In the afternoon, Pei Qian arrived at OTTO Technology and met with Jiang Yuan, who was working overtime to prepare for the launch event.
The entire company had just Jiang Yuan present, as everyone else was already on holiday.
Looking at the empty workstations in the office area, Pei Qian was very satisfied.
During holidays, the Tenda Group absolutely could not have employees working overtime. If anyone had to work overtime, it should only be the leaders.
What Pei Qian despised most was when bosses needed to work overtime and forcibly dragged the entire company’s staff to work overtime with them. Because when bosses worked overtime, they usually had real work to do, but employees didn’t necessarily have anything to do. Bosses requiring employees to work overtime with them was purely because they didn’t want to work overtime alone, so they dragged employees along as company.
Moreover, what kind of money did bosses earn? And what kind of money did ordinary employees earn?
If a boss worked overtime for a month without overtime pay, they earned enough for a car; if employees worked overtime for a month without overtime pay, they helped the boss earn enough for a car.
Therefore, within the Tenda Group, Pei Qian absolutely would not encourage such unhealthy practices. If departments needed overtime, fine, but they must provide overtime pay. And if department heads needed to work overtime, they should do it themselves without dragging along their employees.
In situations like the current one, where only the department head was working overtime, and just for two hours, Pei Qian could completely tolerate it.
Jiang Yuan’s expression looked slightly anxious. When he saw Mr. Pei arrive, he quickly stood up to greet him: “Mr. Pei.”
Pei Qian sat down at the conference table and said with some concern: “You look a bit nervous by your expression. No need for that—relax, it’s just a launch event, nothing too serious. Even if you completely mess it up, it doesn’t matter.”
Jiang Yuan thought Mr. Pei was joking with him and quickly said: “How could that be okay? This phone represents the blood and sweat of the entire department. If I messed it up, I’d be the villain!”
“Anyway, here’s the prototype, and here’s the PPT for the launch event. Please review them.”
As he spoke, Jiang Yuan handed over the phone and laptop that were on the table.
Pei Qian reached out to take them.
When he saw the OTTO G1 phone prototype, he involuntarily sucked in a cold breath.
Something wasn’t right!
This phone looked so technologically advanced!
When Pei Qian first saw the OTTO E1 phone, he didn’t have this sense of shock because the E1 had a forehead and chin bezel. Although its exterior design was pretty, it didn’t stand out from other phones on the market at that time. It even appeared overly bulky due to its extra-large battery, so at first glance, it didn’t seem particularly stunning.
But this G1 phone was completely different.
Although it was still on the larger side, because it used full-screen technology, the forehead and chin bezels were very narrow, only slightly wider than the side bezels. The front camera wasn’t visible from the front, giving a very impressive visual impact.
Especially the chin bezel—it truly shocked Pei Qian.
Pei Qian knew a bit about this technology. The traditional packaging solution for phone screens was called COG packaging, which had high yield rates, low costs, and was easy for mass production. However, its disadvantage was a larger chin bezel, which was why many manufacturers chose to place physical fingerprint modules on the phone’s chin.
The advanced packaging solution was called COF packaging, which could reduce the top and bottom bezels and greatly increase the screen-to-body ratio of the phone, but still couldn’t achieve a 100% full-screen display.
The technology that could truly eliminate the chin bezel was called COP packaging. According to leaks from some digital technology media, Pineapple’s latest flagship phone would adopt this technology, which could compress the phone’s four bezels to the extreme, making the chin bezel as narrow as the side bezels.
But now it was only May. According to Pineapple’s pattern of releasing new phones, they typically released new models in autumn, around October each year. This meant phones using COP packaging wouldn’t appear for several more months.
And the OTTO G1 phone obviously used the COP packaging process. However, visually, its chin wasn’t as small as the Apple X in Pei Qian’s memory, but this visual difference shouldn’t exceed one or two millimeters, so it still looked impressive from the front.
What should have been a rather bulky phone instead gave off an imposing feeling due to the high aesthetics of the full screen.
The first impression this phone gave Pei Qian was very troubling.
However, the two physical buttons on the sides, resembling shoulder keys, had a certain width and protruded slightly. It was precisely because of these two physical buttons that the G1 phone couldn’t be made with curved edges narrowing on both sides. This would make it feel slightly inferior in hand, and although it increased recognizability, it clearly clashed with the current mainstream phone design.
The pop-up camera was on the upper part of the left long edge, a very odd position that Pei Qian had personally specified, precisely because he hadn’t seen phones with pop-up cameras in this position, which could greatly increase the chances of failure.
This made Pei Qian feel a bit more at ease. Clearly, as he had anticipated, this was a phone that took an unconventional approach, using too many new technologies. So the cost must be very high, they couldn’t possibly stock many units, and the overly advanced design concept might not appeal to mainstream consumer groups.
Pei Qian played with the phone a bit and asked: “How much are you planning to set the price at?”
Jiang Yuan didn’t answer directly, instead hesitating a bit: “Uh… Mr. Pei, I was just about to report this to you. The phone’s cost is slightly higher than our previous estimates, so…”
Pei Qian interrupted him: “Just tell me the price directly.”
Jiang Yuan: “Based on the E1’s pricing, this phone’s starting price is set at… 9,899.”
“Mr. Pei, we’ve tried very hard to keep the starting price under 10,000 yuan. There are also higher storage versions priced at 9,999, and a special custom version at 10,199.”
“This price is indeed a bit high, but this is after considering all of Tenda’s various benefits included. If we were just selling the phone alone, we could lower the price to under 7,000 or even lower…”
Pei Qian was overjoyed and raised his hand: “No, this price is just right, not high at all, perfect!”
