I can become stronger by paying salaries. I have one billion employees!

Chapter 187 Zhang Yiming, you've gone down the wrong path! (Seeking monthly votes)
At 10 o'clock sharp, Cheng Weixing went on stage, gave a brief opening speech, and then handed the microphone to Secretary Wei, who was in charge of the commercial sector in Hangzhou.

Immediately afterwards, a middle-aged man wearing an executive jacket walked to the center of the stage and began to speak at length about the theme of the exchange meeting.

Chen Yansen was getting drowsy listening to it, since it was all empty rhetoric and platitudes with no real substance.

The core of the development forum will consist of subsequent presentations of trade and economic cooperation projects and a luncheon discussion.

"...It is an honor to have invited Mr. Chen Yansen, the founder of Senlian Capital. As a leading figure among post-90s young entrepreneurs, I look forward to his experience sharing and hope that Mr. Chen can provide new cooperation opportunities for entrepreneurs at home and abroad..."

Secretary Wei spoke eloquently, and at the end, he did not forget to single out Chen Yansen for special emphasis, regarding him as a major selling point of this year's Young Entrepreneurs Development Forum.

Chen Yansen smiled politely at the media cameras, thinking to himself: If I hadn't come, they would probably have used Cheng Ou from Jumei.com as a gimmick.

I heard that the conference originally invited Wang Xin from Meituan, but he didn't want to participate and was afraid of offending Hangzhou, so he declined by saying that he was born in 79 and was not considered a post-80s generation.

After discussing Chen Yansen, Secretary Wei steered the conversation to Lin Qi, the chairman of Yoozoo Games.

Following the gazes of the crowd, Chen Yansen realized that besides Cheng Ou, there was another game businessman with an even greater net worth.

According to Secretary Wei, Yoozoo Games is currently valued at 30 billion yuan. Even if that's a bit exaggerated, it's probably not far off.

After all, everyone in the audience is a shrewd person, and boasting would only backfire.

The third person named was Cheng Ou. This guy waved at the camera and was very good at seizing every opportunity to promote himself and his products.

He felt that Chen Yansen's phrase "I speak for myself" perfectly matched his personality and Jumei's style.

Unfortunately, Chen Yansen was too famous, and he didn't dare to directly try to imitate the other person's image, otherwise he would be suspected of being a poor imitation.

Zhang Yiming, sitting in the corner, had a hint of envy in his eyes.

As young people, they repeatedly failed in their own business ventures, while Chen Yansen, Lin Qi, Cheng Ou, and others had already made a name for themselves in the industry and amassed a fortune of hundreds of millions.

When will I be able to earn 1 million?
Half an hour later, Secretary Wei stepped down from the podium, and a round of applause broke out.

Afterwards, people took turns going on stage to share their entrepreneurial projects. The more high-end ones were concentrated in investment banking, securities firms, electronics or internet industries, while the more down-to-earth ones were opening dumpling factories or ecological breeding farms in their hometowns.

Sequoia Capital, Hillhouse Capital, and ThinkTank also sent investment managers, but at a lower level, clearly indicating that they did not value this exchange meeting and were only giving face to the organizers.

Just as Chen Yansen was talking to Lao Gao, Cheng Weixing from Fancheng Technology leaned over and said:

"Mr. Chen, after Mr. Cheng from Jumei and Mr. Lin from Yoozoo Games finish their presentations, could you share your entrepreneurial experience with everyone? Just a casual chat, ten minutes will suffice."

"No problem." Chen Yansen nodded slightly.

Since we're already here, we should naturally promote our products and give Tang Qingshan some face.

"Hello everyone, I'm Cheng Ou from Jumei.com. I'm very pleased that the Hangzhou Young Entrepreneurs Association invited me to participate in this development forum. As a beauty-focused website, Jumei has won over users with its exclusive services such as 100% authentic products, 100% real photos, and 30-day unconditional return policy..."

It must be said that Cheng Ou is quite eloquent, and he took this opportunity to talk at length about Jumei's business model.

"What does Lao Gao think of Jumei?"

Chen Yansen looked at Gao Weilin and asked with a smile.

"There is potential, but I think that vertical e-commerce websites for cosmetics, baby products, and footwear are all pseudo-demands. Except for some niche categories, there is still some room for survival. But for cosmetics, once Taobao, JD.com, or you, boss, are targeting it, Jumei will only have one way out."

