Please log in to the crowdfunding home www.zczj.com "Douyu still owe us an explanation and an apology." Under the pressure of rent and life, although Ms. Huo had signed the voluntary resignation agreement, she was still indignant.

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"Douyu still owe us an explanation and an apology." Under the pressure of rent and life, Ms. Huo has signed the voluntary resignation agreement, but she is still indignant.

Another Mr. Yan, who had just joined Douyu Shenzhen for less than a month, even swears, "Douyu is weird, garbage, and disgusting." Not long after he bought a house, his wife was temporarily unemployed, and he had no choice but to sign a voluntary resignation agreement.

On the morning of December 4, in the office on the 9th floor of Building B, Kexing Science and Technology Park, Nanshan District, Shenzhen, employees of Douyu Shenzhen Branch began another day of busyness. But at noon that day, two young girls came from Wuhan, who were in charge of human resources at the headquarters. Their arrival disrupted the originally busy pace of work.

At that time, the two people who arrived first talked with He Hongjie, the head of Douyu Shenzhen, and then He Hongjie had a conversation with the person in charge below. Seeing this situation, coupled with the rumor of layoffs that had been circulated before, people were panicked.

The next day, that is, on Wednesday, all employees of Douyu Shenzhen finally knew about this layoff plan: all Douyu's teams in Shenzhen will be laid off. "At that time, there were still people from nonolive who came from Guangzhou and told us that those who didn't want to leave could go to Guangzhou nonolive." Ms. Huo said that not only brought nonolive people to participate in the negotiations, they even brought legal affairs.

nonolive was first launched on Indonesia in early June 2016. The products cover iOS and Android, and mainly provide live show broadcasts. In June 2017, it announced that it had received a joint investment of tens of millions of dollars from Weiying Capital, Alibaba and Douyu.

According to Mr. Yan and Ms. Hu, another Douyu Shenzhen employee, nonolive is a Douyu investment team, which previously mainly engaged in the Indonesian market. Later, after entering the Thai market, Douyu Shenzhen helped them operate for a period of time. Even the first batch of game anchors in Thailand were found by the Shenzhen team. It was not until October that it stopped assisting at the request of nonolive.

Everyone was shocked after hearing this layoff plan. However, what shocked them even more was the official explanation given by Douyu to the media.

Douyu denied the substantial layoffs in its official statement. They said: "This layoff in Shenzhen is a team optimization configuration. If there are layoffs in Wuhan, it is also an individual situation. Large companies have assessment standards and there will be regular optimizations every year, which are normal personnel adjustments. Currently, the company has more than 2,400 employees, and there is no major layoff plan."

was laid off and Douyu both had their own opinions. So what is the truth? Against the backdrop of game version shrinking and live broadcast platforms facing strict supervision, is Douyu strategically shrinking for winter, and at the same time seeking listing in order to make financial statements good?

Douyu's contraction and overseas expansion

In the past 2018, Douyu encountered many discomforts in China, and even gaining exclusive investment in Tencent is not a good thing to the outside world.

On March 8, 2018, Douyu announced that it had received a new round of investment, with Tencent exclusively investing US$630 million (approximately RMB 4 billion). However, on the same day, Huya Live also announced that it had received a US$460 million investment from Tencent. The two game live broadcast platforms announced that they had received investment from Tencent on the same day, which is the first time in the history of live broadcasts, and it is even uncommon in the history of Tencent’s investment.

Douyu, which has always been competing with Huya Live, is far behind Huya Live in its listing. On May 11, 2018, Huya Live successfully logged into on the New York Stock Exchange . Huya's current share price is US$15.23 and its market value is US$3.104 billion. However, since Douyu's listing was announced in April 2018, it has not taken any further action.

Douyu's discomfort in the capital market is related to the strict supervision and negative news encountered in the past year.

In January 2018, Douyu announced that it would punish its anchor 55 (Lu Benwei) for 1 million yuan and suspend its live broadcast in the live broadcast room. At noon on July 31, 2018, Jiangsu Internet Police posted on Weibo that they received reports from netizens that Douyu anchor Chen Yifa'er openly used the Nanjing Massacre and the fall of the three eastern provinces as jokes in his early live broadcast.

Douyu then announced that it would close Chen Yifa'er's live broadcast room indefinitely and provide patriotic education to its anchors. However, the emergence of negative news cannot be concealed. In October 2018, Douyu anchor B's "Fine Japanese Speech" video leaked, which once again triggered criticism from official media such as the People's Daily.

In addition, Douyu app was removed from major app stores during this year's National Day. In September, the six major departments of the National "Anti-Pornography and Anti-Illegal Publications and Illegal Publications" Working Group Office, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the State Administration of Radio, Television, and the State Internet Information Office jointly issued the "Notice on Strengthening the Management of Online Live Broadcast Services", which required that video live broadcast platforms must obtain ICP business license, Internet culture business license and information network audio-visual program license to provide services.

. Whether Douyu has obtained a license to disseminate audio-visual programs in the information network is still a mystery. Douyu has pointed its development direction overseas. In addition to investing in nonolive, under the leadership of Douyu founder and CEO Chen Shaojie , Douyu has set up a branch in Shenzhen to specialize in expanding overseas business, which is Doyo, a team that has been laid off now.

