After dinner, Simon and Janet spent so ti chatting with Janet's parents about recent events. A little after nine o'clock, the couple decided not to return to their nearby villa and stayed the night in the main mansion instead.
In the upstairs bedroom, Simon erged from the bathroom after his shower to find Janet already in her nightgown, hugging a pillow and standing by the bed, staring at him intently. "I'm sleeping with Auntie tonight," she said.
Simon paused for a brief mont, then continued drying his wet hair with the towel and smiled. "Sure. I've been squeezed dry by you for so long. I could use a night of rest."
Janet did not move. She kept staring at him.
Simon casually pulled the towel a bit lower over his eyes and continued drying his hair.
Janet wrinkled her nose. When the man ca over and wrapped his arms around her, she subconsciously leaned into him. Because of the pillow between them, she even tilted her face forward slightly to et his kiss.
"Good night."
"Mm, good night."
Even as she said this, her heart grew more troubled.
Little rascal.
He really wants to go sleep with Auntie.
At least pretend to coax .
Or just act shalessly, pin down on the bed, and I could pretend I didn't know anything.
After saying good night, Simon released Janet, hung up the towel, and saw she still had not moved. He said nothing more, simply reached out, took the pillow from her arms and tossed it onto the big bed, then wrapped an arm around her waist and gently threw her onto the bed as well before pouncing on top of her.
Yet, more than an hour later, Janet still slipped out of the sleeping man's embrace and quietly left their bedroom.
The next day was Sunday, February 3.
From leaving Los Angeles on January 20 until now, the couple had been resting for two full weeks.
Inside the Boeing 767 cabin, after takeoff, Simon sat in the forward study flipping through the accumulated docunts from the past period. Janet sat across from him, resting her chin on her hand and watching her husband. All kinds of small emotions flickered in her bright eyes.
Simon actually knew that Janet had quietly left last night.
He just did not know what Veronica had said to her.
Since the woman was not speaking, Simon did not bring up the topic himself either.
He really did not know how to handle it.
Across the desk, Janet studied her man for a long ti before finally letting out a soft sigh. She truly did not understand what had happened.
Auntie had clearly been taken advantage of, yet she was still siding with him.
Just like .
Was it only because of last ti?
Janet unconsciously touched her wrist.
Little rascal.
You really are a devil.
She silently made up her mind to co to lbourne as little as possible in the future. At the very least, she could not let him co alone.
Letting out a helpless breath, Janet picked up one of the folders on the desk and began reading it as well.
It was the January statistics report on Arica Online's free trial user growth.
Janet was aware of the free trial plan Arica Online had launched. However, seeing the 2.3 million user reservations versus the actual 810,000 formal installations, she could not help feeling surprised. She lifted the folder toward Simon across from her and asked, "Why is there such a big gap?"
Simon glanced up. He had already reviewed the file earlier. "The main issue is manpower. For this trial, Arica Online prepared a total of 5,000 full-ti and temporary installers on both the East and West Coasts. According to initial expectations, they should have been able to complete about one million installations per month. In reality, however, things turned out to be more difficult than anticipated, with many problems encountered. You can look at the more detailed numbers. Of the 810,000 installed users, 390,000 ca from the regions operated by Bell Atlantic. This is mainly because Bell Atlantic actively cooperated with us to resolve line and equipnt issues and even loaned us so of their staff."
As Simon spoke, he felt a sense of satisfaction in his heart.
The move to acquire Bell Atlantic early had now proven to be completely correct.
Arica Online had signed exclusive ten-year agreents with the three major regional operators the previous year, which ant Bell Atlantic was also barred from entering the internet access service market.
Several months later, seeing the sudden explosion in internet access users, with over 2.3 million reservations in a single month, the three major operators were clearly beginning to regret signing those original agreents.
After all, free trial activities were sothing the major telecom operators had dabbled in before, but none of them had ever experienced such an insanely high volu of reservations. Just one month's reservations, if all converted to formal users, would already equal one-tenth of the three operators' total user base.
