Who would still start a business seriously after being reborn?

Chapter 432 Extraordinary Measures for Extraordinary Times

With the victory over Blizzard, Cheng Yi finally felt relieved.

The game "Honghuang Zhanji" can only relieve their immediate crisis, but not forever. The enthusiasm of internet cafe users can only be maintained for one or two years. Once the hype dies down, Momo Internet Cafe, which relies solely on the game "Honghuang Zhanji", will definitely suffer a fatal blow.

Currently, there is still no concrete news regarding the acquisition of the South Korean company and the acquisition of the Bubble Fighter distributorship.

Shengda has always been determined to win this game, Bubble Fighter.

After all, Bubble Fighter is a casual game, and there hasn't been a single casual game like it in China yet.

If Shengda Group wants to build an online gaming empire, it must develop in multiple fields simultaneously.

To succeed, one must explore casual online games, RPG online games, turn-based online games, and SLG online games.

Just like Taobao's earliest advertising slogan: One-stop shopping, no need to go to other websites.

Currently, Shengda Group's goals completely overlap with those of Momo Group.

Many internet companies, including Tencent, have felt the pressure from Momo Group.

While they were working on marketing, Momo Group had already started building its platform.

Once Momo Group gains momentum, will they still have a good life?

That would definitely be a life-or-death struggle.

However, Chinese people have a unique sentiment towards the New Year, so these groups remained inactive during the Spring Festival.

In the past few days, Cheng Yi has come to understand what the calm before the storm truly means.

Soon, the day arrived for Momo Group to start operations.

Cheng Yi originally wanted Jiang Yuxi to leave with him, but ever since the engagement incident, Jiang Yuxi has been clearly avoiding him.

Unable to contact Jiang Yuxi, Cheng Yi had no choice but to return to Jingzhou City with Lin Yongxing.

Back at Momo Group, Du Yusheng, who had returned a day early, was wearing a red Tang suit and handing out red envelopes to employees at the group's entrance.

Upon seeing Cheng Yi get out of the car, Du Yusheng immediately smiled and said, "President Cheng, Happy New Year! Here's a red envelope! Wishing you a thriving business and that each year is better than the last."

"Thank you, Chairman. I also wish you a prosperous new year." Cheng Yi said with a smile as he accepted the red envelope.

At this time, more and more employees returned to report. Du Yusheng didn't chat with Cheng Yi much. He gave Lin Yongxing a red envelope and then went to give red envelopes to other people.

The red envelope was thick, containing two 100-yuan bills and a stack of 88-yuan change, showing that Du Yusheng had put thought into it.

The Momo Group headquarters has nearly a thousand employees, and just preparing these small change and red envelopes is troublesome enough.

Back in his office, Cheng Yi's new secretary, Qi Wei, brought him reports from the group's various subsidiaries during the Spring Festival.

Qi Wei joined Momo Group right after graduation. She was the vice president of the student union at Handong University of Finance and Economics. She is not only very good at finance and economics, but also has an extraordinary ability to read people.

Cheng Yi's original secretary was the manager of the earliest Momo Internet Cafe, and she was still at the level of doing whatever he was told. In addition, the secretary always wanted to be the store manager, so Cheng Yi let her go.

Cheng Yi's role at Momo Group is that of a housekeeper.

The task is to review and examine the operating conditions of all subsidiaries, compile the findings into a document, and report it to the board of directors.

Momo Group has three vice presidents: Zhang Lingyu, Cheng Yi, and Huang Wenrong.

Although Du Yusheng is the chairman and president, he hardly gets involved in the group's affairs, which has led many so-called "masters of Chinese studies" who specialize in deceiving business owners to study Du Yusheng's behavior.

The renowned scholar of Chinese classics, Zhai Hongshen, even gave a special lecture entitled "Learning Enterprise Management from Du Yusheng and Experiencing the Charm of Non-interference," which attracted hundreds of business owners to sign up.

Only Du Yusheng himself knew that he was not practicing laissez-faire governance at all; he was simply inactive. As a college student majoring in tourism management, it was quite difficult for him to achieve anything significant.

Zhang Lingyu, Cheng Yi, and Huang Wenrong are also secretly referred to by many as the "Momo Three Giants".

Because these three people wielded so much power, no chairman of any group would dare to delegate so much authority, so Du Yusheng was the first person to do so in history.

"President Cheng, these are the greeting cards that various government departments sent you during the Spring Festival." Qi Wei brought over another cardboard box and said, "I've categorized them according to your job title. Please see if there are any you'd like to reply to or express your gratitude to."

