Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

”Chen Yansen, I finished my college entrance exams.”

”Brother Jensen, are you coming back to Chunshen for the Dragon Boat Festival?”

”I finished knitting the gloves. I want to give them to you in person. Why are you ignoring me? I’m mad!”

Chen Yansen lay on the sofa, casually scrolling through the messages from Wang Ziyan.

It wasn’t hard to see that her mood had gone from jubilant to full of anticipation, and then to pitifully aggrieved, all in the span of an hour.

Looks innocent, but she’s a deep one.

President Chen had suffered at her hands in his last life, so he naturally wasn’t willing to fall for it again in this one.

As the saying goes, a fall into a pit, a gain in your wit. There was no need to step into the same trap twice.

Although with his current cunning and intelligence, he could completely dominate Wang Ziyan, Chen Yansen dismissed the thought of repeating his past mistakes every time he thought of Wang Zihao, Wang Zhanjun, and Wen Shumei.

Some places, you only need to stick it in once.

But then he thought of Ye Qiuping, and it felt like a slap in the face.

’You’ve really mastered the art of hypocrisy.’

Chen Yansen gave a self-deprecating laugh as an image of Wang Ziyan in her mid-twenties surfaced in his mind. Those bewitching eyes had almost made President Chen fall for her.

After reading the messages, he sent her the shipping address for the Science and Technology Park’s security office.

The implication was clear: just send it by mail.

By the next morning, Chen Yansen still hadn’t received a reply from Wang Ziyan. He just assumed she was throwing a childish tantrum and didn’t give it much thought.

Besides, he didn’t have time to deal with Wang Ziyan.

From ten in the morning to four in the afternoon, he went through one weekly meeting after another for Pinbei, Orange Technology, Today Technology, Tiangong Technology, and Orange Pay.

Yang Rui took two subordinates and headed directly to Jinling to begin the store inspection process.

After ten days of fierce competition, Qian Du Network and Senlian Capital had burned through over 700 million yuan in total. Even Li Yanhong was starting to feel the strain.

He had originally planned to fight it out until the end of June, but he couldn’t withstand his wife’s constant pillow talk.

”Qian Du’s market cap has dropped by 6 billion US Dollars. The core reason is the declining market share of our search business. Robin, you should focus your resources on the main business,” his wife advised.

At first, Li Yanhong disagreed, insisting on capturing a thirty-percent market share before anything else. But after his wife’s repeated persuasion, he relented and scaled back the offensive, slashing the marketing budget in half.

As a result, the moment the discounts for Qian Du Delivery, Qian Du Group Buy, and DiDi Dache were reduced, order volume plummeted by sixty percent.

After all, most users were only there for the no-strings-attached cash bonuses.

Kuai Pao and Fast Taxi’s subsidy campaigns also tightened their policies. Although they were still giving out cash bonuses, they were now targeted only toward high-net-worth, high-repurchase-rate users.

The pressure lessened considerably in an instant!

On the user side, there was widespread outcry. They felt the ”subsidy war” between the two companies hadn’t lasted long enough, ending after just ten days.

But how could they know that in those ten days, Senlian Capital and Qian Du Network had burned through a combined 1.5 billion yuan?

Although the current promotional activities had been scaled back, the daily cash burn still remained around fifty million yuan.

Whoever couldn’t hold on first would be the first to be eliminated!

Sanbao Group, which had just taken over Meituan, injected an additional two hundred million yuan at once, but it was all gone in less than a week.

Dianping didn’t even have a seat at the table. From May to early June, its business volume shrank rapidly, first falling below the one-billion-yuan mark, then struggling to even hold onto 800 million. Its transaction volume for May didn’t even reach 600 million.

Meanwhile, Manzuo, Dida, and Pinzhituan, who had survived the ”War of a Thousand Groupons,” also died a silent death in this storm and went completely bankrupt.

Taodian’s average daily order volume shrank by seventy percent. In the vast Jiangsu and Zhejiang market, it was left with just over 9,000 orders a day.

Daojia Meishihui, Dianwoba, and Lvtaowang saw their orders cut in half. The newly established Shenghuo Banqing, Yitaoshi, and Delivery Superman were crushed by the ”joint effort” of Kuai Pao and Qian Du Delivery before they could even secure their first round of funding.

In an instant, the group-buy, food delivery, and ride-hailing industries were littered with casualties.

In the midst of this great war, countless cannon-fodder platforms were sacrificed, among them some that might have one day become unicorns.

But they couldn’t even survive the present, so how could they even talk about the future?

While engaged in hand-to-hand combat, Senlian Capital and Qian Du Network were also conducting a major purge of the industry.

The small players were automatically eliminated!

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「Xucheng, Zhuxianzhuang Science and Technology Park.」

The weather in Hubei was gradually changing from warm to hot. The nearby wheat fields were a mix of green and yellow, a sign that the harvest season was not far off.

Chen Yansen sat in his office, scrolling the mouse wheel with his right hand. He quickly finished reading a technical document filled with text and diagrams.

”High-Density Lithium-Sulfur Battery Design Proposal!”

He had laid out the technical direction last year. It had taken the Shencheng City R&D lab a full year to finally overcome all the technical hurdles.

If he had personally led the R&D team, it probably would have been done in less than two months.

But Chen Yansen had no desire to spend all day in a lab doing R&D.

A mobile phone battery R&D lab is a complex system of multiple coordinated zones where humidity, cleanliness, safety, electromagnetic compatibility, and other factors all require strict control.

He would set the general direction; the specific implementation could be left to his subordinates.

After a moment of thought, Chen Yansen named it the ”Deep Blue Battery.”

Compared to the mainstream lithium batteries of 2013, the Deep Blue Battery had an energy density of 600 watt-hours per kilogram, nearly triple the amount.

