as high as those of other buildings, no one dared ignore the master of this floor.

Xiao Ran and Wei Dongling were both of middle age. Wei Dongling was three years older than Xiao Ran, now 33, while Xiao Ran would be turning 30 in a few days. As Xiao Ran’s best assistant and partner, Wei Dongling had grown increasingly powerful. He had held the title of Hong Kong’s highest-paid CEO for four years, with an annual salary of 30 million and being named among Asia’s top ten CEOs for three consecutive years.

Xiao Ran had also changed. Three years had been enough to make him more like a tycoon. He remained the richest Chinese person globally, with his ranking rising for three years in a row, currently at 18th place.

From 1985 to 1993, over eight years, Xiao Ran’s foresight and decision-making, combined with Wei Dongling’s execution and gradual involvement in decision-making, enabled rapid expansion for Phantom Group in the first six years. It was only in the seventh and eighth years that the expansion slowed down, shifting to a focus on stabilizing the market.

Thanks to Wei Dongling, the general managers of its subsidiaries, and all the united employees, the Phantom Group successfully transformed into a large multinational corporation centered on three key industries: entertainment media, telecommunications, and real estate, over the three years from 1990 to the present.

In the entertainment industry, under the leadership of Bai Pengfei, Shuxiang Media even acquired the Ming Pao Group, controlling numerous newspapers, magazines, and publishing houses in Hong Kong and abroad, nearly rivaling Murdoch’s News Group. In television, with the support of its headquarters, ATV became Asia’s most influential television media group through acquisitions and mergers.

In music, Tiannai also grew rapidly, with an increasing number of foreign artists, expanding its influence and becoming one of Asia’s leading record companies. In special effects, Infinite Vision remained world-leading, with its fantasy animations competing with Disney in terms of production quality.

In film production, Phantom Group kept control over film-making, with at least 50% of the films released in Hong Kong each year being funded by them. While maintaining a monopoly in the local market, Hong Kong films gained growing influence globally. Hollywood even began to feel the threat from these films—or rather, from Phantom Group.

A vast film empire had been created, one that Xiao Ran no longer needed to manage personally. He was now simply waiting for the showdown with Hollywood. But before that, he had to deal with the mainland market first.

The leader’s promise was kept—the policies remained unchanged, and the market was gradually opening up. The censorship system has been relaxed for Hong Kong-based distributors, and the videotape market has also opened up, allowing joint ventures with mainland companies, with a 51% stake allowed. The only thing still unaddressed in the mainland market is the restriction on cinema investments, but that day is approaching soon. Xiao Ran received word that on his birthday, the government would send someone to wish him happy birthday and confirm this matter. Xiao Ran could hardly wait any longer. Countries abroad have already noticed the impact of Hong Kong films on their own film industries. France, which has traditionally been lenient toward Chinese-language films, is now preparing to introduce policies to protect its own film industry. If Shadow cannot gain access to the mainland market, things will likely get difficult. However, Xiao Ran isn’t worried that the Hong Kong film market will shrink completely, as those regions have become dependent on Hong Kong films. Currently, Hong Kong produces over 150 films per year, at least 30 of which are distributed globally, while the rest are mostly regionally distributed. But if it can’t gain access to the mainland market, Hong Kong’s film industry will surely face tough times in the coming period. It’s inevitable—if its market share decreases each year, profits will drop significantly, and hardship is bound to follow. Wei Dongling and Xiao Ran had just discussed this matter, but now he was talking about something else—Li Ka-shing wanted to acquire Wharf Holdings’ shares from Shadow. Due to financing issues, after two years of operation, Wharf Holdings’ market value has now reached 150 billion Hong Kong dollars, and Shadow’s stake of over 40% has been diluted to 34% due to financing. What Li Ka-shing wanted were Shadow’s shares so he could take control of Wharf Holdings. In fact, once he obtained Shadow’s shares, he could control Wharf Holdings. Xiao Ran understood very well why Li Ka-shing wanted to do this, as Shadow had harbored ulterior motives regarding Hutchison’s shares in recent years, continuously increasing its holdings. With just another 15% stake, it would be enough to threaten Li Ka-shing’s position as chairman. Of course, Xiao Ran and Li Ka-shing still had a good personal relationship and wouldn’t become enemies over business matters. Wei Dongling suddenly smiled, recalling the days when he started a business with Xiao Ran. Back then, many people crowded into an office of just 100 square meters, even having to give up their own general manager’s office for meetings. Now, his CEO office was so large that one could roll around in it without hitting the walls. “Li Ka-shing is strange—he wants to use Hutchison’s shares plus cash to acquire Wharf Holdings’ shares!” Wei Dongling quickly brought his attention back to the main topic: “Now everyone sees great potential in telecommunications. Why would he give up the benefits he already have?” Xiao Ran finally turned his gaze back, his face full of a smile. He shrugged lightly and said, “Don’t forget, we’ve been aggressively acquiring Hutchison’s shares recently. He must be aware of it. If the deal goes through, combined with our existing shares, we’ll have almost 20%, which is quite threatening!”

