Conquering the world from the Kaiser's driver

In the following time, Lin Shangzhou followed Harvot to look at the current commercial communicators.

There are big differences between commercial communicators and military products. First of all, in terms of appearance, commercial communicators are much more beautiful than military ones. Lin Shangzhou also plans to provide exclusive customization services when selling them, which can customize the shell, color and appearance of other parts. Of course, this will be charged extra.

The second is battery capacity and communication distance. The battery capacity of military communicators is much larger than that of civilian ones, and the usage time is also longer. Lin Shangzhou did this to prepare for the battery expansion service. Customers in need can choose to pay for the battery expansion service, and then they can get a communicator with a larger battery. Of course, no battery can be larger than a military one.

Lin Shangzhou reduced the communication distance of the civilian communicator in order to prepare for the launch of a new version of the communicator in the future.

To put it simply, Lin Shangzhou used the same approach as he used to sell mobile phones in the 1920s to sell communicators. Anyway, communicators can be simply understood as early mobile phones, so he didn't think there was anything wrong with selling them this way.

After checking the communicator, Lin Shangzhou took Harvot and Bode back to the third floor and told them his ideas. During this time, Lin Wenhua also came up to watch the fun.

Harworth said that he was just a researcher, unlike Edison who understood both scientific research and business, so Lin Shangzhou called Louis and asked him to come over.

Ten minutes later, Louis came to the apartment. After seeing him, Lin Shangzhou began to tell him his ideas. After listening to Lin Shangzhou's ideas, Louis praised him repeatedly, but also raised his own question - how much does the communicator cost?

Whether he was explaining his ideas to Harworth or to Louis, Lin Shangzhou did not mention this, as if he had not done a good job of pricing himself.

This was of course impossible. Lin Shangzhou had set the price at the beginning. However, when he told the price to several people present, they all looked at Lin Shangzhou with expressions as if they had seen a ghost.

The reason is simple: the price of the communicator is ridiculously high - 9999 marks.

Rounded off, it was 10,000 marks. Even Louis thought this price was too outrageous, let alone others.

The figure of 30 marks may not seem like much at first glance, but if we use Bauman, who worked at Lin Shangzhou's newspaper and earned marks a week, to calculate it, then it would take Bauman more than six years of work without eating or drinking to buy such a communicator that looks so high-end but is actually completely useless.

In this world, Bowman can be said to be a representative of the ordinary working class. He needs to work for six years without eating or drinking to buy a communicator, not to mention other people who earn less.

Harvot said that it was impossible for ordinary people to buy such things, and others agreed, but Louis looked at Lin Shangzhou thoughtfully, as if he realized something.

Lin Shangzhou then said: "I never thought of selling the communicator to ordinary people. Its target audience is the rich and Junker nobles in Germany."

After he said this, Louis looked as if it was indeed the case. Some of the others understood, but some didn't. Seeing that some people still didn't understand, Louis began to explain it to them.

For ordinary people, ten thousand marks is a huge sum of money, but for the rich and nobles, ten thousand marks is just like ten marks in the eyes of ordinary people. However, ordinary people with assets would hesitate to spend ten marks, but for the rich and nobles, spending ten thousand marks is as easy as sprinkling water.

Lin Shangzhou agreed with Louis' words, and then he also expressed his own thoughts. He did not intend to make money from ordinary people. He knew very well that the current communicators were of little use in civilian use, so he set such a high price to fleece the rich and nobles.

After listening to Lin Shangzhou's explanation, Bode, Havok and Lin Wenhua suddenly realized it. However, this also raised a question - will the rich and nobles be obedient sheep and be fleeced by Lin Shangzhou?

Lin Shangzhou’s answer to this was that not only could they do it, but they would also happily run up to him like little lambs and let him fleece them.

He told the four people about his publicity plan, which was a crucial point. He would use extremely luxurious language to "package" the communicator, and then report the news of Alexandrine using the communicator, shaping the communicator into a symbol of nobility and exclusive to the nobility.

Moreover, during this period, newspapers will use slogans such as "military", "unique in Germany", and "the most advanced Ethernet technology" to help promote the device. Lin Shangzhou has reason to believe that with such publicity, Germany's rich and nobles will be very interested in the communicator.

