Peninsula Steel Love

Chapter 826 Jessica Jung: A Vase?
"dong dong dong"

"Come in."

“Representative, I have made all the arrangements for Director Zhou as you instructed, and they have started their meal now.”

"Hmm, what did you tell him?"

“I told him that I was entertaining important guests and couldn’t leave for a while.”

"Okay, that's settled then. Report to me immediately if anything happens."

"Okay, then I'll head out now."

After watching Ahn Jin-hee leave the office, Lee Boo-jin immediately got up from her chair and walked slowly to the large floor-to-ceiling window.

The night sky outside the window was dotted with stars. Lee Boo-jin silently gazed at the brightly lit Namsan Tower in the distance. After a long while, she returned to her desk and slowly sat down.

That's right, she was deliberately avoiding meeting Zhou Jing, because Lee Boo-jin knew perfectly well why Luo Bing was staying at the Shilla Hotel and what his purpose was in Seoul, but there was nothing she could do about it.

Here's what happened: One day last month, a senior executive at Samsung China suddenly sent an internal email requesting the head office to stop supplying AMOLED screens for mobile phones to Xiaohe Technology, effective immediately.

The request was quickly approved by headquarters, and a letter was sent to Xiaohe Technology immediately. To be honest, Lee Boo-jin found it unbelievable when she heard the news.

What is an AMOLED screen? Those who like digital electronics are probably familiar with it. Here's a brief introduction: Currently, smartphones on the market mainly use two types of screens: LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) and OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode).

LCD screens, which originated as early technology, have matured considerably and offer advantages such as low cost, long lifespan, stable display, and high color fidelity. They were once the mainstream display technology for mobile devices.

Of course, it also has many shortcomings. Since LCDs themselves do not emit light, they need a backlight module to illuminate the screen, which results in high power consumption, impure black levels, and low contrast.

For the same reason, LCD screens cannot be used in curved screens and phones with under-display fingerprint recognition. This is when OLED, with its self-emissive properties, began to emerge.

It's no exaggeration to say that OLED represents a major innovation in mobile phone screen technology. Although it costs significantly more than LCD, its advantages, such as high contrast, high response, wide color gamut, low power consumption, and large size, are obvious.

Most importantly, the thin, flexible, and foldable characteristics of OLED screens provide more possibilities for mobile phone appearance design, which is why OLED is gradually becoming a standard feature of high-end smartphones.

In 2010, Samsung introduced AMOLED, an advanced form of OLED, which adds an active matrix to the original OLEDD to precisely control the display of each pixel.

This allows AMOLED to achieve faster response times and higher refresh rates, making it particularly suitable for displaying dynamic images and high-speed videos.

As a result, a consensus has emerged among mobile phone manufacturers in recent years: whoever masters AMOLED will dominate the market.

Xiaohe started by offering high-performance, low-to-mid-range mobile phones at competitive prices, but as the company has grown, executives like Luo Bing have set their sights on the high-end mobile phone market.

According to the original plan, Xiaohe Technology was to release its first high-end smartphone, the Xiaohe 5, this year. The news had already been leaked to the outside world, but in the end, it encountered the biggest crisis since the company was founded in terms of the display screen.

It's important to know that Samsung holds 99% of the AMOLED screen market share, giving it a complete monopoly. Without Samsung's supply, the Xiaohe 5 would have been doomed to fail.

How did things turn out this way? After investigating the matter thoroughly, Lee Boo-jin almost fainted, because the trigger for the incident was truly speechless.

According to the senior executive in charge of the China region, he led a team to Xiaohe Technology to meet with the supply chain personnel to discuss matters related to the supply of AMOLED screens.

Unexpectedly, Xiaohe's side displayed an extremely arrogant and rude attitude during the meeting, which Samsung naturally did not accept, leading to a heated argument between the two sides, with both sides exchanging profanities.

Ultimately, the executive stormed off in a fit of anger, which led to the aforementioned supply disruption.

Well, if things had ended there, Lee Boo-jin could barely accept it. After all, it's not uncommon for business partners to argue, and Samsung wasn't exactly being unreasonable; at most, they were just acting impulsively.

But she hadn't anticipated that the incident was far more complex than she had imagined; the problem lay precisely with the seemingly aggrieved executive—
"After the incident, I contacted the other party through a friend as soon as possible. When I heard that he was in Shenzhen, I immediately flew there to treat him to a meal and apologized repeatedly."

Oh? Zhou Jing had been listening quietly with the others as Luo Bing recounted the ins and outs of the incident, but as he listened, his brows involuntarily furrowed.

What nonsense! This is ridiculous! He himself is in charge of the supply chain and deals with suppliers all day long, including some that are comparable to Samsung, but he has never encountered anything so absurd.

For a mere verbal dispute to cause such a commotion, and regardless of whether Xiaohe has any issues, Samsung's actions will only lead outsiders to think of one thing: being held hostage.

Are you kidding me? Although Xiaohe Technology is a private enterprise, its size and influence in the industry are undeniable. With the China-Korea FTA about to be implemented, it seems that Samsung's top executives have collectively lost their minds and have no political sensitivity whatsoever.

