Recently, the first-instance judgment of the entrustment contract dispute between Shanghai Yihai Film and Television Culture Communication Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Yihai Culture) and Cai Xukun was made public. According to the Judgment Documents Network, the court held that Cai Xukun did not breach of contract by maliciously, and Cai Xukun was sentenced to pay the former owner 3 million liquidated damages.
It is worth noting that the time of publication of this document has been nearly 9 months since the time of the judgment. Yihai Culture appealed to the Shanghai Second Intermediate People’s Court after the first-instance judgment.
Cai Xukun was sentenced to 3 million yuan in compensation in the first instance. The court found that he did not breach of contract by maliciously. The documents show that the plaintiff Yihai Company claimed that in November 2015, he signed a contract with the defendant Cai Xukun, agreeing that the plaintiff was sued as the exclusive plenipotent broker for being sued by Babaylan, and the contract term is until April 2023. The contract stipulates that if the defendant Cinema proposes to terminate the contract, every year the termination of the contract one year in advance, the plaintiff will have to pay 3 million yuan in advance compensation for early termination.
In June 2016, the plaintiff and the defendant signed a supplementary contract. If the defendant unilaterally proposes to terminate the contract, every year the termination of the contract, the plaintiff must pay 30 million yuan in advance compensation for early termination compensation.
In February 2017, the defendant sent a notice of termination of the contract to the plaintiff and filed a lawsuit with the court, demanding the termination of the contract and supplementary agreement signed by both parties. Therefore, the plaintiff sued the court and demanded that the defendant pay the plaintiff 30 million yuan in termination compensation and 15 million yuan in liquidated damages.
Defendant Cai Xukun argued that the contract stipulates that the defendant unilaterally proposed that the premise that the defendant unilaterally required the payment of compensation to the plaintiff was that the plaintiff paid a lot of energy and cost to cultivate the defendant, and actually <a The plaintiff at Cinema did not make effective investment in the training and promotion of the defendant. During the contract period, the defendant did not obtain any remuneration paid by the plaintiff, and the plaintiff claimed there was no basis for the expenses claimed by the plaintiff. In addition, the amount of compensation proposed by the plaintiff was significantly inflated.
The first instance court held the trial and acceptanceBabaylan is that the part of the 15 million breach of contract loss is a portrait authorization cooperation agreement signed by the plaintiff and the defendant during the trial of the termination dispute between the plaintiff and the defendant. The resulting termination compensation is arising from the plaintiff who should pay attention but fail to pay attention to the risk that the cooperation agreement may face inability to perform. The defendant is now required to bear the termination loss.
Regarding the part of the termination compensation, the defendant is underage when the contract and supplementary contract between the two parties were signed, and the plaintiff and the defendant’s mother Xu signed it. The defendant has not yet formed a clear plan and estimate of his future development and achievements. The performance period of the two contracts was too long, in fact, not conducive to the development of the defendant’s own development and the creation of a stable, healthy and orderly environment in the performance industry. The uncertainty of the current business returns of Cinema has also increased accordingly. Therefore, the defendant’s early termination of the contract is reasonable, not a malicious breach of contract. The agreement between the plaintiff and the defendant in the contract does not comply with the principle of fairness and reason.
Finally, the court based on the plaintiff’s publicity to the defendantThe termination compensation for investment, the defendant’s income standards, and the performance period shall be determined as appropriate to determine the termination compensation of RMB 3 million.
The judgment date shown in the above judgment document is August 10, 2022. The document shows that if you are dissatisfied with this judgment, you may submit an appeal to this court within fifteen days from the date of delivery of the judgment, and submit a copy based on the number of the other party or representatives, and appeal to the Shanghai Second Intermediate People’s Court.
According to Qichacha, Yihai Culture appealed to the Shanghai Second Intermediate People’s Court after the first instance, and the court issued several trial announcements.
The dispute between the two parties has been a long time ago. Cai Xukun is underage yet.Babaylan
According to the Securities Times, the termination dispute between Cai Xukun and his former boss Yihai Culture can be traced back to 2015.
In 2015, Cai Xukun signed a contract with Haoshang Media (Hunan) Co., Ltd. for participating in the “Star Moving Asia”. During the recording of the program, due to the transfer of the program producer, Cai Xukun was told to transfer the same title with Komiks, otherwise he would not be able to continue to participate in the program. In order to continue to complete the program recording, Cai Xukun signed a brokerage contract with Yihai Culture on November 17, 2015, when Cai Xukun was 17 years old.
