Losing Money to Be a Tycoon

December 23rd, Thursday…

Feeling slightly apprehensive, Chang You arrived outside Boss Pei's office once again. The last time he came had been two weeks ago.

At that time, Chang You had brought the Otto OS—which he had been very confident about—here. In the end, a bunch of bugs appeared out of nowhere, and the entire project failed.

Boss Pei had raised some criticisms about the stability of the system and asked Chang You to prioritize stability over all the gaudy, unnecessary details.

This time, Chang You mainly wanted to show Boss Pei two things.

First, he wanted to show Boss Pei the improved Otto OS. Nothing had changed since the previous time; it contained all the same things. In fact, to improve stability, Chang You had gotten rid of some less useful functions.

His aim was to ensure that the system would be as stable as possible, with minimal bugs appearing, while he was reporting their progress to Boss Pei.

Apart from that, he wanted to present the prototype for Otto Technologies' first cell phone.

Otto Technologies had been established close to two months ago. Chang You had to admit that it was a first-tier local manufacturer indeed; it had been extremely efficient in producing the first prototype.

However, Chang You was feeling apprehensive as he held the first prototype in his hands.

He was not confident at all.

Although he could not bear to present this to Boss Pei, it had already been produced. He had to let Boss Pei take a look.

If he was not satisfied, Chang You could still make edits to it.

Before entering, Chang You closed his eyes and said a short prayer that the Heavens would watch over him and that minimal bugs would appear. Then, he knocked on the door.

When he heard 'come in', Chang You pushed open the door to enter the office and then explained the purpose of his visit to Boss Pei.

Pei Qian nodded happily. "Alright, let me take a look."

Pei Qian was quite interested in this cell phone. After all, this was the first tangible product that Tengda was developing.

Before this, Tengda had produced many games, but they were intangible at the end of the day. One could only operate them on computers or game machines; they could not hold the games in their hands and play with them.

ROF was a computer-installation business, but its products were not that different from other DIY computers.

This cell phone would be different. It would be produced using ODM, but cell phones were digital products with a high level of integration after all. The cell phones they created would be unique.

Pei Qian watched as Chang You placed a 'brick' in his hands.

…it was very heavy!

Pei Qian could feel an obvious weight on his hands. "How much does this cell phone weigh?"

Ashamed, Chang You answered, "247 grams."

Pei Qian was silent.

He did not know what else to say other than that it was awesome!

What did this weight mean?

At the moment, the cell phones that were in trend were small. Take Pineapple's flagship models throughout the generations as an example for instance. Until now, they all weighed about 140 grams. Even the bigger models only weighed about 190 grams.

In fact, a phone weighing more than 200 grams would already be considered quite heavy for relatively weaker girls.

One could say that only athletes and martial artists would be able to carry a cell phone weighing 250 grams.

Pei Qian considered the weight of the cell phone in his hand.

Hmm, it would probably feel really good to hit someone with this!

Chang You obviously knew that the cell phone was way too heavy as well. Looking embarrassed, he said, "Boss Pei, we had no other choice. There are too many things in this cell phone.

"A monitor with high refresh rate, a 5800 mAh battery, the latest microchip, a custom-made cooling system, a horizontal linear motor…

"All of these add up to a lot of weight."

Pei Qian nodded.

Indeed, they had no other choice but to do this because they wanted to make the phone worth the full eight thousand yuan.

If they failed to add enough material and the cell phone's worth ended up being far less than eight thousand yuan, the System would not allow Pei Qian to sell the phone at such a high price.

However, that also meant that the cell phone would be relatively heavier.

After all, while other cell phones had 2000 to 3000 mAh batteries, this one had close to 6000 mAh. It would be a surprise if this cell phone model didn't turn out heavy.

To Pei Qian, the additional weight was a good thing. In fact, it would be best if everyone coined the cell phone as a 250-gram machine that charged an IQ tax. Then, Otto Technologies would fail to sell the cell phones and end up accumulating stocks in their warehouses!

Of course, Pei Qian remembered there being cell phone manufacturers who did that. One example was manufacturers of gaming phones.

However, the current market was still significantly different from the market in which gaming phones were introduced.

First, gaming phones only appealed to a small market.

Cell phones were different from computers. They were digital products with high levels of integration.

Computers could be adjusted based on requirements. A gaming laptop and a light notebook were extremely different in terms of appearance and use, so that one could not replace the other.

Yet, the same could not be said for gaming phones and ordinary cell phones.

At the same time, cell phones had too many functions. People used them to take photos, record videos, and the like. Most users of cell phones would prioritize everyday functions such as video playback, chatting software, and taking photos and videos. Gaming was only one additional function a cell phone had.

Thus, most people would find it a waste to spend the same amount of money on a cell phone that had worse camera functions, portability, and interface… even if it offered a better gaming experience.

Of course, a gaming phone might still be a good option for hardcore mobile gamers.

However, there were two more problems.

The mobile game market was not yet thriving in this world.

At the moment, the more popular mobile games in the market were card war games. Mobile war games like Bloody Battle Song were now considered too hardcore and had become very rare.