Before the sale starts, Lin Shangzhou will also use pre-sales and provide free and special exclusive customization services to the first few users who purchase.

After his explanation, Harvot and the other two understood what Lin Shangzhou was planning, and they also knew how high the profit of the communicator was.

The cost of the communicator is ridiculously low. The raw material is titanium, which is of little use and is obtained from the military under contract. As long as they can provide the military with the latest communicators, they will provide the raw materials continuously, and the cost of the raw materials is almost free.

Labor costs are slightly higher. Havok and his team receive tens of thousands of marks in funding every month, and their weekly salary ranges from fifty to one hundred marks. Havok himself earns the highest, with one hundred marks a week, followed by his deputy Chuze, and then some other researchers. The lowest paid are the students who are still in college and occasionally come to help.

However, such expenditure is nothing compared to the profit from the communicators. If they sell all the existing communicators, the net profit will be several million marks.

Now that the plan has been explained, it is time to implement it. Lin Shangzhou believes that in the foreseeable future he will be able to make a lot of money from the rich and Junkers in Germany.

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Chapter 232 Late June to Late July

Since Letitia led women to protest successfully in Berlin, factories that recruit women have been established in many places in Germany. Some factories that do not require too much strenuous work have also relaxed gender restrictions. More and more German women are able to participate in social work. Louise also got involved and established the first women's factory in Berlin.

The reputation of Alexandrine and the SPD also improved significantly with the success of Letitia and others, especially Alexandrine. Her actions in defending women's rights during the protests and her subsequent close relationship with the protest team won her the favor of the German people, especially German women.

In order to allow Letitia to live smoothly in Berlin and in the Sanssouci Palace, Alexandrine hired her as her assistant. After this matter was made public, the public was not very surprised, nor did it cause much commotion, but in the eyes of the right wing it was a very bad signal.

The emperor's advisor was a Social Democrat, and now her assistant was a leader of the women's movement, not to mention rumors that there were syndicalists in the protests or that they were related to syndicalists. Although the SPD stated that all the funds for the protests were provided by them, some people knew in their hearts that this was just a cover-up by the SPD.

In the past, the government would have conducted a thorough investigation of the protest team, but Alexandrine's attitude now prevented them from doing so. Compared to the syndicalists in the protest team, they were more worried that the current emperor would become a left-wing socialist.

She maintains close relationships with assistants of the Social Democrats and leaders of the women's liberation movement. The Queen is only 16 years old and her ideas are still in the formation stage. If they are too left-wing, it will be extremely disadvantageous to the right wing.

However, the German right wing could only watch anxiously. What could they do? Go to the emperor and force her to kill these two people? Just kidding, if they dared to do so, Cecilia's sword would fall on them. They had already missed the opportunity to contact the emperor and had a dangerous idea in mind - assassination.

There are many ways to die accidentally, and it is not difficult for them to let those two people die accidentally. However, those who had this idea gave up the idea after careful consideration. After all, it is easy to see who will benefit most from the death of Hipper and Adolf. When the time comes, Alexandrine will go to the army and cry a few times, and Ludendorff's dictatorship will be staged again.

Not to mention that the military and Hipper seemed to have a good relationship, and if he died, the military would investigate it thoroughly.

Therefore, the right wing can only turn a blind eye to this. The SPD has no chance of winning the election anyway, so they only need to ensure that the chancellor and the majority party in parliament are right-wing.

Lin Shangzhou didn't know what the German right-wing was thinking. If he knew, he would be in a good mood for several days... Even if he didn't know, it didn't matter. He had been in a good mood after receiving two job offers in Wuyou Palace. In order not to arouse suspicion, Letitia and Noah would occasionally follow Lin Shangzhou to his apartment for a night on the pretext of "going for dinner". Alexandrine had no doubts about this except envy.

His life and career were going smoothly. In late June, with the help of Louis, Lin Shangzhou registered his own company, Mercury Power Technology Co., Ltd.