"Okay, let's leave it here for now." Cheng Yi nodded, then asked, "Any news from Shengda Group?"

Qi Wei said, "We don't have much access to information from Shengda's undercover agents yet. According to their current intelligence, Shengda Group has contacted several large internet companies, but it's unclear what they're planning to do. In addition, Shengda Group intends to form an internet cafe alliance, which is about to enter the board of directors' proposal stage."

"Oh? Internet cafe alliance?" Cheng Yi was slightly surprised.

It seems that Shengda Group was panicked when they took the opportunity to seize the internet cafe market in various districts and counties before the new year. After all, that was the internet cafe market in 334 districts and counties, with nearly one million computers.

Since the first day of the Lunar New Year, Zhang Lingyu has been busy developing plans to promote internet cafes in these districts and counties.

Since the four-tiered internet cafe model has already been implemented in 274 locations, the execution process is not particularly complicated; the only complicated aspect is the human element.

Although these people have signed contracts, if you can't control these tough guys, the contracts are just a piece of paper.

After all, this involves thousands of internet cafe owners. In this day and age, those who dare to open internet cafes are local bigwigs.

Momo Internet Cafe's plan is to have Black Panther Security Company and Handong Construction Group's branches in various locations take the lead. Those who are willing to sit down and talk can sit down and talk, and those who are not willing to sit down and talk can talk while lying down.

A contract in black and white can be rewritten if someone goes back on their word.

The internet cafe alliance that Shengda Group wants to build is essentially meant to provide a support system for internet cafe owners, a support system to resist the expansion of Momo Internet Cafe.

With this backing, most internet cafe owners are still unwilling to accept Momo Internet Cafe's "recruitment," since they are more free to make their own decisions.

At this time, Shengda Group also convened an emergency board meeting.

During this Spring Festival holiday, the directors of Shengda Group felt as if each day was an eternity.

After three months of intense preparation, their group's listing on Nasdaq was scheduled for the end of February, but at this moment, they were not happy at all.

So much has happened in these three months that they're all feeling a bit lost.

First, there was the backlash against Momo Legend for shutting down.

Then came the "Primordial War Chronicles" to seize the market. Before they could even establish themselves, they were embroiled in a fishing scandal that shocked the industry.

What angered them most was that, just as they were trying to mitigate the impact of the phishing incident, Momo Internet Cafe took advantage of the situation and quickly seized the internet cafe market in 334 districts and counties.

It's important to know that there are only over 2000 districts and counties nationwide. If we include the internet cafe market in Handong Province, Momo Internet Cafe has now captured one-fifth of the national market.

This data is terrifying.

"Is everyone here?" At this moment, Chen Tianqiao led several senior executives of the group into the conference room.

The directors present all looked at Chen Tianqiao, but none of them had a smile on their faces.

They are directors and investors; they don't need to give Chen Tianqiao any special treatment.

Chen Tianqiao looked around at everyone and said, "The secretariat must have already sent you all letters about the problems the group is facing now."

"Chairman Chen, let's stop with the nonsense," a middle-aged man sitting at the front said in a deep voice. "Just tell me your solution."

"Yes, we're about to go public, and now so many problems have suddenly arisen. The stock price is likely to fall below the issue price."

"If the stock price falls below the issue price, we will suffer huge losses."

"You've been having a lot of problems lately, shouldn't you reflect on that?"

As soon as the middle-aged man started speaking, the board members present all slammed their fists on the table.

Chen Tianqiao said slowly, "Our group has developed too fast, and there are bound to be many imperfections. I hope everyone can be more tolerant of our management team. Now that this has happened, we should think about how to solve it, not about assigning blame."

"The matter must be resolved, but the responsibility must also be investigated," the middle-aged man who had spoken earlier said firmly. "If the responsibility isn't investigated, the same thing will keep happening."

The middle-aged man's words carried great weight, and even Chen Tianqiao did not refute them.

"Tell me your solution first," the middle-aged man said, looking at Chen Tianqiao.

Chen Tianqiao said, "Alright, then I will report to you all."

"Our group is currently facing two problems. One is that our Legend game has a private server issue. This is not our responsibility, but rather the source code leak caused by the Korean side. Everyone has seen how we solved it. Although our reputation has been slightly affected, we nipped the private server in the bud with a swift and decisive approach." Chen Tianqiao said this with a hint of pride in his voice.

Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures.

As for reputation and such, what memories do people have?
Before long, they will forget about it.

