Chapter 149: I Agree
Everyone had already expressed their good intentions. Things having reached this point, Su Jing himself felt that it would be inexcusable for him not to give a definite answer. He downed a cup of wine and said to Qi Yu, “Okay, in light of your sincerity, I agree!”
When everyone heard these words, they all showed delighted expression. Qi Yu was about to raise a glass to toast him in welcome but was interrupted by Fu Yansheng saying, “President Su, since you’ve now agreed, let me ask you something straight.”
Su Jing: “What is it?”
Fu Yansheng: “When did Lin Huan decide to cooperate with FIA?”
Su Jing smiled. This had also been what Qi Yu tried to get out of him through WeChat before. Su Jing hadn’t answered at that time but now that he has decided to switch sides, he didn’t mind using this information to show his good faith. “I don’t know when exactly. Lin Huan didn’t tell me either. But what I do know is that he’s purely an investor, he doesn’t care about company operations, business management or other such things. He just wants to make money by buying and selling. So I’m guessing he must have already looked for FIA before even buying HZ.”
Qi Yu asked: “You mean he already decided to cooperate with FIA before acquiring HZ?”
Su Jing crossed his arms and said, “This is my guess. Speaking of which, the Lizao Group also contacted me last year. And it was even FIA’s chairman Zhang Aifa who met me in person. But as you all know, I only accepted investments at first. I wasn’t entertaining any offers for acquisition. Maybe the Lizao Group hit a wall with me so they asked Lin Huan to deal with me.”
…to deal with?
Qi Yu thought about how Fu Yansheng had said that Lin Huan had used some trick to acquire HZ. He asked curiously, “So just how did Lin Huan acquire your HZ Technology?”
Su Jing: “That guy is very treacherous. Back then, I was in urgent need of funds for our development. I found several investment companies and sold some shares to them. As a result, I went around and found out that those companies that invested in us were all Lin Huan’s people. He got 40% of the HZ’s shares through those various investment companies…”
Qi Yu thought to himself, why was this method similar to the one Xu Jing advised him to do before?
Su Jing looked at Qi Yu and said, “Do you still remember that in order to express your sincerity, you asked President Xu of your Shanyu Investment to invest 10 million? Lin Huan met me at the end of last year and told me that President Xu was also his friend. He also said that instead of begging everywhere for investments, I might as well open my eyes to reality and sell the company at a high price.”
Qi Yu was startled and explained, “The 10 million I asked Shanyu to invest in you has absolutely nothing to do with Lin Huan.”
Su Jing gave a smile that was yet not a smile. “Shanyu’s 10 million yuan was pure investment and you hadn't taken any shares. I know that it was a show of your goodwill. I also know that Lin Huan was simply putting psychological pressure on me by saying that. It’s just that when I talked to you last year, my heart had already been a bit swayed. For an ordinary man, innocent and guileless, treasuring a jade ring becomes a crime. How could I not have known that I couldn’t protect HZ with just my own power? I really did open my eyes to reality. Besides, HZ was something I created without much thought. Everyone wanted to buy it, since he was willing to pay a high price, I just sold it to him. But the value of this company stopped right there.”
Ye Qinru: “What do you mean it stopped right there?”
Su Jing raised his eyebrows and explained, “Since he took over HZ Technology, my team hasn’t performed any technical optimization for the system. The algorithm has been kept at what it originally was. My brothers and I have been sitting idle for half a year. We patch things up and it looks like we’re working hard but we’re actually doing other research.”
“Nice…!” Ye Qinru couldn’t help but want to give Su Jing a thumbs up.
Fu Yansheng: “Then have you and your team studied Blooming Lotus? How big of a difference do you think there is between Blooming Lotus and HZ?”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
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Fu Yansheng said, “Feel free to talk. If we have any questions, we can just ask, right?”
Su Jing looked around and when he saw that none of them showed any impatience, he continued.
At first, Qi Yu could still barely manage to understand, but when Su Jing started talking about “convolutional neural networks”, “high-dimensional space” and “text vectors”, he found himself unable to keep up.
In the end, only Fu Yansheng was still discussing and probing with Su Jing. Su Jing was surprised. “You’ve also done research in this area? You know a lot.”
Fu Yansheng: “I haven’t done any actual research. These are just things I’ve picked up from others.”
Su Jing looked at Fu Yansheng with interest. He continued, “I don’t know if you’ve recruited some new masters to do the algorithm after you acquired Blooming Lotus but if there’s no improvement in this area, you’re going to be steamrolled by closed-loop community malls like HZ. Once they join forces with FIA, you’ll see a huge gap in just three months.”
Ye Qinru: “…”
Wu Shuang said nervously, “It’s that much of an exaggeration?”
Su Jing: “I’ve used your app, so I think I can make some judgements. But you don’t have to worry too much. With me around, the chance of a comeback is still very high.”
Ye Qinru: “How long will it take to turn things around?”
Su Jing: “Half a year.”
Ye Qinru: “Half a year? I heard that HZ and FIA are going to be launching next month. In half a year won’t the dishes be cold by then!”
Su Jing gestured with his chopsticks: “F*ck, even if I led my team to change your algorithmic structure overnight, you still have to spend time to cultivate your user base, right? If you want to catch up quickly, then spend money on marketing to keep up!”
Ye Qinru took the initiative to pour a cup of wine for Su Jing. Filled with a sense of crisis, he said, “Yes, we’ll blot out the sky with advertising, we can’t lose at the starting line!”
Su Jing drank the wine and said with a smile, “It’s fine. In the information age, everyone’s preferences change quickly. Since we’re doing a fashion sharing platform, we have to keep pace with the times. Once I leave HZ, if HZ can’t find a better system architect to be in charge or optimizing the original algorithm, it’ll quickly become chicken ribs. What’s there to be afraid of?”
