Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

It was a complete vicious cycle.

The bitter fruit Wang Xin had sown himself was finally coming back to bite him.

April 16th, Meituan’s daily orders: 37,000!

April 17th, Meituan’s daily orders: 24,000!

April 18th, Meituan’s daily orders: 15,000!

A staggering sixty percent drop!

Meituan Takeout’s operational area might have only covered the two major regions of North China and the Northeast, but it still spanned over 60 cities. On average, this meant that in an area with a population of over a million, there were only about 200 orders per day.

Revenue was less than 30,000 yuan!

That much income wasn’t even enough to cover server costs.

Wang Xin hadn’t expected the chain reaction from the layoffs to be so much worse than he’d imagined. But there was nothing he could do. His only option was to pull back his defenses and find ways to expand his business boundaries, hoping to survive the first half of 2013.

When Ma Liyun saw Meituan’s performance plummet, he was instantly relieved. ’Good thing I wasn’t greedy and didn’t go for a cheap buy.’

Buy on the way up, not on the way down!

A startup on a downward trend might look lush and leafy, but its roots are completely rotten. It doesn’t have much time left.

Pei Yi gathered Shan Jiawei, Zhang Xuhao, Liang Changlin, and others. After a morning of discussion, they quickly devised a ”boil the frog slowly” strategy to encircle Meituan and devour its market share.

Their methods couldn’t be too aggressive. A cornered beast will still fight.

If they provoked Wang Xin’s ruthless side and made him throw his last remaining cash reserves into a fight to the death with Kuai Pao, they wouldn’t be afraid, but it wasn’t worth the risk.

Qian Du and Dianping had the same idea. They were silently nibbling away at Meituan’s market share. Their moves were light and slow, seemingly harmless, yet they took a bite out of Meituan every single day.

In the eyes of their competitors, Meituan was doomed!

Meanwhile, because Kuai Pao was expanding its grocery business, Kuai Pao Maicai, it was in dire need of people. Just by increasing its number of job openings, it caused Meituan’s workforce to shrink by another 10%.

Moreover, most of these people were the backbones of their respective departments.

Among those who remained, the proportion of people slacking off and coasting by was even higher.

After learning about Meituan’s recent situation, Chen Yansen felt that Wang Xin’s performance was much weaker than he had expected, but he didn’t pay it much mind.

He had already crushed Eleme. Crushing Meituan would be no harder than squashing an ant.

After all, this was just the Meituan of 2013, not the industry giant from a decade later with millions of riders, over 100 million daily orders, and more than 300 billion in revenue.

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「Shaopei Town, Yunsu Express Service Station.」

”Manager Wu, is the Qingcheng D2 in stock yet?”

”Uncle Zhang, I’m just a lowly station manager. You can just call me Xiaowu. I set one aside especially for you.”

As Wu Lei spoke, he handed over a brand-new Qingcheng D2.

In the month since the Qingcheng D2 had launched, he had sold over 1,900 units in total.

He’d sold over 300 Orange C3S models and 23 Yaocheng X1s.

Before this, he could never have imagined that the purchasing power of the township market was so astonishing.

”Alright, Manager Wu. Hurry and install Pinbei for me. Lao Li next door said new users can get six eggs for free. And if you play some kind of watering and farming game every day, you get free apples, bananas, and toilet paper?”

Old Zhang grinned, urging Wu Lei to teach him how to shop online.

”Uncle Zhang, you’re talking about Pinbei Orchard. If you play it every day, it’ll use over 200 MB of data a month. What kind of phone plan do you have?”

Wu Lei reminded him.

”I think it’s called M-Zone. 50 MB a month,” Old Zhang said after a moment’s thought.

”In that case, I suggest you get a Star Shining Card. Then you can watch Toutiao and play Pinbei Orchard without spending a single cent on data.”

Wu Lei seized the opportunity to make a sales pitch.

He was also worried that Old Zhang would come back in a month with a phone bill for several hundred yuan and give him trouble.

”What’s the monthly fee?” Old Zhang asked cautiously.

”The monthly fee is 19 yuan. The plan includes 500 MB of nationwide data and 100 minutes of talk time. Data is free for over a dozen apps, including Pinbei and Toutiao, with a monthly cap of 40 GB.”

After speaking, Wu Lei pulled out a flyer and patiently explained it to him.

Of course, his enthusiasm wasn’t free. For every phone card he sold, he received a commission.

”Holy shit! For real?” Old Zhang looked astonished.

”Now I don’t like the sound of that!” Wu Lei said with a straight face, snatching the flyer back.

