Lei Jun’s Kingsoft Years

On November 4, 1991, Lei Jun met Bojun Qiu, the founder of Kingsoft, for the first time at a computer exhibition. Bojun Qiu was known as “China’s No. 1 programmer” because he developed WPS alone.

Lei Jun regarded Bojun Qiu as an entrepreneurial idol, and also tried to decrypt WPS in 1990. Based on this connection, Lei Jun and Bojun Qiu sympathized with each other, and both sides left each other’s contact information.

On January 4, 1992, the 22-year-old Lei Jun officially joined Kingsoft, becoming Kingsoft’s No. 6 employee, who also went to Zhuhai from Beijing. Lei Jun’s first monthly salary was more than 2,000 yuan.

In August 1992, Lei Jun became the manager of the development department in Beijing. In the same month, his paper “Principles and Design of Computer Virus Determination Expert System” was officially published in the authoritative academic journal “Computer Research and Development”.

In 1992, Lei Jun also invited his former business partner Wang Quanguo to join Kingsoft. Wang Quanguo later worked his way up to the position of Executive Vice President at Kingsoft.

In 1992, at the age of 22, Lei Jun also co-authored a programming textbook “In-depth DOS Programming” with Bojun Qiu.

In 1993, at the age of 23, Lei Jun, under the leadership of Bojun Qiu, began to develop Pangu Component, an office software system consisting of WPS, spreadsheets and dictionaries.

In 1994, at the age of 24, Lei Jun was promoted by Bojun Qiu and started to serve as the general manager of Beijing Kingsoft Co. In this year, Lei Jun also published a book called “In-depth Windows Programming: Windows Encryption and Compression Software Programming Techniques and Methods”.

In April 1995, the Kingsoft Pangu Component, developed by Lei Jun, was officially released. However, facing competition from Microsoft and their own positioning problems, the Pangu Component hit a cold streak, and only 2,000 sets were sold in the first six months of its release, which was far lower than the expected 5,000 sets.

In 1995, Kingsoft’s revenue was less than 1/3 of the previous year’s. Kingsoft established Xishanju Studio in Zhuhai to enter the game market.

In 1995, 25-year-old Lei Jun also met 24-year-old Zhou Hongyi, because Lei Jun’s wife and Zhou Hongyi’s wife are girlfriends. Lei Jun was already in a high position in Kingsoft, while Zhou Hongyi was a programmer in Founder Group.

In 1996, the loss of Pangu components in the market also put Kingsoft in trouble. In November 1996, it was reported that Kingsoft had only one or two million yuan left on its books, and the size of the team in their Zhuhai office had plummeted from a high of more than 200 people to only one or two dozen.

Lei Jun, 26 years old, also quite disillusioned, Lei Jun said that they were “lost ideals”, that want to do the national software, the team will be the development of domestic software, the sharpness of the setback.

Lei Jun had once resigned in April 1996, but begged Bojun did not agree, but gave Lei Jun half a year’s vacation (it is also said that Lei Jun resigned, but returned after half a year).

During this period, Lei Jun often soaked in a network forum called CFIDO, where he met Ma Huateng, who was still working as a programmer in Runxun pager company, and Ding Lei, who was still working as an engineer in Ningbo Telecom Bureau, and both of them founded Tencent and NetEase, which were the most famous companies and the richest people in China.

Half a year later, Bojun Qiu and Lei Jun decided to continue to develop Kingsoft WPS, in order to overcome the difficulties, Bojun Qiu even sold the villa rewarded by the investor in exchange for 2 million yuan of capital, they did not like the same period of time Shi Yuzhu to do the Giant Group, as cut into real estate or health care products diversification.

In October 1996, Lei Jun wrote an article in Computer News, “Random Thoughts of a Programmer,” in which he wrote:

“Computers are far less complicated than people, if your program is well written, you can have a good relationship with the computer, you can command the computer to do what you want to do. Every time you sit in front of a computer, you are cruising in your kingdom, and such days are simply heavenly.”

Lei Jun had recalled his 10 years as a programmer in 2008, he said: from 1987 to 1996, it was a sunny time.

Also in 1996, Lei Jun met Sun Taoran at an event in Zhongguancun. Sun Taoran later founded Lakala, which we will mention later.

In 1997, at the age of 27, Lei Jun, led Kingsoft to a beautiful turnaround. Lei Jun’s team launched the WPS 97 software, sold more than 13,000 sets in 2 months, easing the pressure on Kingsoft, but also let WPS in the domestic office market can be PK with Microsoft Office.

In this year, Lei Jun’s salary was 4,000 yuan per month. Because of the outstanding performance, Bojun Qiu rewarded Lei Jun 200,000 yuan in one breath.

Lei Jun put this 200,000 yuan into the stock, I did not expect a few months later earned another 400,000 yuan. At that time, the stock market, really call people nostalgic ah!

In 1997, only 6 years after Lei Jun’s graduation, Lei Jun donated his bonus + stock speculation income totaling 600,000 yuan to his alma mater, Wuhan University, to set up the “Tengfei Scholarship”, which was later known as “Lei Jun Scholarship”.

