Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

This was tantamount to giving the factory and Cao Dahua a protective talisman.

The major associations in Shencheng City also handed out a slew of awards, such as ”National-Level Green Factory,” the ”2012 ESG Model Enterprise Award,” the ”Outstanding Contribution to Asia’s Electronics Industry Award,” and ”Lighthouse Factory.”

After all, Orange Mobile Phone was the top brand for smartphone shipments in Hua Country and the sixth-largest globally in 2012. If Shencheng City couldn’t protect it, plenty of other first- and second-tier cities were willing to offer preferential policies like free land and low-interest loans.

Still, Cao Dahua worried about running into some reckless hothead. ’I should buy a bulletproof Mercedes and have the boss reimburse me for it,’ he thought to himself.

”Another raise and we’ll hit thirty, right?”

”That means a base salary of four thousand a month!”

”The boss totally deserves to be making bank!”

Over twenty thousand employees were ecstatic, joy written all over their faces. They wanted to build a shrine to Chen Yansen and worship him as the God of Wealth.

Five minutes later, Chen Yansen ended the video call.

He had no choice. The group had too many holding subsidiaries. If he attended one party a day like last year, he probably wouldn’t be finished by the Lantern Festival.

「At nine in the morning」, a black-and-white Gusteau rolled into the Zhuxianzhuang Science and Technology Park.

Chen Yansen opened the car door and stepped out, heading into Building Six.

”Class Rep, Happy New Year!” Xu Xingxing, wearing a bright red Ming-style New Year’s outfit, grinned and handed him a red envelope.

”Supervisor Xu, Happy New Year!” Chen Yansen said teasingly as he took the red envelope.

Xu Xingxing had been with him since the FoxTao project. After two and a half years of honing her skills, she was finally promoted from team lead to supervisor in January. While she hadn’t risen as quickly as people like Zhang Yifeng or Xiang Pengfei, her progress was still outstanding.

”Class Rep, Mr. Huang is in the second-floor conference room,” Xu Xingxing reminded him.

Chen Yansen nodded and slipped the red envelope into his pocket.

On the last day before the holiday, the administration department had organized a red envelope giveaway in every office building.

The amounts weren’t huge—fifty, a hundred, two hundred, up to eight hundred yuan at most. It was just a gesture for good luck.

He went to his top-floor office, boiled some water, and made tea.

Chen Yansen leaned back on the sofa, pulled out his phone, fired up his VPN, logged into Mimo, and started scrolling through short videos.

The weather in the North American Region was warm, so even in winter, most of the girls wore revealing clothes. He scrolled past more than a dozen videos in a row featuring busty women.

’I’ve trained this algorithm well.’

A slight smile touched Chen Yansen’s lips.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK!

”Come in.”

Chen Yansen quietly put his phone away and called out.

Huang Zheng, fresh from a meeting with the Investment Attraction and Operations Department, pushed the door open and came in. ”Happy New Year, Boss,” he said with a smile.

”Here, this is for you.”

Chen Yansen grabbed a folder and tossed it to him.

Pinbei Technology Stock Option Transfer Agreement!

Huang Zheng took one look and felt his hard work over the past few months had paid off.

He’d come from Hang City to Xucheng, working from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. every single day. He wasn’t here to suffer; he was here to get paid.

”Thank you, Boss,” Huang Zheng said, grinning.

A total of 1 million shares, worth 11 million US Dollars. That was a huge step up from his annual income when he had his own startup, and this was on top of his salary and bonuses.

”What time does the annual party start tonight?” Chen Yansen asked.

”Six o’clock,” Huang Zheng replied. ”Some of the staff have to catch their trains right after the prize drawing.”

”Thanks for your hard work,” Chen Yansen said encouragingly. He paused, then continued, ”Pinbei did 317.4 billion in sales last year. I want to double that in 2013 and break a trillion in 2014. Whether or not we surpass Ah Li isn’t important. We just need to focus on being our best.”

”Yes, Boss. I understand,” Huang Zheng quickly replied.

”I was just looking around. The workstations in Building Six are too crowded. Let’s move the Customer Service Department, the Investment Attraction and Operations Department, and the Events Department to Building Five.”

Chen Yansen added after a moment of thought.

Pinbei was expanding so fast that the eleven-story office building was crammed to the brim with over three thousand employees.

”I’ll have the administration department coordinate the move for after the New Year,” Huang Zheng replied.

”Old Gao transferred a red envelope budget to your Orange Pay account. Keep it for giving out red envelopes to your subordinates over the New Year: 1,000 yuan for team leads, 3,000 for supervisors, 5,000 for directors, 10,000 for department managers, and 50,000 for project heads. Make sure you spend every last bit,” Chen Yansen instructed.

