On July 26, Beijing time, Xingjing Weiwu Group was officially listed on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange with the stock code "nipg". Xingjing Weiwu Group Chairman and Co-CEO He Youjun, Group Co-CEO Hicham Chahine, Group President Sun Liwei, etc. all appeared at the Nasdaq bell-ringing ceremony.
In this ipo (initial public offering), Xingjing Weiwu Group issued a total of 2.25 million ads (American depositary shares), with the issue price set at US$9/ads, and the total fundraising scale was US$20.25 million (approximately RMB 1.47 billion).
The successful listing of Xingjing Weiwu Group means that "China's first e-sports stock" was officially born. At the same time, He Youjun, who is only 29 years old, has become the youngest founder of a Nasdaq-listed company in Asia.
Xingjing Weiwu Group was officially listed on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange. Picture/He Youjun Social Media
Xingjing Weiwu layout multiple e-sports projects
When it comes to Xingjing Weiwu Group, domestic e-sports audiences may be a little unfamiliar. Everyone is more familiar with its two divisions: Wuhan estarpro and Shenzhen nip . The two teams compete in KPL (Glory of Kings Professional League) and LPL (League of Legends Professional League) respectively, with the latter having its home court in Shenzhen. In addition, Xingjing Weiwu has also made plans in multiple e-sports projects such as CS2 and CrossFire.
Looking back at the development of Xingjing Weiwei, He Youjun gradually created his own "e-sports arena". In 2017, the v5 e-sports club was born in his hands. The following year, the club established a League of Legends team and won an LPL quota. Although the team's performance is average, the amount it received in the A round of financing was as high as 100 million yuan.
At the end of 2020, estar, the kpl team founded by former Warcraft player Sun Liwei, announced that it would merge with v5 to jointly establish the Star Racing Power Group. After the merger, the group headquarters was located in Wuhan East Lake High-tech Zone, with He Youjun as chairman and Sun Liwei as co-CEO. When the time came to 2023, Star Sports Weiwu Group announced its merger with the nip team. At this point, a comprehensive international e-sports group spanning China, the United States and Europe, including mobile game e-sports events, was formed.
After many mergers, the internal structure of the group has also undergone great changes. The prospectus shows that He Youjun holds 14.2% of the group's shares and is the largest shareholder and serves as the group's CEO; Hicham Chahine, owner of NIP Club and co-CEO of the group, holds 12.4% of the shares through the holding institution and is the second largest shareholder; estar team Founder Sun Liwei holds 8.7% of the group's shares; Wuhan Tourism Group holds 8.5% of the shares through Yuyun Enterprise Management Partnership (Limited Partnership). In addition, artist Wang Jiaer is also one of the shareholders of the group (the number of shares held has not been announced).
should avoid hasty exit even if it goes public.
With e-sports club operations as its core, Xingjing Weiwu's business involves diversified fields such as events, talent agencies, advertising and other innovative businesses, covering Asia, Europe, South America and other countries and regions. Going public, especially standing on the Nasdaq bell-ringing platform, is what He Youjun has always wanted to do.
In mid-June this year, Xingjing Weiwu Group submitted a prospectus to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and planned to be listed on the NASDAQ exchange in the United States.
According to the contents of the prospectus, many people have discovered that in 2023, Xingjing Weiwu Group’s revenue increased from US$65.835 million to US$83.668 million, and the gross profit margins in the two years were 5.7% and 8.6% respectively. Under gaap (US GAAP), the net losses of Xingjing Weiwu Group in 2022 and 2023 will be US$6.306 million and US$13.258 million respectively, with loss rates of 9.6% and 15.9% respectively.
He Youjun has his own explanation for the problem that the group's net income has increased but its net losses have increased. In an interview with the media, he once said that there are differences between different accounting standards. Sometimes, the expansion of losses is not caused by real cash flow. For example, if the group wants to go public and issues a lot of options for this purpose, GAAP will directly write this part as a loss, but in fact, they have not encountered a cash blow. “If you put aside these non-cash impacts, StarSport’s profit margins are improving every year."
In this IPO, Xingjing Weiwu Group sold a total of 2.25 million ads (American depositary shares). The issue price was set at US$9/ads, and the total fundraising scale was US$20.25 million (approximately RMB 147 million).
It must be admitted that as the “first stock in Chinese e-sports”, the listing of Xingjing Weiwei is indeed a milestone in the development of Chinese e-sports. However, looking at global e-sports, there are also precedents of clubs that have gone public and delisted hastily. For example, the Danish team Astralis and the American team Faze Clan have suffered in the capital market. How to avoid making the same mistakes is an important issue for Xingjing Weiwu. Influence. Picture/He Youjun’s social media
“The son of the gambling king” uses action to fight against troubles
The listing of Xingjing Weiwu can attract such attention. In addition to the title of “China’s first e-sports stock”, it is also inseparable from He Youjun’s personal influence. "The son of a gambling king" is a label that cannot be removed from him. On the day when Star Sports was listed on the market, it was him, his father Stanley Ho, his mother Anqi Liang and many family members who were playing on the Nasdaq screen in Times Square. Group photo.
Make a name for yourself before the age of 28, otherwise you will have to go home and take care of the family business. In the novel, the "troubles" of the descendants of wealthy families have really appeared in He Youjun's life. Although this agreement with his mother has been completed, But to be more serious, he was born in January 1995 and is now 29 years old. He is a few months late in completing the goal that he had a chance to achieve on time, which makes him a little regretful.
Despite this, the vice chairman and chairman of Nasdaq Group. When Bob McCoey, Chairman of the Asia Pacific Region, congratulated the listing of Xingjing Weiwu Group, he emphasized one point in particular, that is, after the listing of Xingjing Weiwu, He Youjun has set a record and became the youngest founder of a Nasdaq-listed company in Asia.
Beijing News reporter Zhao Xue
editor Wu Zhengyang
proofreader Liu Jun