There are four shareholders in this company, Lin Shangzhou, Louis, Volbeck and Alexandrine. In terms of share ratio, Volbeck has the least shares, only 10%. Lin Shangzhou ranks third with 15% of the shares, and Louis is second with 20%. The remaining 55% is held by the German Emperor. Although the German Emperor is the largest shareholder, given her relationship with Lin Shangzhou...the largest shareholder of this company is actually Lin Shangzhou.

Volbeck and Alexandrine were brought over by Lin Shangzhou for better development in the future. Volbeck was quite interested in this and agreed after some consideration. As for Alexandrine...there should be no need to say more.

Since he is the actual owner of the Havok Institute, it is natural for the institute to become a subsidiary of Mercury Power.

The company was established, but Lin Shangzhou still lacked employees. After some thought, he first sent a telegram to Strasbourg to contact Wang Shunyu, hoping that he could come and help more. Then Lin Shangzhou asked Louis for some people.

Wang Shunyu was extremely frightened after receiving Lin Shangzhou's invitation. He never thought that Mr. Lin, whom they thought had forgotten him, still remembered him and even invited him to run his company. The telegram also stated that if Wang Shunyu was worried about his classmates, Lin Shangzhou could find a job for his classmates in Berlin.

After hearing Lin Shangzhou's words, Wang Shunyu immediately decided to take his classmates north to Berlin. This was an extremely important opportunity. Those classmates who were still in school did not need his care, and they could live well in Strasbourg on their own.

Two days after receiving the telegram, Wang Shunyu came to Berlin with a dozen of his classmates.

After settling these students, Lin Shangzhou brought Wang Shunyu to Mercury Power. After he became familiar with the work, he arranged him in a position that suited him: personnel allocation.

At the beginning of July, the institute was successfully completed. It took a total of three months from the beginning of April to the beginning of July, which was neither long nor short.

After the research institute was built, Havot and his team moved in immediately and began to conduct research without stopping. At the same time, Lin Shangzhou also took the opportunity to ask the military for better titanium for Havot's research.

The director of the institute is Havot. At this stage, the institute is mainly divided into two parts, the R&D group and the manufacturing group. The former is led by Havot and the latter is led by Chu Ze.

The research institute was built and the company was established. The next thing Lin Shangzhou had to do was to build momentum for the sale of the communicator. In early July, Alexandrine showed people the communicator she used intentionally or unintentionally when she appeared in public. For example, when she was talking to someone or getting in a car, she would take out the communicator in front of reporters to answer a call.

The magical little object in the emperor's hand soon attracted people's attention. A reporter boldly went up to ask her what was in her hand. Alexandrine pretended to be mysterious and gave a vague answer, leaving the rest to people to guess.

When the popularity of the communicator reached a certain height, Lin Shangzhou asked the "Forward" newspaper to publish reports on Havot's research on ether technology. Once such reports appeared, they immediately caused a sensation in the German scientific community and even the world scientific community, and then attracted widespread attention from German society.

At the same time, the Havok Institute also extended invitations to scientists in Germany, inviting them to join the Havok Institute. Lin Shangzhou himself also visited some well-known scientists such as Einstein and Planck, but they were already in the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, so he just visited them and hoped that if they had time, they could visit the Havok Institute for a visit and exchange.

The generous treatment offered by the Havok Institute attracted many unemployed scientific researchers, but only a few of them were able to actually enter the institute, and most were screened out by Havok.

After the discussion about the Ether Communicator in society reached a certain level of heat, Lin Shangzhou announced more news about the Ether Communicator to the outside world and packaged the Ether Communicator with all kinds of gorgeous words, describing it as a symbol of nobility. In addition, Alexandrine was using this thing, and after the relevant discussion topic appeared, the German Junkers and the rich immediately became very interested in this little gadget.

In late July, some people who could not contain their curiosity paid a direct visit to the Institute and Mercury Power. Of course, the result of their visit was just to listen to Lin Shangzhou's bragging, and in the end they didn't see anything real.

They were not dissatisfied with this, on the contrary, their curiosity was aggravated. After returning, they shared Lin Shangzhou's boasting in their social circles, which made the communicator receive more attention than before.

However, what these rich and noble people didn't know was that the communicator they were expecting was actually a pair of gold-plated tweezers used to fleece them.

.

Chapter 233 Big Sale

In early August, more information about the communicator was published in the Forward newspaper, including its specific price and when it would go on sale.

