Chapter 382: Ma Liyun: This kid wants to trick me? Cheng Wei: He

Zhou Hongyi and Leiyi Army’s online feud had become almost routine; after briefly sampling the drama, netizens quickly forgot about it.

In short, after seeing it too many times, people were bored.

“Stop just talking—have the guts to livestream a fight.”

“To be fair, 360 phones’ quality and system are pretty good. Last year I bought my dad a 360n1, and it’s better than the Xiaomi 1s.”

“What does 360 have to do with it? 360 uses Orange Phone’s supply chain—the manufacturer is Orange Phone’s factory, and even the system is AuroraOS. It’s normal Xiaomi can’t beat 360.”

“Aren’t Xiaomi’s supply chain and contract manufacturers the same as 360’s?”

“Simply put, MIUI is terrible. On the same Xiaomi 1s, with AuroraOS, the Taobao app launches two seconds faster.”

Lei Yijun stared at the online comments, his face grim.

Before Orange Tech appeared, he never thought making phones was hard—but when 360, an outsider, completely outclassed Xiaomi, he suddenly woke up.

MIUI really is terrible!

It might be slightly better than Meizu’s FlymeOS or Ali’s YunOS, but the gap with AuroraOS is far too obvious—not just in smoothness and responsiveness, but also in resource scheduling and power consumption control.

It’s not about not knowing quality—it’s about comparing products.

Most users have only a vague understanding of electronic component specs like processors, memory, cameras, screens, and batteries.

But they can clearly sense whether a phone is laggy, stable, or compatible.

In 2012, the Xiaomi 1s sold a cumulative 3.7 million units, of which 3.1 million ran AuroraOS, while the MIUI version sold only 600,000.

Sales differed by more than four times!

“A Li, where are we with the hardware testing for the Xiaomi 2a and Xiaomi 2s?”

Lei Yijun tore his gaze from the computer screen and looked up at Li Wanqiang.

“Drop tests, compression tests, interface durability, and waterproofing/dustproofing are all done. The testing team is still checking screen touch accuracy, durability, and calibrating the gyroscope, accelerometer, and light sensor.”

Li Wanqiang, who had just spent half an hour trading insults with Zhou Hongyi, replied from across the desk.

“What’s Orange Tech been up to lately?” Lei Yijun asked next.

Li Wanqiang immediately grasped his boss’s intent and speculated: “Since 360 has launched a new product, with Orange Tech’s R&D strength, they’ve probably already prepared a new device—likely their AuroraFutureOS ecosystem just hasn’t met launch standards yet.”

“Promoting a completely new mobile OS isn’t easy,” Lei Yijun sighed.

He paused, then added: “Pause development of the next MIUI version—only do maintenance.”

Implicitly, he was abandoning MIUI’s iterative upgrades.

Li Wanqiang nodded silently in agreement.

Lei Zong had given MIUI a chance, but Xiaomi 1s’s shipment figures made it clear: switching entirely to AuroraOS was the wiser choice.

Anyway, we’ll first observe market feedback—initially, releasing just a few thousand units is enough to show Chen Yan respect.

Meanwhile.

The Yellow Bike deposit refund crisis continued; within a single day, account funds dropped nearly 100 million yuan.

In other words, about 500,000 users chose to refund their deposits, and some even uninstalled the app entirely.

Despite Yellow Bike’s customer service team desperately calming users, deposit refunds were delayed by over ten hours.

Anyone with eyes could see Yellow Bike had serious cash flow problems.

Otherwise, it could have refunded deposits instantly, like Didi Bike.

Besides, OFO Bike had eliminated deposits, and Didi Bike had launched a “Refund Anytime” feature—users had no shortage of alternatives.

As a result, since entering Huadong market on its third day, Yellow Bike’s new user growth stalled completely.

Chang Wei faced only two options: emulate Didi Bike, or copy OFO Bike.

In his view, the former offered no advantage, but the latter was impossible to replicate—Yellow Bike lacked electronic payment tools and any financial product like Yuexibao to back it.

Unless…

After some thought, Chang Wei narrowed his eyes, ordered his tech team to work overtime developing the “Refund Anytime” feature, and used connections to call Ma Liyun’s personal phone.

“Shared bikes? You mean using Zhifubao’s joint login model to get Ali to endorse you?”

After understanding Chang Wei’s intent, Ma Liyun smiled and asked back.

“Yellow Bike has a massive user base in Huadong and Huabei—it can bring huge new users to Zhifubao; also, shared bikes have high-frequency usage, increasing how often and how long users open Zhifubao…”

Chang Wei spoke confidently, trying to persuade him.

“Besides Yellow Bike, there’s OFO Bike and Didi Bike—why should Ali choose you?” Ma Liyun interrupted, pressing him.

He understood every word the man said.

Shared bike usage involves payment, which could effectively raise payment frequency, cultivate payment habits, and boost Zhifubao’s daily active users and retention.

