Chapter 146: Chapter 136: Orange Mobile Phone Engineering Version, Hardware Troubles

「The third day of summer vacation.」

After finishing his morning meeting at the Innovation Park, Chen Yansen drove to the Zhuxian Town Science and Technology Park.

Downloads for Aurora OS had already surpassed twenty million. At this rate, even if only ten percent of those users bought the new phone, Orange Mobile Phone could still sell two million units.

The tech community widely agreed that the two most anticipated new products of 2011 were Lei Yijun’s Xiaomi Mobile Phone and Chen Yansen’s Orange Mobile Phone.

After all, Xiaomi and Orange Technology were the first phone manufacturers to launch customized operating systems, enhancing the user experience on a software level.

They had cultivated a potential user base of millions, even tens of millions.

Although Orange Technology hadn’t officially announced the new phone’s release date, the establishment of the Shencheng City Orange Phone Factory was a clear signal to the public that the Orange Mobile Phone was just one step away from hitting the market.

There wasn’t much traffic, and ten minutes later, his car pulled into the Science and Technology Park.

As soon as Chen Yansen reached the second floor, he saw Gao Weilin sitting on a rattan chair in the balcony lounge area, a laptop in his lap. Gao Weilin was leisurely sipping coffee, having clearly adapted to work and life in Xucheng.

"Old Gao, aren’t you hot?" Chen Yansen said with a smile, walking over and sitting down across from him.

The sun was rising in the east, and the air was already starting to feel warm and muggy.

"Boss, would you like to try my new coffee beans? They’re a new batch from Narino this year, with a hint of citrus."

Gao Weilin started to stand up to greet him, but Chen Yansen gestured for him to stay seated. So, he just raised his cup and offered with a smile.

The morning sun felt pleasantly warm, and Gao Weilin seemed to be enjoying it.

"No, thanks. It’s not for me." Chen Yansen waved his hand dismissively before asking, "What’s the word from Lotte?"

"They’re very interested, but just like Ali Baba, Lotte is short on funds. Based on FoxTao’s current growth, whether we use a price-to-sales or a price-to-earnings valuation method, the final valuation won’t be less than 2.5 billion US dollars."

Gao Weilin shrugged and said with a smile, "This is a huge investment for Lotte, so I’ve also contacted Augusta Capital. My plan is to use a joint-sale approach with one primary and one secondary partner to sell FoxTao as a package."

This type of acquisition isn’t common in the Mainland, but it’s standard practice on Hong Kong Island.

For many venture capital firms, a controlling stake isn’t important. As long as they can make a profit, they’re happy.

After Lotte learned that Ali Baba was also interested in FoxTao, they started leveraging their relationship with SoftBank. The plan is to acquire FoxTao jointly with Augusta and then merge it into Ali Baba.

This would allow them to indirectly acquire a stake in Ali Baba!

Compared to a stake in FoxTao, shares in an e-commerce giant like Ali Baba are obviously far more attractive.

"I’ve always trusted you to handle things," Chen Yansen said with a nod, not questioning him further.

’Boss, we’ve only known each other for a month, haven’t we?’

Gao Weilin opened his mouth, wanting to make a sarcastic remark, but he held his tongue.

Since resigning, he had been working even harder here in the Mainland than he ever did at Zhaoye Group.

He knew that if he could close this deal, he would instantly make a name for himself in the country’s internet business circles.

"Boss, the Orange Phone Factory’s financial accounting and capital management have been integrated into our financial shared services center and ERP system. Every transaction is transparent and traceable, so it’s very difficult for anyone to pull any tricks."

Pushing aside his stray thoughts, Gao Weilin continued.

"Alright, I understand. Get back to it, then. If you’re short-staffed, just have HR do some recruiting for you."

Chen Yansen grunted in acknowledgment and headed upstairs.

He had flat-out rejected the R&D team’s initial industrial design drafts. The bezels on the top, bottom, left, and right were so wide you could park a fleet of RVs on them.

Compared to the bezel-less phones from over a decade in the future, they were unbearably ugly.

The engineers explained that this was due to the outdated Chip-on-Glass (COG) screen packaging technology of the era. It required wide bezels to house electronic components like driver circuits and ribbon cables, a necessary evil.

After looking into it, Chen Yansen confirmed that the engineers weren’t trying to pull one over on him.

