Rebirth 04: Starting from Taking an Unconventional Approach

The headquarters building of Shanghai Mobile Communications Co., Ltd. is located in the PD area, standing next to Century Avenue.

Completed in 2001, the mobile building is constructed of silver glass curtain walls and black steel. It has a twin-tower structure, with the two towers connected by a sky bridge at a height of 100 meters, forming a huge H-shaped outline.

The building's design concept originates from the metaphor of the "information superhighway." The smooth, curved exterior walls symbolize data flow, while the intersecting structural steel beams mimic the trajectory of a circuit board. The architect responsible for designing the building won an international design award for this.

An Anhui worker responsible for the high-altitude operations on the main building received a special commendation from the project team for catching a piece of tempered glass that was about to fall from a suspended platform on the 37th floor due to an accidental detachment of its anchor bolt. He didn't make a fuss at the time, until the safety inspection team discovered the surveillance footage.

At the commendation ceremony, he rubbed his rough hands together and said in a heavy accent, "My dad said that those who work at heights are not only handling materials, but also the lives of the people below. If glass falls, it can be replaced, but if a person falls, they're gone." This sentence was later printed on the title page of the mobile company's internal safety manual.

An unusual data report traveled along the copper and fiber optic cables laid by the worker, through the ventilation ducts equipped with temperature control systems, across fourteen floors, and arrived at the office of Zhang Qiming, the deputy general manager, on the fifteenth floor of Twin Towers A.

Zhang Qiming was sitting in a chair, his gaze fixed on the open "Postal and Telecommunications Technology Guide," but his thoughts were drifting far away.

He was thinking about how his daughter, Ruiyi, hadn't come home all night, saying that Han Fei's project was about to officially launch, and he wondered how it was going. He was also thinking about how Li Ting kept mentioning that they should find some time to invite Han Fei over for a proper meal. He was also thinking about the quarterly strategy meeting he was going to at the Beijing headquarters next week; he needed to solidify the specific case studies of data business growth in the report...

The phone rang.

Zhang Qiming stretched out his long legs, scratching the back of his ear while answering the phone.

"Mr. Zhang, sorry to bother you," came the voice from the data business monitoring center.

"Speaking."

"Here's the situation, Mr. Zhang. The monitoring system automatically generated an abnormal data flow warning report, trigger level A3 - high-frequency burst, associated partner code QN-20040726, which has been simultaneously transmitted to your office system. The relevant data curve showed an atypical sharp increase around 7:00 AM, and the deviation from the regular SP business model exceeded the threshold. According to procedure, you need to review and confirm this first to determine whether it involves system misjudgment or... abnormal business operations."

Zhang Qiming sighed; the microphone felt hot in his hand because he was gripping it very tightly.

QN-20040726 is the internal cooperation code he specially approved for that project at Qingniao Publishing House.

The anomaly warning was triggered so quickly?

Han Fei, oh Han Fei, aren't you young people moving too fast? Is it a technical problem that caused the billing interface to be maliciously accessed, resulting in data anomalies, or...?

"I understand. I'll take a look at the report," Zhang Qiming said.

He spoke calmly, but his mind was already racing, considering how to deal with the impending troubles: user complaints, billing disputes, and even regulatory inquiries. And what if the cooperation fell through? How would he then face Han Fei, and his most respected former friend?

He hesitated before opening the encrypted file he had just received on his desktop. After the system verified his identity, a detailed business data monitoring report unfolded on the screen.

Zhang Qiming's gaze swept over the basic information at the top of the report, such as the names of the partners and the time range, and finally landed on the core indicators area.

He stared at the report for a long time, then frowned.

Then he leaned forward and looked at it again from the beginning. Suddenly, he was startled, froze, and looked at it with disbelief.

The report interface is very clearly designed, with line graphs, bar charts, and data tables arranged in a well-organized manner.

On the horizontal axis of the timeline, the curves for request volume, subscription success volume, and billing success rate suddenly rise sharply at a 90-degree angle from a certain point in the morning.

The curve symbolizing the growth of paying users seemed to defy gravity, surging straight to the top edge of the chart with an astonishing slope. The growth was so rapid that it even formed pinpoint-like protrusions in some areas, forcing the monitoring system to add a "Data overflow, secondary axis enabled" warning.

The numbers in the table are equally alarming.

The number of new subscribers per hour, the average amount paid per user, the subscription conversion rate... the last few percentage figures made Zhang Qiming subconsciously rub his eyes and look at them again more closely.

This was not the problematic data or system misjudgment he had anticipated, but rather an extremely intense data frenzy.

Zhang Qiming suddenly felt an urge to laugh. The situation before him was extremely absurd and unbelievable, and his mind could not think of any other more appropriate response.

He has managed mobile data services for many years, witnessed the peak of SMS voting craze, and experienced the initial boom of ringback tone services. However, the initial explosive growth and performance of multiple conversion metrics of this new SP business from a dying publishing house are in no way inferior to those mature businesses with massive user bases and strong marketing support.

"You misjudged the situation," Zhang Qiming said into the microphone, leaning back in his chair, hoping his tone wasn't overly smug.

"What...what did you say?"

"This data is completely authentic. It's real data created by tens of thousands of users with real money."

There was silence on the other end of the phone, with only the crackling sound of the other person's breathing hitting the receiver. Then, the voice resumed.

"But Mr. Zhang, this...this is too outrageous."

"That's right," Zhang Qiming said, "it's exaggerated, but he really did it."

Zhang Qiming hung up the phone, stood up, walked to the window, and opened it.

It's 8:30 a.m., and the morning fog has completely dissipated. The traffic is nearing the end of the morning rush hour, but it's still dense. The traffic lights turn green, and the roar of trucks, cars, and motorcycles grows louder and louder; Zhang Qiming even sees the department store windows shaking.

Several employees dressed in shirts and trousers hurriedly left through the main entrance of the building, talking on their phones and waving to hail taxis.

Zhang Qiming ran his hands back through his hair, a habit he'd had his whole life. Li Ting said he should change it so that people wouldn't think he was hiding a hairpiece.

Zhang Qiming returned to the table and picked up the microphone.

The electronic pulses emitted by the telephone traveled from the mobile building, a structure of twin towers, to a thriving domestic society, causing the telephone in the publishing house on Fuzhou Road Cultural Street in the HP District to ring.