Chapter 138: Sister Chengzi Phone Engineering Version: Hardware Troubles (Seeking)

The third day of summer vacation.

Chen Yansen finished the morning meeting at the startup park, then drove to Zhuxian Town Tech Park.

AuroraOS (Aurora System) downloads had surpassed 20 million; with that, even if only 10% of users supported the Sister Chengzi phone, it could sell 2 million units.

The tech circle generally agreed that the two most anticipated new products of 2011 were, first, Lei Yi's Xiaomi phone, and second, Chen Yansen's Sister Chengzi phone.

After all, Xiaomi and Sister Chengzi Tech were the first phone makers to roll out customized operating systems, improving user experience at the software level.

Just the potential users alone numbered in the millions, even tens of millions.

Although Sister Chengzi Tech had not publicly announced the new phone's release date, the establishment of the Shencheng Sister Chengzi phone factory told the outside world that the Sister Chengzi phone was only one step away from launch.

There weren't many cars on the road; ten minutes later, the car pulled into the tech park.

The moment Chen Yansen went up to the second floor, he saw Gao Weilin holding a laptop, sitting in a rattan chair in the balcony rest area, sipping coffee at a leisurely pace—clearly already adapted to work and life in Shencheng.

"Old Gao, aren't you afraid of the heat?" Chen Yansen said with a smile as he walked over and sat down across from Gao Weilin.

The warm sun had risen in the east, and the air was already somewhat stuffy.

"Boss, want to try the coffee beans I just bought? This year's new shipment from Narino, with a citrus aroma."

Gao Weilin had just started to rise to greet him when Chen Yansen pressed him back into his seat, so he raised his cup and recommended with a smile.

The morning sun felt warm on the body, and Gao Weilin seemed to be thoroughly enjoying it.

"No need, I'm not used to it." Chen Yansen waved him off, then asked: "What did Lotte say?"

"Very interested, but like Mama Ali, Lotte is short on funds. Based on Fox Tao's current development, whether you use the market-to-sales multiple or the P/E multiple, the final valuation won't be below 2.5 billion US dollars."

Gao Weilin shrugged and said with a smile: "For Lotte, this is a major investment, so I contacted Augusta Capital again. I'm planning to use a lead-investor-plus-co-investor joint sale to package Fox Tao and sell it off."

This kind of acquisition approach isn't common on the mainland, but in Hong Kong Island it's standard practice.

For many venture capital firms, controlling stake isn't important—being profitable is enough.

After learning that Mama Ali was also interested in Fox Tao, Lotte, leveraging its SoftBank connections, plans to join with Augusta to acquire Fox Tao and then merge it into Ali Baba.

This way, they can achieve a curved entry into Mama Ali's shares!

Compared to Fox Tao's equity, Mama Ali's equity—as the e-commerce hegemon—is clearly more attractive.

"When it comes to getting things done, I've always trusted you." Chen Yansen nodded, raising no objection.

Boss, we've only known each other for a month?

Gao Weilin opened his mouth, wanting to quip, but held it back.

Since resigning, his time working on the mainland had been more grueling than at Zhaoye Group.

He knew clearly in his heart that once this equity sale was completed, he would become famous overnight in the domestic internet business circle.

"Boss, the Sister Chengzi phone factory's financial accounting and fund management have been brought into the financial shared service center and the ERP management system. Every account is transparent and auditable—it's very hard for anyone below to pull anything shady."

Gao Weilin pushed aside the stray thoughts and continued.

"Alright, got it. Then carry on. If you're short on hands, have HR help you recruit."

Chen Yansen acknowledged, then got up and headed upstairs.

The industrial design draft the R&D team initially submitted was rejected by him outright—the bezels on all four sides were wide enough to park a row of RVs.

Compared to the bezel-less phones of a decade-plus later, it was unsightly beyond words.

The engineers explained that this was because current COG screen packaging technology was behind the times, requiring wide bezels to house driver circuits, flex cables, and other electronic components—it was unavoidable.