”Hey, don’t do that! I’ll get it, I’ll get it!” Old Zhang said with a laugh.

Wu Lei’s tactic of feigning retreat to advance worked every time.

Everyone has their guard up. Being too enthusiastic can make people feel like you have ulterior motives. But if you take a strategic step back, they’ll chase after you.

Hu Peng suppressed a laugh, got a Star Shining Card for Old Zhang, and showed him how to activate it over the phone.

A short while later, Old Zhang headed home, delighted with his ultra-thin, large-screen Qingcheng D2.

”Brother Lei, another sale!” Hu Peng said with a smile.

”The Qingcheng D2 sells so well. Customers in the townships don’t care at all whether the phone’s operating system is Aurora Future or Android.”

Wu Lei couldn’t help but sigh with emotion.

”The commission is higher for the Qingcheng D2 with Aurora Future, so who would bother selling the Android version?” Hu Peng said with a pout.

「Meanwhile.」

In a conference room in Office Building No. 9 at the Zhuxianzhuang Science and Technology Park.

Chen Yansen leaned back in his chair, staring silently at the PPT on the screen.

Zhou Shouzhi sat to his left.

To his right, Yan Peng looked down at his laptop screen and slowly reported, ”As of April 21st, our three new products have been on the market for 35 days, with a cumulative total of 13.64 million units sold. This includes 11.6 million units of the Qingcheng D2, 1.507 million units of the Orange C3S, and 533,000 units of the Yaocheng X1.”

He paused for a moment before continuing, ”It’s worth noting that the sales share from Yunsu Express Service Stations has grown extremely quickly, now reaching 19.3%. The Qingcheng D2 accounts for a staggering 82.6% of those sales, and of those, 91.7% are the version equipped with the Aurora Future System.”

Chen Yansen nodded slightly and looked at Zhou Shouzhi. ”It seems that promoting the Aurora Future System will have to rely on the rural market.”

”Liao Wei has reported that when users currently encounter after-sales issues, they either have to mail their device to a nearby flagship store or send it back to the Shencheng City or Luzhou factories. All that back and forth takes too much time.”

”Boss, are you saying we should select a batch of authorized dealers?” Zhou Shouzhi asked.

”I’m more inclined to open our own stores. Smaller scale, but they can handle both sales and after-sales service.”

Chen Yansen gave his answer directly.

Mountain Star, Coolpad, OPPO, and VIVO have been living too comfortably on their offline sales networks, enjoying high gross margins with few problems.

President Chen couldn’t stand to see his competitors having such an easy time!

”Yes, I understand,” Zhou Shouzhi immediately replied.

”Where have we decided for the first stop in the Western European market?” Chen Yansen asked.

”Germany. We’ve coordinated with the local carriers. The launch will be around mid-May, initially focusing on the Qingcheng D2 and the Orange C3S,” Zhou Shouzhi answered.

”Good. Continue,” Chen Yansen said with a wave of his hand.

Next, the newly appointed Director of the Brand Department, Wang Shixiang, began his report.

Ye Qiuping was now in charge of the Senlian Star Shining Card project, so she couldn’t hold her old position long-term. A capable supervisor had been selected from within the company and promoted.

He was a former member of Nokia’s Asian Region brand department, so he had been tempered at a top-tier international company. His fundamentals were solid, he spoke in a structured manner, and he was willing to think on his feet.

Chen Yansen listened with satisfaction and didn’t raise any questions.

Seeing this, Wang Shixiang was delighted and breathed a secret sigh of relief.

An hour later, the weekly meeting ended. Chen Yansen had Lao Zhou stay behind, and they discussed the construction of the offline channel network for another ten-plus minutes before he let Zhou Shouzhi leave.

The Orange Intelligent Life Halls currently numbered 270 stores, located mainly in tier-one, -two, -three, and -four cities, with limited influence in the sinking market.

If they could achieve a full rollout of company-owned stores in townships, perhaps Orange Mobile Phone’s sales could reach the next level.

Back in his office, Chen Yansen glanced at his watch, shut down his computer, and turned to walk toward the elevators.

As the boss, leaving on time could also help to correct the unhealthy and corrupting custom of working overtime at the company.

”Lao Huang, we’re not going back to the Delta today,” Chen Yansen said softly after getting into the car.

Huang Boxiang understood instantly. He drove the eight-million-plus-yuan Rolls-Royce toward their destination.

「Elsewhere.」

Liang Changlin and his team arrived in Yanjing for the first time, bringing with them the Kuai Pao Maicai project.

A city with a population of nearly 20 million!

This market was no smaller than Hu City’s!