The three operators had accumulated their users over decades.
Over the past month, the three operators had even discovered that so users were deliberately switching from smaller local telecom providers to their networks just to get the free trial opportunity. This was even more surprising.
The Arican telecom industry had a highly competitive and open environnt. A single city could have several telecom operators.
Of course, most of them rented backbone network lines from giants like AT&T and then ran their own telephone services. Regional giants like Bell Atlantic, Pacific Bell, and NYNEX had long wanted to squeeze these smaller operators out of the market, but because the smaller ones often had lower pricing, it had been difficult to achieve.
Now, Arica Online, which relied on their networks, had unexpectedly helped push this along.
The senior executives of the three operators probably understood that cooperating as much as possible with Arica Online's expansion would also greatly benefit their own user growth.
However, understanding the principle was one thing. Actually implenting it was not so easy.
No one wanted an outsider to build a villa prettier than their own house in their backyard. Even if they could not stop it, even if the outsider had paid, even if such a villa might attract paying tourists, the hoowner would still find it hard to cooperate without any resentnt.
Of course, after the official takeover of Bell Atlantic was completed in January, the company had beco part of the Westeros system. Raymond Smith and the other executives were able to cooperate fully.
The other two, Pacific Bell and NYNEX, were far less willing.
The original agreent had clearly stated that any additional support beyond network line developnt would require Arica Online to pay extra fees.
Because of the enormous capital investnt, Arica Online's managent had approached this free trial plan with an all-or-nothing mindset. They naturally could not afford to inject even more budget into these operators.
This resulted in the situation where, of the 810,000 installed users in the first month, 390,000 ca from the regions actively cooperating with Bell Atlantic.
After listening to Simon's explanation, Janet continued flipping through the materials and soon asked another question. "The $100 per household budget seems a bit low. Can it actually be achieved?"
Simon replied, "$100 total: $20 for labor, $30 for network costs, and the final $50 for equipnt and software. However, this figure was calculated based on the expected conversion rate to formal users."
For this free trial program, Arica Online had mainly recruited and trained 3,000 part-ti temporary installers from university campuses. They were paid on a piece-rate basis of $20 per household installation.
Arica's household telephone penetration rate exceeded 90%. This trial program was also selective: it was limited to custors of the three major operators. No additional lines needed to be installed. They simply needed to install equipnt at the user's telephone terminal to connect to the computer.
The equipnt and software mainly consisted of modems, network interface cards for the motherboard, NIC drivers, and browser software.
This set of equipnt and software was actually quite expensive, with a total cost close to $200. If trial users did not convert to paid subscribers, Arica Online would reclaim the equipnt. The sa would apply to users who canceled after converting.
Because reclaid equipnt could be reused, Arica Online had budgeted an average of $50 per household based on an expected 25% conversion rate.
Strictly speaking, this involved so accounting creativity.
Ultimately, it ca down to the enormous financial pressure Arica Online was facing.
For the sa reason, despite the terrifying 2.3 million reservation volu, Arica Online's managent had no intention of increasing the number of workers. On one hand, it was not easy to scale up quickly, even with trained temporary workers. On the other hand, it was naturally due to cost concerns.
They also had to consider whether this level of enthusiasm was only temporary.
Rashly expanding the workforce, only for user interest in the free trial to cool down afterward, would create another problem.
Next, Arica Online planned to achieve the expected one million installations per month through more reasonable screening and allocation of already reserved users. That way, when they went public in three months, the market would give Arica Online an excellent valuation.
On the other hand, experiencing the difficulty of waiting in line for a trial opportunity would also, to a large extent, encourage trial users to convert to paid subscribers.
After all, people never treasured things that ca too easily.
If soone had waited in line for more than a month and finally beco a trial user, after the one-month period ended and they saw others still waiting desperately, their thoughts of giving up would naturally weaken considerably.
Strictly speaking, this was also a form of alternative hunger marketing.