Hearing this price, Pei Qian knew this phone was likely doomed!
Who would spend so much money on an unknown brand phone?
Previously, the OTTO E1 phone was priced at 8,199, but that was with the full set of Tenda benefits included.
The G1 phone also came with the full set of benefits, but the price compared to the E1 phone had increased not just a little, but by a full 1,700 yuan.
Because the G1 phone used more new technologies, the cost was naturally higher.
Looking at 8,000 or 10,000 yuan as a base, a 1,700 yuan increase didn’t seem like much. But looking at this number alone, 1,700 yuan could already buy some low-end phones from major brands.
Moreover, current domestic phones, even Shenhua’s flagship models, were far from reaching the 10,000 yuan level.
Without adding Tenda’s various benefits, the OTTO G1 phone could have its price reduced to just over 6,000 yuan, which would be in the same price range as flagship phones from brands like Shenhua.
But according to OTTO Technology’s estimates, the benefits included with the phone were actually worth nearly 3,000 yuan, and became more valuable the longer you used them. So with these benefits included, the phone’s price couldn’t be lowered. Lowering it would mean subsidizing the phone department by taking from other departments, which wasn’t good.
Pei Qian said: “This pricing is fine, don’t worry. Let’s talk about the launch event.”
“Let me look at the PPT content first.”
Pei Qian flipped through the phone launch event PPT on the laptop page by page.
To be fair, the PPT was well done. Like other brand phone launch events, it detailed the phone’s various parameters and new functions, promotional videos had been filmed—all in all, it was steady and flawless.
After quickly browsing through the launch event PPT, Pei Qian fell silent.
Something wasn’t right.
This PPT was so well made that even he wanted to buy the phone—what could he do?
It had to be said that the G1 phone indeed used many new technologies, so just introducing these new technologies already took up much of the PPT. Add to that the phone’s unique appearance and the very impactful full-screen design, and even a standard introduction was already quite attractive.
Whether a phone was practical was something customers would only experience after using it for a while. But whether a phone looked cool and had many new, buzz-worthy technologies could be seen directly at the launch event.
So this approach definitely wouldn’t work. Since the phone’s production volume wasn’t high to begin with, what if the launch event tricked some customers, and like last time, it sold out instantly, creating a feeling among customers that it was “in high demand”? Wouldn’t that be extremely troublesome?
Pei Qian cleared his throat lightly: “The PPT is fine, but…”
“Why didn’t you continue with the style of the previous PPT?”
Pei Qian felt that the previous E1 phone launch event was successful mainly because Chang You’s speaking skills were too good, turning the launch event into a stand-up comedy routine. The content of the launch event itself wasn’t the problem.
They should still list all the phone’s shortcomings, briefly mention the advantages, discourage customers in advance—that would be much better than praising a bunch of advantages at the launch event.
Jiang Yuan quickly said: “That won’t work, Mr. Pei. The previous PPT content was tailor-made for Manager Chang, and only someone with his speaking skills could pull it off.”
“My speaking skills aren’t good, and I might even get stage fright. So I thought it would be better to just hold a steady, conventional launch event. If I try to imitate Manager Chang, it might be very awkward.”
Pei Qian shook his head: “There’s no need to be so quick to doubt yourself.”
“When faced with a problem, don’t first think about whether you can do it, but think about what’s needed for success.”
“For a phone that incorporates new technologies and is full of innovative spirit, would a steady, ordinary launch event be appropriate? It wouldn’t be.”
Jiang Yuan hesitated: “This…”
Pei Qian continued: “So, make the changes I suggest.”
“Currently, the PPT is structured into three parts. The first part introduces the continuous updates and iterations of the phone’s operating system and AEEIS artificial intelligence over the past year, emphasizing that we’ve fulfilled the promises made at the previous launch event. The second part introduces the new technologies used in the phone, praising the phone’s appearance and various parameters. The third part announces the phone’s price, configuration, release date, and compares it horizontally with the E1 phone and other flagship phones from other brands.”
“But in my view, there’s a lot of ineffective information here, purely wasting everyone’s time.”
“Let’s do this: The first part’s self-praise isn’t necessary. We’ve been continuously updating the Otto OS system, existing users already know this, and it’s what we should be doing anyway, no need to boast about it.”
“The second part praises the phone’s appearance and various parameters. This part can’t be removed, but it’s too lengthy. In my opinion, the phone’s appearance and parameters can be covered in just one PPT slide.”
“Although we’ve used some new technologies, these technologies are also full of various defects. How could this part be glossed over? It must be written out in great detail, the more detailed the better. We can’t mislead our consumers.”
“The third part is also a bit dragged out. I think the horizontal comparison section can be removed. We should just focus on ourselves—why do we need to put down other phone manufacturers? This kind of horizontal comparison table is nothing more than attacking others’ weaknesses with our strengths. It’s meaningless. Just announcing the price and release date is enough.”
“Hmm, that’s about it.”
Jiang Yuan was a bit dazed.
With Mr. Pei cutting left and right, the content of the launch event was almost halved!
And most critically, what was cut were the parts that spoke well of the phone, while the parts introducing the phone’s technological shortcomings were to be extensively detailed and repeatedly emphasized.
What kind of approach was this?
Previously, all the phone’s advantages had been condensed into one page, creating Manager Chang’s famous scene of “reading everything correctly in one breath.” But the problem was, Jiang Yuan knew very well that he didn’t have Manager Chang’s eloquence—there was no way he could recreate that famous scene!