Wei Dongling had been in the business world for so many years that he was certainly no longer the inexperienced kid he used to be. Upon hearing Xiao Ran’s words, he immediately understood: “You mean he sees our company growing so fast and decides to step down as chairman, then relaxes. He’ll run Hui De Feng for another two or three years before selling it off…”

Xiao Ran nodded. If he remembered correctly, Li Ka-shing planned to enter the telecommunications markets in the United States or the UK. He clearly remembered that Li Ka-shing had made hundreds of billions by selling telecom companies in the UK and seventy billion by doing the same in the US.

Hui De Feng’s business was no longer limited to sales; it had also expanded into industries like hotels. It was definitely likely to double in value in two or three years. Wei Dongling nodded. He thought this deal seemed like a huge loss for Phantom, but one of Phantom’s core businesses was electronics and telecommunications, and it had already acquired telecom and mobile companies in Europe and the US. If they could integrate these businesses, it would be extremely beneficial.

That was exactly what Li Ka-shing saw as the advantage. He knew Phantom would definitely do it—exchanging the position of chairman of Hutchison for control of Hui De Feng would be a win-win situation. Thinking of this, Wei Dongling nodded and said, “It seems this deal is worthwhile…”

“However, I’m worried that Li Ka-shing’s target is Hong Kong Telecom. If he takes control of it, that would be a big problem!” After some thought, Xiao Ran still thought it was unlikely. Hong Kong Telecom was still in a monopolistic position, so there was no reason for Li Ka-shing to succeed in acquiring it.

“Never mind, let’s not talk about it. How’s the progress with entering the mainland? All other businesses have entered already; only entertainment and media are left!” Wei Dongling looked at Xiao Ran with a mocking smile. He wasn’t directly in charge of entertainment and media; it was mainly Xiao Ran who made the decisions, which explained why he enjoyed watching this situation unfold.

Xiao Ran glared at him and sat down on the sofa to think. Developing the mainland market would take time. The only advantage was that Hong Kong-produced movies had a solid foundation there, so they didn’t need to be introduced as foreign films but could be released directly. Still, this damned distribution had to be handled by China Film Group.

The Chinese government had set a policy of introducing ten foreign films per year at the beginning of the year. By July, the first film to qualify under this policy was “Desperado.” Xiao Ran sneered. It was just one movie—“Desperado.” To counter it, Phantom and the other three major companies would release their biggest hits during the summer vacation. Two of Phantom’s three summer movies were action films, aiming to ensure Hollywood’s first step in China failed completely.

“It’s okay. I’ll catch up to you soon!” Though he said that, Xiao Ran was still frustrated. Chengji Infrastructure had just won a project worth tens of billions on the mainland—something completely incomparable.