In 1998, Lei Jun proudly told his friends, “I sold all my stocks. I made 400,000 dollars in a few months, but it’s too easy to make money on stocks, which will make people’s fighting spirit drift. I still need to concentrate on Kingsoft. I donated to my alma mater, WU. I’m not the person who donated the most money to my alma mater, but the person who gave back to my alma mater the shortest time after graduation. I would be the first student at our school to graduate less than 10 years ago and go back to school and donate.”

On August 12, 1998, Lenovo announced that it had taken a $4.5 million stake in Kingsoft, becoming the single largest shareholder of Kingsoft. Seeking Bojun also gave way to Lei Jun, 28, as CEO of Kingsoft.

When Kingsoft CEO Lei Jun, had set Flag to the outside world: Kingsoft’s ambition is to be listed in Hong Kong within three years, within five years to become the most respected software company in China, within 10 years to become an international software company.

Lei Jun also with a wave of price cuts and promotions, so that the company’s software sales, thus in the performance of Lenovo’s commitment to the realization of the company’s own CEO position.

In 1998, at the age of 28, Lei Jun was also made an honorary professor at his alma mater, Wuhan University.

In the second half of 1998, Lei Jun also had a takeover negotiation with NetEase, which had just been founded more than one year ago. At that time, NetEase had a team of only five or six people, mainly doing personal homepage hosting business, but also helped Guangzhou Telecom to do a set of mail system.

Lei Jun on NetEase opened a purchase price of 10 million yuan, but was rejected by Ding Lei.

In 1999, Kingsoft launched the antivirus software Kingsoft Vibe.

At the same time, Lei Jun realized the huge potential of the Internet and set up Joyo.com within Kingsoft. In October of the same year, he officially led Joyo.com into the field of e-commerce. It can be said that Lei Jun and eBay founder Shao Yibo, Alibaba founder Jack Ma is the earliest group of people to do Internet e-commerce.

This year, the 29-year-old Lei Jun was elected for the first time in China’s top ten IT figures.

At the end of 2000, Kingsoft was reorganized into a joint-stock company, and Lei Jun, 30, became the president of Beijing Kingsoft Co.

At the end of 2000, Lei Jun was also appointed as a consultant of Beijing Municipal Government. At the annual meeting of Jinshan Spring Festival, Lei Jun met Chen Nian, the editor-in-chief of Book Review Weekly, and invited him to join Joyo.com. (PS: Chen Nian later founded Vancl, which is now engaged in live streaming with goods)

In 2001, Lei Jun went to Sohu to find Zhang Chaoyang and asked him if he wanted to invest in Joyo.com, while Zhang Chaoyang wanted to dig Lei Jun to work as an executive at Sohu.

In 2001, at the age of 31, Lei Jun was elected vice president of the Beijing Software Industry Association.

Chen Rui joined Kingsoft that year and was appointed by Lei Jun as his technical assistant the next year. Chen Rui was a high school classmate of Sogou founder Wang Xiaochuan, who years later became chairman of B Station.

In 2002, Microsoft stopped honoring the WPS compatibility agreement it had signed with Kingsoft in 1995, resulting in WPS not being compatible with Microsoft’s Office.

Lei Jun at this time with 40 million yuan on the company’s books, leading a team of hundreds of people began to rewrite WPS, which took three years to complete, so that WPS is deeply compatible with Office documents. At the same time, Lei Jun is also constantly trying to lead Kingsoft to go public, but the timing is always poor.

In 2003, the rise of Internet games, 33-year-old Lei Jun faced two choices, one is to first meet the conditions of three consecutive years of profitability, so that the company listed; the other is not to consider the profitability, take the money on the books to do online games, and ultimately, he persuaded the board of directors of Kingsoft, suspend the A-share listing plan, first invested in doing online games.

In May 2003, Xishanju Studio launched “Swordsman Online”, and in September of the same year, Kingsoft established Blaze Studio in Beijing, which later launched the “Fengshenbang” series of online games.

In September 2004, Lei Jun sold Joyo.com to Amazon for $75 million. By doing so, Lei Jun became a multi-millionaire.

However, Lei Jun was not happy after selling Joyo.com, he had thought for more than half a year, what is the Internet.

Eventually Lei Jun came to the conclusion that the Internet is not only a technological revolution, but also a revolution of concepts; in the future, the Internet will be integrated into all walks of life.

Lei Jun to excellence network is summarized as: “Founded in the Internet bubble burst after the fall in the full rise of e-commerce before.”

Indeed, Lei Jun sold early, or he can certainly have a greater role in the Internet wave.

At the end of 2004, Lei Jun’s good friend Sun Taoran decided to start a third-party payment project “Lakala”, Lei Jun invested 500,000 U.S. dollars (at that time, equivalent to about 4.3 million yuan), which is Lei Jun’s first personal angel investment, the specific return on the return we will talk about later.

In 2004, at the age of 34, Lei Jun was elected “Outstanding Youth in China’s Software Industry”, but this year Kingsoft still failed to go public.

