Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

Seeing the situation, Yu Chendong was filled with regret. He had long known that Zhou Hongyi was a troublemaker, and Lei Yijun was a marketing master skilled at capitalizing on hype.

If he didn’t respond, netizens would think the G800 Pro Sparkle’s design was trash and start flaming Huawei too. But if he did respond, he felt it wasn’t his battle to fight, since Huawei was only earning a design fee and a sales commission.

If he got involved, the hype would only spiral higher.

After some thought, Yu Chendong forced himself to resist the urge to jump in.

Zhou Hongyi and Lei Yijun’s flame war raged from morning till night, and netizens couldn’t get enough. Billionaire bosses, completely disregarding their status to put on such a thrilling show for them—of course, they had to watch the whole thing.

Before leaving work, Chen Yansen glanced at the state of the battle and couldn’t help but shake his head.

The level of tolerance on Weibo in 2012 was shockingly high.

Zhou Hongyi was clearly losing the argument to Lei Yijun. When Lin Bing came online, the situation turned into a three-on-one fight. Insults from people with a technical background always hit the hardest.

”Starting tomorrow, we’re subsidizing each phone by 100 yuan! I’ll show Lei Yijun that making phones takes no technical skill. Anyone can do it!”

Having argued with Lei Yijun online all day, Zhou Hongyi’s eyes were bloodshot with anger as he ordered his subordinate.

’A 100-yuan subsidy?’

’Wouldn’t that be another 5 million in losses?’

The head of 360 Mall glanced at his boss, nodded firmly, and quickly agreed.

’It’s only 5 million. The company can afford the loss!’

For every G800 Pro Sparkle sold, Huawei would take a 40-yuan commission. Meanwhile, Orange Mobile Phone’s manufacturing fee—which included SMT, testing, assembly, and packaging—came to 60 yuan per unit.

Adding in the patent licensing fees for Aurora OS and the battery management system, the hardware profit margin for the 360 Mobile Phone was almost zero.

To vent his anger, Zhou Hongyi had really gone all out.

At 10 a.m. the next morning, the 360 G800 Pro Sparkle went on sale right on schedule.

Yesterday’s flame war had brought the 360 Mobile Phone tens of millions of additional impressions.

Netizens who had previously looked down on the 360 Mobile Phone rushed to place orders after discovering the price on the page had dropped by another 100 yuan.

Flaming aside, there were plenty of clear-headed netizens. Comparing its specs to other brands, the 360 G800 Pro Sparkle’s price of just 1,199 yuan was the absolute pinnacle of cost-effectiveness, performance aside.

What’s more, Zhou Hongyi had promised a seven-day return-and-replace policy for any quality issues.

In the first hour after launch, sales hit 23,000 units!

This scene stunned the onlookers. ’Wait, you guys actually dared to buy it?!’

Lei Yijun sat in front of his computer, staring intently at the sales figures on the page and muttering, ”The numbers have to be fake!”

After all, the Haier W910 had barely sold 2,000 units in a week. It was impossible for the 360 G800 Pro Sparkle to sell 23,000 in just one hour.

But to Lei Yijun’s surprise, before it was even noon, the 360 Mobile Phone was sold out.

Five minutes later, the product was listed again, but the price had returned to 1,299 yuan, and it was now a pre-order link.

”Damn! I was still hesitating about submitting my order, and it already sold out.”

”Didn’t everyone say yesterday they weren’t going to buy it? Who the hell is snatching them all up?”

”See you all in Boss Zhou’s comment section in three days. I want to see how many people will be regretting it so much they’ll be cursing their mothers!”

Given the cautionary tale of the Haier W910, most netizens were pessimistic about the 360 Mobile Phone.

When Zhou Hongyi saw that all 50,000 units had sold out, he felt completely vindicated. He called Chen Yansen with a laugh and said, ”President Chen, I’ve put up the pre-order link.”

”Congratulations. How much stock do you need this time?” Chen Yansen asked nonchalantly.

For each 360 G800 Pro Sparkle produced, the manufacturing fee was 60 yuan, the component price difference was 55 yuan, and the patent licensing fee was 45 yuan, for a total of 160 yuan.

Zhou Hongyi was basically working for him!

So, the more 360 Mobile Phones sold, the better. He would make the money, and Lao Zhou would take the heat—a perfect win-win situation.

