Tech startup: I really do make mobile phones!

Chapter 100 The Real Person's Label, Two Brothers in Harmony
Yingtian.

Inside the Yangjiang Warehouse Center, conveyor belts roar day and night.

The first batch of 10 machines bearing the "Nietzsche" logo and the letter "X" were neatly stacked and packaged as the conveyor belt moved, before being transported by vehicles to various parts of the country.

These "Nietzsche 1" phones, manufactured by Orange Technology and branded with Orange Technology's communication terminal equipment network access license code on the back cover, will eventually be placed in 300 of Nietzsche's township-level direct-sale stores that have already been renovated, awaiting market launch.

On the morning of June 25, the sound of gongs and drums pierced through the thin mist.

Nietzsche Mobile, brandishing the slogan "Smartphones for 399 yuan, we only make 10 yuan profit on each one," plunged headlong into the rural market, which had been in the works for a week.

A small shop on the side of the market in a town below Chongqing.

The shop assistant in the green apron gripped a small megaphone and shouted at the top of her lungs, "A smartphone for 399 yuan, we'll only make 10 yuan profit on each one! 10 yuan!"

The green sign with white lettering that reads "Nietzsche Mobile Phone Factory Direct Sales" is very eye-catching in the sunlight.

Across the street, a small supermarket had only a simple white sheet of paper pasted on its glass that read, "New phones in stock, Orange 1 smartphones!" The hastily written words were slightly wrinkled by the wind, creating a stark contrast between the two.

The lively commotion instantly drew the attention of the market-goers. Groups of villagers flocked to the shop, their rough fingers eagerly reaching for the counter, wanting to touch and see what this legendary "smartphone" was all about.

The 50-inch LCD TV hanging above the counter in the store was shaking violently, not because someone bumped into it, but because the TV screen itself was shaking.

A female host who seemed to have never seen the world was jumping around while holding her head and her long hair.

Everyone's gaze involuntarily followed her shifting center of gravity.
The female host's false eyelashes nearly poked the camera lens, her lips, painted with lipstick lining the entire mouth, were wide open as she let out a scream comparable to an air raid siren: "My God! Viewers, look! This Nietzsche phone can actually take pictures! And zoom in! Zoom in! Zoom in some more!"

The camera suddenly zoomed in on the iPhone screen with the Nietzsche logo, and the male host's hand entered the frame, rubbing two fingers together on the screen to demonstrate the "image zoom function".

The female host suddenly lunged forward and snatched the phone, using the shimmering sequins on her chest as a baseline to force the audience's attention to the phone in the center of the screen: "See that?! Smart zoom! This is high-tech that only foreigners can use!"

The male host nodded proudly beside him, his slicked-back hair gleaming with a waxy sheen under the lights.

They weren't exactly lying; Apple phones are indeed used more by foreigners these days.

"Xiaoya! There's something even more amazing!" The male host said mysteriously, then took back his phone. "Now we're going to use the flash of the Nietzsche phone to illuminate your beauty!"

He quickly pressed the shutter button, and the flash went off immediately.
The male host quickly shoved the screen toward the camera to show the female host's "beautiful photos" using the zoom function.

The Apple 4's Retina display showed every detail of the photo, and passersby were indeed attracted: women stared at the screen and exclaimed, "They really made people look handsome!" while men stared at the bright white sequins in the picture, their Adam's apples trembling as the image was magnified and shrunk.

Three seconds later, the female host seemed to recover from her shock, maintaining her exaggerated smile.

"Did you see that?! Super powerful flash! I love it so much!"

The next moment, she seemed to be possessed by an idol drama girl, spinning and jumping on the stage of the studio, and I closed my eyes.

"The most, most, most crucial thing is," the male host suddenly shoved the screen towards the camera, then pointed with his index finger, emphasizing each word: "Do you know what, Xiaoya! Nietzsche's phone can actually connect to the internet!"

"See this little globe? Now click on it. Now comes the moment to witness a miracle!"

After a three-second wait, the WAP page of the Sohu website finally loaded slowly.

The female host, with her buttocks sticking out and hands on her chest, let out a scream of utter amazement: "My God! I can watch the news! I can check the weather forecast! And there are so many websites to browse! This is amazing!"

"What are you viewers waiting for?!" The male host pointed to the cheap special effects above his head, punched the air, and exclaimed, "The Nietzsche phone, originally priced at 1299, is now available directly from the factory for only 399, eliminating the middleman's markup!!!"