In 2005, at the age of 35, Lei Jun was elected “China’s most influential people in the game industry”.

In that year, Lei Jun led Kingsoft’s game business revenue to exceed that of its software business. At the same time, their rewritten WPS was also officially launched, which was welcomed by the domestic office market. Lei Jun also began to prepare for Kingsoft’s listing in the United States.

In the second half of 2005, Lei Jun also invested 1 million dollars in the venture of Li Xueling, the former editor-in-chief of NetEase. Li Xueling later made the company Huanjiu Times with YY, and led the company to go public.

In 2006, at the age of 36, Lei Jun led Kingsoft to the U.S. listing was again blocked because the U.S. had passed the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which raised the threshold for Chinese companies to go public in the U.S.

In August 2006, Kingsoft received $72 million in financing from GIC (Government of Singapore Direct Investment), Intel Capital and New Horizon Venture Fund.

On November 20, 2006, Yu Yongfu, who worked at Lenovo Venture Capital, met Lei Jun at a bar in Beijing, which eventually led to Lei Jun investing 2 million yuan in He Xiaopeng’s UCWEB.

In January 2007, Lei Jun had teamed up with Ceyuan Capital to invest 3 million yuan in Wang Hang’s Good Doctor Online, a company that was just acquired by Ant Group in August this year (2024), before Lei Jun withdrew as a shareholder.

In February 2007, Lei Jun led Kingsoft again to start the Hong Kong main board listing plan, August 9 of the same year through the Hong Kong Stock Exchange hearing.

October 9, 2007, nearly 38-year-old Lei Jun finally led Kingsoft listed in Hong Kong.

Lei Jun said, “I worked from 23 to 38, especially after we started the IPO from 1999, I believe the pressure in between is hard to express in words.”

In October 2007, Lei Jun invested in Chen Nian, who officially founded Vancl. Lei Jun has also helped Vancl pull financing from Ceyuan Ventures since then.

The English name of Vancl is VANCL, and Lei Jun has explained the origin of this name: VAN is the English word for pioneer, C is the letter at the beginning of Chen Nian’s pinyin, and L is the letter at the beginning of Lei Jun’s pinyin, and together, the VANCL brand means e-commerce pioneer + Chen Nian + Lei Jun.

December 20, 2007, Lei Jun formally stepped down as president and CEO of Kingsoft, although he still retains the position of vice chairman of the board of directors of Kingsoft, but after his main focus on angel investment.

Kingsoft board of directors of Lei Jun’s evaluation is: bow and scrape, merit in Kingsoft.

Kingsoft founder begged Bojun to Lei Jun’s evaluation: Kingsoft’s Zhuge Liang!

In 2008, Lei Jun weekly in He Xiaopeng’s UCWEB company office for two or three days, when Google wants to cooperate with UCWEB, Lei Jun thus met Lin Bin working in Google, Lin Bin is also one of the co-founders of millet later.

In May 2008, Lei Jun and Ceyuan Venture Capital together invested in Bisheng founded LeTao.com. It can be found that some of Lei Jun’s early investments, many times with Ceyuan Ventures. Feng Bo, the founder of Ceyuan Venture Capital, once referred to Lei Jun as the “God of Wealth”.

In September 2008, Lei Jun also invested in the casual game platform 7K7K.

In 2009, the founder of the Meizu Huang Zhang made the first full-touch screen cell phone Meizu M8, Lei Jun also once led He Xiaopeng to visit Huang Zhang, he once wanted to buy shares in the Meizu.

According to Huang Zhang later response, Lei Jun had wanted to let the Meizu valuation of 1 billion, Lei Jun investment to get 30% of the shares of the Meizu, when Huang Zhang did not completely refused, during the period of Lei Jun had arranged for Lin Bin and Lai Wanqiang to visit the yellow chapter, to understand the situation of the Meizu to do the cell phone and the idea.

When Huang formally promised Lei Jun that he could invest in the shares, Lei Jun said he had decided to do a software company.

From February to June 2009, the 39-year-old Lei Jun had invested in four companies in one breath, respectively, Tai Mei Shoes, social recruiting platform Avenue network, Wali network (later acquired by millet, renamed millet entertainment), red circle CRM. the angel round of financing of these companies, are Lei Jun investment.
It is said that Lei Jun has 3 investment principles when making angel investments:

• The first is not to invest if you are not familiar with it. Lei Jun to invest in the project must be familiar with their own or recommended by friends, and is familiar with the field of the project.
• The second is that investment is to invest in people, not investment projects, talent is the most critical.
• The third is to help and not add to the chaos. After the investment, Lei Jun as far as possible only help, do not give entrepreneurs mess.

In addition, Lei Jun has also reflected on their own software, missed the Internet wave of this matter, because in his bitter to do Kingsoft, between 2004 and 2007, Tencent, Baidu, NetEase, Ali, the rapid rise of these Internet companies, and the scale of revenue, the company’s valuation far more than Kingsoft.

This allows Lei Jun began to reflect on the importance of the trend.