Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

Taobao, Tmall Mall, Xiami Music, and UC Browser all placed promotional banners for new Profit Treasure customers in their most conspicuous locations. Even YunOS pushed marketing ads to its users.

When Ma Wenteng, far away at Penguin Headquarters in Shencheng City, heard the news, he curled his lip and commented with disgust, ”What a terrible name.”

”It sounds more like a financial product and doesn’t have a strong connection to managing spare change. The name alone is a failure,” Liu Zhiping teased with a chuckle.

In his opinion, ”Change Treasure” was a dozen times better than ”Profit Treasure.”

A good product starts with a good name.

”Unfortunately, Yixun Network and Paipai Network are completely unable to form a closed business loop with WeChat Pay and Change Treasure,” Ma Wenteng sighed.

He couldn’t help but recall his first meeting with Chen Yansen two years ago. The man had bluntly asserted that Penguin didn’t have the DNA for e-commerce and that throwing money at it would never yield results.

’He believed it now!’

Yixun Network and Paipai Network were like two piles of wet mud, completely unsalvageable.

”You win some, you lose some. Although the average amount of funds held per user in Change Treasure is less than Orange Pay, it has more activated users than Yu’e Bao.”

Liu Zhiping’s smile faded as he offered some quiet consolation.

Leveraging WeChat’s 300 million users, Change Treasure had accumulated over 60 million users just two months after its launch, while Yu’e Bao had 56 million.

However, Yu’e Bao’s total funds reached 230 billion Hua Yuan, an average of 4,100 yuan per person. Change Treasure, on the other hand, had only a little over 20 billion Hua Yuan, averaging 300 yuan per person.

In the users’ minds, WeChat was a social app, not a financial management tool.

The vast majority of users who activated Change Treasure only had a few dozen yuan in their accounts.

Hearing this, Ma Wenteng gave a helpless smile and casually asked, ”By the way, are the AFOS versions of QQ and WeChat ready? That kid, Chen Yansen, called a few days ago saying he wanted to invite me for tea, but he won’t even come to Shencheng City. What’s there to drink? It’s obvious he was just prodding me to get things done.”

”They’ve passed testing. The mobile R&D department reported that Aurora Future OS is more efficient at low-level resource scheduling. In the AFOS environment, WeChat starts 49% faster than on Android devices and 31% faster than on iOS. Power consumption and application lag have also been significantly optimized.”

Liu Zhiping replied with a serious expression.

”Are you saying that Aurora Future OS has better performance than Android and iOS?” Ma Wenteng asked, stunned for a moment before pressing for more.

”Pony, the hardest part of a mobile operating system is promotion and adoption. Even though Aurora Future OS provides standardized development tools and technical interfaces, lowering the barrier to entry and maintenance costs, trying to carve out a niche in a market dominated by Android and iOS is easier said than done,” Liu Zhiping said, shaking his head.

It wasn’t that he was pessimistic about Aurora Future OS, but an ecosystem barrier is never something built on technology and capital alone. You need the right time, the right place, and the right people—not one of those elements can be missing.

Wasn’t Microsoft powerful enough? Didn’t they have enough capital?

To promote Windows Phone, they poured in billions of US Dollars over the years and even partnered with an international mobile giant like Nokia. In the end, they couldn’t even capture 3% of the market share.

Although the shipment volume for Orange Mobile Phones isn’t low, it’s still a world away from Nokia in its heyday. So what if Aurora Future OS has stronger performance?

”It just gives users another option,” Ma Wenteng said with a shrug, unconcerned.

”Profit Treasure’s trial funds copied Yu’e Bao’s marketing strategy exactly. I never realized before that Ma Liyun is also a master-level plagiarist,” Liu Zhiping said sarcastically.

”Good things are meant to be ’learned from.’ Go talk to Xiaolong and have him come up with a plan as soon as possible. The trial funds model isn’t suitable for Change Treasure, but we can use an event with discount red envelopes to further increase the average funds held per user.”

Ma Wenteng leaned back and said nonchalantly.

Little Ma never agonized over whether something was plagiarism. Looking at the domestic internet scene, which boss wasn’t a ”porter” of ideas?

Winner takes all!

Whoever wins is the true originator!

Take the food delivery industry, for example. Who even remembers Eleme anymore?

Nowadays, when you talk about food delivery, everyone says Kuai Pao was the first delivery platform in the country.

Eleme?

Sorry, never heard of it!

”Okay,” Liu Zhiping agreed readily.