If a Deep Blue Battery weighed 50 grams, it would be enough to power a 1-watt mobile device for 30 consecutive hours.

In reality, a phone’s power consumption is only 0.01 to 0.1 watts in standby mode; about 0.5 to 2 watts when browsing the web, reading text, or chatting on WeChat; and about 2 to 4 watts when playing intensive games, watching high-definition videos, or video calling.

In other words, the Deep Blue Battery had triple the battery life of a conventional lithium battery.

Although lithium-sulfur batteries have a short lifespan due to the polysulfide shuttle effect, Chen Yansen’s design used a solution of graphene-coated sulfur particles plus a metal diaphragm, combined with a flexible sulfide solid-state electrolyte, to effectively suppress the shuttle effect.

This not only solved the shortcomings of lithium-sulfur batteries but actually increased their cycle life from 500 to 1,200 charges.

Additionally, by using a nanoporous aluminum current collector and a vertical carbon nanotube array, the electrode thickness was reduced by 40%.

Simply put, the Deep Blue Battery offered high energy density, a long lifespan, fast charging speeds, and a low cost per unit of capacity.

Furthermore, it could be mass-produced using existing lithium-battery production lines, requiring only upgrades to the coating and packaging processes.

For Chen Yansen, the most important question now was whether to cooperate with Desai Battery or to start from scratch and keep all the profits for himself.

The former would be fast, the latter slow.

In the last two years, Gao Weilin had successively acquired a portion of Desai Battery’s shares, bringing his current holding to 9.4%.

But he was still at least 40% short of a controlling stake!

Moreover, the largest shareholder had a state-owned background. It would be extremely difficult for Chen Yansen to snatch food from the tiger’s mouth.

Therefore, Chen Yansen quickly made a decision: acquire a medium-sized battery factory, preferably one with production lines compatible with the Deep Blue Battery.

”Old Gao, come here for a second.”

After clearing his thoughts, Chen Yansen took out his phone and called Gao Weilin.

”Right away, Boss,” Gao Weilin immediately replied.

Five minutes later, Old Gao pushed the door open, walked in, and plopped down in a chair, waiting for Chen Yansen’s instructions.

”Leak a message that Senlian Capital is interested in selling its Desai Battery shares. They can be split up or sold as a package. Find an institution that’ll give the highest bid,” Chen Yansen said slowly.

In the past two years, thanks to supply orders from Orange, Apple, Mountain Star, and Huawei, Desai’s stock price had seen an annual increase of over 120%.

Senlian Capital had invested a total of 530 million yuan. Selling now was expected to cash out at 1 billion yuan.

Compared to investments in other industries, the return on investment for Desai Battery wasn’t particularly high.

”Boss, Desai’s stock has seen huge gains these past two years. If we hold on for another year, we might make another five hundred million in net profit.”

Gao Weilin didn’t know about the Deep Blue Battery plan, so he tried to persuade him patiently.

”I’m planning to acquire a medium-sized battery factory. In the future, Orange Mobile Phone will produce and sell its own batteries. I need you to make a trip to Shencheng City, and I’ll have Old Cao assist you when you’re there.”

Chen Yansen shook his head, laying out his plans without further discussion.

Old Gao’s eyes darted, and he instantly understood Chen Yansen’s intention. He secretly guessed that the company most likely had a complete solution for battery technology, with product performance far exceeding that of Desai Battery.

Since the boss didn’t elaborate, he didn’t press the issue.

Anyway, he would find out everything once he got to Shencheng City.

He nodded and readily agreed, ”No problem, Boss. I’ll go back and screen a list of suitable buyers first, then head to Shencheng City tomorrow.”

”Thanks for your hard work,” Chen Yansen said, patting Gao Weilin’s shoulder.

Not daring to delay official business, Old Gao left the office as soon as Chen Yansen was finished and headed for the strategic investment department’s work area.

Not long after Old Gao left, Ding Houmeng from the intellectual property department knocked on the open door and said, ”Boss, you were looking for me?”

”Sit.”

Chen Yansen gestured with his hand, then handed him the technical proposal for the Deep Blue Battery.

”This document contains all the core patents for the Deep Blue Battery. Make sure it’s all handled properly.”

Ding Houmeng took the document and first nodded in acknowledgment. ”Boss, I’ll read through it first.”

Chen Yansen paid him no mind and turned to busy himself with other matters.

About twenty minutes later, Ding Houmeng had finished a rough reading. He looked up and said, ”Boss, I believe we can file patents for the positive and negative electrode materials, the MOF separator preparation process, the microcapsule formula for the self-healing electrolyte, and the laser etching method for the 3D electrode. However, it’s missing the exploded-view diagram of the battery structure and the performance comparison curves.”

”Find Cao Dahua. He’ll help you gather the remaining materials.”

Chen Yansen said casually.

”Then I have no more questions, Boss. As soon as the materials arrive, I can start drafting the patent claims and description,” Ding Houmeng replied.

Chen Yansen grunted in acknowledgment and waved his hand dismissively.

The next day, Gao Weilin pulled a team from the strategic investment department to go to Shencheng City and inspect battery factories.

「Meanwhile.」

A rumor that Senlian Capital was looking for a buyer for its Desai Battery shares began to spread through the industry circles.

As a major client of Desai Battery, Orange Technology accounted for 30% of their revenue.

Therefore, Desai Battery’s board of directors paid extremely close attention to Senlian Capital.

They grew nervous the moment the news broke.

After some thought, Jiang Jie, the chairman of Desai Battery, took the initiative to call Chen Yansen, wanting to probe his true intentions.

He wanted to see if this was a normal reduction of holdings or if there was a deeper meaning behind it.