Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

Hu Weiyi and Wang Zihao led their team from East China to North China, then to Southern China. In just six short days, they visited twelve different bicycle factories.

Only Fujida and Phoenix met OFO Bike’s procurement requirements for price, production capacity, and acceptable quality rate, with a complete vehicle cost of 390 Hua Yuan each.

After the two returned to Hang City, Wang Zihao took a short break before continuing his search for a smart lock supplier.

「Meanwhile.」

A list of DiDi Bike license plates and passwords quietly began circulating in the Yanjing Region. The spreadsheet contained the passwords for 1,600 bikes, all spontaneously collected and compiled by netizens.

DiDi Bike’s average daily revenue plummeted from 10,000 Hua Yuan to 7,000, a sharp drop of thirty percent.

Cheng Wei felt helpless upon learning this, which only strengthened his resolve to switch to smart locks.

"President Cheng, the employees in the maintenance department are demanding a raise." Just then, the heads of the HR and operations departments knocked and entered the office together.

’A raise?’

Cheng Wei furrowed his brow. He remembered clearly that the salary for a maintenance position was 6,000 Hua Yuan, which was not a low figure in Yanjing in 2012. Plus, the company covered their social insurance.

’What are they so dissatisfied about?’

"The steel frames, inflatable tires, and chains used for DiDi Bikes are all of very ordinary quality. The failure rate is too high."

The head of the operations department slowly explained.

After all, the first-generation DiDi Bikes only cost 190 Hua Yuan to produce. How good could the quality be?

After half a month of exposure to wind and sun, the damage rate for the handlebars was as high as one-third.

There were also obvious signs of rust on the frame joints, and problems like broken bells, flat tires, and dropped chains were frequent.

Hearing this, Cheng Wei’s expression softened as he immediately understood: there was a problem with the salary structure for the maintenance staff.

After a moment of thought, he said to the head of the operations department, "Change the base salary to 3,000 Hua Yuan, with a basic monthly maintenance quota of 500 bikes. Anything beyond that will be paid on a per-piece basis at 5 Hua Yuan per bike."

Switching from a fixed salary to a pay-for-performance model not only resolved the conflict but also boosted the employees’ motivation to work.

The heads of HR and operations exchanged glances. After receiving their boss’s conciliatory policy, they immediately left the office to announce the news.

Although the base salary was lowered, most of the maintenance staff accepted the new plan and signed new employment contracts with the company.

Cheng Wei’s management style for project operations was becoming more and more seasoned. He had easily smoothed over a minor disturbance.

This incident reminded him that shared bikes parked outdoors had a drastically reduced lifespan. If he only focused on cheapness, it would be great at first, but the subsequent maintenance work would generate much higher costs.

Thinking of this, he quickly called the bicycle factory in Jinmen and halted the production of the first-generation DiDi Bikes.

For a time, both DiDi Bike and OFO Bike coincidentally raised their production cost standard for a complete vehicle to around 400 Hua Yuan.

At this moment, a fourth-year student from the Peking University Guanghua School of Management had just gotten on a DiDi Bike at a subway entrance. As he was crossing an intersection, the light turned red, and he tried to squeeze the brakes.

But unfortunately, the bike’s brakes were faulty. The bike shot past the crosswalk and was sent flying two or three meters by a speeding Electric Vehicle.

Chang Wei’s head was ringing, and it took him a while to come to his senses. His whole body ached. By the time he recovered, before he could even check his injuries, the old man on the Electric Vehicle pointed at him and started yelling unhappily, "Hey! You little punk, are you colorblind? You dare run a red light?"

"The brakes are broken."

Chang Wei was fuming but didn’t know who to blame. He knew the old man wasn’t wrong to yell at him.

"Alright, stop lying on the ground. I’m not paying your medical bills. I’ll let the red light thing slide. Let’s just leave it at that."

After speaking, the old man hopped on his Electric Vehicle and sped off.

Although Chang Wei was primarily, if not fully, at fault, he had taken a nasty fall. The old man was afraid Chang Wei would try to extort him, so he vanished in a flash.

"Damn it, as if I’d try to extort you," Chang Wei muttered, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. Then, fighting through the pain, he moved the bike to the side and plopped down on the curb.