Gao Weilin responded in a low voice, his tone resolute.

During his time in mainland China, he conducted in-depth research on the e-commerce and mobile phone industries.

Vertical e-commerce seems to have chosen the weakest link in the industry giants' territory, avoiding their sharpest attacks and competing with them directly.

But how could Ma Liyun and Liu Qiangdong tolerate someone competing with them for market share?

Once Alibaba and JD.com go public, e-commerce websites like Jumei will enter their final countdown to death.

In fact, after Jumei's market value peaked at nearly 60 billion US dollars in 2014, it began to plummet and continued to decline.

The same face mask product sells for 99 yuan per box on Jumei, supplied by a third-party distributor, while Taobao and JD.com directly contact the brand and offer promotional prices of only 59 yuan, or even 49 yuan per box.

In addition, Jumei's weak control over its suppliers led to some people forging brand authorization letters and customs declarations, selling a mix of genuine and counterfeit goods, or even selling only counterfeit goods, causing Jumei's image in the eyes of users to plummet.

Before Chen Yansen's rebirth, Jumei had already been bankrupt for five or six years.

“For cosmetics, unless you work directly with the brand, it’s very difficult to eliminate counterfeit products.”

Chen Yansen nodded, acknowledging Gao Weilin's words, and then told Song Yuncheng.

The reason why Chen Yansen required the business development, legal, and marketing departments to jointly review the qualifications of so many top-tier (S and A) brand third-party merchants when they approached Pinbei, and why he would directly reject them if there were any problems.

If Pinduoduo can't solve the counterfeit goods problem at the beginning, it will become too difficult to reverse as the scale grows.

You can sell low-priced goods, but counterfeit goods are different; they can easily cause a platform to collapse.

Upon hearing this, Song Yuncheng seemed to understand something.

A dozen minutes later, Cheng Ou returned to his seat, still feeling unsatisfied. The next person to go on stage was Lin Qi from Yoozoo Games.

Chen Yansen had no knowledge of the gaming industry and had only invested 200 million yuan in Mihoyo in exchange for a 15% stake.

After Lin Qi came down, Cheng Weixing quickly walked up to Chen Yansen and reminded him that he could go on stage.

Chen Yansen straightened the wrinkles in his clothes and then stepped onto the podium.

There had been some whispers and discussions, but they disappeared instantly after Chen Yansen went up.

"I am the founder of Orange Technology and Pinbei Mall. All of you here are my industry seniors. As for entrepreneurship, I have been in the industry for less than two years and only have some limited knowledge..."

Chen Yansen said modestly.

But the arrogant look on his face clearly said: I've achieved what I have in just two years, what about you?
"Personally, I think that before starting a business, you should first choose a good path, either one with few people and a narrow path, or one with many people and a wide path," Chen Yansen said with a faint smile, casually bluffing.

The people below didn't give him any money, and they weren't his sons, so how could Chen Yansen possibly talk about any truly useful information?

He spoke for several minutes, but it was all empty rhetoric. At first glance, it sounded like profound insights, but upon reflection, it was all nonsense.

Zhang Yiming, standing in the crowd, felt that Chen Yansen's words made a lot of sense. As he listened, he pondered how to utilize his strengths and find the most suitable path for himself.

"Mr. Zhang, I've organized a small networking event tonight. Chen Yansen, Lin Qi, and Cheng Ou will all be attending. Do you have time?"

At this moment, Cheng Weixing took advantage of his position to slip over to Zhang Yiming's seat and asked in a low voice.

He realized that Chen Yansen was interested in Zhang Yiming, so he used Chen Yansen as a pretext to organize a small gathering of influential people in the industry.

Zhang Yiming didn't think too much about it. He had just seen Cheng Weixing approach Chen Yansen several times and subconsciously assumed that Cheng Weixing was inviting Chen Yansen. He never expected that Chen Yansen was the first person Cheng Weixing had invited.

"Of course I'm free. What time would you like to meet?" Zhang Yiming readily agreed.

"It's not decided yet. I'll let Mr. Zhang know later." Cheng Weixing felt relieved after getting Zhang Yiming on board and replied with a smile.

After Chen Yansen stepped down, he used Zhang Yiming's name to persuade Chen Yansen to attend the evening's exchange meeting.

Chen Yansen agreed without hesitation.

