Chapter 156 Zhang Xuhao: Failed and lost 100 million in financing (asking for monthly tickets)
Chen Yansen returned to Building 8 and took the elevator to his office on the fifth floor.
On the table was the lunch ordered by the executives, which included five dishes and a soup, along with four sets of bowls and chopsticks. The restaurant also sent a few bottles of drinks.
"Lao Gao, call Ye Qiuping over, and also call Wang Xueting from the Human Resources Department."
Chen Yansen sat down, but didn't rush to eat. Instead, he called Gao Weilin and others to eat together.
Eating is secondary. I mainly want to talk about the expansion of Orange Technology and the recruitment progress of Pinbei Technology.
After a while, Gao Weilin, Ye Qiuping and Wang Xueting came together.
"Boss!" Three people greeted at the door.
"Come in, let's talk while we eat."
Chen Yansen rolled up his sleeves and motioned for the three to sit down.
"Thank you, boss." Gao Weilin responded and sat down first.
Ye Qiuping and Wang Xueting looked at each other and sat down next to Lao Gao.
Wang Xueting graduated from Tongji University with a major in human resources management. She had previously worked in a communications company in Shanghai for many years before being poached by Chen Yansen to join Orange Technology with a monthly salary of more than 40,000 yuan.
She was the one who recruited Zhang Cong and Zhou Ze, two big names in the field of industrial design.
"How is Pinbei's recruitment progress? Help me build the framework of the human resources department first, focusing on development and investment promotion in the early stage."
Chen Yansen picked up the chopsticks, picked up a shrimp and put it into his mouth, then looked at Wang Xueting and asked.
"There are currently two suitable candidates for human resources managers, one is Xiong Li from Yidong, and the other is Zhang Junjie from Suning. They both have extensive experience in the e-commerce field, and Xiong Li also has experience in business operations."
Wang Xueting answered immediately.
"Mr. Ye, do you know this person?" Chen Yansen turned his gaze to Ye Qiuping.
"The recruitment supervisor of Dongdong Small Appliances is very capable. He understands both personnel and business." Ye Qiuping thought for a moment and gave a positive evaluation.
"Arrange an interview as soon as possible. If they are suitable, both of them will be hired."
Chen Yansen nodded and made a decision immediately.
"Okay, boss." Wang Xueting replied.
"The recruitment progress of Orange Technology and Pinbei Technology is slower than I expected. So, formulate an internal referral reward mechanism with the reward amount equivalent to the headhunting expenditure cost, and give it to me before leaving get off work."
Chen Yansen thought for a moment and added.
Take Orange Technology for example, most of its employees come from mobile phone manufacturers such as OPPO, Xiaomi, Huawei and ZTE.
Allowing them to make internal referrals can significantly speed up the recruitment process.
After all, they understand the treatment and working environment of Orange Technology, and it would be more convincing if they come forward to communicate with old colleagues.
"Understood, boss." Wang Xueting replied immediately. There are currently 6 people in the Human Resources Department including her, although the interview rooms are fully booked every day.
However, the current total number of employees at Orange Technology is still only over 200.
It’s not that the salary and benefits are bad, but that Orange Technology is developing too fast and their recruitment speed cannot keep up with the demand.
"Lao Gao, have you paid for the equipment at the Orange Mobile Phone Factory?"
Chen Yansen put down his chopsticks and asked Gao Weilin.
"There are 34 production lines in total, and the equipment funds were directly transferred to the supplier's public account, totaling 1.37 billion yuan."
Gao Weilin had been on business trips with Chen Yansen several times and knew his temper well, so he answered casually, explaining while eating.
This is why most mobile phone manufacturers choose OEM factories. Before the mobile phones are even produced, the equipment alone will cost more than one billion.
But for Chen Yansen, the money was well spent.
Once the factory goes into production, it can accommodate more than 5,000 employees, bringing him 4,000 humanitarian contributions every month.
The monthly production capacity can be increased from 500,000 units to 3 million units!
Those netizens on Weibo who were scolding Chen Yansen for being a monkey can finally keep quiet for a while.
From August to early October, the factory's total shipments were about 1 million units, with a total pre-sale sales of 3.5 million units, and 70% of the orders have not yet been produced.