After looking into it, Chen Yansen confirmed the engineers weren't pulling his leg.

But in 2011, solutions did exist; they just added to packaging process costs, which was why 99.9% of phone brands on the market gave up on them.

Chen Yansen mulled it over: if the Sister Chengzi phone was about the same as Xiaomi, Meizu, or Samsung, with no unique advantage of its own, why would users choose Sister Chengzi?

Just because AuroraOS was smoother than stock Android?

Then users could just flash a new ROM—why bother buying a Sister Chengzi phone?

So Chen Yansen scrapped the first version of the design and started over.

First, he spent big on COF packaging equipment. This more advanced packaging technology could mount chips onto flexible circuit boards and then connect them to the screen, dramatically shrinking the bezels.

There were basically no phone factories in the country using COF packaging technology. After Cao Dahua and Zuo Hongyu inquired, they could only buy imported brand-new equipment—at 700,000 yuan per unit, over 500,000 yuan more expensive than used COG packaging equipment.

Second, add virtual buttons to shrink the phone's chin.

In this regard, even the usually bold Apple hadn't dared to outright remove the home button.

And Xiaomi, on its first-generation phone, likewise kept Android's three hard keys—the back key, home key, and recent-apps key.

Chen Yansen went all the way: he scrapped all touch keys and adopted full-screen gesture controls.

On the hardware side, he chose an ultra-high-sensitivity touchscreen;

On the system side, he made deep modifications to AuroraOS to optimize touch latency.

Additionally, the processor was switched to the Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8260, whose performance was on par with the A5 chip used in the iPhone 4S—the same chip as in Xiaomi's first-generation phone.

Finally, the phone's plastic shell was changed to high-strength aluminum alloy.

Although costs went up, it improved the phone's structural strength and reduced the chance of screen cracking from the narrower bezels.

Running the numbers, just the bill of materials alone hit 1,100 yuan!

Add in R&D, manufacturing, marketing, and sales costs, and for a phone priced at 1,999 yuan, even with strict supply chain control, the gross margin couldn't reach 10%.

But what Chen Yansen cared about wasn't that few-dozen-yuan margin—it was how many Human-Flame sparks the phone industry, from R&D to sales, could add for him.

The moment Chen Yansen stepped onto the third floor, two engineers walked over, holding a 4.5-inch engineering-sample Sister Chengzi phone, smiling as they greeted him.

"Boss, this is the engineering sample shipped over from Shencheng. Zhou Ze and I tested it—touch latency is basically within acceptable range."

Zhang Cong was the head of the industrial design group; the Zhou Ze he mentioned was the head of the hardware design group.

One came from ZTE, the other from Huawei's Honor phone team.

"Oh, Old Cao moves fast."

Chen Yansen took the phone and walked with the two toward the testing group.

The testing team had about ten engineers, each with an Orange phone, rigorously testing performance, interface, and sensors.

They also tested audio and video playback smoothness, whether there was distortion in sound quality, and if audio and video were synchronized.

In addition, there were many other issues—heat dissipation, battery life, and device compatibility—and the testing phase alone would take a month.

Chen Yansen demanded that as many bugs as possible be fixed before launch.

If users discovered them after launch, whether through recalls or compensation, the losses would be incalculable.

Chen Yansen knew in his heart that caution never hurt.

For example, AuroraOS had also undergone two weeks of testing before launch, yet still had numerous minor bugs afterward.

Zhang Cong and Zhou Ze led Chen Yansen through the testing team for the entire morning, reporting each issue discovered so far.

System issues were directly fed back to Wang Teng.

For hardware problems, if they stemmed from suppliers, issue a warning first; if unchanged, replace them immediately.

"Boss, is there still room to further optimize the exterior design?"

After finishing his report, Zhang Cong asked tentatively.

In 2011, everyone's aesthetic for smartphones was based largely on Apple, including Zhang Cong.

Thus, the Orange phone's exterior resembled one-third of the iPhone 4 and bore some resemblance to the Meizu M9, but with a narrower bezel and thinner body.