The skin on his palms, arms, and thighs was scraped raw, with dark red blood seeping out.

"DiDi Bike? This piece of junk raised 300 million and is valued at 2 billion? Are the investors insane?"

Chang Wei laughed in anger. He had heard from a classmate that DiDi Bike, which had recently appeared on the streets of Yanjing, had just raised 300 million with a valuation as high as 2 billion. His interest piqued, he had decided to try the product out.

Who would have thought that less than ten minutes later, he’d end up eating dirt?

"Is it really this easy to make money in the internet industry? You can just put a few bikes on the street and trick people out of hundreds of millions?"

Chang Wei’s eyes narrowed as he pondered this.

He was also one of the Huian People, and he was sick and tired of hearing the name Chen Yansen.

’As someone of the same generation, who would be willing to admit they’re inferior?’

Although his family background meant he could have a successful career without going into business, he wanted to compete with Chen Yansen in the commercial world.

’What a load of bullshit about some new king of the internet!’

’He just got lucky and caught a few industry trends!’

Chang Wei leaned against the roadside, glaring viciously at the DiDi Bike. He quickly abandoned his plan to volunteer as a teacher in the Northwest and instead developed a keen interest in shared bikes.

Cheng Wei had no idea that his desperate cost-cutting measures had just created a new competitor for himself, born from a fall.

「On the other side.」

At Zhuxianzhuang Science and Technology Park, even though it was already 10:30 PM, Building 6, where Pinbei’s headquarters was located, was still brightly lit.

Tomorrow was Pinbei Mall’s first time participating in the Double Eleven grand promotion!

During the 27-day presale period from October 14th to November 9th, the total transaction volume reached 29.43 billion Hua Yuan. The highest single-day sales hit 2.06 billion, with a daily average of 1.09 billion, representing a month-over-month growth of 26.7%.

Looking at the output, Pinbei’s daily sales fluctuated wildly, with highlight moments of 2.06 billion and troughs of 500 or 600 million a day.

From November 4th to November 9th, performance hit rock bottom, with daily sales under 400 million.

Users were suppressing their purchasing urges, all waiting for Double Eleven to arrive.

Everyone knew that prices would be lowest on the day of the grand promotion, a stark contrast to the e-commerce sales events a dozen or so years later.

Chen Yansen walked out of Building 9 and went straight into Building 6.

On the giant LED screen on the first floor, real-time information such as Pinbei’s daily active users, order volume, average order value, conversion rate, and sales figures scrolled by.

With an hour and a half left until midnight, the cumulative sales were a paltry 340 million, not even half of a normal day’s sales.

There was nothing to be done; this kind of situation was extremely normal right before a major promotion.

Whether it was the merchants or the e-commerce platform, everyone’s mentality was the same: ’November is all riding on tomorrow!’

"Class President, want some barbecue? I’ll go get you some." The moment Xu Xingxing saw Chen Yansen, she approached with a grin.

"Beef, tofu skin rolls with cilantro, medium spicy. Bring it to me on the second floor." Chen Yansen didn’t stand on ceremony, ordering directly from Xu Xingxing.

"How about a bottle of beer, too?" Xu Xingxing suggested.

"If I get drunk, will you take me home?" Chen Yansen raised an eyebrow and asked with a smile.

"Sure, I’m just afraid President Chen wouldn’t be willing," Xu Xingxing said, tilting her head up.

"Good that you know." Chen Yansen changed the subject and turned to head upstairs.

"President Chen!"

"Brother Sen!"

"Boss!"

The moment he reached the second floor, a chorus of greetings rose to meet him.

The preparations had long been completed. The employees from the Investment Attraction Operations Department and the Key Account Investment Attraction Department were mostly eating barbecue and drinking beer, openly coasting while collecting the company’s overtime pay.

Chen Yansen walked over toward Zhang Yifeng and his group.

Li Hui immediately brought over a chair and placed it in front of the boss.

Chen Yansen sat down, took the bottle of beer Zhang Yifeng handed him, and took a small sip. "This beer usually tastes like nothing special," he said, "but once a big promotion comes around, you can taste the malt. Isn’t that strange?"