"Yes! Ladies and gentlemen, you heard right! My Nietzsche 1st generation smartphone, cutting out the middlemen, is directly from the factory, and it's only 399!!!"

At this point, the female host had regained her "dignity," holding up an Apple 4 with a Nietzsche logo and pointing the phone directly at the camera.

"Call the number at the bottom of the screen now, 399! Only 399! Take home the Nietzsche phone! The first 100 orders will receive a free premium electronic pen worth 99 yuan! Yes! It's free! Just give it to us!"

Orange Mobile has already included the 2-yuan resistance stylus in the overall cost of the phone, but Nietzsche has singled it out and sold it for 99 yuan!
Um... Is this Nietzsche's way of making money?
The television screen suddenly zoomed out to a wide shot, and the male host's voice became impassioned: "Viewers at home! Don't hesitate! This allows you to access the internet and take photos!"

These days, the "audience friends" that TV shopping hosts talk about are similar to the "family members" that internet celebrities talk about in later generations.

In front of the Nietzsche Factory direct-sale store, the crowd at the market was stirred up by the host's highly inflammatory shouts. Many people's hands, clutching their money, were slightly hot, and their eyes were burning with the fervor of impulsive consumption.

Meanwhile, countless eyes were glued to the Nietzsche mobile phone advertisement on the television screen, and the Nietzsche order hotline customer service group was ringing incessantly.
"You little bastards, bragging so loudly!"

The owner of the small supermarket across the street flicked the orange peels into the trash can, turned down the volume with the remote, and changed the channel to watch the TV series "Mountain City Bangbang".

"A smartphone for 399 yuan? You're probably buying a stupid phone!"

She picked at the pith of her back molars, glancing sideways at the person opposite her.
A little girl in a blue and white school uniform with pilling cuffs squeezed into the Nietzsche shop. She nervously clutched a handful of loose change and was asking the shop assistant something.

Then, the shop assistant frowned, and finally waved her away. The little girl left dejectedly.

On the glass counter in front of the proprietress were several "new machines" sent over by Lao Zhang from the strong stall in North China, which were being tested.

It costs 499 each and is a smartphone.

The proprietress glanced at the exquisitely packaged box and wondered if it was just a worthless charlatan with a gilded exterior but a rotten interior.
A smartphone for 499? Absolutely a lousy one!
That evening, the supermarket owner held the fully charged power bank and yelled, "If you're out of power, you're out of power! Why did you leave it at my checkpoint?!"

Meanwhile, a VIP club in Yingtian.

In the fragrant sandalwood room of the club, Lu Laowu enjoyed a Thai massage from a girl, his left hand unconsciously stroking the gold-embossed spine of Nietzsche's "The Will to Power" on the coffee table.

The serious voice of Xiaoli, the secretary beside him, cut through the decadent music around him.

"President Lu! President Jiang! The first-day sales figures for Nietzsche mobile phones are in! 3 units were shipped via TV shopping, and 5.3 units were sold through 300 directly operated stores in townships. Total revenue reached 3300 million, with a gross profit of 2300 million!"

"Damn it!" Old Lu slammed his hand on the coffee table, making the ashtray shake violently. "Speed ​​up the renovations of the remaining 800 stores!"

Xiaoli's fingers flew across her notebook as she wrote without looking up: "The construction team has signed an expedited agreement. They are currently setting up sheds in some areas during the rainy season. Starting next week, there will be three progress reports every day."

Currently, three of Nietzsche's 1200 stores nationwide are under construction, with construction teams working to meet deadlines.

"Time is money!" Old Lu leaned against the massage bed, counting on his fingers: "Earning 20 million less a day means almost 600 million a month!"

It must be said that Lu Laowu's math skills are truly excellent.

The gold ring on his finger dazzled under the crystal chandelier, causing Brother Jiang, who was working hard nearby, to squint: "Brother Jiang! My 'smartphone' business is doing pretty well, isn't it?"

Brother Jiang owns 49% of Nietzsche's company, so naturally he's willing to help him.

He pushed up his gold-rimmed glasses, his gold teeth peeking out from his smile.

"Brother Lu has such good taste! If he hadn't been ripped off by those bastards in the film industry back then, he would have been a regular at Forbes by now!"

Amid the compliments, Lu Laowu's smile suddenly turned somber, and his thick palm slammed on the coffee table, causing the wine glass to sway slightly.

"Actually, we should have earned more! That Orange Technology is just weird. They sell phones with 30-second fast charging for only 499 yuan. They don't go to the big cities, and they're just competing with us for the rural market!"

