Back to the prime of life

Chapter 219 Money
It has been almost a year since Chi Yongsheng was 'tricked' into coming to the United States, but now he and his wife no longer talk about it. Giving up the choice of becoming a university professor will probably be the highlight of his life decision.

As for living apart, well, this is now testing the relationship between the couple, since Mrs. Chi no longer needs to work.

Having money doesn't necessarily equate to having happiness, but it certainly brings the freedom to choose happiness.

When Lu Changge landed in San Francisco, it was still daytime, but he was already incredibly sleepy.

Chi Yongsheng picked him up and took him to a hotel near the company. As for the rest, no matter how important it was, they would have to wait until he had a good night's sleep.

When he woke up, Shen Mo also rushed over from the company. Currently, Chatter only has 8 people in the entire company. Apart from Shen Mo himself, the remaining 7 people are all engineers, 4 of whom are of Chinese descent.

She did want to hire people, but on the one hand, she was short of funds, and on the other hand, Lu Changge had mentioned from the beginning that she would strictly control the growth of the number of employees.

So far, the technology has yielded good results. Chi Yongsheng was forced to become an expert in the Erlang language platform within a year, and he is competent in everything from front-end to back-end, from development to operation and maintenance.

His abilities have been growing, as evidenced by his numerous conference calls; people are ultimately driven by pressure.

Even Lu Changge hadn't initially expected them to achieve this level. In just one year, they perfected a high-concurrency, low-latency system, built an end-to-end encrypted communication foundation, and developed a highly customized and efficient protocol design based on XMPP. Moreover, in order to serve global users, they began planning to deploy a globally distributed server architecture, which of course required money.

"You don't even have a single customer service representative?" Lu Changge joked.

"I'm probably the customer service manager. I say I'm the CEO, but I don't actually manage anything. I'm more like a logistics manager, which means finding places for them, purchasing equipment, and handling payroll, etc."

Chi Yongsheng said, "Actually, President Shen has been forced to become a semi-technician. Now she knows everything and can even code. But as for the WeChat development for enterprise users that you mentioned last time, we need to hire two more people to be in charge of that."

Zhou Shuang asked, "How do you recruit people?"

"Originally, it was through Lao Chi who found him. After all, he is a university professor and can find tech experts active in Silicon Valley through various connections. Now that Chatter is famous, it's much easier. Just give him stock options and raise the requirements."

Lu Changge asked, "How will they be given?"

"The proportions are typical for Silicon Valley startups. This is an option pool that we discussed and came up with, but the earliest participants only have a year left, so it's not time to exercise their options yet," Shen Mo explained. "Silicon Valley has been around for decades, and some programmers treat stock options at new companies like buying lottery tickets. Winning just one can turn their lives around. So people here are more accepting of stock options."

Chi Yongsheng added, "The difference is that our user base grew too fast, so prices rose rapidly. Now it's difficult to gain even 0.5 percentage points. The three foreigners who joined later were all highly capable and experienced elites. Later, we developed a Symbian-based version, which was done by one of them, along with me and another person."

Zhou Shuang exclaimed in surprise, "No wonder you were so confident that you could launch the company's WeChat account with just two more people."

“It seems that DST’s decision to contact me wasn’t a coincidence; you guys have really gained some reputation.” Lu Changge stroked his chin. “In that case, it seems we can still negotiate the price with them.”

"Of course, since you're here, you can also meet with other venture capitalists."

Shen Mo had absolutely no interest in the $5000 million first round of financing offered by DST; she agreed to invest, not the amount.

This woman, born into a merchant family, has a knack for business. "I only have a few people, and most of the labor costs are covered by stock options. As for renting a place and buying some office furniture, who here can't chip in to cover that? Chatter has huge potential. If it weren't for the high cost of the servers, I wouldn't even want to raise funds. But even for the servers, I don't need as much as $5000 million. I only need a fifth at most."

Lu Changge understood, of course. Ten million could last for more than half a year. But what would happen after that?

But that's a bit of a dilemma.

Zhou Shuang glanced at her. "The 5000 million was raised based on a 10% equity ratio, and that's without any negotiation. You only want 1000 million, so you're only giving him a maximum of 2%? Would a company like DST only offer 2% in the first round? No way. Even a fool knows you have to take a big bite when the new company is small."

"That doesn't matter, it's their choice to invest, they have to listen to us. To be honest, if it weren't for the financial crisis, I really would have asked my family for help." Shen Mo said with a touch of pride.

In reality, this is just talk. Chatter itself carries inherent risks; if they don't take venture capital money, then gambling with their family's money would be too much. It's not like they casually have billions in cash at home.

Having billions in assets and having billions in cash are worlds apart.

