Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

Whether their support was genuine or not, the successive endorsements from these tycoons propelled Aurora Future OS to the number one trending spot online.

At 6:00 PM, the official Weibo account of Huaguo Daily reposted Orange Technology’s promotional poster with the caption: ”Technological innovation is the powerful force driving social progress. We are delighted to learn of Orange Technology’s successful development of the Aurora Future OS, another major achievement for our nation’s tech sector.”

In the time that followed, seven or eight other official media outlets also came out in support of Orange Technology.

Meanwhile, a hastily prepared script was delivered to the anchor of the 7:00 PM nightly news.

The anchor wiped the cold sweat from his brow and quickly familiarized himself with the script. After all, misreading a single word on air would cost him two hundred yuan from his salary.

By now, the Qingcheng D2, Orange C3S, Yaocheng X1, and Moss M7 had all gone on sale.

The Qingcheng D2 garnered the most attention.

At a price of 799 Hua Yuan, users could find no reason to complain.

The entire stock of 200,000 units was sold out in just one hour.

The 100,000 units of the Qingcheng D2 running Aurora Future OS were gone before 8:00 PM.

On the Taobao second-hand market, people immediately began reselling the new Qingcheng D2 phones they had just managed to buy, with markups generally ranging from 300 to 500 Hua Yuan.

Several hundred units were sold in just a few minutes!

It couldn’t be helped; the Qingcheng D2’s value for money was just too insane!

Yan Peng didn’t hesitate for a second. He immediately told the heads of all sales channels to switch the product links to pre-order mode.

The market performance of the Orange C3S was considerably ”cooler,” selling only 127,000 units in two hours.

The Yaocheng X1 was the most expensive, yet its sales figures were jaw-dropping: a total of 73,000 units sold.

It didn’t receive the cold shoulder people expected. Despite its underdeveloped app ecosystem, the Yaocheng X1’s specs were truly worthy of a flagship killer. That, plus the 1% chance of winning a gold bar, tempted many people to take a gamble.

The Moss M7’s sales were the most dismal, with only 7,000 units sold.

For most people, the price was simply too high.

You could buy a whole Qingcheng D2 for 799 Hua Yuan, so who would want to spend 999 on a Moss M7 Smart Speaker?

Elsewhere, just as Chen Yansen and He Dingyou finished their conversation and entered the banquet hall, Zhou Hongyi sidled up, insisting on taking a photo with him.

Chen Yansen was actually a bit put off, but considering Lao Zhou contributed seven to eight hundred million in gross profit for him each year and provided tens of thousands of strands of Human Dao Fire, he finally, reluctantly, agreed.

What he didn’t expect was that Lao Zhou immediately posted the photo on Weibo.

His intentions were obvious.

’What have you got to say now, Little Heizis!’

”Feeling great, having dinner with a good friend.” Zhou Hongyi’s caption was tacky, but it was one hell of a flex.

”@President Chen Yansen, if you’ve been kidnapped, change your profile picture to this one.”

”Whoa! Did President Chen really change his profile picture?”

”Dude, stop messing around! That’s always been President Chen’s profile picture.”

”I’m dying! People actually believe a ridiculous joke like ’Zhou Hongyi kidnapped Chen Yansen’!”

But the netizens still wouldn’t let Zhou Hongyi off the hook, continuing to tease him good-naturedly.

By midnight, after eight hours of sales, the three new phones—the Qingcheng D2, Orange C3S, and Yaocheng X1—had sold a combined total of 1.727 million units.

The Qingcheng D2’s sales were in a league of their own. It completely dominated the sub-1000 yuan market, selling a total of 1.37 million units. Shipping dates for pre-orders were already backed up by five days.

The Orange C3S sold 241,000 units, and the Yaocheng X1 sold 116,000.

With a cumulative 1.727 million units sold, the total sales revenue reached a staggering 2.63 billion Hua Yuan!

Outsiders speculated that Chen Yansen was likely using low-cost smartphones to pump up sales volume, hoping to surpass Apple, ZTE, and LG in 2013 shipments to become the world’s third-largest smartphone brand.

In reality, Chen Yansen did have a similar plan, but his target wasn’t third place—it was second.