Chapter 136: Patent Licensing, New Semester Arrangements (Begging for Monthly Tickets)

"President Chen, sorry for the impoliteness. I'm on a business trip in Peng Cheng today, and since it's close to Xu Cheng, I didn't give you a heads-up and came by uninvited."

Li Wanqiang caught a glimpse of Chen Yansen in his peripheral vision, quickly apologized to Song Yuncheng, then turned and walked over with a smile.

"President Li, don't do that next time. You have to call ahead so I can meet you at the door, or I'll get upset."

Chen Yansen gripped Li Wanqiang's hand and teased him with a deliberately stern face.

As for the business-trip excuse, he didn't buy it.

With less than two months until the Xiaomi phone launch, even though Li Wanqiang was head of marketing, he should have been staying in Yan Jing at this point.

"President Chen is too kind." Li Wanqiang replied verbally, but his eyes flickered uncertainly, as if waiting for the right moment.

"Let's go upstairs to talk. This is the Fox Taobao office area—the conditions are a bit rough."

Chen Yansen led Li Wanqiang upstairs, and at the same time instructed Song Yuncheng: "Tell Xu Xingxing to go to Old Cao's office, first shelf on the left, grab a tin of tea leaves, brew two cups and bring them up."

Song Yuncheng nodded and relayed the message to Xu Xingxing.

"This is the entire Fox Taobao team?" Li Wanqiang reached the second floor, looked around, and asked in surprise.

"Mm, about 90%… no wait, should be 60% are Xu Yuan college students, the rest are recruited from the open market."

Chen Yansen said with a smile.

People like Zhang Wenbo and Hu Li had already received their diplomas, so naturally they couldn't be counted as college students anymore.

They had all moved out of the dorms too—some rented in the faculty apartments, some rented houses in the village across from Xu Yuan.

A seamless transition from study to work!

Plenty of people on the project team joked that once everyone graduated, especially those in customer service and editing, they'd each have two or three years of work experience on average.

"Impressive! I should have brought President Lei along to see this."

Li Wanqiang took a look around, then followed Chen Yansen into the conference room and said as he sat down.

"President Li, you didn't come all this way just to say that, did you?"

Chen Yansen looked at Li Wanqiang with a smile, a teasing glint in his eyes.

With his current powers of observation, the micro-expressions on Li Wanqiang's face and the subtle movements of his hands and feet couldn't escape his notice.

"I knew I couldn't hide it from President Chen." Li Wanqiang had been holding it in for a while, and once Chen Yansen saw through him, he actually felt a lot more at ease and said frankly: "Xiaomi wants to obtain the patent license for the Aurora OS memory-cleanup algorithm."

"No problem."

Chen Yansen agreed readily.

To him, the generational garbage-collection algorithm wasn't exactly a hot commodity—just an optimization scheme he'd come up with in three hours.

"President Chen, the price is negotiable. You can't refuse before even hearing the offer."

Li Wanqiang, hearing him agree too quickly, instinctively assumed it was a refusal and said with a bitter smile.

"President Li, what I mean is, I can license the algorithm patent to Xiaomi for use."

Chen Yansen raised his voice and emphasized it again.

Li Wanqiang couldn't believe it—Chen Yansen had just agreed like that?

Then what about the negotiation strategy and talking points he'd so carefully prepared before setting out?

Coming back to his senses, Li Wanqiang breathed a sigh of relief and probed: "President Chen, what about the price?"

But in his heart he was thinking: Could it be that Chen Yansen wants to quote a sky-high price to make me back off?

"Before you came, President Lei must have given you instructions. I'd like to hear Xiaomi's offer first."

Chen Yansen leaned back, folded his arms, and said lightly.

In negotiations, he liked to see the other side's cards first before deciding.

"President Lei has two options. One, a ten-million licensing fee for a three-year term; two, Xiaomi pays Sister Chengzi's Tech five yuan in patent royalties for every phone sold."

Li Wanqiang had originally wanted to bring out Plan A to probe Chen Yansen's bottom line.