As the market for Orange 1 in its home city of Shenzhen becomes saturated, wholesalers with strong sales outlets in North China have begun to adjust their strategies, pushing Orange 1 to second- and third-tier distributors.

This distribution system, originally built on counterfeit phones, formed a three-tiered chain: "Shenzhen and North China strong – second- and third-tier cities – towns" (although not absolute, many channels directly connect Shenzhen to towns). Now, the Orange 1 itself is following this chain, directly competing with its own branded Nietzsche phones in the town market.

Lu Laowu complains about Orange Technology all the time, but if he knew what happened to Nietzsche in his previous life, he would probably burn incense and kowtow to Orange.

In his previous life, he insisted on building his own factory from the start, resulting in a shockingly low yield rate, and he even had an amateur directing professionals.

To save on system costs, they crammed in a Java system from the millennium, essentially sending Nietzsche back to the "feature phone Stone Age".

At least this time it's associated with Orange, even though "Nietzsche" is just a rebranded and repackaged Orange 1 scrapped design "X machine", it's equipped with the real Orange OS system, and the basic intelligent experience has been brought up.

Although using the resistive stylus to swipe across the screen feels like "fighting" with the screen, it still offers about 60% of the smoothness of the Orange 1. For users in the 399 yuan price range, this hassle is tolerable.

However, when Orange 1 pushed out a system patch to upgrade to Orange OS 1.0.1 to fix the battery reserve bug, the same problem still existed in Nietzsche OS 1.0.

Although Chen Mo also has system access to the "X" machine, he would not take the initiative to help others rebrand and maintain the system. Don't they have any pride?

Lu Laowu originally intended to price Nietzsche at 699 yuan, but he watched helplessly as Orange 1, after reaching market saturation in Shenzhen, did not expand into first-tier cities, but instead turned its attention to rural towns.
So, it turns out that great minds think alike when it comes to market insight?
Lu Laowu opened "Nietzsche Mobile Phone Factory Direct Store" with green signboards in towns and villages, while Orange 1, leveraging Huabei Qiang's second and third-tier distribution network, penetrated the shelves of small supermarkets, mobile phone shops and repair shops in towns and villages.

While the two appear to be neck and neck, they have unconsciously formed a mismatched competition by pairing high-end and low-end products, jointly squeezing the survival space of traditional counterfeit mobile phones in rural markets.

This isn't the real product versus a generic brand fighting in a rural market.
It was clearly a tacit agreement between the two brothers to stop short of a fight; the other guy didn't even get a scratch, while the cheap knock-off phones that were gathered around watching the spectacle were smashed to pieces and bleeding profusely.

The Orange 1 outperforms Nietzsche in all aspects, forcing Nietzsche to become the "gatekeeper of 399 yuan smartphones," while Orange 1 itself stands at that threshold, becoming the "high-end product" in the eyes of rural users.

Lu Laowu initially cut the price from 699 to 399, and then sold the resistance pen separately for 99, making only 200 yuan profit per Nietzsche unit from users.

If 499 Orange 1 didn't appear in rural markets, guess how much profit it would make.

The real one (Orange) VS. the rebranded one (Nietzsche)
The two seem to be in fierce competition, but in reality they are competing in different areas. The first to fall will not be each other, but rather the counterfeit phones like the "Hi-Fun 4" and "Pineapple X9".

In first-tier cities like Shenzhen, among price-insensitive consumers, counterfeit phones can still compete with the Orange 1 by differentiating themselves from other products; but in rural markets, they are completely powerless to resist.

These traditional rural markets, once monopolized by counterfeit and stockpiled phones, are being slowly eroded by Nietzsche's "green signboard" and "loosely sold" oranges.

In the past, some branded mobile phone manufacturers would always sell off their unsold inventory in first-tier cities to consumers in rural towns at inflated prices, but now Nietzsche's "green storm" has disrupted their plans.

When the Nietzsche phone priced at 399 yuan, with its resistive screen and 1% orange-like user experience, became the "basic understanding" of smartphones for rural users, those big-name brands that profited from information asymmetry suddenly lost their market share.

What's even more ingenious is that the more realistically Nietzsche portrays the "goalkeeper" role, the more the Orange 1's 499 yuan model resembles a "light luxury choice," a "high-end product" for the poor.

Although primary wholesalers prefer to supply oranges to cities first, township business owners are willing to pay extra to get their oranges from these channels in order to capitalize on the hot-selling "high-end" trend.

After all, in physical businesses where cash flow is king, selling fast is always more important than making a lot of money.