Like other mobile phone manufacturers in later generations, Lin Shangzhou gave his brand a nice name, "White Oak". The brand logo is an oak tree. The prices of the communicators were also announced in this issue of the newspaper. The prices from low to high are: M1 communicator, priced at 9999 marks; M2 communicator, priced at marks.

The newspaper also announced the release date of the communicator: it will be officially released on August 15th, but it will be sold in limited quantities, with 150 units of each model. If you want to buy more, you will have to wait until the 15th of next month. Before the sale starts, White Oak will support 50 pre-sales, and the first 20 people out of the 50 pre-sales can enjoy free personal customization services.

After the price and release date were announced, ordinary Germans instantly lost interest in this kind of thing. At 10,000 marks a piece, they could not afford it. After taking a look at it in the newspaper, they no longer paid attention to this little toy for the rich.

As for the rich people, they breathed a sigh of relief after seeing the price. Lin Shangzhou's boasting at the time spread throughout the aristocratic circle of Berlin through those who could not restrain their curiosity, and the rumors became more and more outrageous. It was precisely the outrageous rumors that made them generally believe that the price would be relatively high. After seeing that it was only 10,000 marks and a little over 10,000, they felt somewhat fortunate.

However, such a price did not reduce the "aristocratic nature" of the communicator. With a limit of 300 units per month, the 50 pre-sale spots were sold out within an hour. Some of the remaining people who did not get a pre-sale spot chose to bribe Lin Shangzhou with some tricks in order to be able to buy such a "good" thing, but unfortunately, Lin Shangzhou, as the emperor's adviser, did not waver at all. He said that there were only 50 pre-sale spots each month, and those who did not get one would have to wait for the communicator to go on sale.

Faced with Lin Shangzhou's resolute and tough attitude, the wealthy and nobles were helpless. The person behind him was the emperor, so what could they do?

The pre-sale quota for 50 communicators earned Lin Shangzhou nearly 500,000 marks in one go. Of course, this 500,000 marks was the company's income, but no one would say anything even if he put the 500,000 marks into his own pocket, and he did so. After leaving 100,000 marks as the company's property, the remaining marks all went into his own bank account.

In just one day, he became rich again. After getting the money, Lin Shangzhou spent it immediately. Part of it was used to build a flying club in Berlin, part of it was used to make up for the losses of the Louis factory, and the last small part was used to fund the development of the Strasbourg General Labor Union.

The workers' organization under his name had grown from Strasbourg to the entire Alsace-Lorraine region. In order not to attract the attention of the government, they stopped expanding after having grown to this extent.

Lin Shangzhou gave them money in order to allow it to continue to develop towards other parts of Germany and cooperate with the Free Workers' Union when necessary.

His specific idea was to let workers go to work in factories in other places and develop local workers together with the Free Workers' Union. As for the rest, he would wait until he had enough marks in the future.

On the second day after he made money, Lin Shangzhou spent all the money he earned the day before in just one day. However, he was not worried about being short of money. He still had 250 communicators that had not been sold this month. Judging from the enthusiasm of the customers, these 250 communicators would be sold out on August 15th.

They can bring Lin Shangzhou at least 2 million marks in income, so he doesn't have to worry about money at all. If he doesn't have money, he can just make more. There is still a lot of wool for him to fleece from the rich and nobles in Germany.

Some time later, on August 15th, the day the communicator was released, just as Lin Shangzhou had expected, 250 communicators were sold out in just one morning. In just one morning, the communicator earned Lin Shangzhou more than 3 million marks in revenue. 3 million of the more than 3 million marks went into Lin Shangzhou's pocket, and the remaining 500,000 or 600,000 marks became the company's funds.

Mercury Power currently has no other business except selling communicators, and it does not have many employees, so 600,000 or 700,000 marks are more than enough.

Although he already had a huge sum of 3 million marks in his hands, this amount of money was far from enough for what Lin Shangzhou wanted to do. He needed the money in many places. He needed a large number of marks to invest in aircraft designers such as Junkers; he needed a large number of marks to build airports all over Germany and even in various places in the Reichstag; he needed a large amount of funds to maintain an airline that was initially unable to make ends meet... 3 million marks were not enough for these things.