Less hardcore mobile games did not require screens with a high refresh rate; neither did they require a lot of battery.

Thus, from the perspective of consumers, Otto Technologies' cell phone would be quite… useless.

It was manufactured by a random brand that no one had heard of, and it was quite heavy. These two points alone were enough to form a horrible first impression in consumers' eyes.

Seeing Boss Pei in deep thought made Chang You think that he was unhappy with the prototype. Thus, he quickly said, "Boss Pei, this is only a prototype. We haven't started producing it in bulk.

"If you think it is too heavy, we can think of other things. For example, we could cut down the battery's capacity to about 4000 mAh. That would probably cut 200 grams from the cell phone's weight…"

Pei Qian quickly raised his hand. "No, it's quite good this way!

"No matter how good the cell phone's functions are—if it runs out of battery, it would be as good as a brick. It would not be able to do anything. We have to make sure that the cell phone would have enough battery, so that nobody would have to worry about battery life!

"The battery capacity is good now. It would make our cell phones stand out. You have to keep it this way, understand?!

"All in all, I'm very happy with this prototype. This was the ideal cell phone I had in mind!

"That's about all I have to say for the hardware. I'll try the system out now."

Pei Qian tried out the Otto OS for the second time.

Chang You had been worried at first, but Boss Pei seemed unexpectedly satisfied. He quickly said, "Alright, Boss Pei. If you have any more suggestions, you can raise them at any time.

"There's another thing. We're in the process of custom-making the cell phone's appearance. We're matching colors for the back cover, working on the logo, and the like. We want to make the cell phone as beautiful as possible so as to attract more customers…"

As Pei Qian scanned the cell phone, he shook his head and asked, "The color of its back cover?

"Don't distract yourselves with so many unnecessary decorations. Just make it a pure, simple color.

"If you think it looks ugly, just place a logo on it. That's what Pineapple does, right?"

Chang You felt light-headed. "Then… what if it still looks ugly?"

Pei Qian looked up at him. "Make the logo bigger to cover it."

Chang You was speechless.

What the h*ll did he mean by 'make the logo bigger'?! Did he mean that bigger logos would distract customers from the color of the back cover?

At the moment, many flagship cell phone models had back covers of varying colors. What's more, all of those colors were given special, meaningful names. That was one of the emerging trends in the local cell phone industry.

Yet, Boss Pei had an altogether different taste. Not only was he forbidding them from creating the cell phone in various colors, but he was also asking them to use a simple color.

On top of that, he wanted to make the logo bigger.

At the moment, only Pineapple cell phones had huge logos on the back cover and were still selling well.

That was because creating huge logos reflected one's immense confidence in the brand.

If an unknown brand enlarged their logo on their cell phones, customers might be asked an extremely awkward question whenever they picked their cell phones up: "Ai, what brand is that?"

Thus, most domestic cell phone brands placed their logos in low-key positions and made their back covers look more dazzling. That made cell phones of other brands significantly different from Pineapple's.

Otherwise, those brands would be cursed horribly.

If Chang You had been allowed to decide, he would probably have chosen to go with the bulk of other domestic cell phone manufacturers and created a dazzling back cover with a low-key logo.

However, now that Boss Pei had given him clear instructions, Chang You had no other choice but to rack his brains to fulfill his requests.

Pei Qian continued toying with the 250-gram machine, feeling surprised inside.

There were no more bugs this time!

It looked like Chang You had been working hard during this period. He had repaired all the bugs that had appeared before, and the system was now much more stable.

After playing for about ten minutes, only three or four bugs appeared. What's more, none of them had affected the cell phones' usability.

Chang You visibly sat more upright.

It had not been easy! So many bugs had appeared before. He had been crushed.

After that, Chang You had led his team of brothers to work even harder than before. Finally, they had repaired most of the bugs.

What's more, in order to prepare for this reporting session, everyone had spent several days testing the system out. Their confidence had recovered only after they had confirmed that no more bugs could be found.

Even then, Boss Pei still managed to find three minor bugs. Chang You was shocked.

Did Boss Pei have the innate ability to draw bugs out of programs and products?

Still, the session had been a success.

Chang You deliberated for a moment and said, "Boss Pei, the system is now much more stable than before. Can we start working on those new functions?"

Pei Qian was silent.

He's not giving up!

Pei Qian's expression darkened as he answered strictly, "It's not good to try and bite off more than you can chew!

"Where are you now? There are so many things to improve within the original Android System. Are you already satisfied now that you've only managed to repair a few bugs?

"Go back and continue improving it. The details are still not as good as they can be!"

Chang You took back the cell phone, visibly confused.

The details were still not as good as they could be? They had more or less caught up with most other domestic cell phone manufacturers; how was that still not good enough?

However, Chang You did not dare to question Boss Pei any further and had no choice but to take the cell phone quietly. He planned to go back to self-reflect.

He still had not managed to push the system's research and development work to the next stage this time.

Although the final version of the cell phone was becoming clearer, Chang You felt that he was drifting further from his own expectations.