One Yuan First Recharge: I'm Actually the Boss Behind a Fortune 500 Company

Three years later.

In the provincial capital's high-tech industrial park, there is a gray-white twelve-story office building with a metal logo bearing the four characters "Xingyue Intelligent" on its exterior wall.

The logo design is simple and restrained, with silver-gray lettering that reflects a soft light under the sunlight.

This is Xingyue Intelligent's new headquarters. From that 40-square-meter office to now renting an entire floor of office space in the High-tech Park, Wang Hao has walked this path for three years.

Three years is not a long time, but it is enough for many things to change fundamentally.

Xingyue Intelligent's product line has expanded from the initial one model to five.

It covers everything from entry-level budget phones to mid-to-high-end performance models.

The sales channels have expanded from three cities surrounding the provincial capital to eleven cities in the province, and through the provincial agent network, they have entered the county-level markets of two surrounding provinces.

Monthly sales have increased from a few dozen or a few hundred units initially to a stable level of over three thousand units now.

For a domestic mobile phone brand that has no capital background and relies entirely on its own accumulation and development, this number is not amazing, but it is solid enough.

More importantly, Xingyue Intelligence survived.

In the past three years, at least six newly established mobile phone-related startups have failed in the provincial capital alone.

Some died because of supply chain problems, some because of broken cash flow, and some because of misplaced product positioning.

Xingyue Intelligence isn't the biggest or the fastest, but it's the most stable.

Wang Hao eventually applied for and received the funding from the Science and Technology Bureau.

One million two hundred thousand, to be disbursed in two installments.

He did not invest all of the money in market expansion, but instead put most of it into research and development and the construction of after-sales network.

Today, Xingyue Intelligent has seventeen authorized after-sales service stations in the province, covering all prefecture-level cities and some key counties.

Wang Hao had kept in mind Director Li's veiled reminder, but the funds ultimately did not lead to the situation he had feared.

Perhaps it was luck, or perhaps it was because he maintained sufficient vigilance and distance while accepting the money.

After that text message, Qian Decheng contacted him twice more.

Once by phone, and once by asking someone to pass on a message, both expressing the intention of "wanting to meet and chat," but never specifying what they wanted to talk about.

Wang Hao declined both times, and his reasons were quite sincere—the company is small, and we need to take steady steps; he doesn't want to participate in any collaborations beyond his capabilities for the time being.

Qian Decheng did not insist. After that, he never contacted him again.

Mr. Chen, the owner in Ancheng, has now become one of Xingyue Intelligent's largest channel partners in the province.

He not only made Xingyue Intelligent's products a great success in Ancheng, but also took the initiative to help Wang Hao expand into several surrounding county-level markets.

What started as a trial order of fifty units three years ago has now become a stable partnership of several thousand units per year.

Mr. Ma from Lincheng encountered a minor problem a year ago because he took too big a step – in order to boost sales, he secretly sold his goods to a market in another province, which led to a complaint from the local distributor.

Wang Hao made a phone call to Boss Ma, but instead of confronting him, he simply laid the matter out on the table:

"Boss Ma, Xingyue's rule is regional protection, and no one can break it."

This time, I'll cover the loss; I'll buy back the goods at the original price and cover the shipping costs. But this can't happen again.

Mr. Ma remained silent for a long time on the other end of the phone before finally saying, "Mr. Wang, I understand."

Since then, Mr. Ma's business has been conducted in a very proper manner, and no similar problems have occurred again.

Lin Yongjian is now the production director of Xingyue Intelligent.

The workshop was moved from an old industrial area on the outskirts of the city to a standard factory building near the high-tech park, where the area tripled and the production line increased from one to three.

Lin Yongjian's team has grown from the initial eight or nine people to more than thirty.

He's still the same quiet person, but if anything goes wrong on the production line, he's always the first one to show up.

The channel department that Zhou Haibo is in charge of has expanded to six people.

He traveled to every prefecture-level city in the province, and at his busiest, he traveled more than 8,000 kilometers in a single month, changing his car's tires twice.

The reputation he built within the distribution network has become one of Xingyue Intelligent's most valuable intangible assets.

Sister Wang is still in charge of finance and administration, but she now has three people under her.

Her desk was always piled with various reports and documents, but she could always find a certain number within thirty seconds when Wang Hao needed it.

Wang Hao once asked her, "How does your brain remember so much?"

Without even looking up, Sister Wang replied, "Because you don't remember."

"..."

Competition in this industry will never go easy on you just because you've achieved some success.

In the provincial capital's shopping malls, the counters of major brands are still packed with people.

Online promotional battles rage on, with price wars leaving everyone battered and bruised.

Companies hundreds or thousands of times larger than him are already walking on thin ice; his meager resources simply cannot withstand any major mistake.

He turned around, went back to his desk, sat down, turned on his computer, and began to look at the product planning proposal for the next quarter.

The development of the new product has entered the engineering verification stage, but there are still some technical issues to be resolved.

The screen's power consumption performance is not as expected, the heat dissipation structure needs to be readjusted, and the battery life has not yet reached the design target under heavy use scenarios.

Lin Yongjian's production line also needs to undergo pre-production tooling modifications for the new product.

There were a lot of problems, but Wang Hao had gotten used to them.

To put it simply, starting a business is about overcoming one hurdle after another.

There is no such thing as a one-time victory; the reality is that after defeating one boss, the next one is already waiting for you at the door.

He picked up a pen and wrote down several key goals for the next quarter in his notebook: increase the engineering verification pass rate of new products to over 95%, increase the coverage of township markets in the province by another 10%, and shorten the after-sales response time to within 24 hours.

After writing this, he put down his pen and glanced out the window.

The late summer sun slanted down onto the streets of the high-tech park, casting long shadows of the roadside trees.

There weren't many people on this street. Occasionally, a few young people in work clothes would walk out of the park entrance, carrying plastic bags from the convenience store, probably buying dinner during their overtime break.

Wang Hao's gaze fell on the street, and he suddenly remembered three years ago—when he stood on that old street, watching the factory buildings of the provincial capital's electronics factory turn into silhouettes in the sunset.

That road had come to an end. He found a new path amidst the ruins.

Now, he is in his third year on this new path.

The road ahead is still very long, and we can't see the end or what lies beyond the bend.

But he wasn't in a hurry.

His path was built step by step in this way.

(The End!)