After thinking about the future, Lin Shangzhou felt that the pace of making money was too slow.

.

Chapter 234 Where to spend money

"So poor..."

Sitting on the sofa in Alexandrine's office, Lin Shangzhou couldn't help but sigh when he thought of his extreme lack of funds. Alexandrine, Cecilia and Noah were in the office. Letitia had other work so she was currently working.

After hearing Lin Shangzhou's extremely annoying speech, the three people in the room were speechless. Noah came to him, knocked on his head and said, "You, you, earning millions of marks a day is not enough?"

"Ah."

Lin Shangzhou nodded sincerely, then said with a bitter face: "These three million marks are really not enough. I regret that I only sold 300 copies a month. Now I think I should have sold more."

"Humph…"

Noah snorted and wanted to say something to him again, but when she saw that her lover was really distressed, her heart softened and her words turned into comfort.

"Shang Zhou, there's nothing we can do about it. If you release too much in a month, the value of the communicator won't be that obvious. So don't worry too much about it. Four million marks a month is enough. There's still a lot of time. You can save it up slowly and eventually."

Seeing that Lin Shangzhou was really worried about this problem, Alexandrine thought about it for a while and said to Lin Shangzhou after Noah finished speaking: "Fritts, if you need money, I can lend it to you, and you can pay it back slowly in the future."

Lin Shangzhou shook his head and said, "Alexandrine, I appreciate your kindness, but I don't need to borrow money. I'd better save it slowly by myself."

"That's fine."

Noah walked around the sofa and finally sat down on the left side of Lin Shangzhou. He turned his head and looked at his face, and asked curiously, "Shangzhou, what are you going to do? Millions of marks are not enough?"

After she asked this question, Alexandrine and Cecilia showed some curiosity in their eyes. Three million marks was not a small amount even for a wealthy aristocrat. Some Junkers might not even be able to come up with three million marks. However, Lin Shangzhou said that three million marks was not enough.

What on earth is so expensive?

After thinking for a few seconds, he stood up, walked to the side, faced the three people and said, "Three million marks is indeed a lot, but what if I want to provide wages for tens or even hundreds of thousands of workers?"

"!?"

The three looked at Lin Shangzhou in surprise when they heard what he said. Alexandrine and Cecilia were the first to react to what Lin Shangzhou said, and after a few seconds of confusion, Noah also figured out what Lin Shangzhou meant - he wanted to pay the striking workers.

But the point is not here, the point is "striking workers". Where are the striking workers in Germany now? Lin Shangzhou's words mean that he wants to start a strike again, and the scale of this strike is definitely not small.

Thinking of this, Cecilia frowned and asked, "You want to lead the strike again?!"

Alexandrine and Noah also looked at him with questioning eyes, and then to their surprise, Lin Shangzhou shook his head.

"It's not me who is leading the workers to strike, it's the workers themselves who are striking."

"The workers themselves are striking..."

Alexandrine repeated this sentence in a low voice, and then her eyes lit up, and she understood what Lin Shangzhou meant. She immediately said: "So Fritz, you mean that the workers go on strike, and then you provide them with funds so that they can strike longer?"

After hearing her words, Noah and Cecilia's minds suddenly became clear. If Lin Shangzhou was planning to do this, then three million marks were indeed not enough.

"Shang Zhou, why are you doing this? Wouldn't it be better to improve the workers' wages when you become prime minister?"

Noah asked in confusion. Alexandrine had similar doubts in her heart. After Noah asked her own question, she immediately said, "Fritts, Noah is right. And if other parties knew that you secretly funded the workers' strike, wouldn't it be very disadvantageous to you?"

Lin Shangzhou nodded. What they both said made sense. These things were certainly within his consideration, so he had already thought of a solution.

"Noah, Alexandrine, I have thought about what you said. My idea is this: I hope to split the right-wing party before the election."

“Split the right-wing party?”

Alexandrine was stunned for a moment, and then she realized what Lin Shangzhou meant. Splitting the right-wing party? She asked Lin Shangzhou in confusion and curiosity: "But didn't you always tell me that the right wing was united? How are you going to split them?"