Only now did he finally understand the real reason why Lee Boo-jin had offered to host the dinner tonight. She was asking him to smooth things over to prevent the situation from escalating further, fearing that if the authorities intervened, Samsung would be in deep trouble.

Wait a minute, Zhou Jing narrowed his eyes and suddenly thought of a possibility. Although Lee Boo-jin was far away from the group's core industries and could not intervene, she could only use this method to "save the country indirectly." The key is that Lee Jae-yong is not stupid either.

Samsung was recently given a severe reprimand by the Ministry of Commerce. It's unbelievable that they would so quickly and recklessly run into trouble again.

Therefore, there's only one answer, and Luo Bing's next words perfectly confirmed Zhou Jing's guess. "The two of us downed five bottles of red wine, and in the end, he relented, but said it would be a two-year delay before supplies could resume. Sigh."

As expected, Zhou Jing knew exactly what was going on, but before he could even speak, Yuri was already cursing under her breath.

"Damn, this is obviously playing games with people. They have no sincerity whatsoever; they might as well just refuse outright. Waiting two years will be too late. Tch."

The speed at which 3C digital products are updated is something anyone on the street could probably tell you, so Yuri naturally scoffed at the so-called "loosening of restrictions".

Hehe, Zhou Jing chuckled inwardly as he looked at Yuri's indignant expression, thinking that Quan Laoliu's righteous indignation hadn't changed at all, but he really needed to change his habit of talking faster than thinking.

Of course, Yuri can't be blamed either. Luo Bing and Su Xia shared the same idea, otherwise there wouldn't have been this dinner party tonight.

It seems I need to remind Luo Bing and the others. With that thought, Zhou Jing picked up his wine glass, took a small sip, and then said leisurely:

"Mr. Luo, don't sigh. In my opinion, that drink wasn't a waste. At least they gave you the truth, didn't they?"

"Oh?" Luo Bing was stunned for a moment before recovering and asking Zhou Jing, "President Zhou, do you mean... he's not just making excuses for me?"

“Of course,” Zhou Jing put down his wine glass and said decisively, “because there’s no need for that. Forgive my bluntness, Mr. Luo, but if Samsung were really going to hold a grudge against you over such a trivial matter, they wouldn’t have accepted your invitation at all.”

"It's even more impossible for them to propose a two-year delay in delivery without consulting headquarters. This only proves one thing: they accidentally revealed their hand after drinking too much, haha."

"What trump card?"

Uh, Zhou Jing covered his forehead, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. Who could blame him when the question came from Yuri, not Luo Bing or Su Xia?

What a curious little guy! He was blinking his big eyes, hoping Zhou Jing would answer his questions, completely unaware that Luo Bing and the others had already started to smile.

Who are they? Zhou Jing has already said so much; if they still don't understand, they might as well go home, wash up, and go to sleep.

Luo Bing, in particular, was previously blinded by his own involvement, but after Zhou Jing's reminder, he immediately realized what was going on.

Poor Yuri was completely bewildered by the cheerful crowd and Zhou Jing's embarrassed expression. Luckily, Jessica's sweet voice rang in her ears at that moment.

"Yuri, what did Oppa just say?"

Jessica was equally surprised by the sudden change in the atmosphere, but Yuri was too busy being curious to translate for her, which made Jessica even more confused.

“Unnie, Mia’e.” Yuri finally remembered her duty for the evening and quickly translated the conversation between Zhou Jing and Luo Bing.

She expected Jessica to be just as bewildered as she was, but to her surprise, Jessica wasn't surprised at all; instead, she nodded in agreement.

"It's pretty much what I thought. Samsung is most likely constrained by insufficient production capacity, and delaying supply for two years was their final solution anyway. They just happened to seize on Xiaohe's minor flaw and used it as an excuse to make trouble."

"Pfft, cough cough."

Zhou Jing was drinking water when he heard Jessica's words clearly, which shocked him so much that he choked on his water on the spot.

"Mr. Zhou, are you alright?" Luo Bing asked anxiously upon seeing the situation.

"No, it's nothing. I just choked on it by accident, haha." Zhou Jing laughed awkwardly to hide the intense shock he was experiencing.

Goodness, Sika's progress is terrifying! There's not a trace of an idol or celebrity in her speech anymore; she acts like a high-level executive from a major company.

In fact, not only Zhou Jing, but Luo Bing also noticed Jessica's sudden display of powerful aura, and his surprise was far greater than Zhou Jing's.

To put it bluntly, Luo Bing's initial definition of Jessica was that she was just a pretty face, a mistress, you know what I mean.

Having navigated the ups and downs of the business world for many years, Luo Bing has seen it all. Not to mention having two sisters, there are countless other outrageous cases.

However, as Jessica spoke earnestly and eloquently, he felt a sense of unease, as if he had misjudged her, and he became curious about what exactly Jessica had said.

"Hey Zheng, Quan, why don't you two have a little meeting? Share your thoughts."

It had to be Su Xia again. Luo Bing was too embarrassed to ask, but this guy didn't care. He had already seen through Luo Bing's confusion.

Alright, let's have our great Director Zheng make his grand entrance! Zhou Jing shrugged at Su Xia's teasing smile and then gestured for Yuri to translate Jessica's words to everyone.

结果
(End of this chapter)