Qi Yu: “…”
Fu Yansheng said before that if Su Jing were to leave HZ to create another HX or HY, Lin Huan would have bought HZ for nothing… Heh, looking at things now, it really did seem to be the case.
They spent nearly three hours enjoying their meal. When it was almost ten o’clock, the five of them got up. Ye Qinru asked Su Jing, “When can you come?”
Su Jing asked him back, “When do you want me to come?”
Ye Qinru: “Of course, the sooner the better!”
Su Jing laughed and teased him, “Just who was it who said I was impatient? Chief Ye, I think you’re more impatient than I am!”
Ye Qinru: “Call me impatient all you want if that means you’ll let me bring the lawyer to your hotel later to find you!”
Su Jing: “Bring the lawyer to the hotel? What for?”
Ye Qinru: “To sign the contract!”
Su Jing was dumbstruck. “It’s already so late. Are you scared I’m gonna run away!?”
Fu Yansheng said with a smile: “Chief Ye, there’s no hurry. Everyone has drank quite a bit today and it’s not extremely urgent. Let President Su go back to get a night’s rest. We’ll meet tomorrow morning to formally discuss his compensation offer.”
Hearing what Fu Yansheng said, Ye Qinru finally gave up and called a car to take Su Jing back to the hotel. They then all parted ways.
Fu Yansheng took Qi Yu home. Qi Yu didn’t often drink Chinese liquor and he drank a bit too much tonight. After sitting in the car for a while, he started feeling a bit dizzy. Curious about the threshold of this man’s knowledge, he closed his eyes and quickly asked, “Teacher Fu, did you really understand what Su Jing was saying?”
Fu Yansheng: “I haven’t done any in-depth research on artificial intelligence and machine learning, but from a mathematical point of view, those things he said were similar to modeling principles. That’s probably why I could understand a bit. However, Su Jing sharing core content like that shows his sincerity in wanting to jump ship to join you.”
Qi Yu closed his eyes and snorted, “You sure know how to pretend. Chief Ye is in charge of such a big technology department, he usually holds meetings with people from the tech teams but even he looked a little confused.”
Fu Yansheng turned his head to look at him, “Do I really appear so powerful in your eyes?”
Qi Yu took Fu Yansheng’s hand and intertwined their fingers. He said in a low voice, “I feel like you’re still hiding a lot of things from me…”
Fu Yansheng: “…”
After a while, Qi Yu said added, “By the way, tomorrow morning, you guys discuss Su Jing’s compensation package with him. I still have something to do, so I won’t be attending.”
Fu Yansheng asked, “What are you going to do?”
Qi Yu: “I have an appointment with Tang Weiye for lunch tomorrow at noon.”
Fu Yansheng frowned and said, “What are you meeting with him for?”
Qi Yu: “I’m going to ask him about Si Hang’s situation.”
Feeling Fu Yansheng’s hold on his hands tighten, Qi Yu couldn’t help opening his eyes and looking at him from out the corner of his eyes. He saw Fu Yansheng pursing his lips, seemingly a little unhappy. Qi Yu smiled and said lazily, “It’s just lunch. No need to be so jealous. When you leave and I got socializing with different men and women every day, what would you do then?”
Fu Yansheng: “…”
After arriving at the villa in the southern suburbs, Fu Yansheng sent Qi Yu to the door before leaving.
Because he was a little drunk, Qi Yu went back to the room, washed his face and fell promptly asleep. The next day, he called Su Jing, saying that he still had important matters to attend to today and if he had any requirements he could simply discuss it with Ye Qinru. — This too was a negotiation strategy. Although the Si Yuan Group certainly wouldn’t treat Su Jing unfairly, Qi Yuancheng suggested that Qi Yu shouldn’t come forward in person when discussing this aspect – Su Jing exchanged a few courteous words and the two hung up the call.
At breakfast, Qi Yu ran into Qi Yuancheng. He briefly reported the result of last night’s negotiation with Su Jing while they had breakfast. Qi Yuancheng expressed his satisfaction.
Qi Yu remembered HZ’s technical information that Su Jing had disclosed last night. He also remembered how Su Jing had mentioned that Lin Huan said that Xu Jing was his friend. He had a bad premonition in his heart. He asked Qi Yuancheng, “Dad, when Jing Ge leaves will he sign a non-compete agreement?”
Qi Yuancheng: “Of course, he will.”
Qi Yu just breathed a sigh of relief when heard Qi Yuancheng add, “But he’s not a technical person so this kind of agreement has very limited control over him. He’ll still be able to use elsewhere the contacts he accumulated through Shanyu Investment in the past. Whether what he’ll do will be good or bad for us depends on his own conscience.”
Qi Yu’s heart jumped up once again. He took a few absent-minded mouthfuls of his meal before putting down his chopsticks.
Near noon, Qi Yu and Tang Weiye confirmed their meeting time and place. When he was about to head out, he saw that Su Jing had sent him a message, “This Fu Yansheng of yours, just where did he come from?”
Qi Yu was taken aback and replied, “Why? What’s the matter?”
————
【Little Theater】
Qi Yu: I feel like you’re still hiding a lot of things from me…
Fu Yansheng: It can’t be helped. Undercover agents must keep a low profile.
Qi Yu: Hmph, sooner or later, I’ll squeezed out every single drop from you.
Fu Yansheng: …
hahahahahha yea fu yansheng time is running out
Thanks for the chapter <333
👀
thanks for the chapter!
I don’t expect very high of a conscience from this Xu Jing anymore.. sigh