"This project was launched in April, and Chen Shaojie supports this project very much." Mr. Yan told Phoenix.com Technology that YY has biggo overseas and Cheetah has live.me overseas. In addition, the current live broadcast market in China is not good, Douyu also wants to do overseas. Although he has invested in nonolive, he still wants to do a project by himself.

It can be said that nonolive is Douyu's godson, and Doyo is Douyu's biological son. Douyu invested a lot in Doyo and was optimistic about the prospects of this project. Many employees said that they knew about the company's plan for the project during the interview.

"When I was interviewing, when talking about development goals, the interviewer said that several Southeast Asian countries will be launched this year, entering Japan in the first half of 2019, starting the Middle East market in the middle of the year, and going to Canada or the United States at the end of the year." Ms. Hu still remembers the information she received during the interview, which is also the reason why she chose this company - prospects.

Doyo This project was launched in April, and He Hongjie was finally selected to be responsible. He was previously the vice president of the live broadcast platform biggo, a subsidiary of YY, but later he was directly driven away by Li Xueling, the founder and CEO of Huya Times, because of some problems, and came to Douyu to take charge of the project in Shenzhen. When Ms. Huo joined Doyo at the end of July, her office had just been renovating for a week.

Then more and more people came to interview. Ms. Hu is one of the employees with a long-term qualification. She told Phoenix.com Technology: "Doyo's core management teams all came from Wuhan. They felt that Wuhan was not suitable for overseas business, so they came to Shenzhen, then found an office and started to recruit large-scale foreign countries."

This is also an aspect that Douyu spent a lot of money in Shenzhen. In addition to the accidents of several early employees, many of Doyo recruited externally, and the recruitment requirements are not low. Many employees used to come from UC, Cheetah, biggo and even Tencent; some came from overseas companies who returned to work in China due to Douyu's recruitment, and some were foreign employees. While signing the voluntary resignation agreement, Ms. Huo saw a salary form, and some people found by He Hongjie had a monthly salary of more than 70,000 yuan.

"There are many people who have been poached from Shanghai, Beijing and other places." Ms. Hu said that more than half of the employees in the Shenzhen team have been in less than 6 months, one-third have been in less than 3 months, and the rest are in about 8 months, and basically no one has been in more than 1 year of employment.

Mr. Yan is a typical example. He previously worked in Beijing and worked on several live broadcast platforms. Due to climate factors and career considerations, he gave up the opportunity to choose Douyu's team in Shenzhen, and finally joined Douyu Shenzhen in November.But what he didn't expect was that he encountered such a situation less than a month ago.

"If I haven't left my unit in Beijing, the year-end bonus this year will be about 60,000." However, the conditions offered by Douyu Shenzhen are enough to attract Mr. Yan. In addition to being able to escape the bad air, he can get a year-end bonus of 120,000 after working for a year. This is enough to see how well Douyu’s treatment conditions in Shenzhen are.

In addition, Douyu, which is preparing to show off its strength overseas, has also recruited many foreign employees and foreign interns.

Ms. Hu said: "There are two foreign employees who signed the labor contract with Douyu. There are also one Vietnamese employee who has joined the company for more than a month, but has not received the contract." In addition, there are many local employees recruited in Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam.

Ms. Hu gave an example, saying that Douyu recruited more than ten local employees in the form of labor dispatch in three countries, mainly to help with business expansion, product experience, feedback, operation and maintenance, etc. The office in Vietnam is in a local shared office community, which is considered the best office in the local conditions. "Now Douyu suddenly announced the cancellation of the lease. In addition to the shock of these employees, the shared office community even planned to send a lawyer's letter on the grounds that Douyu breached the contract."

Among these foreign employees, there are two typical examples, one is a Vietnamese employee who has not obtained the labor contract and a Malaysian intern.

"Douyu refused to make compensation for layoffs on the grounds that the Vietnamese employee and Douyu did not have a labor contract." Ms. Hu said that the employee has been in Douyu Shenzhen Company for more than a month, but the entry process has been on the OA system and the labor contract has not been obtained for a long time. Another Malaysian intern encountered this situation just over a week after coming to Shenzhen. He spent a lot of energy and time on interviews and visas.

Mr. Yan introduced that these foreign employees are considering suing Douyu for compensation. "It's really embarrassing that I've been thrown abroad." Ms. Hu laughed at herself. Is it necessary to lay off employees or is it planned?

The layoffs came very suddenly, and this is true for every Douyu employee in Shenzhen. Before noon on December 4, everything was normal in the office, and even job seekers came for an interview on the same day.

The office area on the ninth floor of Building B, Kexing Science and Technology Park has become more and more crowded as more and more people join. In the near future, four rows of workstations have been added. As the recruitment progresses, human resources are expected to be filled soon. "The team is expected to be around 200 people." Ms. Hu said that the person in charge at that time He Hongjie also said that when Building D of the Sinovac Science and Technology Park is built, they will be moved there because the office area there will be more spacious.

