Assistant Xin nodded and took notes: “Yes, Mr. Pei. Regarding workstations, we still have considerable space on this floor. We could squeeze in a bit and add a few more desks…”
“Squeeze in? How could you think that way!”
“Providing employees with comfortable, spacious work environments has always been our company’s principle. This floor is already overcrowded and completely saturated.”
“Go talk to the building manager and tell him we’re renting another floor. All arrangements and furnishings should follow the same standards as this floor!”
Renting office space counted as a normal expense, not a business venue, so it wouldn’t delay the settlement.
Although Tenda’s office layout was extremely inefficient, with plenty of usable space, following their current sparse desk arrangement meant that everything was technically filled up.
Under these circumstances, renting another floor wasn’t breaking any rules.
“Oh, and when we signed the lease contract last time, it was for one year, right?” Pei Qian asked.
Assistant Xin nodded: “That’s right, we signed for one year. Manager Zhang offered us favorable terms—one month’s deposit and paying month by month, to reduce initial financial pressure.”
Pei Qian waved his hand dismissively: “This time, ask Manager Zhang if we can modify the contract. Let’s forget the one-month deposit and monthly payments. From now on, we’ll pay quarterly. After all, our company’s cash flow is excellent now, and it’s troublesome to make rent payments every month for these trivial amounts.”
“Also, rent another floor and sign the contract with Manager Zhang all at once.”
Assistant Xin asked: “Do you need to review the contract?”
Pei Qian thought for a moment: “No need.”
The last time they rented, Pei Qian barely looked at the contract. There were too many clauses to go through, so he just noted the price and handed everything over to Assistant Xin.
This time, he was simply changing from monthly payments to quarterly payments and renting another identical floor, so naturally, Pei Qian didn’t need to be involved again.
This way, the newly rented floor would require one month’s deposit and three months’ payment upfront as soon as the contract was signed, instantly spending 1.8 million yuan.
Add to that office desks, chairs, computers, and so on—essentially duplicating this floor—which would cost another 700,000 to 800,000 yuan.
In total, he would spend 2.5 to 2.6 million yuan.
Perfect!
Pei Qian had considered renting another floor before, but at that time, the company’s office space was still very spacious, and the system wouldn’t approve renting another floor.
After this period of natural expansion, with games getting bigger and updates becoming more substantial, they naturally hired more employees. Though each person still had plenty of space, the floor was basically full, so expansion was finally possible.
“Oh, don’t forget about that Qiao Laoshi matter,” Pei Qian reminded.
Assistant Xin nodded: “We’re already investigating.”
“Good. Now go find Manager Zhang and quickly sign the contract to rent another floor.”
Pei Qian wanted Assistant Xin to spend this money right away to avoid any complications.
“After signing the contract, come back and we’ll discuss the new employee benefits.”
“Yes, Mr. Pei.” Assistant Xin turned and left.
Pei Qian roughly calculated the current number of employees.
Tenda had expanded to over sixty people, nearly seventy.
Across the five Slackin’ Internet Cafés, including waitstaff, chefs, bartenders, delivery personnel, and others, each café employed around twenty people, bringing the total to nearly one hundred.
Fei Huang Studio had grown to a team of more than ten people.
All together, these teams totaled less than two hundred people—these were Pei Qian’s “biological children” teams.
There was one exception: Shangyang Games.
So far, Shangyang Games was still in the process of reputation recovery while expanding its losses.
After acquiring Shangyang Games, Pei Qian hadn’t forcibly raised the employees’ salaries to Tenda’s level, nor had he provided the same benefits.
Shangyang Games had a total of 50 employees, but their office rent was only 150,000 yuan per month, with employee salaries at just 200,000 yuan. Whether in terms of work environment or salary level, they were far below Tenda’s standards.
Pei Qian officially took over on May 10th. To ensure Shangyang Games continued to operate at a loss, he hadn’t made any hasty moves, neither raising salaries nor adding benefits.