The reason they are troubled by this is simply because their IPO is imminent, and this incident will only have some impact on the stock price.

If it weren't for the IPO bell-ringing event, they could have completely ignored this public opinion storm.

None of the directors present spoke, waiting for Chen Tianqiao to raise the next question.

Chen Tianqiao continued, "The second problem is that our market has been squeezed by Momo Group. Momo Group copied our Legend and made a game called 'Honghuang Zhanji', and then used their share of the internet cafe market to attract our players."

"They plagiarized our legend, so who's to blame?" the middle-aged man said.

Chen Tianqiao sighed and said, "Most of the responsibility lies with me. I was also misled by Luo Shengyi. Firstly, I didn't expect the game Legend to become so popular, after all, it was a trial game that I was distributing. Secondly, I didn't expect that a small, unlicensed internet cafe would rise so quickly to become a business empire in such a short time."

Chen Tianqiao's words were very frank, and all the directors present remained silent.

Strictly speaking, Chen Tianqiao did not bear much responsibility.

A game that's lukewarm in South Korea has only a one percent chance of becoming a hit in China.

The odds of a small internet cafe rising to become a business empire are less than one in ten thousand.

Chen Tianqiao encountered both of these extremely slim chances.

The first probability made Chen Tianqiao a fortune, while the second probability presented him with his greatest challenge.

Perhaps this is what Buddhism refers to as cause and effect.

"Let's continue with the solution," the middle-aged man said again.

Chen Tianqiao said, "The reason why our Legend can't compete with Honghuang Zhanji is because of too much interference from the Korean side. So we imitated Honghuang Zhanji and made Legend 3. Many of the settings of Legend 3 are based on the settings of Honghuang Zhanji. Since they copied us, we can also copy them. This game is expected to be launched in April."

"In addition, we have also formed an internet cafe alliance. Players who play Legend in the internet cafe alliance can enjoy discounts on internet fees and exclusive game gift packs for partner internet cafes. In this way, we can ensure a stable occupancy rate for the internet cafes in the alliance. As long as their income is stable, it will be difficult for Momo Internet Cafe to absorb them. Of course, we also have to give up some profits, that is, our point card fees will be lower than those of Honghuang Zhanji."

"Are we supposed to cover the internet fee discounts?" the middle-aged man asked.

"Of course not," Chen Tianqiao said. "Many internet cafes are now engaged in cutthroat competition, and many have reduced their internet access fees to 1.5 yuan. We have formed an internet cafe alliance to fix the internet access prices. Even if they offer discounts, their profits will still be higher than during the previous cutthroat competition, so we don't need to bear this cost."

The middle-aged man nodded slowly and said, "That sounds pretty good."

Chen Tianqiao continued, "Furthermore, regarding the 334 districts and counties where Momo Internet Cafe is about to expand, I plan to invite several courier companies to help restrain them. I have already..."

"What did you say? Contact the courier company?" The middle-aged man's eyes suddenly turned sharp.

Her imposing presence immediately overwhelmed Chen Tianqiao.

Chen Tianqiao couldn't help but ask, "Uncle Chen, is there a problem with this?"

The middle-aged man looked at Chen Tianqiao with disappointment and said coldly, "I really didn't expect you to come up with such a plan! What are those courier companies? They're the lowest-level thugs and scoundrels. And what are we? We're legitimate entrepreneurs! How could you want to get involved with them? Don't you think Shengda is chaotic enough already?"

The directors present also cast strange glances at Chen Tianqiao.

Express delivery companies are truly a haven for thugs and scoundrels. They are responsible for half of the road bullying incidents nationwide, and some express delivery outlets fight each other almost every day to seize territory.

Once you get involved with a courier company, it's much harder to expose them later.

These courier companies operate on a very simple contracting system. Each region, under the leadership of its manager, operates on a pay-for-work basis. In addition, they handle corporate orders. In order to seize more market share, they hire local thugs and ruffians. Over time, they become local bullies who dominate their area.

These local bullies are far beyond the reach of internet cafe owners, because they have ample funds, a large workforce, and most importantly, many of their top salespeople earn tens of thousands of yuan a month.

Take Shunfeng, a leading company in the express delivery industry, for example. In 2000, most of its sales staff in some cities in Guangdong Province were earning tens of thousands of yuan a month. Each person's income was equivalent to that of a small internet cafe. Driven by such high profits, they obeyed the orders of their regional managers without question.

Anyone who dares to cut off their source of income, they dare to take their life.

(End of this chapter)