Chapter 803: Hot-selling Phones, Friendly a.s.sistance, and Scalpers Take Action
This time… Luke wasn’t the one who came up with the name F2F.
If he proudly called it FB, it would be an instant kill.
That was because a certain university graduate had already registered the FB domain name a few months ago.
Not only was this graduate’s website developing rapidly, it had also expanded to many Ivy League universities, and was very well received by college students.
The biggest headache was that the college wasn’t one to be trifled with. A lot of their alumni moved in the political circle.
Jenny didn’t want to get in trouble over a website name.
Luke could only secretly complain that the name “F2F” was in a similar format to the rough way a particular bigshot surnamed Ma did things.
Back to the “buying votes” incident, except for a few celebrities who came under fire, the t.i.tanium phones and F2F were completely unscathed, and even used the hype to get bigger.
The celebrities didn’t suffer any losses.
For a celebrity, the worst news was no news.
A chance like this, to get their name out in front of the entire country and brush up their popularity, wasn’t easy to come by.
They apologized and donated; on the surface, they appeared subdued, but it was hard to tell if they were happy or sad in private.
Taking advantage of this occasion, Jenny increased the supply of t.i.tanium phones and managed to sell fifty thousand more.
There were too many people who wanted to buy a t.i.tanium phone, and this stock was s.n.a.t.c.hed up in less than two days, which conversely only fueled the urge to buy one.
Scalpers with their sharp nose for business opportunities also joined in the scramble for the t.i.tanium phones, creating even higher demand.
For example, in Los Angeles, the standard 1G model that was originally worth 299 dollars was now worth 500 dollars.
The premium 2G model was worth almost a thousand dollars.
There was no other reason.
The celebrities who took part in the charity show all received the best of the t.i.tanium phone prototypes.
Those who could afford the full amount didn’t mind spending another five hundred dollars.
Jenny ran into a lot of problems when sales took off.
A lot of companies even wanted to buy shares, but most of them were just trying to take advantage of the situation and wanted to haggle over the price.
There were also some less savoury people who dropped by for “discussions” and threatened Jenny outright to sell them the shares.
Luke quietly took out his black notebook and wrote down all the names of the people who had threatened Jenny.
People who used such dirty tricks had undoubtedly done a lot of bad things.
If he ran into any of them in the future, he would take care of them.
Of course, t.i.tanium Phone Company wasn’t afraid of this trash, and their partner, Weyland Corporation, wasn’t simple either.
Even if Jenny wanted to sell the shares, their partner would have to give up their right to purchase the shares first as per the contract.
Following the phone sales, t.i.tanium Phone Company’s current worth skyrocketed.
The value of a company that had entered the profit-making phase wasn’t something that a company with empty ideas could compare with.
In the beginning, Jenny had estimated the phone company’s worth on paper to be two billion dollars; that could now turn into real money at any time.
Also, with the sales of the t.i.tanium phone and its popularity, this number was still increasing rapidly.
As long as they sold half a million t.i.tanium phones this year, the company’s worth would double.
Of course, Jenny was in charge of all this. Luke didn’t want to be involved in the detailed management of the company; it was annoying.
But he still called Weyland to sound out the old man’s intentions.
In the end, the old man expressed his satisfaction with Luke’s recommendation of Wade.
Luke didn’t ask what Wade had done in the Amazon jungle for Weyland.
Since he hadn’t taken the mission, it was best not to care about the content.
Weyland, on the other hand, gave him another half a million dollars as thanks for recommending Wade.
Luke thought for a moment, then accepted the gift.
After hanging up, he mumbled, “Weyland probably got a lot of benefits this time.”
Although Luke had recommended Wade to Weyland, Luke wasn’t a recruitment company.
This extra thank-you fee could only mean that Weyland was very satisfied with his gains from the mission this time.
Secondly, Weyland was doing this to maintain their relations.h.i.+p.
After the South Pole expedition, he had cla.s.sified Luke as a professional specialist.
It was one thing for Luke himself to be strong, but his “casual” recommendation of Wade, who had accomplished Weyland’s mission, meant that Luke had his own circle of very capable people.
After paying this “agent fee,” Weyland could continue asking Luke for suitable candidates for other specialized missions in the future.
He had given Luke the money, and Luke had accepted, which meant that both parties had tacitly agreed to this “agent mode”.
After encountering such a good thing, Weyland was indeed in a good mood.
When he saw that his personal investment of a hundred million dollars in 12% of t.i.tanium Phone Company shares had doubled, the old man felt that the future was bright.
With a wave of his hand, Weyland personally urged his company to speed up the cooperation with t.i.tanium and push forward the transformation and construction of a wireless network in major cities throughout the country.
Weyland Corporation didn’t belong to Weyland alone. He was only a major shareholder with 23% of the shares, but had relied on his outstanding abilities and prestige to be chairman of the board for many years.
If he wanted to use Weyland Corporation funds, he had to explain why to the board of directors.
His investment in t.i.tanium Phone Company had been a personal one.
Weyland now needed a lot of money to invest in highly confidential private research which could bring him unparalleled benefits. The old man didn’t want to share it with anyone.
Thus, he couldn’t let Weyland Corporation funds enter the research project.
He would profit by pus.h.i.+ng t.i.tanium Phone Company along, whether by selling his shares in the company or using the money for loans.
There was no need to justify this investment in his research project to anyone.
Weyland Corporation would also benefit greatly from promoting the t.i.tanium phones. Just by being the first to enter this market and gathering a fixed number of customers would already generate huge profits.
As one of America’s largest international telecommunications companies and one of the largest network carriers, Weyland Corporation’s efforts caused the sales of t.i.tanium phones to blow up even more.
At the end of August, Jenny had to call Luke and ask, “Can we adjust our hunger marketing plan?”
Luke didn’t think too much of it. “Can’t you adjust it yourself?”
Jenny said, “Based on our survey, the current demand on the market is for at least half a million phones, which is equivalent to our sales for all of this year, when we’re only planning to put a hundred thousand phones on the market in September.”
Luke thought for a moment. “You want to increase stock?”
Jenny said, “That’s right. Your idea of hunger marketing is indeed very successful, but if this goes on, I’m afraid that it might have even more negative side effects. Some of our peers are now saying that we’ve become like scalpers, selling our phones at high prices.”