GPHL and GAC intend to join hands with Guangzhou football team to hire football management talents with an annual salary of more than 500,000 yuan
Both parties may hold 50% equity of Guangzhou Football Team
The “Xiajia” who took over the Guangzhou Football Club (hereinafter referred to as “Guangzhou Team”) seems to have an eye.
On January 17, GPHL released information on a recruitment website to recruit football management talents with an annual salary of 500,000 to 600,000 yuan. As soon as the news came out, it immediately triggered speculations from all walks of life that Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Group would take over the Guangzhou team. Li Chuyuan, chairman of GPHL, also said in an interview with the media that he intends to reconnect with Guangzhou’s football business.
A person familiar with the Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Group told the “Securities Daily” reporter that the two state-owned enterprises of Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Group and Guangzhou Automobile Group may respectively take over 50% of the equity of the Guangzhou team, but the plan is still under discussion. The relevant person in charge of GAC Group told the “Securities Daily” reporter that if there is a suitable opportunity, GAC Group will not rule out renewing the frontier with Guangzhou Football in an appropriate form.
Who is the winner of the Guangzhou team?
GPHL and GAC may each hold 50% stake
The reporter learned exclusively from a person familiar with GPHL that GPHL will most likely take over the Guangzhou team, which is also a task of “being ordered in danger”. Previously, GPHL took over the trusteeship of Kangmei Pharmaceutical at a critical moment. At present, GPHL is discussing with Guangzhou Automobile Group whether to take over the Guangzhou football team together. The plan may be that GPHL and GAC will each hold 50% of the shares, but this plan is still under discussion.
According to the recruitment advertisement of GPHL, in 2022, GPHL will continue to pay attention to the needs of football business in Guangzhou, and fully mobilize corporate resources to provide strong support. In order to achieve faster, stronger and more professional development of football in Guangzhou, the company recruits football management talents from all over the world, including professional talents in competitions and markets, and requires 5 to 7 years of work experience, including business Development, responsible for club access, player registration transfer, etc.
It is worth noting that, according to the recruitment website information, GPHL offers very attractive salary for football management talents, with an annual salary of 500,000 to 600,000 yuan. As of January 17, among the 1,202 vacancies of GPHL on the recruitment website, the highest salary is the general manager position of the subsidiaries of Xi’an, Shaanxi and Nanning, Guangxi, reaching 450,000 to 600,000 yuan per year. It can be seen that GPHL attaches great importance to football management positions.
On December 27, 2021, Li Chuyuan, chairman of GPHL, publicly stated at the 12th Guangzhou Party Congress that GPHL intends to reconnect with Guangzhou’s football business in 2022. Wanglaoji, a brand of GPHL, also launched a poll on Weibo on December 28 last year, asking netizens for their opinions on the choice of “Guangzhou Team” or “Guangzhou City Team”.
In fact, GPHL has a deep relationship with the Guangzhou team. According to public information, as early as October 1984, Guangzhou Baiyunshan Pharmaceutical Factory signed a contract with the Guangzhou Municipal Sports Commission to jointly host the Guangzhou football team on the condition of sponsoring 200,000 yuan per year, which was the first national enterprise to host a sports team. In 1989, Guangzhou Baiyun Team expanded into a football club. At the beginning of 2006, GPHL acquired 90% of the team’s shares, established Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Football Club, and won the first league championship in the team’s professional league history in 2007.
The reporter of “Securities Daily” asked if GPHL has decided to join the Guangzhou team? As of press time, GPHL has not responded.
However, the relevant person in charge of GAC Group told the “Securities Daily” reporter, “Football is a very popular sport all over the world, which can provide a good communication platform for enterprises to carry out marketing activities. Guangzhou has a strong The football atmosphere, Guangzhou citizens love football, and GAC also sponsored the Guangzhou team in 2010. Therefore, if there is a suitable opportunity, GAC will not rule out the possibility of renewing the leading edge with Guangzhou football in an appropriate form.”