「Meanwhile.」

Facing the aggressive advance of Profit Treasure, Zhang Yinjia was already prepared. After an emergency meeting with the promotions department, he rushed straight to Chen Yansen’s conference room and pleaded, ”Boss, it’s just a gimmick. Please just agree to it.”

”Old Zhang, who did you pick up this bad habit from? Always trying to use your boss as a marketing tool at the drop of a hat?”

Chen Yansen scolded irritably, his face stern.

”Hehe, Boss, you have a huge following and generate a lot of buzz. I heard from Liang Bo that when Mao Chaorong’s Mimo first launched, it was all thanks to you advertising on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter that the product had a perfect start.”

Zhang Yinjia pulled over a chair and said shamelessly.

He paused, then added, ”You can’t play favorites, can you?”

Chen Yansen fought back the urge to curse. He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. After pondering for over ten seconds, he put on a look of resignation and said wearily, ”Do what you want. Just keep the number of spots low. I don’t have time to fool around with you on this.”

”Got it! Thanks, Boss! I’ll tell finance later to add an appearance fee for you,” Zhang Yinjia joked boldly.

”Get out!” Chen Yansen cursed.

Zhang Yinjia grinned and scurried gleefully out of the office.

Chen Yansen’s brow furrowed. ’This unhealthy trend seems to have been started by Ye Qiuping.’

Thinking of this, President Chen immediately sent out a text message: ”Come to my office.”

That afternoon, Orange Pay launched the ”Invest in Yu’e Bao and Split 10 Billion in Trial Funds” event.

The rules were as follows: from February 28th to March 31st, based on the daily average amount held in a Yu’e Bao account, the 1st place winner would receive 3 billion in trial funds (valid for one day); 2nd to 10th place would each receive 300 million in trial funds; 11th to 50th place would each receive 50 million in trial funds; 51st to 100th place would each receive 20 million in trial funds; and 101st to 200th place would split the remaining 1.3 billion in trial funds.

Ten billion sounded impressive, but based on a 5% seven-day annualized yield, the daily return was just over 1.3 million.

The top ten winners would also receive a 64GB Orange C3, and the first-place winner would get to have lunch with the founder of Senlian Capital.

Just ten minutes after the event went live, the amount held by the person in first place on the Yu’e Bao leaderboard broke 1 million.

The buzz on platforms like Weibo, Toutiao, Penguin News, Sohu, and NetEase exploded instantly.

The money was secondary. The chance to dine with a mega-billionaire worth fifty billion US Dollars—even getting just a few words of advice—would be immensely beneficial.

It was practically the Hua Country version of ”Buffett’s Lunch”!

And you didn’t even have to spend tens of millions like a sucker; you just had to invest in Yu’e Bao.

Entrepreneurs who wanted to meet Chen Yansen, get funding from Senlian Capital, or just ride the wave of hype all made their moves. In less than half an hour, the first-place Yu’e Bao total had surpassed 5 million.

The amount held by the person in 200th place was 193,000.

”Wait, are we living in the same Hua Country?”

”I’m crying. I’ve worked for ten years and only have 27,000 in savings.”

”Dude above me, at least you have savings. I’m different—I’m all debt.”

”It’s only been half an hour. You don’t think first place will pass 30 million by tomorrow, do you?”

”Fucking hell, I just realized today that I have a problem with hating the rich.”

Netizens chattered away, all discussing the event.

「At the same time.」

Seeing this, the banks and financial companies blew up the complaint hotlines for the Bank Association and the Fund Management Association.

’Orange Pay and Wealth Treasure are openly violating regulations. Are the authorities blind?’

’Can’t they see?’

According to Article 24 of the ”Administrative Measures for the Sale of Investment Funds,” the sale of funds through methods such as lotteries, rebates, or the gifting of physical items, insurance, or fund shares is prohibited.

Before, when Orange Pay was giving out trial funds, everyone tolerated it. But now they were giving away Orange Mobile Phones. They were completely dancing on a knife’s edge—it was so fucking arrogant.

Two hours later, Chen Yansen received a call. After hearing the other party’s demands, he didn’t say much, simply calling Zhang Yinjia over and telling him to cancel the mobile phone reward. The trial funds would remain.

Immediately after, the event page rules were slightly adjusted.

The event continued as usual, completely unaffected.

When Ma Liyun saw that the authorities weren’t intervening, he immediately decided to copy Yu’e Bao’s event wholesale.

The banks and financial companies were completely dumbfounded.

’Is this fucking legal?’

As a result, the very next day, Change Treasure also launched a corresponding discount red envelope event: purchase 1,000 yuan of Change Treasure and instantly get an 8.8 yuan discount!