In his view, Zhang Yiming was at a critical juncture in his life, and whether he invested or partnered with him, he would reap considerable profits.

During their conversation, the other person looked at him with admiration, so it seems that the other person couldn't refuse his offer to invest.

In this way, Cheng Weixing managed to put together the gathering by using a strategy of deceiving both sides.

After the morning forum discussions concluded, we moved on to lunch.

As soon as Chen Yansen and the others sat down, someone came over with a business card and a fawning smile to greet them.

Among these people were business owners in dumpling processing, electronic toys, and aquaculture, as well as investment bankers and securities managers. The former were dealt with by Song Yuncheng, while the latter were passed on to Gao Weilin.

Chen Yansen then chatted with Zhang Yiming.

"Are you interested in joining Pinduoduo or Orange Technology? Whether it's product recommendation or the algorithm department of Aurora OS, we need algorithm engineers with your extensive project experience."

Chen Yansen took the initiative to extend the invitation.

During his time at Kuxun.com, Zhang Yiming accumulated a wealth of recommendation engine technology. Later, he joined Wang Xin's Fanfou.com, where he focused on search, message distribution, and hot keyword mining.

After more than four years of training, Zhang Yiming has achieved remarkable success in execution, team management, and algorithms.

This is also why Wang Xin wanted to get him to work with him as soon as he founded Meituan.

Zhang Yiming pushed up his glasses, unable to hide the smile on his face, but he finally declined, saying, "Thank you for your appreciation, Mr. Chen, but I left Jiujiufang because I want to create my own product."

“These two things don’t conflict. I can give you funding and authority to develop the product independently.” Chen Yansen waved his hand, indicating that he didn’t care.

"Mr. Chen, but I haven't figured out what product to make yet." Zhang Yiming smiled wryly, feeling somewhat touched. Chen Yansen was showing him enough respect and trust.

He thought for a moment and asked, puzzled, "Does Mr. Chen think so highly of me?"

In the mindset of a science and engineering guy, everything has a reason, and Chen Yansen had no reason to value him so much.

"I plan to develop a personalized recommendation engine for Pinduoduo Mall to improve the efficiency of product sales. Therefore, I am paying close attention to outstanding talents in algorithm in China. Last year, I had a headhunter contact you, but Mr. Zhang did not agree to switch jobs."

Chen Yansen is lying through his teeth.

Zhang Yiming chuckled awkwardly, feeling a little embarrassed. He hadn't expected Chen Yansen to have paid attention to him so early.

He did receive headhunting offers last year, but at the time he had no intention of changing jobs and only wanted to start his own business. He had no idea whether any of the people he rejected ended up being hired by Chen Yansen.

"Mr. Chen's product solution is excellent. I have done similar attempts at Kuxun and Fanfou. In fact, we can extract information such as product attributes and descriptions, and calculate the similarity between products based on these feature vectors, so that the recommendation system can play a role."

Zhang Yiming didn't hold back in front of Chen Yansen and spoke candidly.

He originally thought Chen Yansen was a liberal arts student and his abilities were more inclined towards management.

Unexpectedly, during their conversation, the other person demonstrated astonishing comprehension and was able to readily articulate the general code implementation, which greatly surprised him.

"So, what kind of product does Mr. Zhang want to make?" Chen Yansen recalled the timeline and realized that the other party's current focus should be on news content distribution.

"The initial idea is to develop a mobile browser that integrates intelligent search and personalized display. After all, with the development of smartphones in the past two years, the advantages of mobile devices have been gradually amplified..."

Zhang Yiming replied with a smile, his tone sincere.

and many more!

Shouldn't you be developing Toutiao (Today's Headlines)?

Chen Yansen really wanted to interrupt him.

He initially thought Zhang Yiming was fooling him, but he saw that the other man's eyes were sincere and his breathing and heartbeat were extremely normal.

This means that the other party is 99% telling the truth.

Furthermore, the market prospects for mobile browsers are indeed quite good, as evidenced by He Xiaopeng's sale of UC and cashing out 200 billion yuan.

However, in doing so, Zhang Yiming's path completely went astray.

Should I still invest in Zhang Yiming?
Chen Yansen never expected that his first meeting with Zhang Yiming would start like this.

This is like being reborn in 1999, investing 1000 million yuan in Ma Liyun to create Alibaba and engage in e-commerce, but instead he insists on developing QQ chat rooms—it's as surreal as that.

(End of this chapter)