However, it was not until the day when the news of the layoffs was confirmed that everyone suddenly realized that this seemed to be a premeditated layoff.

Douyu's office lease contract termination date in Block B, Sinovac Technology Park was advanced to mid-December, which is one week after the layoffs. "At that time, the property will arrange cleaning staff to clean up the site, water, power and network outages." Ms. Hu said that Douyu also requested to sign a voluntary resignation agreement and leave the company on December 7.

In addition, although Douyu's reimbursement process is cumbersome, everything is normal. Starting from mid-November, individual reimbursement and contract approval submitted on the OA have been stuck at the same node, which is difficult to advance. Also in mid-November, Douyu founder and CEO Chen Shaojie visited his office in Shenzhen. At that time, he first visited the investor Tencent, and then came to the office. He walked around for a while before leaving.

One of the employees who joined Douyu Shenzhen in August said that she has always been confused, and it has been there since she joined the company. First of all, it took her and another colleague's offer to reach a written notice from verbally to 13 days, and the HR feedback was that the above had not completed the process.

But He Hongjie, the head of the Shenzhen team, gave people a different feeling. He once encouraged her like this: "It is expected that the product will be launched for at most two months. Come on, and history will remember us."

At that time, there were only more than 30 people in the Shenzhen team, mainly focusing on the product and technology business line.However, they encountered many difficulties, the biggest thing was that product development has never received support from the headquarters.

Mr. Yan indirectly confirmed this. He is responsible for building the audit backend and wants to directly reuse Douyu's code to quickly build it, thereby saving time and cost. However, the email he sent to the technical director of the headquarters has been sank to the sea. "They never responded, so we had to find an outsourcing team to do it." The technical director of Douyu is Zhang Wenming, one of the co-founders.

Zhang Wenming and Chen Shaojie are fellow villagers and college alumni, and Douyu is the second time they have collaborated to start a business. In Douyu, Chen Shaojie is mainly responsible for external affairs such as financing, foreign investment and corporate strategy; Zhang Wenming is a typical technical man, mainly responsible for internal affairs such as product and technology operation, iterative development.

This is actually a very cruel thing for a brand new team. First of all, the technical difficulty of live broadcast products is itself more difficult than that of general Internet products; secondly, the backend support of live broadcast products is more than magnitude more than other Internet products, which also means that this is a R&D method that is destined to burn money.

11, after finally the product was launched, they found that the product functions were very difficult to use. Ms. Huo said that this is because the development time is too short. In addition, the quality of the underlying code He Hongjie has previously built with the outsourcing team is too poor. The technical team recruited later does not have enough time to make major changes, so she can only rush to go online first and then optimize.

"I work overtime day and night. Many people come from other places, but they don't get ready, they just go out early and come back late. They don't even bring their wives and children." Ms. Hu said that she had completely experienced this process, so she could see the attention of the product and technical team.

However, the data feedback obtained by the product is pretty good. According to Mr. Yan's disclosure, before the layoffs, this product had achieved more than 9,000 new users every day, and the new users had broadcast more than 2,000 broadcasts every day, and the retention rate of new users reached 30% the next day.

This is also an aspect that makes them very angry. It has been three years since nonolive developed. However, Doyo's product development has been launched for three months without support and has obtained good market feedback. However, the headquarters is optimized under the name of "the Guangzhou team is better than the Shenzhen team."

"In addition to the pressure of listing, it may also be caused by internal struggles at the top." Mr. Yan said that Douyu's senior management has always been dissatisfied. The team led by Zhang Wenming has always advocated acquiring nonolive to deploy overseas business, but the team led by Chen Shaojie has always advocated doing overseas business, which is a point of contradiction between the two sides. Another contradiction is that Chen Shaojie promoted many senior executives and completely suppressed Zhang Wenming. A typical case is that Chen Chao, the senior vice president of Douyu, was promoted by Chen Shaojie.

An insider close to Douyu told Phoenix.com that the disagreement between Douyu's senior executives is no longer news. The overseas business department in Shenzhen was established by Chen Shaojie's first-hand support, so it is not surprising that he did not get Zhang Wenming's support.

At present, among the more than 70 laid off employees, more than ten still refuse to sign the voluntary resignation agreement because they are not satisfied with Douyu's compensation plan. "We originally wanted to fight for N+6, at least N+3 compensation plan, but Douyu's approach is disappointing." Ms. Hu said that Douyu gave everyone an N+1 compensation plan.

What made them even more upset was that Douyu gave everyone the assessment in the end of the year assessment was C, so that the amount of compensation obtained by their compensation plan was reduced by half. This is also an important reason why the remaining ten people refused the compensation plan. Whether it is Ms. Hu or Ms. Huo, the compensation she received is pitifully small. "Those technical and product managers who have given up better technology are the most pitiful," they said.

Mr. Yan received only more than 5,000 yuan in compensation, and he gave up his former boss's year-end bonus of 60,000 yuan. "Douyu makes me disgusted. I never want to have any contact with such a garbage company again." Mr. Yan said that he has been a black fan of Douyu all his life.

Just now, Douyu announced that it had successfully launched a satellite called "Douyu 666" into the sky at the Jiuquan Satellite Center.