Rebirth of America, this is my time

What?

This fact surprised Ethan.

Why?

Ethan didn't understand.

And that frowning look on his face made it look like anyone who stops me from making money will die!

Such an excited expression made Nolan laugh and put out his cigarette, Okay~Okay~Ethan~ don't be excited~

He pressed down his hands and said: Ethan, to be honest, if possible, I also hope that the time to sell goods can be as long as possible, but this kind of thing is not possible, because if you go eastward, the cost of selling goods will increase. It’s greater than the profit of the product itself.”

You should know Ray Kroc, right? He's the father of McDonald's! He created a standardized kitchen! He came up with a food supply chain system! But even so, they still need to find multiple suppliers in North America for their own Restaurants offer standardized products.”

No matter what kind of company you are, if you want to do business all over the country, you must have multiple factories across the country, because factories in a single area cannot carry out distribution throughout the country.

Having said this, Nolan paused, pointed to the map behind him and said: But we, Atari, only have one factory, or in other words, so far, only two game companies, Sega and Milowa, have multiple factories across the country. branch.

In this way, troublesome things arise. Take the route you ran before as an example. It started from our California to Houston and Austin, Texas. The total distance is almost 1,800 miles. A round trip, then It’ll take a week.”

We don't even count the cost of gas. Two hundred gallons of gas for a round trip is only a few hundred dollars, and the personnel expenses are negligible. Even if each of us has a daily food and lodging subsidy of ten dollars, it only costs more than two hundred dollars a week for three people. .”

“But I have to calculate the labor cost of the production staff.”

Nolan Bushnell looked at Ethan with a smile, and pointed the thumb of his left hand outside his office.

We have more than a hundred employees at Atari. It is because of their existence that we can continue to produce circuit boards, and their weekly salary is twelve thousand U.S. dollars. In other words, when you take a When more than 100 or even 200 yuan of circuit boards are sent to Texas, the profits from your trip can only offset our normal personnel expenses at Atari. At the same time, Tang and I’s sales revenue is the real source of our share. .”

As for why there aren't other branches?

At this point, Nolan stopped.

There was helplessness on his face.

Ethan, I don't think I need to answer this, right?

Everyone in the industry knows that electronic arcades are really not very profitable.

If we can really make crazy profits and fully compensate Milohua, how can Professor Ralph Bell agree to the settlement? The professor actually knows, or everyone knows, that the electronic arcade is just a reputation It’s just pretty!”

Because the ones who really make money in this industry are the merchants who buy arcade machines!

Nolan Bushnell's little calculation made Ethan feel a little emotional.

In his previous life, video games were globally recognized as cash cows. Whenever a global financial crisis came, no one who made video games could not survive it.

Zhuchang has relied on games to go from the era of the three major portals to 2023. Goose Factory has also relied on video games to make BA fall behind. Mihuyou has sucked out tens of billions of cash flows. As for Laoren, Sony is even more useless. Having said that, the former has always been a blue chip stock held by Liben National Pension Fund all year round, while the latter is reported to be bankrupt every year, but it is still brought back by the game.

However, making money from video games does not mean making money from electronic arcades.

The electronic arcade industry is a one-time deal. Game companies sell arcade machines to various merchants and earn a small profit. The merchants are the real income kings because they make money from players.

When it comes to opening up the channel for game companies to collect money directly from players, the video game industry actually looks glamorous.

And how to open this channel?

Professor Ralph Bell actually told the world.

That is to be a home host.

Only by truly selling video games into the hands of players! It takes video games to be a cash cow!

But something like a host...

Personal computers just came out~

When Ethan thought about all this, he put away his resentment and laughed, Nolan, I understand what you mean, the cost-benefit principle~

At the same time, he also asked: But if we don't sell it, then we don't want the market on the east side? You know, people in New York, Chicago, and Boston are very rich!

Bring Snake Game over there and you can make two million in any way!

Oh~Ethan~This is actually what I want to tell you next! Nolan Bushnell rubbed his hands eagerly and said with a smile: Actually, in the past week or so, the United States has Game manufacturers in the central and eastern regions are looking for me and want to cooperate with Atari.

I think this cooperation is feasible, but the content...

Nolan did not finish his words, but took out a document from the drawer and pushed it in front of Ethan.

Ethan turned it over and saw that the first page was filled with the name of the company and their cooperation plan.

A New York game company proposed to obtain the production license for Snake Game.

For this, they are willing to pay 8% of the net profit of each machine.

A gaming company in Miami said that they want to license the game motherboard of Snake Game.

In return, they would give Atari a fixed fee of ten dollars for every gaming motherboard sold.

Since when signing the contract, Ethan directly handed over the license for Snake Game to Atari on a one-year basis, so if he followed the normal process, Nolan Bushnell would not have to give it to him. Look at this kind of thing.

Because no matter what method Nolan uses to sell Snake Game to the East Coast, no matter which partner Nolan chooses to sign and what kind of cooperation contract, Ethan will ship the goods according to Atari's selling price and the final bill. Commission based on the amount. Even if others sell it for $1,000, he still sells Atari for $1,200. But now this quotation made him know how much people in this era despise creativity.

You want to get the authorization with an 8% profit commission for each complete machine and a quote of ten dollars a piece?

Ethan immediately threw the document on the table, These people really look ugly but think beautiful!

Pfft! Nolan Bushnell laughed directly.

