Chapter 80: Information

Ren Yinglian was the last hidden danger left behind by Yingfeng; once she was resolved, Di Ye no longer had any worries and began to earnestly tinker with his new business.

At noon on February 28th, he treated Fu Chuanyi and Qi Hongying to a meal to accompany them, gave instructions on the specific arrangements in Pengcheng, and in the afternoon, he gathered the 10 team members for a class, demonstrated that Toy Browser, explained the source code, and introduced relevant knowledge and technical points.

That night, relying on his incomparable focus, Di Ye resisted the temptation of Xia Fangfei and spent the night typing on his keyboard in the rented apartment; he not only finished the paper on the browser but also wrote a forward-looking treatise on future technologies such as HTML, CSS, and Javascript.

"Fangfei, are you sure you won't come to Jinling with me?"

"No, you hurry up and go, goodbye."

"Hey, you used to be reluctant to let me leave, but now you can't wait for me to go; you've had a change of heart."

"Serves you right! Who told you to just focus on typing last night instead of exercising with me..."

On the morning of March 1st, Di Ye carried his computer bag, dragged his suitcase, and took a bus alone to Jinling to inspect the VCD Player company that Xia Jianwu was setting up.

Xia Jianwu was driving the Audi he had used last time he went to Yuncheng, waiting for Di Ye outside the Zhongyangmen long-distance bus station; the first thing he asked upon meeting was, "When are you going to Hong Kong?"

"I'm going to Pengcheng on March 4th, and I can go anytime after that, but I can only stay for 7 days. You still haven't settled the chip supply?"

Xia Jianwu opened the trunk, and while helping him put in his luggage, he said with a look of annoyance, "C-Cube's business is clearly all in the mainland, yet they insist on putting their sales office in Hong Kong, and they hired some idiot who doesn't know anything as Manager, with his eyes stuck on his forehead, looking down on us mainlanders completely. Every time I contact him, he only gives me 1 minute, and he hangs up as soon as the time is up."

"He's dead set on the price of 70 dollars per piece and won't budge?"

Xia Jianwu nodded, cursed, and complained, "70 dollars is the ex-factory price. If you count tariffs and other expenses like shipping, it converts to over 600 yuan in Renminbi; it's no different from outright robbery!"

"Didn't you contact C-Cube's headquarters through Wanyan?"

"I contacted them once. Sun Yansheng said he is a Shareholder of Wanyan and it's inconvenient for him to interfere with domestic sales work."

Sun Yansheng is the Chairman of C-Cube, and he teamed up with Jiang Wanmeng to create the VCD Player; the brand "Wanyan" is a combination of these two people's names, and Wanyan's rapid collapse happened to be related to him dumping chips to other manufacturers.

"It's just a case of wanting to be a whore while still wanting to set up a memorial arch for chastity."

After Di Ye finished venting, he sat in the passenger seat of the Audi, took the sample issue of *Viewing Era* out of his Notebook Computer bag, and introduced it: "Fangfei put this together, and it's very popular in Yuncheng."

Xia Jianwu took it and flipped through it, saw the introduction of the Yunshang Fan Association and photos of several main leaders on the first page, couldn't help but laugh, and praised, "My little sister is doing quite well in Yuncheng. Secretary General of a fan association, that's impressive!"

After praising, he asked suspiciously, "The name of this association is a bit strange. The first character represents Yuncheng, which is understandable, but why is the second character the 'shang' for clothing instead of the 'shang' for appreciation?"

"Li Bai has a line of poetry that goes, 'Clouds make one think of clothes, flowers make one think of her face.' The president of this association is a fashion designer; besides organizing fans to watch movies together, she also plans to improve some of the costumes from movies and TV shows to sell for money."

"Sure enough, everything is business."

Xia Jianwu remarked casually, returned the magazine to Di Ye, and started the Audi to leave the Zhongyangmen bus station.

Di Ye fastened his seatbelt, held up the magazine, and while admiring the celebrity photos inside, asked, "How many VCD Players is your factory planning to produce a month?"

"This thing is very easy to produce, it's just tightening screws. It can be adjusted at any time according to funds and sales; 5,000 a month or 50,000 a month are both fine."

"What is the cost per unit?"

"If calculated with 70-dollar chips, the cost per unit is 3,000."

Di Ye rolled up the magazine, made a gesture like he was going to hit someone, and threatened, "Don't give me that nonsense, tell the truth."

"2,800."

"Do you believe I'll really hit you? The cost for Manager Wang to build one CD Player is only over 400, and you need 2,800 to build one VCD Player?"

"2,500, I'm definitely not lying to you this time. Before, Old Wang helped you produce CD Players; the parts were embezzled, the factory building belonged to Panda Electronics, and you didn't have to worry about employee wages or benefits, just pay a little overtime, so the cost was very low. Now that we are building the factory ourselves, everything has to be calculated, and the cost is bound to rise a lot."