”No problem. Mission accepted,” Huang Zheng said with a cheerful grin.

After giving his instructions, Chen Yansen asked quietly, ”When are you heading back?”

”Back to Hang City tomorrow morning,” Huang Zheng replied instantly.

”Have some tea.” Chen Yansen picked up a cup of hot tea and offered it to Huang Zheng.

Huang Zheng thanked him profusely and took a small sip from the cup.

When he first started working for Chen Yansen, he’d felt a little awkward, worried that his young boss would be arrogant and difficult to work for. But after a few months, he found Chen Yansen to be even more composed and steady than Duan Yongping.

He was generous and incredibly patient, and he never arbitrarily changed strategic direction over minor setbacks.

Xiang Hailong, however, wasn’t so lucky. Li Yanhong was incredibly impatient. He’d said bluntly that if DiDi Dache couldn’t capture 20% of the market by the end of Q2, the CEO would be replaced.

In reality, after the subsidy war ended, Xiang Hailong had steadily consolidated his position in the North China, East China, Central China, Southern China, and Northeast regions. Although his market share hadn’t budged, daily orders had climbed from 600,000 to 900,000. By leveraging the Qian Du Map ecosystem, DiDi Dache was gradually building a loyal user base.

Xiang Hailong’s approach was steady and stable, but Li Yanhong couldn’t afford the loss of face!

That was because Fast Taxi’s daily volume had already surpassed 8 million orders, giving it nearly ninety percent of the market share.

Ever since Xiang Hailong had taken over the project, DiDi Dache’s market share had been in a freefall, plummeting from 25% to just over 10%.

This made Li Yanhong’s move to kick out Cheng Wei and replace the CEO with one of his own men look like a complete farce.

If Cheng Wei had been incompetent, it would have been understandable for the investors to sideline the founder. But after leaving DiDi Dache, he went on to make DiDi Bike a roaring success. In contrast, Li Yanhong’s hand-picked successor, Xiang Hailong, was performing even worse than Cheng Wei had.

As a result, the Qian Du Network ran into trouble with its acquisition of UC Browser. He Xiaopeng didn’t trust Li Yanhong. After weighing his options, he actually rejected Qian Du’s offer and started cozying up with Ma Liyun instead.

Li Yanhong glared at Xiang Hailong, his face a mask of displeasure. He waved a dismissive hand, telling him to get out.

A moment later, Wang Zhongpu, the head of Qian Du Delivery, came in and sat down opposite Li Yanhong.

”Boss, there’s an issue that requires your final say,” Wang Zhongpu began slowly. ”Our delivery drivers in places like Yanjing, Changshan, and Jinmen will be heading back to their hometowns in the next day or two. That’s going to create a vacuum in our delivery capacity. Should we increase the per-order rate and offer rush bonuses during the Spring Festival period to incentivize them to stay?”

”How much have daily orders in the Yanjing Region dropped compared to last week?” Li Yanhong asked.

”Fifty percent.” Wang Zhongpu sighed softly. He understood what his boss was getting at.

”The non-local population is around forty percent, which means order volume still has more room to fall,” Li Yanhong said dismissively. ”What’s the point of just raising the per-order rate and rush bonuses? Their overall income will still go down. It’s useless unless you do what Kuai Pao does and give the riders a base salary.”

In his view, it wasn’t worth wasting money on just forty percent of the order volume. Besides, there were always more riders.

Wang Xin thought along the same lines as Li Yanhong, but he was more cautious.

He knew that a delivery rider who was familiar with the routes and residential complex layouts was three to five times more efficient than the average person. These were the riders worth trying to win over.

So, after discussing it with Wang Huiwen, he hand-picked a select group of riders. From February 9th to February 12th, they would receive an extra daily subsidy of 200 yuan. From February 13th to February 15th, the subsidy would be 100 yuan per day. On top of that, he also increased the per-order rate and rush bonuses.

Compared to Qian Du Delivery, Meituan Takeout was at least willing to spend some money.

The north wind cut like a knife through the streets of Yanjing.

Jiang Hao had just finished the morning rush. He pulled his orange windbreaker tighter. It had a goose-down liner inside, so it was plenty warm.

Just as he was thinking about heading back to the station for a cup of tea, he saw a few Qian Du Delivery drivers in their red windbreakers up ahead.

Jiang Hao scowled in disgust. Their uniforms were filthy, a disgrace to the entire delivery industry.