"Brother Sen, does that mean the better our performance, the stronger the malt flavor gets?" Yuan Wei, another veteran employee personally recruited by Chen Yansen, called him Brother Sen just like Zhang Yifeng and Li Hui, and boldly cracked a joke.

"Yifeng, how much do you think we can sell tomorrow?"

Chen Yansen asked casually.

"We sold 2.79 billion over two days during 618. Double Eleven should be at least triple that!" Zhang Yifeng said with a chuckle.

"Ah Li sold over 6 billion last Double Eleven. Let’s aim for that number," Li Hui chimed in.

"Get outta here! The boss and I set a target of 5 billion. If we don’t hit it, are you guys going to pay the difference?"

Huang Zheng happened to be making his rounds on the second floor and hurried over when he saw the boss.

The moment he heard Zhang Yifeng and Li Hui’s slogan of 6 billion, he immediately cut in.

The Double Eleven transaction volume was tied to everyone’s Q4 performance bonus. The goal could be ambitious, but not ridiculous.

"Yifeng and Li Hui are just joking. Don’t worry, Mr. Huang. I’m not the type to change my orders on a whim."

Chen Yansen saw through Huang Zheng’s deliberate interruption and said with a light chuckle.

Li Hui didn’t say anything, quietly walking to the side to get a chair for Huang Zheng.

"Boss, you’ve misunderstood me. I wasn’t thinking that at all," Huang Zheng explained, his face flushing as he sat down.

"Is that so? Then let’s make a bet. If the final Double Eleven sales reach 5 billion, Pinbei’s Q4 quarterly bonus multiplier will be 1.2. For every additional 1 billion above that, the multiplier increases by 0.1, with no upper limit."

Chen Yansen said unhurriedly.

"No problem." Huang Zheng couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief upon hearing this, because the reward for hitting the 5 billion target was already a 1.2x quarterly bonus multiplier.

Zhang Yifeng, Yuan Wei, Li Hui, and the others looked excited, but there was nothing they could do at this point.

The tempo of the promotion was already set; all they could do was wait for the results.

Before long, Xu Xingxing brought over a plate of barbecue.

Time ticked by, and in the blink of an eye, it was midnight.

The Double Eleven grand promotion had officially begun!

Today happened to be a Sunday, and users had stayed up late into the night just to wait for the final payment moment.

Dozens of categories, including snacks, women’s apparel, cosmetics, 3C electronics, home appliances, and department store goods, were instantly flooded with tens of millions of buyers submitting orders at the same time.

Millions of data submissions were coming in every second, posing a severe test for both Pinbei and Orange Pay.

Fortunately, they were well-prepared, and the servers didn’t crash, but issues like page stuttering and slow loading still occurred.

Everyone at Pinbei, from top to bottom, was in a state of high excitement, their eyes glued to the data backend, fingers poised over the F5 key, constantly refreshing.

million!

million!

million!

In less than a minute, the platform’s sales broke the 100 million mark!

An hour later, cumulative sales reached one billion!

Chen Yansen glanced at his watch and signaled for the administration department to start clearing people out. Any department not completely gone in fifteen minutes would have their Q4 quarterly bonus canceled.

Outside the park, hundreds of buses were parked, ready to safely transport the employees back to their hotels or residential complexes in the city.

Chen Yansen and Song Yuncheng, meanwhile, entered the guest room section of the Sky Garden one after the other.

"I bought you a new present." As soon as he entered the room, President Chen eagerly took out a light-blue, one-piece cosplay outfit.

"You just love to tease me." Song Yuncheng’s cheeks flushed as she fiddled with the tail on the cosplay outfit, giving Chen Yansen a coquettish glare.

"Be good and change into it," Chen Yansen said, staring intently at Song Yuncheng.

Song Yuncheng picked up the cosplay outfit and obediently slipped into the bathroom.

...

...

In Yanjing, at the Jingdong Headquarters Building, the night outside was pitch-black, but the office area was as bright as day.

Liu Qiangdong held a wine glass, clinking it one by one with the heads of the procurement and sales departments for each category.

"Brothers! Raise your glasses! Win this Double Eleven, and your year-end bonuses will be doubled!"

Liu Qiangdong laughed heartily and raised his glass in a toast.

On the large screen behind him, Jingdong’s cumulative sales for the first hour were frozen at 310 million Hua Yuan!