”I’ll give you a firm answer tomorrow.” Zhou Hongyi didn’t rush his decision, wanting to see today’s pre-order sales first.

”Alright, no problem,” Chen Yansen replied before hanging up.

He estimated that the total sales for the 360 G800 Pro Sparkle could reach around 2 million units.

After all, smartphone buyers in 2012 were easy to fool. A big screen, lots of memory, a high-megapixel camera—if you stacked the specs well and added a consumer-friendly price, it was guaranteed to sell.

Just like how a few years later, when 360 fully entered the mobile phone industry, it would have annual shipments of at least five to six million units.

A few minutes later, Lei Yijun called as well. ”President Chen, you’re manufacturing for the 360 Mobile Phone. Aren’t you afraid of getting flamed by netizens?”

”President Lei, my people are waiting to work and eat. Zhou Hongyi offered a high price. I hope you can understand,” Chen Yansen said with a faint, unhurried smile.

But inwardly, he was thinking: ’It’s really because you’re not trying hard enough to use up the Orange Phone Factory’s production capacity.’

”President Chen, what’s your sales forecast for the 360 G800 Pro Sparkle?” Lei Yijun asked bluntly.

”No less than a million units. Two million is also possible,” Chen Yansen answered truthfully.

He had spoken with Yu Chendong. Huawei was planning to tweak the G800 Pro Sparkle’s design and release it as their main model for the second half of the year to break into the low-to-mid-range market.

This showed that Huawei hadn’t short-changed Zhou Hongyi on the hardware and industrial design.

As long as 360’s pre-installed software could be uninstalled smoothly, selling two million units a year would be no problem at all.

”President Chen, you’re that confident in this product?” Lei Yijun was stunned. He trusted Chen Yansen’s judgment, which made him all the more surprised.

”The G800 Pro Sparkle is running on Aurora OS 1.3,” Chen Yansen stated plainly.

It sounded like a massive flex, but Lei Yijun knew that the Aurora OS really was that good.

For a few dazed seconds, he even wanted to abandon the MIUI system and jump ship to Aurora OS, but in the end, he forced himself to resist the impulse.

’If I even gave up on MIUI, what part of the Xiaomi Mobile Phone would still be ours?’

”You’re giving Zhou Hongyi an opportunity, but he might not appreciate it. Be careful he doesn’t turn around and bite you one day,” Lei Yijun warned.

”I’m very experienced when it comes to training dogs. President Lei, you should probably worry more about how you’re going to handle the impact of the 360 Mobile Phone,” Chen Yansen replied with a soft chuckle.

The rivalry between 360 and Xiaomi was, in reality, a competition pitting Huawei and Orange Technology against Xiaomi.

To be honest, Xiaomi held no advantage in either its OS or its hardware.

Lei Yijun knew full well that the first-generation Xiaomi Mobile Phone’s life cycle was at its end. To weaken the impact of the 360 Mobile Phone, Xiaomi had to quickly launch a thousand-yuan phone with comparable specs but stronger performance.

After dealing with Lei Yijun, Chen Yansen glanced at his watch, pushed open the door, went downstairs, and drove toward Xuyuan.

「Meanwhile.」

Even though the price of the 360 G800 Pro Sparkle had gone back up to 1,299 yuan, customers’ interest in placing orders didn’t diminish in the slightest.

In fact, some buyers in places like Hu City, Yanjing, and Jinling received their phones that very afternoon.

After testing them out, most buyers found that the 360 G800 Pro Sparkle’s performance was surprisingly good.

Perhaps because expectations were low enough, most users were very satisfied with 360’s first phone.

Suddenly, the comment sections on 360 Mall and Zhou Hongyi’s page were flooded with positive reviews.

Some tech bloggers even published in-depth ”hardcore” reviews of the 360 Mobile Phone.

This had an extremely positive effect on the 360 Mobile Phone’s pre-order sales.

By early morning, pre-orders for the 360 G800 Pro Sparkle had reached 86,000. Combined with the 50,000 units in stock, total sales on the launch day hit 136,000.

These numbers made Ding Lei, who had previously given up on making phones, suddenly reignite with interest.

’If even Zhou Hongyi can succeed, there’s no reason I can’t!’