Although Chen Yansen is very popular, some impatient users still urge him to ship the goods in the comment section, and many of them even use swear words.
"What about the brand department? How are the online public opinions and user feedback?" Chen Yansen looked at Ye Qiuping and couldn't help but sigh in his heart that this woman has a really strong psychological quality.
Even though he knew he was being thoroughly investigated, he was still able to stay in Orange Technology with peace of mind, and was now sitting opposite each other and eating comfortably.
Wang Xueting looked nervous and restrained, but she was actually as relaxed as if she were at home.
"Except for the problems of insufficient production capacity and poor signal due to the aluminum alloy back cover, judging from user feedback, the praise rate of Orange phones is much higher than that of Xiaomi phones. The data department combined with the sales model predicted that if the production capacity problem is solved, the monthly sales volume can be increased by more than 3 times."
When Ye Qiuping heard Chen Yansen calling her, she looked up and spoke slowly.
"Wait another month until Shenzhen City finishes recruiting workers and debugging equipment."
Chen Yansen's tone was flat.
Although the aluminum alloy back cover affects signal reception, it improves the body strength and heat dissipation effect.
Compared with Xiaomi phones, the fluency and user experience of Orange phones are obviously of a higher level.
As a result, after Xiaomi's pre-sale volume exceeded 700,000 units, it received a lot of negative reviews online, with many people mocking that the phone was so hot that you could fry an egg in it.
If there were no Orange phones, users might still tolerate Xiaomi's heating and lag because of its ultimate cost-effectiveness.
With so many choices to choose from, who would want to settle for less?
After lunch, Gao Weilin, Ye Qiuping and Wang Xueting left the office.
Chen Yansen put his feet on the desk and took out his mobile phone to check the news.
Ali increased the annual technical service fee and store breach of contract deposit for Taobao Mall, angering small and medium-sized sellers.
These merchants go to the stores of large merchants to place orders, cancel orders, bombard with negative reviews, etc. to vent their dissatisfaction.
To put it bluntly, Ma Liyun felt that the sheep were fat and it was time to harvest them.
But small and medium-sized sellers don’t think so. Last year, Ali quietly adjusted the search rules to direct traffic to large and brand merchants. Their income dropped significantly, and they had been holding a grudge for a long time.
This unilateral price increase completely angered them, and hundreds of merchants even ran to the Ali headquarters to protest.
"Let's make some noise! The more chaotic this market is, the better!"
Chen Yansen thought to himself and muttered to himself.
Who is Ma Liyun?
Even if we compromise temporarily, we will have to deal with these people later.
Like Zhang Yong, he believes that with the development of e-commerce and economic improvement, users' demand for products will continue to increase and the average order value will gradually increase.
As a result, it abandoned the 6 trillion yuan sinking market.
But three years later, Pinxixi emerged and turned the e-commerce landscape upside down, forcing Ali to create Taote and Tao Factory, and Dongfang was also deceived into launching Xixi and Xixi Special Sale.
Helplessly facing a hopeless situation, Pinxixi launched the strategy of "refund only", firmly grasping the hearts of users, and made rapid progress all the way to become one of the top three e-commerce companies.
Chen Yansen's Pinbei borrowed the business model of Pinxixi, aiming to take over the small and medium-sized sellers abandoned by Ali and Yidong.
Take the mobile phone industry as an example. A mobile phone priced at 1,999 yuan is just a mid-range smartphone for many people, but many people still cannot afford it.
There is never a shortage of users for feature phones and copycat phones priced at 299 yuan, 499 yuan, and 699 yuan.
Existence is reasonable! It is normal for a trillion-dollar sinking market to breed an e-commerce giant.
Chen Yansen just needs to go with the flow!
Sliding the screen, the second piece of news is the death of Apple CEO Steve Jobs, and Apple is about to enter the Cook era.
The rest of the news focused on the fierce competition among group-buying websites, with Lashou, Wowotuan, Nuomi, Dianping and Meituan fighting each other, poaching employees and offering high subsidies in an attempt to gain market share.
What surprised Chen Yansen was that Lashou and Nuomi.com were extremely strong in this life, and their online marketing was good. They could even compete with Meituan’s most valued field sales team.
If this trend continues, it will be difficult to determine the winner of the Thousand Regiments War in a short period of time.
