As a self-made successful entrepreneur, what was Zong Qinghou's entrepreneurial journey all the way?
In 1987, the school-run factory lost money because of poor management, so Zong Qinghou contracted the school-run factory and began to practice his entrepreneurial dream buried in his heart for many years. That year, he was 42 years old. Zong Qinghou led two retired teachers to start their business by borrowing 14, yuan and selling soda, popsicles and stationery paper on a commission basis.
in 1988, the enterprise successfully developed and put into production Wahaha children's nutrient solution, and established Hangzhou Wahaha nutritious food factory. Children's nutrient solution emphasizes the real use value and solves the problem of children's anorexia and partial eclipse. Because of its exact efficacy and obvious effect, it quickly became popular in the market, and its products sold well all over the country, and the enterprise stood firm in the fierce market competition.
in 1991, in order to expand the production scale and meet the needs of the market, Wahaha, a small school-run factory with only 1 employees, acquired Hangzhou Canned Food Factory, an old state-owned factory with more than 2, employees, at a cost of 8 million yuan. After the merger, Wahaha Food Group Company was established. Hangzhou can factory, which originally lost more than 4 million yuan, turned losses into profits in only three months. In 1991, the output value of enterprises exceeded 1 million yuan for the first time, reaching 217 million yuan. The merger was successful, and Wahaha initially took shape.
In 1994, Wahaha actively responded to the State Council's call for counterpart support for the resettlement work in the Three Gorges reservoir area, devoted itself to the development of the western region, and creatively merged three poor enterprises flooded in Fuling area with the reform idea of "general contracting of resettlement tasks and resettlement funds", and established the first branch of Wahaha outside the province, Fuling Company. Since then, Wahaha has taken the pace of "going west and going north" and has established more than 16 branches in 29 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions across the country.
in 1996, Wahaha group invested part of its fixed assets to establish five joint ventures with foreign companies such as France's Danone group, and absorbed investment of 45 million us dollars. Wahaha holds 49% of the shares, and Danone and Baifuqin jointly hold 51%. After the Asian financial turmoil, Baifuqin sold its equity to Danone overseas, making it jump to an absolute holding position of 51%. Danone immediately proposed to transfer the trademark right of Wahaha to the joint venture company, which was rejected by the State Trademark Office. The two sides signed a contract. In the same year, Zong Qinghou led Wahaha employees to aim at the bottled water market and produce Wahaha pure water.
In May, 1998, Wahaha launched the carbonated beverage "Very Coke", which was intended to challenge Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola. By virtue of its channel advantages, its sales volume reached 6, tons in 26.
In 1999, Zong Qinghou continued to move westward and northward, and decided to set up a company with employees raising funds and holding shares to set up a number of companies unrelated to Danone. Most of these companies were built in the west and old areas. By 26, the total assets reached 5.6 billion yuan, and the profit for that year was 1.4 billion yuan.
In the restructuring in 2, Zonghe employees bought back 55% shares of Wahaha Group from the government, and Wahaha realized "full shareholding". Among them, Zong Qinghou holds 3% of shares, 5% of senior management and 2% of employees. 46% of the shares are owned by Hangzhou Shangcheng State-owned Assets Management Co., Ltd.. This year, Danone acquired Robust, Wahaha's biggest competitor.
In 22, Wahaha made use of its own brand and strength to enter the children's wear industry from a high starting point.
After the SARS epidemic ended in May 23, Zong Qinghou sent a large number of drinks to the retail terminal before his competitors, which made the sales increase by 16% annually. The company's operating income exceeded 1 billion yuan, making it the fifth largest beverage manufacturer in the world, second only to Coca-Cola, Pepsi Cola and Kyrgyzstan.
in 24, Wahaha implemented the strategy of "all-round innovation", and new products such as nutrition express and refreshing were continuously introduced, which made the enterprise get rid of homogenization competition.
In 27, under the leadership of Zong Qinghou, Wahaha's turnover exceeded 25 billion yuan. In April, Zong Qinghou, the head of Wahaha, revealed that Danone wanted to acquire 51% equity of other non-joint venture companies in Wahaha at a low price of 4 billion yuan, but it was rejected by itself. Danone immediately hit back at Wahaha for violating the joint venture contract, and said that it could not tolerate the huge private wealth empire established by Zong Qinghou outside the joint venture company.
on April 9th, 27, Danone requested Zong Qinghou as the chairman of the joint venture company to initiate legal proceedings against the non-joint venture company. On May 31st, Danone filed an application for international arbitration against Wahaha, claiming that Chinese shareholders had infringed upon the interests of the joint venture. On June 4th, Danone filed a lawsuit against the company of Zong Qinghou's daughter in the United States, saying that its non-joint venture could not use Wahaha brand. On June 7, 27, Zong Qinghou resigned as the chairman of the joint venture and published an open letter to the chairman of Danone. He said that he could not stand the bullying and framing of two directors of Danone (Fan Yimou, President of Asia Pacific Region, and Qin Peng, Chairman of China Region), so he had to resign and specialize in litigation.
in 28, despite the troubles caused by Danone's forced purchase, Wahaha's sales volume under Zong Qinghou continued to grow, with the sales volume increasing by more than 4% in the first half of the year, and the annual sales volume exceeded 3 billion yuan.
on September 3, 29, Danone announced that with the support of the Chinese and French governments, it had reached a friendly settlement plan with Wahaha. As part of the settlement, Danone and Wahaha will terminate their joint venture. Danone agreed to sell 51% of its shares in various Dawa joint ventures to Chinese partners.
In 21, Wahaha launched its high-end milk powder-Edison infant formula milk powder. The product was produced by the cooperative enterprise Holland Centennial Royal Dairy Company, imported and came to China. This also created a precedent for foreign enterprises to OEM for China. This year, Zong Qinghou was named the richest man in Forbes China, with a total wealth of 53.4 billion RMB.
in 211, the group company achieved an operating income of 67.855 billion yuan, up 23.65% year-on-year.
In 212, 67-year-old Zong Qinghou became the richest man in China again, with a total wealth of 63 billion RMB.