Seeing Nietzsche's first day of sales bring in 2300 million yuan in profit, Lu Laowu and Jiang Laodi, the two coal bosses, finally had an epiphany in the club's private room.

Back then, investing in movies and speculating on shops were just small-scale operations. Now, selling mobile phones in rural towns is what I call striking gold.

This isn't just a battle between Orange 1 and Nietzsche; it's clearly a joint effort to uproot the counterfeit and overstocked mobile phones in rural and lower-tier markets!
"Xiaoli! How's the acquisition of the OEM factory going?"

"The contract is signed!" Xiaoli flipped through her notebook: "President Jiang suggested building our own production line to get rid of our dependence on Orange Technology. After all, we're competitors now."

This logic is not surprising.

The rural market is currently a blue ocean, with the two companies tacitly sharing the market share of counterfeit and surplus phones. But what about in the long run?
"No!" Lu Laowu turned to Brother Jiang, who had recovered from his slumber, and tapped the coffee table with his index finger: "Not only will we not get rid of them, but we'll also place another 300 million OEM orders to keep them in check!"

Seeing the other party's stunned expression, he leaned forward and lowered his voice: "We'll use a feint to poach the best engineers with high salaries and secretly develop the Nietzsche new machine. Once our factory's new machine rolls off the production line, we'll confront Orange!"

Right now, Nietzsche's sales are booming, and Lu Laowu knows that he must not cause any unforeseen problems at this time.

The next day.

Xiaoli led a well-dressed "mobile phone engineer" into the private room.

Old Wang stood awkwardly in the center, wringing his hands – he had just been released from inside for good behavior, and then…
He subconsciously glanced at Xiao Li behind Lu Laowu. She had a gentle smile on her lips, but it sent a chill down his spine.

Old Wang gritted his teeth: "Let's gamble and turn a bicycle into a motorcycle. Could it be that that bitch has run off with my fortune and I'm really going to have to eat chaff and wild vegetables for the rest of my life?"

Lu Laowu sized up the middle-aged man with shifty eyes, then suddenly slapped his thigh:
"You're the one! I'm going to make a 100% replica of the iPhone 4, using the best chips."

Lu Laowu had consulted an expert about the Nietzsche 1's specifications and naturally knew that the chip was two generations behind the mainstream.

But the huge success of this Nietzsche-branded product made him arrogant.

How difficult can it be to make a smartphone? Isn't it just a matter of buying some parts, putting them together, and slapping a brand on it?

"Old Wang, you're the expert! What chip do you think Nietzsche's new machine should use?"

Old Wang adjusted his disguise glasses and said without hesitation, "Lianfaco MT6574, price 30 yuan!"

This familiarity made Lu Laowu lower his guard, but he didn't notice the beads of sweat on the back of the other man's neck.

When the cost of hardware components was approaching 300 yuan, Lao Wang started talking about system compatibility issues.

Lu Laowu waved his hand dismissively: "Forget it! I know there are free Java systems!"

Old Wang's pupils contracted sharply upon hearing this, but remembering his secretary Xiao Li's instructions, he could only nod in agreement.

In just a few words of conversation, Old Wang's flattery had already led the arrogant Lu Laowu back to the same old path he had taken in his previous life.

This Java system from the millennium is clearly dragging new phones back to the feature phone era.

Brother Jiang seized the opportunity to add fuel to the fire: "The contract stipulates that for every Orange OS unit rebranded after this batch of orders, an additional 50 cents licensing fee will be charged! This free Java system is great! We have to use it."

It's a pity Zhao Tiezhu isn't here, otherwise he would definitely claim he was wronged!

This 50 cents is for TouchPal! Our Orange OS hasn't charged you a single cent in licensing fees!
Under the "professional" guidance of General Manager Lu and General Manager Jiang, Old Wang didn't care whether it was reasonable or not, he just focused on quickly getting the hardware configuration list for Nietzsche's new machine to be completed.

Pairing a top-of-the-line chip with a Java system from the millennium is like putting handlebars and pedals on a sports car.

As he was leaving, Lu Laowu patted Lao Wang on the shoulder, his face beaming with a broad smile.

"Work hard! Once the new machine is launched, I'll make you the R&D director of Nietzsche!"

Little did they know, at the corner of the corridor outside the private room, Brother Jiang was smiling sinisterly as he watched Xiao Li and Lao Wang enter a private room, plotting something.

Nietzsche's new machine has not yet been born, but it has already been quietly shrouded in a shadow.

　Wishing everyone

　　Happy Dragon Boat Festival!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)