Nearly two months had passed, and although Shangyang Games’ reputation had improved, their financial losses remained consistently stable, which satisfied Pei Qian greatly.
So he felt it was about time for Shangyang Games’ employees to bear some responsibility.
Directly raising the salaries and benefits of Shangyang Games’ employees to match Tenda’s level might cause some issues.
As the saying goes, rewards and punishments should be clear.
Tenda Games had outstanding performance, so giving more salaries and benefits was normal and reasonable.
But Shangyang Games was a newly acquired company—an “adopted child”—and was still consistently losing money. Suddenly providing the same benefits as his “biological children” lacked sufficient justification.
Therefore, he could only give a small reward.
They had diligently revised the game according to Mr. Pei’s requirements and salvaged Shangyang Games’ reputation. This counted as a small achievement deserving recognition.
Implementing an across-the-board salary increase and providing some benefits shouldn’t be excessive.
The workspace, office furniture, computers, and so on could be brought up to Tenda’s standards, as this could be considered a way to improve work efficiency, be reasonable, and convincing.
By this calculation, he could rapidly spend another 1 million yuan or more on Shangyang Games.
Still not enough.
Pei Qian thought further: his “biological children” team of two hundred people could use some more benefits.
In what areas?
Clothing, food, housing, and transportation—clothing and food had already been supplemented, so housing and transportation remained.
Transportation had always had some subsidies, with full reimbursement for taxi fares when working overtime. However, there were no subsidies for daily commuting. Pei Qian decided to provide an additional 500 yuan per person per month for transportation expenses, spending another 100,000 yuan.
Housing was a major expense. After testing the system’s limits, Pei Qian decided to provide a 1,000 yuan monthly housing subsidy for each employee!
That was another 200,000 yuan gone.
Though it wasn’t much, the system wouldn’t allow more.
Pei Qian would have liked to pay out of pocket to build employee dormitories, but evidently, the system considered building employee dormitories too extravagant at this stage and didn’t approve.
Pei Qian had to settle for second-best: a 1,000 yuan housing subsidy per person.
After all these arrangements, Pei Qian felt somewhat relieved.
Fortunately, with enough effort before this settlement, he should be able to create a loss of about 1 million yuan.
Although the official platform’s unannounced change of the revenue split to 70-30 caught Pei Qian off guard, after careful planning, it wasn’t fatal.
Or at least, it wouldn’t be fatal during the settlement a week later.
The biggest impact would be in the future, but future problems could be dealt with later. In the next cycle, Pei Qian would devise other money-losing methods. In the worst case, he could open more Slackin’ Internet Cafés or acquire more loss-making companies—no big deal.
Having roughly sorted out his thoughts, Pei Qian leaned back comfortably in his chair, feeling much more relaxed.
“Knock, knock, knock.”
There was a knock at the door. Assistant Xin had returned.
“Mr. Pei, we’ve rented the entire floor above us. The contract has been signed and the payment has been made,” Assistant Xin reported.
Pei Qian nodded. Indeed, Assistant Xin was efficient.
“Here’s what I’m considering for new employee benefits: a housing subsidy…”
Pei Qian briefly explained his ideas to Assistant Xin.
Assistant Xin smiled and nodded: “Mr. Pei is truly too generous. As the saying goes, good deeds bring good rewards, and that’s certainly true.”
Pei Qian was startled.
Good deeds bring good rewards?
What did that mean?
Assistant Xin smiled and said, “Speaking of rent, there’s some good news.”
“Manager Zhang said that since Tenda moved into Shenhua Luxury View, it has become a role model and example for all companies, and the past six months of cooperation have been very pleasant. Therefore, he’s waiving all deposits and property management fees for us, and reducing the rent from 4 yuan to 1.5 yuan per square meter.”
“Calculating this way, for these two floors, we’ll save at least 400,000 yuan every month!”
“Mr. Pei, this is truly a case of everything aligning in our favor! Congratulations!”
Pei Qian: “????”
Don’t try to fool me because I haven’t read many books. Could Manager Zhang have such authority?