Post “Golden Dollar Football” Era
Where will the Guangzhou team go?
Looking back on the history of the Guangzhou team for more than ten years, there are many heavyweight investors.
At the beginning of 2010, Evergrande Group bought out the entire equity of Guangzhou Football Club with 100 million yuan, and Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Group withdrew from Guangzhou Football. Public information shows that after Evergrande entered the team, the Guangzhou team ushered in a glorious decade. From 2010 to 2019, the Guangzhou team won 8 Chinese Super League championships, 2 FA Cup championships, 4 Super Cup championships and 2 championships. The AFC Champion has become one of the most successful professional football clubs in China and even in Asia.
In 2014, Alibaba invested 1.2 billion yuan in the Guangzhou team and obtained a 50% stake in the club. In November 2015, Guangzhou team Taobao was listed on the New Third Board, becoming the first stock in Asian football, with a market value of more than 20 billion yuan. In addition to Alibaba, the star shareholders of the Guangzhou team also include well-known companies such as Gold Mantis, Grandland Group, and Keshun.
However, from an operational point of view, with continuous large-scale investment, the Guangzhou team’s operating income cannot cover business costs such as transfer costs and player salaries, and has been operating at a loss since 2013. From 2017 to 2019, financial data shows that the Guangzhou team lost 987 million yuan, 1.829 billion yuan, and 1.943 billion yuan respectively, and the losses expanded year by year; the net cash flows from operating activities were -433 million yuan, -1.583 billion yuan, -2.220 billion yuan respectively yuan, and cash continued to flow out.
Taking 2019, the year with the most serious losses, as an example, although the main business income of the Guangzhou team increased by 29.85% year-on-year to 783 million yuan, the operating cost was as high as 2.406 billion yuan, which was 3.07 times the operating income. Among the income, nearly 60% comes from the related party Evergrande Real Estate.
As of the end of the first half of 2020, Evergrande Real Estate and Alibaba held 56.71% and 37.81% of the Guangzhou team respectively. The Guangzhou team had assets of 2.151 billion yuan, total liabilities of 7.354 billion yuan, and net assets of -5.203 billion yuan. insolvent state. On March 10, 2021, ST Guangzu (delisted) was delisted in a low-key manner. With the shareholder Evergrande Real Estate falling into a liquidity crisis, the Guangzhou team is also facing the dilemma of where to go.
In fact, not only the Guangzhou team, but with the strict regulation of the real estate industry, the Chinese Super League, dubbed the “real estate league”, has also been impacted, and many Chinese Super League teams have doubts about their ability to continue operating. In February 2021, after winning the first Chinese Super League championship, Jiangsu Suning announced the disbandment. With the debt restructuring at the China Fortune Group level, the future of the Hebei team has also cast a shadow. Recently, the Shenzhen team was also rumored to be looking for new investors, and its sponsor, Kaisa Group, was caught in the financial breach of related companies not long ago.
Shen Meng, executive director of Chanson Capital, said in an interview with a reporter from Securities Daily that football clubs do not necessarily make money, but they are a sign of local social development. Appear. At this stage, the real estate industry is affected by continuous and strict macro-control, and no longer has the ability to invest in football projects, and the local government will not let the iconic sports decline. Therefore, there are many news of the transfer of football clubs.
Shen Meng believes that under the current environment, almost no football clubs are in a healthy state. Therefore, when real estate companies withdraw, operating costs, especially player salary costs, must be greatly reduced, so that Chinese football can form a virtuous circle.
IPG China Chief Economist Bai Wenjia told the “Securities Daily” reporter that maintaining a football team is “money-burning”, and a real estate company in financial crisis cannot continue to bear it. After the ebb of “Golden Dollar Football”, subsequent shareholders should take steps to gradually commercialize the club in order to make the club healthy and sustainable.
(Editor in charge: Wang Qingyu)
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