After finalizing some matters, Xiao Ran went home. Lin Qingxia was currently taking a break and not filming any movies. In fact, she didn’t even need to take on that many roles—given the increasingly long production cycles for Hong Kong films, the average duration for a major movie now reached a year. A superstar like Lin Qingxia, worth tens of millions, would take on at most two movies per year, and usually just one.

Xiao Ran was quite pleased about this. Longer production cycles not only allowed films to be made more refined but also indirectly extended the lifespan of certain genres. For example, wuxia movies, which had once started to decline, still maintained strong vitality—a surprise outcome for him!

When he got home, Xiao Ran saw Lin Qingxia playing with their son, who was just over a year old, and their daughter, who was two months old. He quietly approached her from behind and suddenly wrapped his arms around her. “How’s it going? Bored at home?”
“Not at all! I’m so happy spending time with my son and daughter!” Lin Qingxia gave Xiao Ran a disdainful look, which left him feeling uninterested. After playing with the children for a while, Lin Qingxia turned to him and said, “By the way, the preparations for your birthday party are almost done. Most of the invitations have been sent out. Stop working for a few days and stay at home with the kids and me!”

Xiao Ran felt aggrieved. Hadn’t he spent time with Lin Qingxia? Last year, he had even taken a month off to travel with her around the world and bought some properties—was that not spending time with her? With a sad face, he complained, “You know I’ve been busy with the post-production of ‘Jurassic Park’ lately and simply can’t free up time.”

Historically, Hollywood opened the door to the Hong Kong market—and eventually the global market—through ‘Jurassic Park.’ Now, Xiao Ran intended to do the opposite: return this film to North America in its original form.

However, in the movie, he would only serve as a producer; Liu Mei and Leung Jun would be the directors. After collaborating on several films over the past couple of years, these two directors had grown increasingly in sync and even developed feelings for each other. Plus, Leung Jun was excellent at creating large-scale scenes, making him the perfect choice.

It was only then that Xiao Ran realized that Chinese directors weren’t incapable—they had simply had their talents constrained by the stingy Hong Kong film industry in the past. Now that they had ample space to showcase their skills, a large number of talented individuals emerged, even surprising Xiao Ran.

The most typical example was Wei Changqing. Initially, Xiao Ran wasn’t entirely confident handing ‘Lethal Weapon’ to him, so he gave him some guidance on how to shoot it and assigned Chen Musheng to assist. When the movie was released, Xiao Ran was shocked. Although it had changed significantly due to the different styles of the directors, it was still a classic on par with the original.

Returning to the previous topic, Xiao Ran could imagine what ‘Jurassic Park’ would become in North America. This Hong Kong-produced film, with an investment of over 150 million—the highest ever at the time—was filmed on a small island rented in Southeast Asia, which was transformed into a completely realistic location. It was also the only Hong Kong film to take two years to produce.

However, this wasn’t the work Xiao Ran truly wanted to use to break into Hollywood, as this film was, in a sense, quite Westernized. What Xiao Ran longed for was that urban wuxia film, “The Hero,” which could truly represent Eastern culture. The script for that film was completed last year, and after being refined by the Phantom Scriptwriting Group, which brought together the best scriptwriters from Hong Kong, even an ordinary director could likely produce a great film with it. But aside from Xiao Ran, who else could freely utilize all the members of this group of over twenty scriptwriters? Of course, even if Xiao Ran didn’t direct the film, it would still have to go through this process. As per tradition, after discussing with the scriptwriting group, Xiao Ran finalized the overall structure, leaving room for many sequels. The plot was extremely rich and well-developed, creating a complete world that followed scientific logic, with some scholars and professors also contributing to its construction. “What are you thinking? If you don’t want to accompany me, just leave!” After having children, Lin Qingxia seemed much younger, always smiling gracefully. “And don’t you even want to take a look at your son and daughter?” Xiao Ran sighed helplessly and leaned in…