As a result, the material cost per device exceeded the original plan by 200 yuan, but the feel was indeed excellent—the touch was silky, the aluminum back cover had high quality, and it looked far more premium than plastic alternatives.

"The current design is fine."

Chen Yansen nodded in agreement; since the engineering prototypes were already made, adjusting the exterior design now would be troublesome—he had been present during the initial sample approval, so there was no need for pointless tinkering.

"Boss, there's a hardware issue: we have 100 engineering prototypes, but I found the battery sizes are inconsistent—the maximum deviation is 1.3 millimeters."

Zhou Ze spoke with a serious expression.

Remember, a phone is a precision digital product, and every electronic component has strict placement requirements.

If battery dimensions deviate from design standards, the assembly equipment won't function properly.

"That's ridiculous."

Chen Yansen was momentarily stunned; in his view, suppliers merely needed to produce according to contract terms—how could such a massive error occur?

Zhou Ze pulled out two batteries and placed them on the table.

Chen Yansen looked and instantly laughed bitterly—the size difference between the two batteries was obvious, even to the naked eye.

Right before their eyes, he immediately pulled out his phone and called Zuo Hongyu.

"Replace the battery supplier. After these engineering prototypes were made, didn't you and Lao Cao inspect them?"

Chen Yansen questioned bluntly.

"Huh!? We inspected them, didn't find any problems." Zuo Hongyu had indeed checked, but only tested phone functions—he never disassembled the hardware.

Electronic components like processors, screens, cameras, and speakers had established incoming inspection procedures and usually didn't have issues.

"If we don't replace this supplier when the battery size deviates from design specs, who knows what other problems will arise later."

Chen Yansen didn't scold Zuo Hongyu further, only gave him a serious warning.

He sighed inwardly: these Shenzhen suppliers were not very reliable.

Unbeknownst to him, during these years of rampant Shanzhai phones, a battery that didn't explode was considered a good product.

As for dimensional mismatches—a 1-2 millimeter deviation? Just force it in by hand; after all, it still worked.

"Yes, Boss." Zuo Hongyu's face flushed pale then red—he never imagined he'd made such a major mistake in the supply chain.

After hanging up, he immediately took his team into the material warehouse and pulled out the batch delivered by Youpu.

"Digital calipers!" Zuo Hongyu shouted to his assistant.

"Boss, here you go." The assistant beside him quickly handed them over.

Zuo Hongyu picked up a battery and began measuring its length, width, and height—his expression grew darker with each reading.

Deviation: 0.3 millimeters!

Deviation: 0.5 millimeters!

Deviation: 0.9 millimeters!

"Damn it! Even you dare to screw over Zuo Hongyu! Who approved this batch? Get out right now!"

Zuo Hongyu flew into a rage, cursing loudly.

He immediately pulled out his phone and called the Youpu Battery manager: "Manager Wang, three out of ten batteries you sent are out of spec—are you kidding me?"

"Manager Zuo, that's an exaggeration! Don't worry, our batteries won't explode—they work, that's all that matters. I'll arrange something at Xinghe Renjian later…"

Wang Hongde on the other end laughed it off evasively.

"Arrange your mother! Get these pieces of junk out of here right now!" Zuo Hongyu cursed back without mercy.

"Manager Zuo, go ask around—which battery's dimensions are an exact match? If you have the guts, go ahead and sue! Once U-P sells a product, we've never taken it back."

Wang Hongde was a hardened rogue, utterly unfazed, grinning as he spoke.

"Fuck! You won't get the final payment!" Zuo Hongyu threatened.

"Haha, I never planned to collect the final payment anyway, Manager Zuo. Tell your backer, the big fish from the north, not to mess with Shenzhen's rules so casually."

Wang Hongde laughed loudly, dropped this warning, and hung up.

Only then did Zuo Hongyu realize: Orange Tech's hiring offers in Shencheng must have threatened someone's interests.

After a moment's thought, he reported this situation to Chen Yansen.

(End of Chapter)