Di Ye then put away the magazine and said, "A cost of 2,500 is too high. Adding in channels, marketing, advertising, and other expenses, you have to sell it for at least 3,000 to make money."

"Wanyan sells them for 4,500, and you want to sell them for 3,000? That won't work, you have to sell them for at least 3,500! Otherwise, if I only make a few dozen yuan per player, why should I work so hard to open a factory? Wouldn't it be more comfortable to just work honestly at Panda Electronics?"

"According to the survey I did in Yuncheng, if the retail price of a VCD Player exceeds 3,000, the customers' willingness to buy will drop significantly. If you want to be an instant hit, it's best to set the price at 2,999 or 2,888."

Xia Jianwu shook his head repeatedly and rejected it, "At that price, I'd lose money on every unit sold; I can't do that."

"What if we can convince Sun Yansheng to lower the chip price to below 50 dollars?"

"If it's below 50 dollars, selling it for 2,999 is barely okay, but how are you going to convince him?"

"Wanyan only sold about 20,000 VCD Players in total last year, which is equivalent to C-Cube selling 20,000 chips. Calculated at a price of 70 dollars, that's only 1.4 million dollars in total."

Di Ye held up the magazine in his hand again and said, "This magazine will tell Sun Yansheng that if he lowers the chip price to 50 dollars, we can help him sell 240,000 chips a year, and the sales volume will reach as high as 12 million dollars. If he lowers the price to 40 dollars, we can help him sell 600,000 chips a year, and the sales volume will reach as high as 24 million, which is far more cost-effective than stubbornly sticking to a unit price of 70 dollars."

Xia Jianwu glanced at the magazine and said in surprise, "Is this magazine that powerful?"

"It contains Yingfeng's sales records for January. We sold over 12,000 players at a package price of 2,500 yuan. Yuncheng only has a population of over 3 million, and its GDP ranks outside the top 80 in the country, yet we could still sell over 10,000 units. So, if we expand across the country, how many will we sell?"

"Theoretically, it sounds like there's no problem, but don't forget that we are just a small factory that has just been established. Even if calculated at a unit price of 40 dollars, we can only afford to buy one or two tens of thousands of chips, and that Hong Kong Manager at C-Cube doesn't accept installment payments."

"This magazine also contains an analysis report on pirated discs. It will tell Sun Yansheng that the VCD Player market is now ready for everything, it just lacks a leading example. As long as he supplies goods for one month at a price below 50 dollars, our small factory can become that example, and then we can drive home appliance manufacturers all over the country to go to him to buy chips. By then, you can point at that Hong Kong Manager's nose and tell him to get lost."

Xia Jianwu had been tortured quite a bit by the Hong Kong Manager, and after imagining the scene of finally being able to hold his head high, he laughed loudly, "If it can really be like that, I'll call you Brother Di three times then."

Di Ye was amused by his act of lowering his own status and said, "I don't care about verbal cheapness. If you are really grateful to me, give me some practical benefits."

"Introduce you to a few pretty girls?"

"Sure, I'll call your sister right now and report this to her, and see if she scolds you or me."

"Don't, I was wrong..."

Xia Jianwu had placed the VCD Player factory in the Jinling Economic and Technological Development Zone, which was quite far away, taking more than half an hour to drive there. Therefore, after chatting nonsense for a while, he returned to the topic of business and said with a worried face, "My dad still wants to pull Panda Electronics in as a shareholder, and then use the Panda brand directly for the VCD Players. What do you think we should do?"

"What do you think?"

"If Panda Electronics becomes a shareholder, purchasing parts through their channels would reduce costs quite a bit, and there would be no need to spend a lot of money on brand promotion. But the Panda brand belongs to the state, and I'm always a bit uneasy and unwilling."

Di Ye also had ideas about Panda Electronics and said, "I heard that Panda Electronics is preparing to go public, right?"

"That's right, they are preparing to go public in Hong Kong and Pujiang next year. The company's senior leadership is very concerned about this matter, and they talk about it every day; it's annoying as hell."

"If they go public, there is a possibility of being controlled. Have you ever thought about a snake swallowing an elephant, taking over Panda Electronics, and becoming the leader yourself?"

Xia Jianwu was stimulated by this whimsical idea, stepped on the gas pedal, and almost rear-ended the car in front. He hurriedly slowed down and said, "Stop talking nonsense. Panda Electronics is directly managed by the Ministry of Finance, with assets of several billion. What do I have to take control with?"

"You can't control it now, but it might not be the case in three or five years. You once said that Panda Electronics is like China at the end of the Qing Dynasty, with strong enemies outside and worms inside, and it will be finished sooner or later. When it's about to be finished, that will be the right time to acquire shares."