Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

Chen Yansen wasn’t angry; he asked the question in a calm tone.

”That’s true, but the investment banks on Hong Kong Island only gave it a valuation of less than six billion,” Zhou Shouzhi explained.

”And that’s why Liu Qiangdong gave up on listing on Hong Kong Island,” Chen Yansen said with a smile.

The implication was clear: Digital Sky Technology’s offer was too low.

”President Chen, I’ll be in touch.” Zhou Shouzhi needed to discuss this further with his boss.

Pinbei had grown too fast to prove its long-term performance stability. The risk was too high, so investment firms were unwilling to offer a high valuation.

After a moment of thought, Chen Yansen decided against opening a new round of financing.

The only exceptions would be Penguin Investment or a state-backed venture capital firm. The former could provide Pinbei with free traffic, while the latter could offer policy support and help with regulatory compliance.

The reason Chen Yansen hadn’t moved Pinbei’s headquarters to Hang City, Hu City, or Jinling was because by staying in Xucheng or Luzhou, he had connections in high places who could look out for them.

Otherwise, with Pinbei’s aggressive user acquisition tactics, if they were in a city where they had no connections, the fines from the Market Supervision Association would be enough to fill an entire building.

Features like ”Bargain to Zero,” the ”Cash Prize Wheel,” and the ”Money Printer” were incredibly effective for user acquisition. In fact, any day that didn’t bring in at least a few hundred complaints was a sign that new user growth was flagging.

Before the end of the workday, Liu Zhiping called. After confirming that Chen Yansen had no plans to raise funds, they exchanged a few pleasantries and hung up.

Penguin wasn’t in a hurry, anyway. Holding a 15% stake in Pinbei, they had already made a killing on their investment.

「Meanwhile.」

The phone lines at Market Supervision Association offices across the country were ringing off the hook. Complaints accusing Jingdong, Sunning, and Gome of deceptive marketing were flooding in.

Many customers who had been unable to purchase the low-priced products felt the entire 418 Home Appliance Festival was nothing more than a publicity stunt by the e-commerce platforms.

Screenshots of products whose prices were raised right before being ”lowered” for the sale also began to go viral on social media.

At 5:00 p.m., the National Commerce Association announced it was launching an investigation, vowing to punish any instances of price fraud without leniency.

However, the official in charge of the investigation was left dumbfounded after a preliminary review. From his perspective, not a single one of these bastards was innocent.

If they were to actually enforce the penalties, no one would escape unscathed.

After all, the higher-ups had held a meeting at the start of the year and set an ambitious target of ten trillion for the e-commerce market in 2012.

He feared that news of the penalties would have an overly negative impact on the e-commerce market.

As a result, the whole affair generated a lot of noise. Every day, some well-known lawyer would offer analysis, suggesting the platforms involved in the 418 promotion could face fines ranging from 50,000 to 500,000.

But it was all thunder and no rain. Aside from being summoned for a ”discussion,” the impact on Jingdong, Sunning, and Gome was practically zero.

Pinbei also came out of this battle as the industry’s number two, its sales volume in the home appliance sector second only to Jingdong.

That evening, Chen Yansen announced that all Pinbei Technology employees, including part-time customer service staff, would receive a 1.3x multiplier on their Q2 bonuses. Instantly, cheers erupted throughout Building 8.

「Meanwhile.」

Far away in Yanjing, at 11:00 p.m. on the night of April 20th, Cheng Wei’s outsourced development team finished their work ahead of schedule. After a round of testing, DiDi Dache 1.0 was finally ready for market.