It could also collect user travel data—times, locations, frequencies—helping Zhifubao better understand user needs and offer personalized recommendations and marketing.

But compared to OFO Bike and Didi Bike, Yellow Bike’s user scale and market share were far behind.

Chang Wei’s family background could get Ma to answer the call, but not sway his decision. “OFO Bike is backed by Senlian Capital—they won’t actively send offline traffic to Zhifubao. Didi Bike won’t entrust deposits to Zhifubao either. Once they expand nationwide, deposit totals won’t be lower than 3 billion yuan—Cheng Wei won’t give up that money.”

Chang Wei froze slightly. Though he knew his reasons were weak, to secure the deal with Zhifubao, he had to bluff anyway.

3 billion yuan?

He knew domestic shared bike brands were countless—over twenty—and only OFO, Didi, and Yellow Bike were large.

If all their deposits could be funneled into Yulibao, the total would reach over 10 billion yuan—potential profits were substantial.

After banks took notice of shared bike deposits, Ma Liyun also got interested.

“Ali wants 20% equity,” Ma Liyun said after thinking.

Though the partnership would bring many benefits to Zhifubao, Zhifubao had more users, and Yellow Bike was also a beneficiary.

Without sufficient profit for Ali, Ma wouldn’t agree.

20%?

Why don’t you just rob me?

Chang Wei growled, face dark.

After three funding rounds, his stake was under 70%—if he gave Ali another 20%, it would drop below 50%.

“Is Chang Zong having trouble?” Ma Liyun asked, a sneer on his face.

“No trouble, Ma Zong—I have no objections,” Chang Wei said helplessly.

Accepting Ali’s investment had pros and cons, but overall, the pros outweighed the cons.

Ma Liyun smiled, gave a few vague replies, hung up, and handed follow-up coordination to Lu Zhaoxi.

…

…

Two days later, Lu Zhaoxi found Ma Liyun and said bluntly: “Ma Zong, Chang Wei isn’t honest. I recommend canceling the deal with Yellow Bike.”

“Couldn’t you agree on valuation?” Ma Liyun gestured for Lu Zhaoxi to sit down and explain.

“Chang Wei has no intention of opening a data interface. He wants to deposit user deposits into Yulibao under the name of Clock Company,” Lu Zhaoxi explained slowly.

In that case, the “deposit” would be full of water.

If Chang Wei embezzled it, Zhifubao would struggle to detect it.

This wasn’t about getting Ali to endorse him—it was about finding a scapegoat!

“Chang Wei won’t budge?” Ma Liyun frowned.

Lu Zhaoxi could see through Chang Wei’s tricks—he could too.

“He never had good intentions,” Lu Zhaoxi snorted.

“I remember Didi Bike’s founder Cheng Wei used to be general manager of Zhifubao’s B2C division. Call him,” Ma Liyun immediately abandoned Yellow Bike.

“Understood,” Lu Zhaoxi nodded.

On the other side.

Upon receiving the call from his former employer, Cheng Wei immediately accepted Zhifubao’s olive branch.

“Refund Anytime” and “Deposit Recharge” features could ease some user concerns, but they still couldn’t match the appeal of “no deposit.”

A massive deposit pool was good—but only if you survived first.

The one truly unwilling to give up billions in deposits was Chang Wei, not Cheng Wei.

On March 8, Didi Bike officially announced it would adopt a “no deposit” strategy: users only needed to buy a 199-yuan Yulibao product and bind their Zhifubao account in personal settings to qualify.

Instantly, Yellow Bike users across Huabei uninstalled the app and switched to Didi Bike.

“Didi finally has the strength to compete with OFO.”

After clinging to Ali’s leg, Cheng Wei couldn’t help but sigh.

Soon after, Didi Bike began massive deployment of shared bikes across Huadong, directly competing with OFO Bike.

But Cheng Wei and Hu Weiyi both remained restrained, Moqidi maintaining consistent subsidy policies for new and existing users.

Neither dared to rashly start a price war!

After all, Didi and KuaiDi were the precedent—without over a billion yuan on the books, who dared to play games?

At the same time.

After one week of trial operation in Husheng, OFO Shared E-Bike deployed another 5,000 e-bikes, expanding service to Jin Ling, Lu Zhou, and Hang Cheng—totaling 50,000 vehicles.

Meanwhile, the shared bike business, after Hu Weiyi and Wang Zihao deployed over 300,000 additional units across Huadong, Huazhong, and Huinan regions, reached a total exceeding 500,000.

Combined, bike and e-bike operations generated 2 million yuan daily revenue, with a 13.7% gross margin, projecting annual revenue of 1 billion yuan.

But upfront investment was huge, labor costs high—based on current volume, annual net profit wouldn’t reach 50 million yuan.

With Didi Bike and Yellow Bike closing in, if a price war erupted, not even 50 million net profit was guaranteed—avoiding a billion-yuan loss by year-end would be considered good management.

(End of chapter)