Chapter 520: 4G Era, Shared Interests
In June, a new chapter in China's Internet history began.
On the morning of the 1st, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology officially issued 4G licenses to the three major telecom operators, China Mobile, China Unicom, and China Telecom, marking the beginning of a new era of communications.
In the office, Song Ci was concentrating on browsing the news about the issuance of 4G licenses on the computer screen, and a smug smile appeared on the corner of his mouth.
The issuance of 4G licenses was six months earlier than in the previous life. It seemed that the "Internet Plus" proposal that he had vigorously promoted at the National Conference in March had indeed attracted the attention of senior management.
This decision to accelerate the development of the country's digital information industry is undoubtedly an excellent opportunity for Tengda Group, which has already been preparing for it, to make further progress.
The opportunity cannot be missed. With his mind made up, he quickly picked up the landline phone and pressed the internal short number.
"Mr. Song!" Jiang Tiantian's crisp response came from the other end of the receiver.
"Director Jiang, the General Office has issued a notice to convene a meeting of the group's senior management at 9:00 AM on June 4th."
"Okay, Mr. Song," Jiang Tiantian replied, then asked, "What's the agenda for the meeting?"
A Song Dynasty poem: "Tengda Group's strategic opportunities, potential challenges, and comprehensive responses in the 4G era."
"Understood. The General Office will draft a document and issue it immediately."
As soon as the microphone fell, there was a gentle knock on the office door.
"Come in." Song Ci looked up and saw Zhang Yong and Wang Jing coming together.
The two greeted each other and sat down at the desk familiarly.
As soon as Wang Jing sat down, he handed over a document in his hand and said solemnly:
"Mr. Song, I just received an email from China Mobile. The chairman of China Mobile, Xi Guohua, wants to lead a team to visit you to discuss cooperation."
Song Ci took the document and quickly glanced through it, stroking his chin thoughtfully:
"The 4G license has just been issued, and President Xi is already paying us a visit. It seems China Mobile is really impatient this time."
Zhang Yong understood China Mobile's intentions and chuckled, "In the 3G era, China Mobile is constrained in every way.
Although it has a huge user base and financial strength, it is like holding gold and unable to move forward, and there is no trace of the glory of the 2G era.
Now that a new era has begun, they naturally want to rush to be the first, fearing they will be left behind."
Song Ci hummed softly, leaned back in his chair, and looked at him with a far-reaching gaze: "China Mobile was also forced by the situation to be allocated the 3G standard TD-SCDMA with independent intellectual property rights in my country.
Whether in terms of technological maturity, industry chain support, terminal ecosystem or user experience, it is difficult to compete with China Unicom and China Telecom."
He shook his head slightly, and said with some emotion: "This is not because of lack of strength, but because of the cost of bearing the national independent innovation strategy.
Being forced to compete in a non-market environment with rivals armed with powerful weapons is incredibly difficult."
Zhang Yong and Wang Jing nodded in unison, as they were well aware of China Mobile's predicament in the 3G era.
Zhang Yong adjusted his glasses and said, "Especially after China Unicom introduced the iPhone in 2008, this revolutionary product redefined the smartphone experience.
A large number of high-end Chinese mobile users have switched to China Unicom, which has had an immeasurable impact on China Mobile's brand image and user structure."
"That's right." Song Ci folded his hands on the table and analyzed, "The TD-SCDMA standard is not mature enough and is limited to China, which has led to international manufacturers such as Apple and Samsung being reluctant to invest in the development of new models.
China Mobile's 3G mobile phones have always been plagued by a shortage of models and poor user experience, and have struggled to maintain their position in the market."
Zhang Yong shared this sentiment and went on to explain: "China Mobile dominated the 2G era with its GSM network, but this success became a hindrance during its transformation.
It's inevitable that they'll be caught between maintaining the massive 2G business and promoting the immature TD network."
Wang Jing smiled upon hearing this and offered a vivid analogy: "If you ask me, China Mobile in the 3G era is like a martial arts master with profound inner strength but limited moves. He has all his skills but no way to display them.
Thinking about it this way, I understand why President Xi is so anxious."
Song Ci's eyes gleamed, "It is this excruciating pain that will force China Mobile to spare no effort to reverse its decline in the 4G era.
This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us at Tengda!"
Zhang Yong took over the conversation and made an objective assessment: "According to the information obtained by the technical department, although China Mobile's 4G standard TD-LTE still has a "T" in it, it is no longer the same as before and is technically on par with China Unicom.