Chen Yansen frowned. After selling FoxTao, his influence on the group buying industry was almost reduced to zero.
He doesn't care who will win in the group buying competition.
Anyway, from 2011 to 2013, both group buying and takeout were losing business.
After Ele.me received 1 million yuan in financing at the beginning of the year, it failed to make any splash in the circle.
Venture capital seems to have forgotten about the food delivery sector, and has no intention of investing or following up on the investment.
Thinking of this, Chen Yansen called Lao Gao and asked him to try to contact Zhang Xuhao.
On the one hand, by investing in advance, he will be able to make a fortune in the future whether Ali or Meituan acquires Ele.me; on the other hand, he can use this opportunity to participate in the daily operations of Ele.me.
Prepare in advance for the next step.
After hearing this, Gao Weilin immediately agreed.
After joining Senlian Capital, he originally thought that his job was all about buying and investing, but he ended up becoming the financial director of Orange Technology, and from time to time he had to help his boss pay the balance for cars and houses.
This person doesn't look like the head of an investment institution at all, he's simply Chen Yansen's housekeeper.
This time he finally had the chance to demonstrate his expertise, but after getting to know Ele.me in depth, he was stunned.
Who came up with such a shitty business model?
There is no hope of making a profit! The platform is not pleasing to both buyers and merchants.
In order to make money, merchants have no choice but to increase online prices. After all, packaging, delivery and platform commissions increase costs; buyers are unwilling to spend more money and feel that the platform is passing the costs on to themselves.
Ele.me, which was founded two and a half years ago, has only received one round of financing so far. Its daily order volume is more than 3,000. After deducting management and technical costs, Ele.me has actually been losing money.
Gao Weilin wanted to persuade Chen Yansen, but finally he sighed and chose to trust his boss's vision.
When it comes to doing business, no matter how ten of you are, you are no match for your boss. Just do your job well. If you cross the line at will, you may cause dissatisfaction from your boss.
Two days later, Zhang Xuhao received a call from Gao Weilin.
"I'll give you 100 million yuan, and you want 30% of Senlian's equity." Gao Weilin made his offer.
"US dollars?" Zhang Xuhao asked tentatively.
"Huayuan." Gao Weilin sneered, thinking that this guy was overthinking. Given Ele.me's current scale, a valuation of 200 million is already a lot.
Zhang Xuhao was silent. During this period of time, he had been thinking about whether to change the name of the product.
Are you hungry? He is really hungry now! In the past two years, apart from the US$1 million financing from Sands Venture Capital, he has not received a penny from venture capital.
He wanted to expand the market, but he had no money! This lousy name was like a curse to him! He wanted 100 million in funding, but he couldn't bear to give up 30% of the shares.
After thinking about it, Zhang Xuhao said he would consider it first. After hanging up the phone, he immediately checked the background of Senlian Capital and found out that the boss behind it was Chen Yansen.
Zhang Xuhao immediately had an idea. He took the quotation from Senlian Capital and went to negotiate with GSR Ventures, Sequoia Capital and Hillhouse Capital respectively, taking the opportunity to raise his own value.
This greatly puzzled Zhang Lei of Hillhouse Capital, as he had previously studied Ele.me's business model and, frankly, did not like it.
In his opinion, Chen Yansen has a good business vision and should not have set his sights on Ele.me.
So Zhang Lei called Chen Yansen.
Chen Yansen then realized Zhang Xuhao's trick and denied it with a smile: "I will not invest in takeout even if I invest in group buying."
After the two men finished exchanging greetings, Chen Yansen snorted in his heart: Zhang Xuhao, this guy, looks honest, but is actually so sinister. He can understand Zhang Xuhao's actions, but he still feels unhappy about being plotted against.
The idea of investing in Ele.me was instantly dispelled.
Sure enough, those who were able to leave their names during the golden decade of the Internet were not simple characters.
Although Chen Yansen himself is an unethical person, he likes partners who are moral with him. People like Zhang Xuhao are too cunning, so it is better to invest in Meituan than in him.
It didn't take long for Zhang Xuhao to realize that he had messed up. Not only did he offend Senlian Capital, but he also missed a financing opportunity.
(End of this chapter)
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