But the moment his eyes met Chen Yansen's, he felt seen through, his mind went blank, and he laid his cards on the table directly.

"Let's go with the per-unit royalty."

Chen Yansen rejected the first form of cooperation.

Lei Yi choosing a patent license showed that over the past twenty days, Xiaomi's R&D center hadn't reverse-engineered Aurora OS's memory-cleanup algorithm.

It also showed they believed that within three years, they couldn't surpass Sister Chengzi's Tech in algorithms—which was why they'd given Li Wanqiang these two negotiation options.

Li Wanqiang hadn't expected Chen Yansen to be so decisive—agreeing so readily on the one hand, and not haggling on the other.

This cooperation had become the easiest deal of his career.

For a moment, he felt the trip might not have been necessary at all—they could have closed the deal over the phone.

After both sides signed the contract, Chen Yansen called Wang Zihao, and they drove into the city to treat Li Wanqiang at the Sky Garden.

After all, Li Wanqiang represented Lei Yi, and last time they went to Yanjing, Lei Bus had been more than generous as a host.

After food and drink, Chen Yansen had originally wanted to arrange the next stop and take Li Wanqiang to the Galaxy Star, but Li Wanqiang kept declining, saying he had to catch an evening flight.

"Your wife keeps a tight leash?"

Chen Yansen teased with a smile.

"You know the answer." Li Wanqiang pointed a finger at Chen Yansen and gave a helpless, bitter smile.

"Don't worry, I won't tell your wife."

Chen Yansen said in all seriousness.

Li Wanqiang didn't know whether to laugh or cry, and with his assistant, hurried through the night to Peng Cheng's Guanyin Airport.

Early the next morning, he arrived at Lei Yi's office to report the results of the trip.

"The kid agreed that readily?" Lei Yi frowned, finding it hard to believe.

Honestly, if it were him, even if Chen Yansen quoted ten yuan, or even fifteen, he wouldn't necessarily be willing to license it.

One must remember that today's flashing craze was sparked by Aurora OS—when MIUI first launched, it didn't have this kind of buzz.

"Besides General Chen's generosity, there might be other reasons. For example, at the last Internet Open Conference, Lei Zong, you generously shared your supply chain management experience with him, so General Chen is just returning the favor."

Li Wanqiang guessed.

"This kid's interesting—he's got some sense of loyalty." Lei Yijun smiled faintly, feeling a warm glow in his heart.

Recalling how, when Chen Yansen had consulted him last time, he had still been holding something back, he now felt a twinge of guilt, thinking to himself: Lei Yijun, you've really gotten old—how is it that you're not even as straightforward as a young man?

Unfortunately, Lei Jiaozhu's guilt lasted only three short days.

Because three days later, Meizu released an updated version of a deeply customized system based on the Android system, and its performance in cache and fragmented junk cleanup was identical to AuroraOS.

No matter how slow Lei Yijun's reactions, he understood now.

It turned out the patent licensing he had thought would be so hard to negotiate was something Chen Yansen had never taken seriously at all—as long as you pay, anyone can get the license.

Meizu certainly wouldn't promote a competitor, and planned to embed this algorithm into the FlymeOS currently under development, pushing it to market together at the autumn new product launch.

Lei Yijun no longer waited either, and updated MIUI's latest system overnight, announcing to the outside world that Xiaomi had performed optimization on memory management.

As for how it was optimized and what technology was used—not a single word.

It wasn't until a few years later, when netizens dug up the financial annual reports of several phone manufacturers, that they were shocked to discover these manufacturers paid Sister Chengzi's Tech a patent licensing fee every year—ranging from tens of millions to hundreds of millions.

Only then did everyone understand that behind those years of Android customized systems, Sister Chengzi's Tech had been there all along.

Meanwhile.

Wang Teng learned that Chen Yansen had licensed the generational garbage collection algorithm to both Xiaomi and Meizu, and immediately slapped his thigh hard, leaning over Chen Yansen's desk: "Boss, that's our trump card!"

"Regarding the garbage collection algorithm, I've come up with a better technology. I've sent it to your email—evaluate the R&D cycle and get it online as soon as possible."

