Du Xueqian is standing on the side of the broken bridge. Below is the sea more than ten meters deep. The choppy sea waves are spreading to the distance. Du Xueqian has been staring at the other side.
In June this year, Du Xueqian took his wife and children to Florida in the south of the United States for vacation. On the way back to Miami from Key West, they passed a famous scenic spot in the United States —— Broken Bridge, here is famous for a classic scene of Schwarzenegger's action film True Lies. However, when Du Xueqian stood on the side of the broken bridge, his mind was not about how Schwarzenegger saved the beauty, but thought that many things should be like the broken bridge, which should be broken at the moment. Don't be too bound. The opposite side of the bridge was beautiful scenery.
Du Xueqian's holiday was different from the previous one. He was very troubled all the way because he had to make a major decision: whether I should reinvent myself in a new venture.
This sense of entanglement is not the first time in Du Xueqian's life. two thousand and three In, when he was still a junior, he was faced with the choice of continuing to complete his college education or discontinuing his studies and heading south to Shanghai to start his own business. In the end, he chose the latter, two thousand and four One Listening Music Network was established in Shanghai in.
Time interval twelve Du Xueqian still chose to stand on the front line of the entrepreneurial wave again. two thousand and fourteen year twelve month four The smart hardware company Squirrel Internet, founded by Du Xueqian, released its first product, the smart photo frame, and announced that it was awarded Lanchi Venture Capital one thousand Ten thousand dollars A Round investment.
From one of the top ten personal webmasters in China, the founder of Yiting Music, the angel investor, to the founder of Squirrel Internet, Du Xueqian has become an entrepreneur again “ busy person ” This feeling makes him feel “ Much better ” 。
"I like the Internet so much"
In 2003, in a beautiful university in Jiangnan, a junior boy sat in the noisy canteen and ate his last lunch here, and decided to leave this place for the time being in search of dreams. The next day he got on the train to Shanghai. In addition to basic daily necessities, there is only one laptop with you. This person is Du Xueqian.
The reason why he dropped out of school to start his own business was that he loved the Internet.
Du Xueqian began to like the Internet in his third year of senior high school. That year, Du Xueqian watched the Internet course in class and went to the Internet cafe after class. The price he paid for this was that he was only admitted to an ordinary college in Yangzhou in the college entrance examination.
After he went to college, Du Xueqian became even more unscrupulously obsessed with the Internet. For this reason, he specially rented a computer in the school's Internet cafe for years.
In the next semester, Du Xueqian's personal website, "Flying with the Wind Inn", went online and collected a lot of online knowledge that Du Xueqian had seen. Later, Du Xueqian began to work part-time outside crazily, becoming the first person in his class to buy a laptop and use a color screen mobile phone.
The climax of the event happened in his junior year. Du Xueqian's teacher talked to him and asked him to repeat the grade on the grounds of insufficient credits. He had always had the idea of going south to start his own business, so he decided to quit school, so there was a scene of the beginning of the paragraph.
"This decision has affected my life, but today, I still don't regret my decision. At that time, unlike today, everyone supported college students to start businesses. At that time, teachers didn't like students to do anything other than study, and teachers hated me. "Du Xueqian said that he felt that college students today are very happy and open-minded. If you want to start a business, there will be countless people to support you, give you advice, help you, and invest in you. This was not the case at that time. Young people today should cherish the environment."
"I missed two opportunities"
In the second year of Du Xueqian's arrival in Shanghai, Yiting Music Network was established in 2004. With its rich music resources, Yiting attracted a large number of users, and entered the top 300 in the world in March 2006. In 2009, Yitan Music Network reached its peak, with a daily flow of several million.
"I was going to be the best music website in China at that time." Du Xueqian said that he spent a lot of time on user experience, and many initiatives were innovative at that time.
Du Xueqian told Sina Technology that the Internet connection between China Unicom and China Telecom was very slow at that time, so he used the dual interface method to listen to music. The users of China Unicom and China Telecom had their own access caliber, which ensured the fluency in the process of listening to music, which was the first in the Internet.
