Towards the end of the year, many Internet technology companies began to distribute benefits, such as Douyin 2 billion, Kuaishou 2.1 billion, Pinduoduo 2.8 billion, Baidu’s 2.2 billion and so on. These companies have put the amount of money for the Spring Festival activities on the App icons to facilitate users to understand the activities. What is different is that the App picture of LeTV Video says "12.2 billion owed."
Many netizens speculated that this means that LeEco has a debt of 12.2 billion yuan. On February 7, LeTV Information Technology (Beijing) Co., Ltd. issued a clarification announcement that the LeTV App’s icon is only a Spring Festival marketing strategy. In fact, as of September 30, 2020, the company’s net assets are-15.3 billion. This is really a sad story, the real debt is higher than the figure on the icon.
On February 8, Zhang Wei, the new CEO of Lerongzhi, revealed LeTV's current financial situation. He said that LeTV sold a total of 400-500,000 TV sets in 2020 and can barely maintain the company's operations. The previous company's founders and major shareholders Jia Yueting, Sun Hongbin and others are no longer involved in the company's operations.
At the end of 2019, LeEco laid off 50% of its staff. Now LeRongzhixin has about 250 employees, and LeEco has about 200 employees, and it needs to spend about 120 million yuan in salary a year. However, since 2018, Lerong Zhixin has not owed any more money and has been working hard to repay the debt. LeEco Video is still LeEco’s main product, with more than 1 million daily active users.
Fortunately, LeEco’s current creditors are relatively mild, and they all know that LeEco has no ability to repay debts. Zhang Wei expressed the hope that LeTV TV can maintain its current sales, and LeTV will continue to provide support to users.
LeEco’s most eye-catching concept is its smart ecological concept. In 2015, it wanted to open up platforms such as smart TVs, smart phones, tablets, PCs, theaters large screens, and future vehicle terminals and VR terminals. This intelligent ecological concept is indeed advanced, but the steps are too big,LeTV lacked funds. Founder Jia Yueting liked to toss around. Several products launched but failed to reach the level of publicity, which eventually caused problems in the LeTV capital chain.
Now Jia Yueting fled to the United States, founded the electric car "Faraday Future", and is seeking investment in many aspects, but the future is uncertain. Domestic LeEco can barely maintain operations and cannot repay its debts. Recently, there have been frequent news that Jia Yueting has obtained financing and will return to China. If LeTV wants to come back from the dead, it can only hope that Jia Yueting's Faraday Future financing will succeed, and then give it to LeTV.
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