Now that its shortcomings have been overcome, China Mobile must redeem itself from past failures and rebuild its glory."
Wang Jing echoed this sentiment: "At a recent press conference, China Mobile pledged its commitment to building the world's largest 4G network, clearly demonstrating its resolve."
Song Ci couldn't help but exclaim: "The construction of 4G networks will drive hundreds of billions of yuan in investment, inject strong momentum into the entire industry chain including communication equipment, network planning, and terminal manufacturing, and bring in massive orders.
Our strategic partner, Huawei, is poised to take advantage of this opportunity and soar to the sky."
Zhang Yong's expression straightened. "In the 4G era, network speeds are accelerating rapidly. High-bandwidth services like HD video, mobile games, and cloud applications will thrive. All business departments should prepare for this."
"I had already started making arrangements before you came," Song Ci said calmly, "The executive meeting on the morning of the 4th was set up for this purpose."
Wang Jing showed admiration on her face and praised sincerely, "Mr. Song is as perceptive as seeing through fire, always able to seize the initiative!"
"Stop the polite talk." Song Ci waved his hand, interrupting Wang Jing's compliments. His steady and powerful voice captured the attention of both of them.
"I just thought about it and felt that China Mobile's initiative to seek cooperation was most likely aimed at network construction and user experience optimization."
Zhang Yong strongly agreed: "Mr. Song is wise.
The group's big data technology can accurately analyze user traffic patterns and mobile scenario data, helping China Mobile scientifically plan base station locations and maximize network resource efficiency. This is one example.
After a brief pause, he gathered his thoughts and continued his analysis: "Secondly, in the early stages of 4G network construction, insufficient signal stability is inevitable.
I guess China Mobile is eyeing WeChat's signal enhancement and adaptive compression technology, which allows it to maintain a relatively stable connection in a weak network environment.
This will optimize the network experience over the 'last mile' from base stations to user phones, allowing users to experience unprecedented smoothness at the very beginning of 4G commercial use."
Song Ci nodded slightly. "Old Zhang, your judgment coincides with mine. However, the scope of our cooperation goes far beyond this."
Powered by 4G's high speed and low latency, Tenda's cloud computing and big data capabilities will open up a vast blue ocean for application innovation."
His tone gradually rose, and he described the future with a passion: "For example, we can jointly develop high-definition video group chats within the WeChat system.
There are even unprecedented social features such as real-time AR interactive filters and lightweight cloud games.
These 4G-exclusive features are the most attractive selling points for users and can form a strong driving force for users to upgrade to 4G networks."
The office fell into a brief silence, as Zhang Yong and Wang Jing immersed themselves in the beautiful picture of Tenda empowering mobile with data and the win-win cooperation between the two parties.
However, Song Ci changed the subject at this moment: "But the above are not the cooperation goals I want most!"
His blazing eyes swept over the two capable men, and he revealed his true intentions word by word: "The area I most want to cooperate with is the terminal!"
"Terminal?" Zhang Yong and Wang Jing's faces were filled with confusion and astonishment, and they were secretly wondering: Tenda's main business is Internet services and software ecology, and it has never been involved in the hardware manufacturing field!
Seeing the two of them looking confused, Song Ci patiently explained, "A few days ago, Engineer Liu reported to me that the team had worked tirelessly for six months to solve the technical problems.
The first mature and usable version of TenOS, Tenda's mobile operating system, has officially been released!
Of course, we must look at the current situation objectively.
Currently, TenOS is still a product that is deeply customized and optimized based on Android open source code, and has not yet completely broken away from its reliance on Android's underlying architecture to achieve complete independence."
After a brief pause, Song Ci said firmly: "But this is the first successful step in the Long March, and it is a breakthrough from zero!
With this basic version, at least when reporting to the higher-ups, we can present tangible results and give a preliminary explanation to the leaders."
As CEO, Zhang Yong has a keen sense of strategy and immediately grasped the huge opportunity hidden in Song Ci's words, realizing it before Wang Jing did:
"Mr. Song, are you targeting China Mobile's huge 4G contract phone market?"
"That's exactly what I mean!" Song Ci nodded, stating his own analysis, "I estimate that in order to quickly seize the 4G market, China Mobile will need to sell at least 100 million mobile phones in the next one to two years.
Although they are all mid-to-low-end contract phones, the base is a huge one hundred million units!
If every machine can be equipped with TenOS, we can begin to build a system ecosystem! This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to 'seed' TenOS on a large scale!
At this point, Zhang Yong and Wang Jing understood.