Chen Yansen said casually, not even lifting his head.

A new algorithm?

Wang Teng froze for a moment, then let out a heh-heh laugh. He just knew his own boss wouldn't be that stupid.

Use the 1.0 algorithm to make money, and the 2.0 algorithm to seize the market.

"Anything else?"

Chen Yansen raised his head, saw Wang Teng still standing nearby laughing foolishly, and asked softly.

"Nothing! I'll get right on it." Wang Teng came back to his senses, ran back to his office laughing, opened his email, and began studying the algorithm logic Chen Yansen had sent.

"This is way stronger than version 1.0—no wonder Chen Zong licensed it to two companies at once. Compared to this, version 1.0's efficiency is a whole tier behind."

After reading it, Wang Teng's eyes lit up, and he hurriedly pulled in a few algorithm engineers, plunging headfirst into the conference room.

The boss comes up with the plan; they handle the execution.

……

The June days slipped by in an instant.

It was right before graduation, and the campus was filled with a restless atmosphere, as students who'd been interning elsewhere returned one after another.

In front of Pearl Lake, the gymnasium, and the library, people were taking graduation photos everywhere.

Graduation season is also breakup season.

Every night, someone downstairs would cry their heart out—the reasons were nothing more than being dumped by their partner, or betrayed by their girlfriend.

Song Yang, however, was the happiest. Every day, people streamed into the startup park to send packages, mostly big parcels of clothes and the like, and a single order could earn him over ten yuan in commission.

He now understood what Chen Yansen had said—during summer break and right before graduation, you really can count money until your hand cramps.

Half a year without business, but one good run sets you up for three years.

In just one week of graduation season, Song Yang earned twenty to thirty thousand yuan in courier commissions alone.

The day before the break, Chen Yansen called Tang Zhenzhe and Song Yang to the second floor of the startup park and gave them a few brief instructions.

"Sen-ge, you want us to be campus general agents? No way, no way!" Song Yang shook his head vigorously after hearing.

Back then, Chen Yansen had advised him to do courier agency work, and now he could earn seventy to eighty thousand a year—how could he have the nerve to take on the campus card general agency for the flashlight company?

Tang Zhenzhe was a little tempted, but since Song Yang had refused, he couldn't really say anything, and could only shake his head along with him, saying sincerely: "Sen-ge, if you're too busy, Tang Zhenzhe and I can help out, but as for being campus general agents, let's forget it."

"A second-level agent gets 50 yuan commission per card; I'll give you two 80 yuan. But I'm not making nothing either—the recharge rebate commission goes to me."

Seeing they wouldn't agree, Chen Yansen explained with a smile.

Based on last September's card sales volume, Tang Zhenzhe and Song Yang could each get forty to fifty thousand, but the bulk of the recharge rebate commission was still in Chen Yansen's hands.

"How about this—I'll just take 10 yuan per card. I don't have to sell cards anyway, it's just managing second-level agents and liaising with the Telecom business hall. Getting 30 yuan per card feels like hot potatoes to me."

Song Yang thought it over and was only willing to accept 10 yuan commission per card.

"Same for me." Tang Zhenzhe also felt this money came too easily and felt uneasy holding it.

At 10 yuan per card, he and Song Yang could each get over ten thousand—not a small sum, but compared to forty or fifty thousand, it felt much more solid.

"Fine then. I'll have Zihao assign you the agents later. Recruit some second-level agents in your departments—making money or not depends on those first two days of the semester."

Chen Yansen smiled helplessly. He was giving them a chance to make money, yet they kept pushing it away.

College students really are thin-skinned. If it were him, he'd want not just the phone card commission but the recharge rebate commission too.

After saying this, Chen Yansen stood up and walked toward Room 206.

Song Yang pulled Tang Zhenzhe toward the first floor, planning to work out a campus card sales plan for after the semester started.

Even though Chen Yansen looked down on the slim profit from campus cards, he still wanted those few dozen threads of human-kindred flame.

Streams accumulate into rivers, sand gathers into towers—even a mosquito's leg is still meat!

(End of chapter)