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

Chapter 349: Bald Photos of the Three Giants! Leading the Trend: The Popularity of Intelligent Voice Assistants!

The following morning, December 1st, Xiaomi released the Xiao Ai voice assistant software package, which users could download from the Xiaomi App Store.

In just one hour, the number of downloads exceeded 3!
Some users who wanted to buy the Moss smart speaker but were deterred by the price immediately installed the Xiao Ai Tongxue APP.

Despite the fact that only one-third of the functions could be used due to device and performance limitations, netizens still had a great time playing with it.

Therefore, it's not that domestic users dislike smart voice assistants; it's just that the Orange C3 and Moss smart speakers are too expensive, making them reluctant to spend the money.

Chen Yansen firmly believes that as long as material costs come down, Orange Technology can launch a smart speaker priced at 99 yuan and easily sell a staggering 2000 million units a year.

There are no unsellable products, only unsellable prices.

Although the launch of Xiao Ai (Xiaomi's AI assistant) has impacted the sales of Moss smart speakers, Xiaomi still has to pay Orange Technology a patent royalty fee for every download or installation it achieves.

Lei Yijun will make money, but Chen Yansen will never lose money!

Half an hour later, SF Express announced that it would launch "SF Best" on December 3, officially entering the e-commerce industry.

Meanwhile, Analysys released its November group-buying market report, in which Kuaipao topped the group-buying industry charts for the first time with a monthly transaction volume of 13.7 billion yuan.

Dianping ranked second with 11.2 billion yuan.

To everyone's surprise, Meituan's transaction volume that month was only 7.9 million yuan, making it the fourth largest player in the industry.

Under the personal supervision of Li Yanhong, Lashou.com leveraged its products such as Baidu Maps, search engines, and Baidu Tieba as its traffic foundation, increasing its transaction volume from 6.5 million yuan to 8.6 million yuan.

Six months later, Lashou.com has returned to the top three in the market!

Kuaipao's growth momentum is getting stronger and stronger, while Meituan is declining, failing to take off in the food delivery business and failing to maintain its group buying business.

After seeing the report, Zhang Tao from Dianping couldn't wait to tag Wang Xin on Weibo and give him a good scathing rebuke.

With Meituan behaving like this, it still wants to be the big brother?
Look in the mirror first!

But his happiness lasted less than five minutes before his face darkened. Kuaipao's speed was astonishing; in just a few months, he had already reached number one.
In terms of funding, number of employees, technology, and products, Dianping is no match for Kuaipao.

Meituan is no good, but Dianping can't beat KuaiPiao either!

And then there's Lashou.com relentlessly pursuing them!

Perhaps next month, Dianping won't even be able to keep its second-place position in the industry.

On the other hand, after learning that Ali had entered the food delivery industry, coupled with the blow to the group-buying business, Wang Xin became depressed for a time.

Since November is the peak season for e-commerce, the output of the group-buying industry will inevitably be affected. He thought that with a transaction volume of 7.9 million yuan, he would either be number one or number two, but he never expected it.

Only Meituan experienced negative growth, while KuaiRun and Lashou.com achieved a turnaround against the trend.

That afternoon, news of Jia Nailiang and Li Xiaolu's wedding broke, and LeTV even held a special live broadcast for it.

After all, Jia Nailiang is a shareholder of LeEco Pictures, and the more users and revenue LeEco has, the higher his profits will be.

Chen Yansen sat in his office, his gaze sweeping over the relevant news articles, and he couldn't help but shake his head with a smile.

In 2012, "Sleeping Dragon and Young Phoenix" and "getting a haircut" were just ordinary words, but more than a decade later, they have become words that people dare not look at directly.

“Beep bell—!”

Suddenly, the landline on the table rang.

Chen Yansen picked up the receiver, and the voice of Tian Tian, ​​the receptionist on the first floor, came through the speaker: "Boss, Mr. Yu from Huawei has arrived."

"Let Lao Zhou handle the reception; I'll go over later."

Chen Yansen replied.

Yu Chendong's visit to Xucheng was merely to obtain a patent license for the language analysis development tool, which Zhou Shouzhi could handle.

“Okay, boss,” Tian Tian replied immediately.

Chen Yansen put the microphone back in its original position, not taking Yu Chendong's visit to heart.

He's not Ren Zhongfei, so there's no need for him to come downstairs to greet him.

While Zhou Shouzhi and Yu Chendong were discussing patent licensing, Wang Xin refuted on Weibo: "The industry report from Analysys has huge biases at the data level."

The implication is that Meituan's actual transaction volume is far greater than 7.9 million.

Three minutes later, Dianping CEO Zhang Tao used his personal account to post a message in support of Analysys data: "I don't know about other websites, but Dianping's data is quite accurate."

In an instant, Meituan and Wang Xin were thrust into the eye of the storm.

Seeing this, Pei Yi chuckled mischievously and immediately offered his support: "Thank you for Analysys's support of the group-buying industry."

Although not explicitly stated, the authority of Analysys data was acknowledged.