“2%? That’s unlikely, too stingy.” Lu Changge found it a bit funny. “They probably wouldn’t be interested at all if it were less than 5%. On the other hand, it’s good news for us that the new company has received investment. With money, our ability to act will definitely be greatly enhanced. Boss Shen, didn’t you ever think that if we gave you $3000 million, you could create even greater value? It’s my fault, I kept telling you to save money, and you’ve become addicted to it. You don’t even know what to do with so much money.”

“Yes,” Chi Yongsheng said, “we can make this money work for us, or at worst we can buy back the options we’ve promised. There’s always a way.”

Hearing this, Shen Mo's expression softened slightly, but she still stuck to her bottom line: "Anyway, 10% is impossible unless DST offers an exorbitant price."

At this meeting, Lu Changge started involving Xu Qiuxue. Before leaving, he said, "This is my sister. I paid to bring her here to study. In her spare time, let her do an internship here. She is majoring in communications and has also studied computer science. If there are any areas where she is not skilled enough, there is a professional teacher, Mr. Chi, here."

Not a full-time employee, just an intern, so as the boss, this requirement is quite simple.

"Hello, uncle and aunt."

"Tsk." Lu Changge really forgot to mention this. "Why are you calling me uncle and aunt? You call me brother, and you call them that. I'm being treated like a senior too." "Haha." Shen Mo laughed heartily. "Interesting, interesting. How about this, I'll take the three of you around tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow we'll officially meet DST. Lao Chi doesn't have time. He's more useful than me now. The company can't do without him."

"Row."

Later, Lu Changge went to their office again. It was different from the white-collar cubicle he had imagined. In some ways, it was more like an apartment. When he arrived, three people were sitting on the sofa with their legs propped up on the coffee table while they worked. They were wearing headphones around their necks and looked very comfortable.

These people reacted relatively coldly to their boss; it was basically just a smile, a handshake, an introduction, "Oh, it's you," and that was it.

After that, Lu Changge had a private talk with Chi Yongsheng.

Moreover, he asked a rather pointed question.

"Has any of these people raised the point that it's unfair that 70% of Chatter's shares are controlled by a completely unproductive Chinese company?"

Old Chi was taken aback, then said, "They didn't do absolutely nothing. The original version of the chatter was completed in China, and the people here didn't participate at all. Even the first outsider only added icing on the cake when he came."

"That's true, but the flowers are what really catch the eye. Who would notice the roots buried in the soil? There might not be any changes in a day or two, but over time, it's not surprising that all sorts of thoughts will emerge. In the end, the fact that those technical directions we envisioned were able to be implemented and operate smoothly is thanks to them."

Chi Yongsheng suddenly understood.

"Your sister isn't just here as an intern, is she?"

“I will not accept your idea of ​​leaving the United States until she becomes like you, no matter what the reason.”

This statement actually answered his question, but he put a little thought into how he said it.

Lu Changge's direct meaning was to make her become the second you, but Chi Yongsheng thought that he had never proposed to leave the United States, so perhaps he was also on guard against her.

But then he thought maybe he was overthinking it...

Because Lu Changge's words directly expressed his trust in him, without any attempt to hide it.

"Don't worry, I'm a professionally trained teacher, and I'll teach her very well."

On the other side, Shen Mo also took Zhou Shuang away.

"The iPhone officially entered China a few months ago, and the chatter model has been proven. It is estimated that the momentum in China will pick up next year or the year after."

Shen Mo tilted his head and asked with a smile, "Is there something you want to say?"

"what?"

"Stop pretending. I've known you for so long, don't I know you? Your expression has changed."

Zhou Shuang covered up her grievances by saying, "What I meant was that I will do very well in the future. Isn't this just me being defiant?"

"Let me explain it for you," Shen Mo said casually. "You mean to say that right now the trunk is weak and the branches are strong, but it won't always be the case, so you're trying to remind me, right?"

Zhou Shuang paused for a moment, then asked, "So, do you think that way?"

"Say what you want to say first."

Okay, since we've come this far, let's finish.

“I think the reason why the trunk is weak and the branches are strong is not because you and Lao Chi are strong, nor because I am weak, but because of the development pattern of smartphones. We all consider ourselves elites, but if it weren’t for Lao Lu’s initial ideas, most of us would just be ordinary elites now.”

Shen Mo was somewhat surprised, "You actually admire him so much now?"

"Facts always prevail."

"But actually you're overthinking it."

Zhou Shuang joked, "That's also because you guys did a great job with Chatter. It's only been a short time, and they're already asking for 10 billion US dollars. That's a bit scary."

"Yeah, don't worry. If we give up halfway through this important matter because of our own muddle-headedness, it will be a lifelong regret. I plan to just focus on doing things well and see how well we can accomplish it in the end."

(End of this chapter)