After a seventeen-hour flight, when they arrived in Los Angeles, it was still Sunday morning, February 3, due to the ti difference.
They continued resting until the next day. On Monday morning, Simon flew to San Francisco again.
This ti it was for work.
After continuously applying various small pressures on Simon during this period, the housekeeper Alice Ferguson had finally produced two business proposals, both of which were highly valued by Ygritte, Arica Online, and even Bell Atlantic.
The two business proposals were: an online paynt system and an online software store.
The forr was similar to what would later beco PayPal, while the latter was equivalent to the App Store for iPhones in Simon's mory.
Moreover, the two proposals were complentary to each other.
Ygritte Company had been exploring reliable monetization models. Web software was one aspect, and under Carol Bartz's managent over the past year, it had already begun showing results.
On the portal side, aside from advertising revenue, Jeff Bezos had also been considering other monetization thods.
Although the software and network departnts were cooperating smoothly thanks to Simon's forceful diation and suppression, relying on the software departnt to support the network departnt in the short term was simply unrealistic. If such dependency ford, the portal site would never be sustainable.
The online paynt system and online software store, which the housekeeper had continuously refined after drawing inspiration from Simon, gave Jeff Bezos hope. They had even allowed Arica Online and Bell Atlantic's Raymond Smith to see the enormous comrcial potential within them.
Igret headquarters near Stanford University.
In the conference room, Simon, Jeff Bezos, Carol Bartz, Steve Case, John Chambers, Raymond Smith, and other senior executives from several companies sat on both sides of the long table, listening as the housekeeper personally presented her business plan in front of the projector and answered everyone's various questions.
"...To build an online paynt system, we need corresponding products. Therefore, we must create a complete online consumption ecosystem. The online software store is the most important part of that. The market potential for computer application software can already be seen from Microsoft and Oracle's developnt over the past few years..."
"...Moreover, the market has never lacked excellent comrcial software, especially so highly specialized small application software. What constrains their developnt is mainly distribution channels. The sa applies to the increasingly large PC gaming market. Many professional software designers working alone or in pairs can produce gas whose quality is in no way inferior to those from professional ga companies. However, due to the difficulty of comrcialization, they are unable to distribute and sell their gas..."
"...Ygritte, however, possesses an unparalleled distribution advantage. Using the World Wide Web platform, we can transcend mainstream operating systems such as Apple's Macintosh, Microsoft's Windows, and the traditional DOS system. With this online advantage, we can distribute and sell application software, PC gas, and other products to users of these platforms at extrely low cost. The company can take a commission from each transaction..."
"...In addition, once the online paynt system is completed, we can use this system to further promote online billing, online retail, and other businesses..."
The housekeeper continuously switched through her PPT slides, speaking for twenty minutes straight before finally stopping.
Everyone waited patiently as the short-haired woman with delicate features picked up the water glass on the desk and took several sips. Raymond Smith was the first to raise a question. "Alice, you ntioned earlier that user accounts for the online paynt system would be linked to physical credit cards. Have you considered the difficulty of achieving this goal? For years, comrcial banks have racked their brains trying to enter the Arican Express paynt system without success. Similarly, how do you ensure that comrcial banks will open paynt interfaces to us?"
When Alice Ferguson heard this question, she scanned the conference room and finally let her gaze rest on Simon for a mont before answering, "The entire Westeros system, including the recently acquired Bell Atlantic and MCA, generates hundreds of billions of dollars in annual cash flow. Our demand for comrcial loans is also considerable. I believe this is a client that any comrcial bank would desperately want to secure. If such a client requests that they open an online paynt interface, I do not think it would be particularly difficult."
Everyone was montarily stunned by this answer, then broke into smiles.
They had not expected the answer to be so simple and direct.
It was almost crude.
Indeed, if it were a small company with no background trying to build such an online paynt system, just the banking aspect alone would be enough to kill the business plan in its cradle.
Ygritte was different.
With the entire Westeros system as backing, getting banks to agree was indeed very easy.
Reviews
All reviews (0)