Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

Finally, Marques asked with a solemn expression, ”Will you destroy humanity?”

The video cut off abruptly!

It sent a shiver down the audience’s spines, like an electric shock!

At the end, Marques included the product name and announced that the Smart Speaker would be released simultaneously on Amazon, Best Buy, Walmart, and eBay in one week.

Orange Technology Co. Ltd?

A manufacturer no one had ever heard of!

But in the eyes of his viewers, Marques’s recommendations were always meticulous and professional. Even if the Alexa Smart Speaker turned out to be a piece of crap, some people would still want to give it a try.

Such was the influence of a popular influencer.

Many similar review videos appeared on YouTube and Facebook. Some went viral, while others were completely ignored. But after brewing online for about a week, Alexa’s reputation grew louder and louder in both the tech and gadget communities.

After all, with a gimmick like ”the world’s first artificial intelligence Smart Speaker,” it was hard *not* to get famous.

What’s more, Wang Teng didn’t skimp on marketing. Not only did he hire international influencers for product seeding, but he also ran image and video ads on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Google, and Hulu.

First day of launch: 19,000 total overseas sales!

Second day of launch: 32,000 total overseas sales!

Third day of launch: 54,000 total overseas sales!

Then, the Alexa Smart Speaker unexpectedly appeared in a photo Justin posted on Facebook. Even though only half of it was visible, it was still spotted by sharp-eyed fans.

Sales of the ”Justin” Smart Speaker on Amazon exploded instantly!

Fourth day of launch: 87,000 total overseas sales!

It was no surprise. In 2012, Justin’s popularity in North America was at its absolute peak. He had over 43 million fans on Facebook, over 24 million followers on Twitter, and his YouTube videos had more than 2.7 billion views.

”You hired Justin Bieber? Why don’t I see that cost in the marketing plan?”

Chen Yansen asked Wang Teng during a meeting.

”Boss, it was a total coincidence! I don’t have the extra marketing budget to hire a celebrity.”

Wang Teng chuckled slyly. ’My luck is insane,’ he thought. ’Getting this for free is fucking awesome!’

As for hiring a celebrity spokesperson?

Neither Wang Teng nor Chen Yansen had ever considered it.

The reason was simple: the return on investment was too low. Besides, with the Alexa Smart Speaker’s high material costs and low gross margin, it wasn’t like a high-margin luxury item or cosmetic. A combination of online and offline sales channels would suffice.

”Eleven days since the domestic launch, we’ve sold a total of 89,000 units. Four days since the overseas launch, we’re at 192,000 units. I guess you could say it’s more popular abroad than at home.”

Chen Yansen smiled faintly, his gaze sweeping over the report.

A cumulative total of 281,000 units sold worldwide!

Total sales revenue of 320 million!

While there was still a gap compared to the sales figures for the Orange C2 and Orange D2, in Chen Yansen’s eyes, the Alexa Smart Speaker had already far exceeded his expectations.

The overseas market was less price-sensitive, and the reception for Alexa was also quite high.

Chen Yansen then turned to Ye Qiuping and asked, ”Is the Paramount deal settled?”

”An 8% commission. Sales channels will be focused on the official Paramount store, movie theater concession stands, authorized retailers, and theme park shops. We expect to be ready for distribution by early July.”

Ye Qiuping confirmed with a nod.

Zhou Chuangxi, Daniel, Yan Peng, and the others couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief, looks of joy appearing on their faces.

From system development to hardware design and finally to its sales launch, the Alexa Smart Speaker had consumed nearly a billion in manpower, materials, and financial resources.

The large server cluster deployed in the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory alone, including installation and maintenance, cost four hundred million.

On top of that, there was the R&D team of over 200 people and the hardware investment for training the deep learning algorithms.

If the market response had been mediocre, it would have been unacceptable to the R&D engineers, including Zhou Chuangxi and Daniel, let alone to Chen Yansen.

’Good things come to those who wait!’

’If the product’s performance is solid, the sales won’t be low!’

Chen Yansen thought to himself.