After the contract was signed, the two parties signed a supplementary contract in June 2016 and modified Cai Xukun’s termination compensation. For example, Cai Xukun’s unilateral termination compensation was changed from 8 million yuan to 80 million yuan, and the early termination compensation was changed from 3 million yuan per year to 30 million yuan per year.
In 2017, Cai Xukun proposed an explanation to Yihai Cultureand file a lawsuit. The main reason is that Yihai Culture unilaterally increased the contract liquidated damages and compensation at the same time, and also required Cai Xukun to bear the cost investment in his acting career activities and withdraw a high share of his acting activities income.
In addition, Cai Xukun believes that Yihai Culture has not fulfilled the performance arts brokerage obligations agreed in the contract, has not fulfilled the artist’s brokerage affairs management and operation obligations, and has not made complete and reasonable plans for his acting career, so it is impossible to improve professional and stable support for the better development of his acting career.
However, Yihai Culture tells another story. It stated that on November 12, 2015, he signed a brokerage contract and supplementary agreement with Cai Xu Kun, stipulating that he is Cai Xu Kun’s exclusive plenipotent broker, and the contract term will be April 17, 2023. After signing the contract, the company arranged for Cai Xukun to participate in the large-scale cultivation talent show “Star Moving Asia”, and arranged for her to go to South Korea to receive artist training and release albums, help Cai Xukun develop from a middle school student to a formal debut artist.
In January 2017, the company notified Cai Xukun to participate in the performance, but was rejected. Since then, Cai Xukun refused to participate in any activities arranged by the company. On February 10 of that year, Cai Xukun proposed to terminate the Brokerage Contract, and then filed a lawsuit with the court, demanding the revocation of the Brokerage Contract.
Yihai Culture does not agree to terminate the contract. In the counterclaim, Cai Xukun was ordered to pay 50 million yuan in breach of contract compensation, and paid 70% of all the acting income (including later advertising endorsement income) obtained by him in online dramas and variety shows “Idol Trainee” to the company.
On October 29, 2018, Jing’an Court made a judgment to terminate the brokerage contract and compensation agreement signed by both parties. However, regarding the compensation question caused by the termination of the contract, the judgment stated that the two parties can negotiate on their own, and if they fail to reach the negotiation, they can claim the corresponding rights separately. This also became the origin of future disputes between the two parties.
In November 2022Babaylan, Yihai Culture published several Weibo posts in succession, explaining the litigation matters with Cai Xukun, and disclosed a number of expenditure evidence.
Yihai Culture stated that after signing the contract with Cai Xukun in November 2015, the company invested a lot of money and resources to cultivate his acting career, shape his image and promote it, and his early termination of the contract caused huge losses to the company.
Yihai Culture has published evidence including training contracts signed for trainees such as Cai Xukun and some training and even plastic surgery fees. In addition, the company has arranged photos of the Komiks activity for the group where Cai Xukun is located, and related materials have attracted great attention.
In addition to going to court directly due to termination disputes, relevant legal documents show that in recent years, Yihai Culture has also sued Cai Xukun and his endorsed products and companies, including L’Oreal, Yangshengtang, VIVO, etc.
If he sued Cai Xukun, Cai Xukun Studio and VIVO Company, he believed that Cai Xukun and Cai Xukun Studio had cooperated with VIVO without the company’s consent, and agreed that Cai Xukun was the spokesperson for the vivox23 series mobile phone, and filmed a large number of advertisements and posters and other promotional materials.
Yihai Culture believes that its behavior infringes on its exclusive brokerage rights, constitutes unfair competition, seriously damages the legitimate rights and interests of Yihai Company, and causes significant economic losses to Yihai Company. However, most of these lawsuits ended with Yihai Culture’s withdrawal of the lawsuit.
For the first-instance judgment, many netizens congratulated Cai Xukun on winning the case and successfully terminated the contract↓
As well as netizens used this to warn young people who hoped to enter performing arts companies and MCN institutions↓
Source | BabaylanYangcheng Evening News·Yangcheng School Comprehensive Judgment Document Network, Upstream News, Securities Times, @Cai Xukun, Netizen Comments and other editors | Wu Xia