Gong Zhenbing of Lashou.com followed suit, saying sarcastically, "When Meituan was number one, the data was accurate, but now that it's fourth in the industry, the data is inaccurate!"

Recently, there have been frequent verbal altercations and fights between the staff of Lashou and Meituan. Gong Zhenbing has a very poor impression of Wang Xin, and he will not miss this good opportunity to kick him while he is down.

Netizens aren't stupid; once pointed out, they immediately understood Wang Xin's little scheme—he simply didn't want to admit his defeat.

For users, Kuaipao has the best user experience when using group-buying apps. Other products like Meituan, Lashou, and Dianping always seem to have all sorts of bizarre issues.

Or, once you arrive at the physical store, the owner says the partnership with the group-buying website has been cancelled;

Either the location information is fake, and customers go there only to find that the store on the website isn't actually there at all.

Users have very little patience; most people will uninstall the app immediately after experiencing it just once.

When it comes to competing on products, services, and after-sales service, Meituan, Lashou, and Dianping are no match for them.

Because Kuai Pao's middle and senior management not only experience the delivery process, but also have to be on duty in the customer service department, they are very familiar with the problems encountered by users and know better how to solve them.

Wang Xin, Zhang Tao, and others still only scratched the surface when it came to the work emails sent by the customer service department.

While they are very focused on the merchant side, they don't have a good understanding of the user side.

To put it bluntly, it's not down-to-earth enough.

As dusk settled and the cool moonlight reflected on the glass window, Chen Yansen closed his laptop, pushed open the door, and walked out.

Zhou Shouzhi, Ye Qiuping, and Yu Chendong were still waiting downstairs; he would have to show up for the evening's drinking party.

With a ding sound!
The elevator door slowly opened.

As soon as Chen Yansen reached the lobby on the first floor, he saw Zhou Shouzhi and Yu Chendong walking out of the conference room next to the rest area.

"Mr. Chen, it's been a long time. You've grown even taller and more handsome since last time." Yu Chendong quickened his pace and greeted him with a smile.

Chen Yansen looked disgusted and cursed inwardly: Yu Dazui's flattery was so awkward and clumsy, it had no skill whatsoever.

"Mr. Yu just likes to joke around. So what's the maximum score?" Chen Yansen shook Yu Chendong's hand and teased him with a smile.

"It must be a ten-point system."

Yu Chendong said, squinting his eyes.

With Huawei's capabilities, it is certainly possible to develop a smart interaction engine development system, but its performance and market appeal are questionable.

Every profession has its own specialization!
Huawei's strong technological foundation in the communications industry does not mean that it can develop an excellent product in the field of voice recognition.

In fact, more than a decade later, Huawei launched a smart voice assistant called 'Xiaoyi (Xiao E)', but it received a lukewarm response and was not even as well-known as 360 Smart Assistant.

"It's a rare treat for President Yu to come to Xucheng. Tonight is the first show, and there will be a second show tomorrow," Chen Yansen warmly invited.

"Work is the priority, let's sign the contract first," Yu Chendong said with a grin.

He appeared to be smiling broadly, but was actually extremely calm inside.

He saw it clearly: Chen Yansen's enthusiasm was superficial and not genuine.

"Boss, Mr. Yu, please!" At this moment, the driver drove the car to the door, and Zhou Shouzhi raised his hand to signal.

Upon receiving the news, Ye Qiuping also rushed over.

The group split into four cars, slowly drove out of the science park, and then sped off towards the Sky Garden.

At this moment, Yu Chendong, who was sitting in the car, stopped smiling, and a cold glint flashed in his eyes.

The doubts that had been in my mind were instantly resolved after talking with Zhou Shouzhi.

Orange Technology's licensing fee standard for its language analysis development tool is: a one-time patent usage fee of 2000 million yuan, plus an additional 2 yuan deduction for each download or installation.

Frankly speaking, the commission rate isn't even that high.

But the entry fee is 2000 million!
Regardless of whether Huawei can independently develop the semantic core after acquiring this set of development functions, it will still have to pay 2000 million.

Yu Chendong pondered the strategic significance of intelligent voice assistants for Huawei phones throughout the journey.

Finally, he thought again, "It can't be that by then 360, NetEase, and Ali Cloud phones will all have smart voice assistants, but Huawei won't, can it?"
Equipping mobile phones with intelligent voice assistants may not become a growth point for performance, but if others have it and we don't, it will become a disadvantage for Huawei.

Yu Chendong thought to himself, compared with Xiaomi, Huawei is already a step behind, but it can't fall behind Coolpad, Lenovo, ZTE and the like.

At the drinking party, everyone was drinking and their faces were flushed.

After careful consideration, Yu Chendong decided at the dinner table that he would go to the headquarters of Orange Technology the next day to sign the authorization agreement.

As for 2000 million, it's just a drop in the ocean for Huawei.

Chen Yansen leaned back in his chair, a faint smile on his face, as Zhou Shouzhi and Yu Chendong discussed the details of the cooperation.

Ye Qiuping sat to the side, her soft little hand constantly wandering along the edge of President Chen's thigh.