After the Alexa Smart Speaker became a huge hit in overseas markets, some people with a keen business sense immediately sent its design, feature list, and component teardown diagrams to factories back home, intending to create a one-to-one clone.

But as the hardware designers at the domestic factories examined the materials, they felt something was off. Then it hit them—this was just the Moss Smart Speaker!

Aside from the name and the app ecosystem, the two products were completely identical.

It turned out that Alexa and the Moss Smart Speaker were the same product all along.

The would-be counterfeiters were dumbfounded when they found out. Once they understood that the core of a Smart Speaker was its built-in voice assistant, they had no choice but to give up on their plan to copy it.

The hardware was easy enough to replicate, but they couldn’t crack the smart voice system.

”Awesome! Raking in $40 Million in Four Days—Moss Smart Speaker Achieves Fame and Fortune Abroad!”

”The World’s First AI Speaker, as Seen with Justin, Wins Countless Fans Overseas!”

”Man Brings High-Tech Gadget Back from the Lighthouse Country, Only to Find It’s Made in Shencheng City?”

Perhaps because the Alexa Smart Speaker was selling like crazy on Amazon, or perhaps thanks to the boost from the ”Justin effect,” on the last day of June, the Moss Smart Speaker’s sales skyrocketed. Its total online sales, which had fallen to an average of just over 5,000 units per day, suddenly surged against the trend amidst massive social media hype, hitting 47,000 units in a single day.

It even surpassed the sales from its initial launch day during the 618 festival!

Meanwhile, in the North American market, it smashed records, selling an unprecedented 100,000 units in a single day.

Chen Yansen had effectively jump-started the Smart Speaker market, maturing it two years ahead of time. Seeing this, Amazon, Google, and Microsoft all announced their entry into the Smart Speaker market.

Back in China, Ke Da Xunfei, Qian Du, and Xiaomi were green with envy.

In just five days, it had generated $60 million in overseas sales. Even though the sales velocity was expected to drop significantly, over the course of a year—factoring in the markets in Europe and America, Australia, and South America—it could still generate at least $2 billion in revenue. Who wouldn’t be tempted by that?

Lei Yijun immediately called Chen Yansen and asked tentatively, ”President Chen, is Orange Technology licensing the patents for its voice interaction engine?”

’R&D is too slow,’ he thought. ’Nothing beats using a ready-made solution!’

”President Lei, you must be joking. The smart voice interaction engine is Orange Technology’s core patent—it’s several orders of magnitude more important than even Aurora OS,” Chen Yansen refused flatly.

”Haha, just a casual question. Don’t mind me, President Chen. By the way, the date for the 11th Internet Conference has been set. Will you be attending?”

Lei Yijun gave an embarrassed laugh and quickly changed the subject.

”I’ll probably go. But President Lei, while I can’t license the patents for the smart voice interaction engine to Xiaomi, I *can* license the patents for our Language Analysis Development Platform.”

Chen Yansen said with a smile.

It would be difficult for Orange Technology to bring down the training costs for AI chips, computing power, and big data on its own. While he could maintain a lead on the software side, the hardware domain involved far too many complex technical elements. Therefore, the only way to build up the market was to use profit as the driving force. It was just like his approach in the food delivery and ride-hailing sectors: making money was the prime directive.

”The Language Analysis Development Platform?”

Lei Yijun was taken aback. He hadn’t expected such a sudden plot twist.

With Chen Yansen’s explanation, he quickly grasped the difference between the voice interaction engine and the language analysis development tools. The former was the finished product; the latter was the production toolkit.

The Language Analysis Development Platform included technical solutions for voice recognition, natural language processing, and speech synthesis. A company only needed to feed it voice and text data for algorithm training, or connect it to Qian Du’s search API, and they could develop a voice interaction product similar to Moss (Alexa).

Lei Yijun agreed without a moment’s hesitation, and the two immediately began discussing the licensing fees.

Chen Yansen already had a plan prepared. He laid out the predetermined fee structure for him, item by item.

After hearing the long list of fees, a hesitant look appeared on Lei Yijun’s face. ’This is fucking brutal,’ he thought.