He shrugged and said: There is no way. If it weren't for the fact that after we reached a settlement with Mi Luohua, Mi Luohua sued all the plagiarists on the market, then they would probably continue to plagiarize.

Yes, if Milohua hadn't transformed into Disney and vowed to give all infringers a hard blow, then the sales of Snake Game would never have been as smooth as they are now.

Only when the iron fist hits these plagiarists will they know what pain is!

But just because they were beaten doesn't mean they are sensible!

After making quick money, who really wants to pay licensing fees?

So, you don't want to discuss this matter with me, do you?

Ethan knocked on the table and asked: To be honest, after seeing the conditions above, I feel like my own blood pressure has increased.

Yeah~ brother~ I feel the same as you, I think these guys are very funny! Nolan complained.

Then he changed the subject and said, However, among so many companies, there are still two that are full of sincerity.

One is Midway Games and the other is Chicago Coin.

Nolan picked up the documents that Ethan had thrown over again, flipped through them briefly, and pushed the information from those two companies in front of him.

With a glance, Ethan also understood the information related to it.

Midway Games was born in 1958, and Chicago Coin was born in 1932. They previously made traditional coin-operated arcade machines. They have rich market channels and have certain experience in the production of electronic arcade machines.

As for experience, how did Atari know about it?

Very simple!

Both companies have made imitations of table tennis games, and both of them are currently sitting in the dock of Milohua!

With Mi Luohua's endorsement, everyone knows they have made money!

Perhaps because the two companies are both in Chicago and have had certain contacts, their cooperation plan was jointly proposed. They are willing to jointly win the rights to the thirty-two states in the eastern and central region of the United States that Atari does not want to involve. For the publishing rights of Snake, they can pay a 10% commission on the selling price of each unit for the complete machine, and for the game motherboard, they are willing to pay a fixed fee of thirty US dollars per game motherboard.

If it were just these, Nolan wouldn't say they were sincere.

What really surprised Ethan was that they wrote down the calculation standards for commissions and fixed fees.

The two companies said that because the Snake Game arcade machine does not allow gambling and does not overlap with the traditional businesses involved in the two companies, their existing customers will not treat them the same way they treat emerging electronics companies.

In order to seize the market, when they released the copycat version of Pong, they directly set the price of a game console at US$800, which was slightly different from Atari's US$1,000, so the price was not high. If improvements are made, eighty dollars for a complete machine is already their limit. If improvements are made, they won't be able to even pay workers' wages.

The same is true for game motherboards. They want to win Snkae Game because they want to take away the market share of electronic arcade machines on the market, so the price of their replacement motherboard is only two hundred and forty US dollars, and the material cost is one hundred US dollars. Fifty US dollars, and the cost of replacing the board is thirty US dollars, their gross profit is only sixty US dollars, and they give Atari thirty US dollars, and the remaining thirty US dollars can only support the company's normal expenses.

Therefore, they know that their offer may not meet Atari's expectations, but they still hope to get the license.

To be honest, Ethan didn't actually believe what they said.

Don’t capitalists pursue profits?

Are you doing charity here?

But this kind of detailed planning made him very comfortable.

how to say?

It feels like someone is telling you from the bottom of their heart, I know your product is good, if possible, please let me make it.

The desire revealed between the lines made Ethan secretly happy.

Of course.

After feeling satisfied, he did not express his opinion.

Throwing the document back again, he said with a smile: Nolan, Atari is yours.

This is your company.

As a partner in a single project, I will only perform my obligations in the contract normally. How can I interfere with the operation of your company?

You know, I'm only interested in this now...

Ethan raised his right hand, rubbing his thumb, index and middle fingers together.

Okay! Okay! Okay! Ethan's clear statement made Nolan laugh.

Right? I understand!

Give me two weeks and I will transfer the share of the first phase to you.

What about the reward for changing the board? Ethan asked with a smile.

This question made Nolan smile and shake his head.

He took out the company's checkbook from the drawer and wrote a check for $5,124.

Here! Here you go!

Note: ① The world’s first commercial home game console, Odyssey, has no CPU and is purely the charm of physical photoelectric reaction. I don’t know how Ralph Bell simulated the photoelectric feedback of more than a dozen games with one machine. And it’s only the size of a briefcase. The U.S. Patent and Copyright Office has his patent drawings. I can’t understand them, but I was shocked. ②Midway Games is a very powerful company. Mortal Kombat is made by him. ③The electronic arcade industry is the most rubbish industry in the entire electronic game field. This view is recognized by the industry. The most famous one is actually Nintendo. Nintendo’s then president Hiroshi Yamauchi once thought about making arcade machines by himself, selling and publishing them, and then doing it. It was given up after only two years, because electronic arcades are the art of real estate, and the real customers are those businesses that open entertainment venues. Game companies simply cannot make money from players. Therefore, when Hiroshi Yamauchi discovered this situation, he directly He gave up on the arcade market, preferring to authorize production to others rather than accumulate labor, and then shifted the research and development line to the development of home game consoles. Not only that, Sega and Atari actually tried to occupy the arcade field, but in the end they all stayed in the corner and became the marketing center. It is precisely because they cannot make money that real-life game companies are crazy about making home consoles. No one is willing to give up most of the profits to middlemen. At the same time, this is also the reason why Ralph Bell is respected in the game circle. He started He could have made an arcade machine, but he didn't because he found that it was not a sustainable business model.