However, the glory did not continue. From 2010, Yitan Music Network began to decline.
In 2011, Jujing Music Network acquired Yican Music with US $10 million, and after the acquisition, it sought to list in the United States with the concept of "China Pandora". However, this key step to listening to music has undergone major changes.
Du Xueqian introduced that the Chinese Cultural Industry Fund promised to invest 30 million dollars after the acquisition of the whale, The original development plan was disrupted, which seriously damaged the vitality.
"The morale of the staff has gone, and the funds have also gone, so that all our development plans have been aborted."
At present, Yiting Music maintains an annual profit of 12 million yuan, and the only profit model is flow realization. Du Xueqian has gradually withdrawn from the management and operation of Yitian because he has "little imagination".
Recalling the process of Yitian Music Network from prosperity to decline, Du Xueqian believed that the situation of today would be caused by two missed opportunities.
"The first is the PC client; the second is the mobile Internet." Du Xueqian said that the first venture focused too much on the user experience and focused too much on the product. He did not know how to take a long-term view, see the company's development, and even less consider the profit model, so he put a lot of money on the product itself, ignoring the changes of the times, Only then can I miss these two opportunities.
Du Xueqian said that these mistakes are inevitable. Although the glory of Yikan is no longer there, the feelings and experience brought by it will still accompany him throughout his life.
"Don't live a boring life"
From 2013, Du Xueqian began to fade out of Yitian Music Network and focus on angel investment.
In fact, Du Xueqian started angel investment as early as 2006 with the introduction of his friends, making his first investment in 7K7K.
"After my first venture, I know many issues that entrepreneurs should pay attention to, so I can better guide them."
"For example, many entrepreneurs lack strategic thinking. In angel investment, I will tell them that you should not only consider the product, but also the personnel structure. It is very helpful for early enterprises. At least, I have come to the way they are going, and I don't want them to make many mistakes again. I will directly tell them what to do." Du Xueqian said.
Many projects invested by Du Xueqian, such as bean and fruit food, have achieved good results. However, Du Xueqian admitted that although angel investment is the most comfortable time in life, it is also the most confused time.
"The Internet era has changed too fast. In the past two years, I have always been afraid that I would be abandoned like this." Du Xueqian said that in the final analysis, I have been away from the front line for too long. I still want to do some practical things, and compete with the post-90s generation in the front line.
Du Xueqian summed up one word for himself: "cheap". "I can't live a dull life."
For his second venture, Du Xueqian chose the field of intelligent hardware. Du Xueqian explained that he was optimistic about the development of hardware and the elderly market.
"At present, the society and families have paid too much attention to children, but too little attention to the elderly. This venture is to do something for the elderly, and the squirrel intelligent photo frame is aimed at the direction of intelligent hardware for the elderly," said Du Xueqian.
This squirrel intelligent photo frame, known as "the first intelligent product bought for parents", starts from the needs of the elderly, rather than from intelligence, to solve the needs of some elderly people who have never used intelligent devices to contact their children and relatives, changing the complexity of the operating system of intelligent devices for the elderly on the market,
Du Xueqian said that the photo frame is an entry point for squirrel interconnection. In the future, it will also build a series of intelligent hardware around the family to make the elderly and children more closely connected.
Now, Du Xueqian arrives at the company at ten o'clock every morning, works with the team, and can return home at eight o'clock in the evening.
Although compared with being an angel investor in the past, Du Xueqian has a busy life, but Du Xueqian feels that this life is meaningful.
"First of all, I am not handsome and have no advantage in appearance, but I am a person who likes to think and consider problems comprehensively. In addition to my previous experience in angel investment, I think there is no reason for me to stop starting a business." Du Xueqian.
Du Xueqian, who set out again, said frankly that he was not afraid of failure. He just didn't want to retreat behind the scenes. "But this will be my last venture," said Du Xueqian.