But even in 2011, a solution existed. It just increased the cost of the packaging process, which was why 99.9% of phone brands on the market had abandoned it.

’If the Orange Mobile Phone is just like Xiaomi, Meizu, or Samsung,’ Chen Yansen mused, ’with no unique advantages of its own, why would anyone choose Orange?’

’Just because Aurora OS is smoother than stock Android?’

’In that case, users could just flash the ROM. Why would they bother buying an Orange Mobile Phone?’

And so, Chen Yansen scrapped the first design and started from scratch.

First, he spent a fortune on Chip-on-Flex (COF) packaging equipment. This more advanced technology allowed the chip to be mounted on a flexible circuit board, which was then connected to the screen, drastically reducing the bezel width.

There were virtually no phone factories in the country using COF technology. After making some inquiries, Cao Dahua and Zuo Hongyu found they had no choice but to buy new, imported equipment. At 700,000 yuan per machine, it was over 500,000 yuan more expensive than a used COG machine.

Second, he added virtual buttons to reduce the phone’s "chin."

In this respect, not even the ever-daring Apple had ventured to eliminate the Home button entirely.

Xiaomi, too, had kept the three standard Android navigation keys on its first-generation phone: Back, Home, and Multitasking.

Chen Yansen decided to leapfrog them all, abolishing all capacitive keys in favor of global gesture controls.

On the hardware side, this meant using an ultra-sensitive touchscreen. 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

On the software side, it required deep modifications to Aurora OS to optimize touch latency.

Furthermore, the processor was upgraded to the Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8260, which had performance comparable to the A5 processor in the iPhone 4S and was the same model used in the first-generation Xiaomi phone.

Finally, the plastic phone casing was replaced with a high-strength aluminum alloy.

While this increased costs, it also improved the phone’s structural integrity and reduced the risk of screen shattering—a potential consequence of the narrower bezels.

When the costs were tallied, the bill of materials alone came to 1,100 yuan!

Factoring in R&D, manufacturing, marketing, and sales, if the phone were priced at 1,999 yuan, the gross margin would be less than 10 percent, even with tight control over the supply chain.

However, Chen Yansen wasn’t concerned with a few dozen yuan of gross profit. He cared about how much Human Dao Fire he could gain from the entire mobile phone industry, from R&D all the way to the final point of sale.

The moment Chen Yansen arrived on the third floor, two engineers approached him, smiling and holding a 4.5-inch engineering prototype of the Orange Mobile Phone.

"Boss, this is the engineering sample sent over from Shencheng City. Zhou Ze and I have tested it, and the touch latency is mostly within an acceptable range."

Zhang Cong was the head of the industrial design team, and the Zhou Ze he mentioned was the head of the hardware design team.

One of them came from ZTE, and the other from the Huawei Honor phone team.

"Oh, Old Cao works fast."

Chen Yansen took the phone and followed them toward the testing area.

The testing team consisted of about a dozen engineers, each with an Orange Mobile Phone, rigorously testing its performance, ports, and sensors.

They were also checking the smoothness of audio and video playback, looking for any sound distortion or audio-video sync issues.

On top of that, there were numerous other issues to address, like heat dissipation, battery life, and compatibility. The testing phase alone was expected to take a full month.

Chen Yansen’s directive was to iron out as many bugs as possible before the phone went to market.

If users discovered them after the launch, the losses from recalls or compensation would be incalculable.

’Better safe than sorry,’ Chen Yansen thought.

For instance, Aurora OS had undergone two weeks of testing before its launch, but plenty of minor bugs still surfaced afterward.

Zhang Cong and Zhou Ze spent the morning with Chen Yansen in the testing area, going over all the problems they had discovered so far.

System-related issues were reported directly to Wang Teng.

For hardware issues caused by a supplier, they would be given a warning first. If they didn’t fix the problem, they would be replaced immediately.

"Boss, is there any more room for optimization on the exterior design?"

Zhang Cong asked tentatively after finishing his report.

Back in 2011, everyone’s aesthetic standard for smartphones—including Zhang Cong’s—was basically benchmarked against Apple.

As a result, the Orange Mobile Phone’s appearance was somewhat reminiscent of the iPhone 4, with a slight resemblance to the Meizu M9, but with narrower bezels and a thinner profile.