"Behave yourself." Chen Yansen patted Ye Qiuping and warned her in a low voice.

Ye Qiuping winced in pain, let out a soft groan, and subconsciously rubbed her bottom.

The night outside the window was deep, and the lights were dazzling, much like Ye Qiuping's watery eyes.

……

……

At 8:30 p.m. that evening, a talk show on Hunan TV went viral and immediately became a trending topic.

"Nine out of ten bald men are millionaires! Why do big shots all love to shave their heads?"

"Ma Liyun, the head of Alibaba, makes his first appearance with a bald head."

"Ma Liyun shaved his head, perhaps because he has seen through the vanities of the world and is preparing to become a monk!"

Netizens couldn't hold back their laughter when they saw Ma Liyun's bald head photo.

Several clever commenters made up stories: "Ma Liyun shaved his head because he lost a bet with Chen Yansen. It is said that when Ali invested in Kuaipao, Chen Yansen said that Kuaipao could become the number one in the industry, but Ma Liyun did not believe it! So they used their hair as a bet, and whoever lost would shave their head."

In reality, when Kuaipao received funding from Ali, it had not yet entered the group-buying industry. This kind of nonsense cannot stand up to scrutiny, but most netizens believed it.

After all, this person's story was quite detailed and even touched on business cooperation.

"If Chen Yansen loses, I can't even imagine what he'll look like with a shaved head."

"She's definitely prettier than Ma Liyun!"

"Nonsense! Ma Liyun didn't compete on looks either; she won purely on money."

"Brothers, here's the picture! I photoshopped a picture of Mr. Chen with a shaved head. @Mr. Chen Yansen, you don't mind, do you?"

"Save this, delete it now! Beware of lawyer's letters from Senlian Capital!"

Before long, some netizens put together photos of Ma Liyun and Chen Yansen with their bald heads, and the post went viral.

While Chen Yansen was still socializing, Weibo's servers crashed.

The culprit was actually a photoshopped image!
Chen Yansen and Ma Liyun faced each other, both with shaved heads, which was quite comical.

"This thing can crash Weibo's servers?"

Liu Qiangdong was speechless.

But he was incredibly envious. Although the two of them were the subject of online pranks, as the founders of Ali and Pinbei, this trending topic brought huge traffic to their products.

Handsome Dong hesitated, wondering if he should also follow the trend and shave his head.

Before he could make up his mind, netizens made the decision for him by taking one of his photos without permission, photoshopping it to show him with a bald head, and putting it together with Ma Liyun and Chen Yansen.

When access to Weibo returned to normal, Liu Qiangdong was surprised to find that he and Liu Qiangdong had also become trending topics.

The good news is that they finally benefited from this surge in traffic.

The bad news is that some people are blatantly lying, insisting that Liu Qiangdong's bald photo is the ugliest.

Enraged, Handsome Dong cursed, "Damn it, there's nothing wrong with me being second, right?"

……

……

Virtual City, in front of the Sky Garden Hotel.

Chen Yansen waved goodbye to Yu Chendong and then got into the back seat of Ghost's car.

"Boss, you're trending on social media." Ye Qiuping bit her lip, trying her best to suppress a mischievous smile.

"Trending topic? I don't think I posted anything on Weibo today."

As Chen Yansen spoke, he took out his phone.

After opening Weibo, the first search term is "bald photos of the three e-commerce giants".

Chen Yansen raised an eyebrow, glanced at Ye Qiuping, and then clicked on the link.

He saw himself sitting side by side with Ma Liyun and Liu Qiangdong. Everything below his head was normal, but where was his hair?

Chen Yansen's face darkened, and he didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

"Boss, do we need the brand department and legal department to get involved?" Ye Qiuping asked tentatively, covering her mouth with a slight smile.

"Forget it, I'm not really at a disadvantage. I can take this kind of joke."

Chen Yansen decisively rejected Ye Qiuping's suggestion.

Ma Liyun and Liu Qiangdong had similar mindsets. Ma shaved his head to celebrate the successful completion of the equity repurchase plan and to start afresh, which also symbolized the rebirth of Alibaba.

Free data delivered right to your door – why not take it?

So when the three men's bald photos spread across the internet, netizens didn't receive any lawyer's letters from Pinduoduo, Ali, or JD.com.

Over the next few days, executives from mobile phone manufacturers such as NetEase's Ding Lei, OPPO's Chen Yongming, Meizu's Huang Zhang, Coolpad, and ZTE either communicated online or visited in person, all with the same goal: to obtain patent authorization for the language analysis development tool.

On December 3, a black Maybach with a Beijing license plate drove into Zhuxianzhuang Science and Technology Park, surrounded by two Audis.

Is Pinduoduo located in this run-down place?

Liu Qiangdong rolled down the car window, looked around at the surroundings, and couldn't help but smile bitterly, realizing that he had lost too badly.

In terms of technology and talent reserves, in what way can Xucheng compare to Yanjing?

As soon as the car turned at the intersection, he saw Chen Yansen not far away, looking at him with a smile.

(End of this chapter)