When the top leader personally visited Tenda last year, he entrusted the important task of developing an "independent domestic mobile phone operating system" to Tenda Technology.
The chairman has always been shouldering heavy responsibilities and has put in a lot of effort and thought to find breakthroughs in ecological applications for TenOS.
Previously, the bank had painstakingly wooed Huawei and Xiaomi to become shareholders of MyBank and share core interests. One of its long-term goals was to bring these two domestic mobile phone manufacturing giants under its control.
Being more closely bound to the Tenda ship will pave the way for Huawei and Xiaomi phones to be equipped with Tenda mobile phone systems in the future.
Wang Jing thought of this and a complex emotion welled up in her heart. She felt empathy for Song Ci's immense pressure and also felt deeply for the group's investment. She softly consoled him:
"Mr. Song, don't put too much pressure on yourself. Since the top management is determined to promote the domestic system, they will definitely provide corresponding policy support at the critical moment.
The group has invested enormous human, material, and financial resources in the development of TenOS, and the progress achieved is obvious to all. The leadership is beyond reproach, both morally and rationally."
"I'm aware of all this!" Song Ci shook his head, obviously unwilling to talk too much about the hardships at this moment, and quickly brought the topic back to the real business planning.
"Right now, we need to focus on how to implement this cooperation plan. My plan is to bring Huawei into the cooperation framework."
Song Ci's calm gaze swept across Zhang Yong and Wang Jing's faces, with a questioning and decisive look:
"Today, the right time, right place, and right people are all here. The issuance of 4G licenses is the right time; the advantages and needs of the three parties are the right place;
We have a good cooperative foundation with China Mobile and Huawei, and share common strategic goals, which is harmony for people.
This is the golden opportunity for the three companies to reach in-depth cooperation and jointly build the "network + terminal + ecosystem" iron triangle!
Song Ci sat up straight and began to articulate his carefully considered cooperation plan in a clear and structured manner, like a commander strategizing a battle:
“In this iron triangle alliance, each party has clear goals and roles:
China Mobile's core demand is to quickly promote the 4G network and reverse its user disadvantage in the 3G era.
It can provide high-quality 4G network security, competitive call fee subsidies, and a powerful offline mobile phone sales channel across the country that is unmatched by anyone.
Huawei also has its own demands. It certainly wants to seize market share in the mid- and low-end mobile phone market and hone its communication technology.
They will be responsible for providing mobile phone hardware design and manufacturing, while ensuring that the communication module is perfectly compatible and deeply optimized with the mobile TD-LTE network.
What we at Tenda need is to build the TenOS ecosystem and open up a third mobile ecosystem entrance besides iOS and Android.
The Group can provide the TenOS operating system, which is deeply optimized and highly compatible with mobile 4G networks, and integrates and embeds all popular applications such as WeChat, mobile payment, online video, and app stores.
At the same time, it can also provide value-added services such as cloud storage and big data analysis to empower the entire ecosystem."
Before Song Ci could fully reveal his ideas, Zhang Yong, who had already caught up with the rhythm of his thoughts, took over the topic:
"This creates a perfect closed loop: China Mobile gains user stickiness and traffic growth through its network and channels; Huawei increases its market share and brand penetration through large-scale shipments;
By pre-installing TenOS, Tenda successfully introduced and locked users into our Internet service ecosystem, gaining valuable user access and data resources.
This is a true win-win situation!"
"That's right! The one who knows me best is Zhang Yong!" Song Ci couldn't help but clap his hands and laugh when he heard that.
The laughter was filled with admiration for the capable assistant and the pleasure of having the strategic concept thoroughly understood.
He paused again, looked at Wang Jing who was slow to react, and gave an order: "Sister Jing, let's put it this way, you will be responsible for it yourself.
I communicated and negotiated with the mobile company and made my intention clear: to upgrade the originally scheduled high-level meeting between the two sides to a three-party strategic meeting and invite Huawei to join.
I believe that with President Xi's foresight, he will be happy to see this happen and welcome such a powerful ally to join.
On the Huawei side, I will call Mr. Ren to explain the situation and extend an invitation. It will then be seen whether Mr. Ren will take the time to attend or delegate his rotating CEO to attend the meeting.
We should strive to hold a trilateral meeting as soon as possible to finalize the general direction of cooperation and establish a '4G Ecological Alliance'! The sooner the better."
Wang Jing's expression froze, and she agreed quickly: "Don't worry, Mr. Song, I'll contact them right away to ensure that the cooperation is successfully concluded."
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(End of this chapter)
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