This had added 200 yuan to the material cost of each phone, but the feel in hand was undeniably excellent. It was silky smooth to the touch, and the aluminum alloy back cover had a premium texture that looked far more high-end than plastic.

"The current design is fine."

’The engineering prototypes are already here. It would be a huge hassle to change the exterior design now. Besides, I was there when we finalized the sample, so there’s no need to create unnecessary trouble,’ Chen Yansen thought, nodding in approval.

"Boss, there’s a hardware problem," Zhou Ze said, his expression serious. "This batch has 100 engineering prototypes, but I found that the battery dimensions are inconsistent. The largest deviation is a shocking 1.3 millimeters."

As you know, a mobile phone is a precision electronic device. The placement of every single component is clearly specified.

If the battery dimensions don’t meet design standards, the automated assembly line won’t be able to function correctly.

"That’s ridiculous."

Chen Yansen was taken aback. ’The supplier just has to manufacture according to the contract specifications. How could they make such a huge error?’

Zhou Ze took out two batteries and placed them on the table.

One look was all it took for Chen Yansen to laugh in exasperation. The size difference between the two batteries was so obvious you could see it with the naked eye.

Right there in front of them, he immediately pulled out his phone and called Zuo Hongyu.

"Change the battery supplier. Did you and Old Cao not inspect the units after this batch of prototypes was produced?" Chen Yansen demanded bluntly.

"Huh!? We did inspect them! We didn’t find any problems," Zuo Hongyu replied. He had indeed checked them, but he had only tested the phones’ functions, not disassembled them to inspect the internal hardware.

Components like the processor, screen, camera, and speaker all had their own incoming inspection procedures, so problems with them were rare.

"The battery dimensions deviate from the design specifications. If we don’t replace a supplier like this, who knows what kind of trouble they’ll stir up in the future."

Chen Yansen didn’t reprimand Zuo Hongyu further, just gave him a stern warning.

’The suppliers from Huaqiang North really aren’t very reliable,’ he lamented internally.

What he didn’t realize was that during these years when knock-off phones were rampant, any battery that didn’t explode was considered a good product.

As for specifications not matching? An error of one or two millimeters? Big deal. Just jam it in by hand. It’s not like it won’t work.

"Understood, Boss." Zuo Hongyu’s face went pale. He couldn’t believe he’d made such a huge blunder with the supply chain.

After hanging up, he immediately took some men to the materials warehouse and pulled out the shipment from You Pu.

"Vernier caliper!" Zuo Hongyu shouted to his assistant.

"President Zuo, here you are." His assistant, who was standing nearby, quickly handed it over.

Zuo Hongyu picked up a battery and began measuring its length, width, and height. His expression grew darker with each measurement.

A 0.3-millimeter deviation!

A 0.5-millimeter deviation!

A 0.9-millimeter deviation!

"Son of a bitch! They dare to screw me, Zuo Hongyu, over? Who signed off on this shipment? Tell them to get the hell out!"

Zuo Hongyu was seething with rage and started cursing.

He then whipped out his phone again and called the head of You Pu Battery. "President Wang, three out of every ten batteries you sent fail to meet the dimension specs. Are you messing with me?"

"President Zuo, that’s a bit of an exaggeration! Rest assured, our factory’s batteries are guaranteed not to explode. As long as they work, it’s fine. How about this, I’ll set something up at the Xinghe Renjian Club later..."

Wang Hongde, on the other end of the line, just laughed and tried to brush it off.

"Arrange my ass! Get this junk out of here, now!" Zuo Hongyu cursed back without holding anything back.

"President Zuo, go ask around. Which battery manufacturer can get the dimensions perfect every time? If you’ve got the guts, go ahead and sue us! You Pu has never taken back a shipment once it’s been sold."

This Wang Hongde was a real piece of work, completely unfazed. He just chuckled slyly.

"Fuck! Then you can forget about the final payment!" Zuo Hongyu threatened.

"Haha, I never expected to get the final payment anyway. President Zuo, tell that big fish from the north who’s backing you not to come here and break the rules of Huaqiang North whenever he feels like it."

Wang Hongde let out a loud laugh, and with that final warning, he hung up.

Only then did it dawn on Zuo Hongyu. The high salaries and benefits Orange Technology was offering for recruitment in Shencheng City must have stepped on someone’s toes.

After a moment of thought, he reported the situation to Chen Yansen.