Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

The 20 million in stock options served two purposes: attracting highly skilled engineers and ensuring team stability.

In another two or three years, it would be commonplace for startups to use stock options as an incentive to attract employees.

Once Mogujie and Meili Shuo were established, they would very likely try to poach employees from the category and Investment Attraction departments. This move by Chen Yansen would not only help retain core team members but also raise the poaching costs for his competitors.

For people like Yuan Wei, Zhang Yifeng, Chen Xu, and Hu Li, he planned to give them stock options worth 500,000 yuan.

If another company wanted to poach them, they would have to cover an additional cost of 500,000 yuan. Otherwise, no one would be willing to leave.

Everyone from customer service representatives to team leads would receive stock options, which would vest in four installments over two years—25% every six months.

In other words, to get all the options, an employee had to stay with FoxTao for at least two more years.

After the meeting, Chen Yansen had Yuan Wei and Zhang Yifeng stay behind. He sized them up for a moment before announcing, "Starting in February, your base salaries will be raised to 4,500, and you will both serve as team leads for the Investment Attraction department. Going forward, new hires will be randomly assigned to your teams."

Yuan Wei and Zhang Yifeng exchanged an excited smile. "Thanks, Brother Sen."

With his years of work experience, Yuan Wei instantly understood Chen Yansen’s intentions. His heart tightened as he warned himself to be more careful from now on. ’Chen Yansen is not a boss who can be easily fooled.’

"You can go."

Chen Yansen waved his hand.

The Investment Attraction department had 26 people and had been without a designated leader until now. This was intentional on his part—he wanted to let them compete. Competition bred motivation.

Promoting Yuan Wei and Zhang Yifeng and giving them raises also sent a clear message to the other members of the department: perform well, and you’ll have a chance to become a team lead.

After finishing up his work, Chen Yansen took the stock option agreement he had drafted to Wang Jing for review, mainly to ensure it was legal, compliant, and that nothing had been omitted.

Not until 4:30 in the afternoon did Chen Yansen emerge from Wang Jing’s office. He sent the revised document to Xu Dan and told her to handle the next steps: print the stock option agreements, distribute them to the FoxTao team for signatures, and finally, submit them to the finance department.

Walking along Xue Lin Road, Chen Yansen sent a message to Meng Jie while mentally planning FoxTao’s last big event before the New Year—the Home Improvement Festival on January 18.

The event categories included kitchen and bath supplies, large home appliances, bathroom fixtures, lighting, and furniture. Seventy brands were participating in the event, with over 500 products featured in flash sales.

Although the commission rates for these products were lower than for cosmetics or food, the event had attracted major brands like Red Star Home Products Association, Madam Fang, Schneider, TOTO, and Submarine.

As soon as the teaser page went live, it instantly surpassed 100,000 clicks. They made 800,000 yuan in advertising fees alone.

’I need to have Xu Dan hire two more people for event operations. Even though FoxTao’s main focus is on its productized channels, we can’t skimp on seasonal and category-based events,’ Chen Yansen thought to himself, stopping at the intersection.

"What are you thinking about?"

Just then, Meng Jie walked over and patted Chen Yansen on the shoulder, rising onto her tiptoes to do so.

"Thinking of you," Chen Yansen said, snapping out of his thoughts. He smiled and wrapped an arm around Meng Jie’s, and the two of them walked toward the campus gate like a couple of buddies.

The next morning, Xu Dan walked into the conference room carrying a thick stack of documents.

Starting with Song Yuncheng, each agreement was signed in triplicate: one copy for the employee, one for the company, and one for the venture capital firm’s records.

"100,000 shares?"

Song Yuncheng flipped open the option agreement, her face filled with astonishment when she saw the number of shares listed.

"You’re FoxTao’s first employee. You designed our brand identity, served as the team lead for design, customer service, and operations, and you even brought thirteen B2C platforms to the project..." Xu Dan began, listing Song Yuncheng’s accomplishments one by one.

Based on the Series A valuation, FoxTao had a total of 500 million shares, each valued at 5.6 yuan. If she cashed out when the price was high, these 100,000 shares would be worth at least 560,000 yuan.

If the company’s valuation increased during the Series B funding round, the value of the options would rise accordingly.

"Twenty-five percent vests every six months. If you leave before they’re all vested, the company might buy back your vested options, or you might have to wait until after the Series B round or the IPO for the buyback window to open."

Xu Dan continued to explain.

"I understand." Without hesitating, Song Yuncheng signed her name.

The next ones to come in were Zhang Wenbo, Xiang Pengfei, Meng Xibo, and the others.

Everyone received a different number of options, but most received over 30,000 shares, with the highest grants reaching 100,000.

The general principle was that category management positions received more than Investment Attraction, team leads received more than regular staff, and customer service received the least. Still, even they got 5,000 shares each, worth twenty to thirty thousand yuan.

At 10:00 AM the next day, FoxTao’s first Home Improvement Festival went on sale.

On the first day, sales reached 6.7 million yuan, the average order value was 890 yuan, and the total order volume was 7,520, with returning customers accounting for over 70% of orders.

These returning customers were already used to the Super Rebate model and had complete faith in FoxTao’s product curation and price comparison capabilities. They would buy anything from electric kettles to color TVs and refrigerators.

On the second day of the event, sales were 4.1 million yuan.

On the third day, sales were 2.3 million yuan.

After the three-day event, total sales amounted to 15.3 million yuan, with a gross profit of 1.84 million. Zhang Yifeng and Yuan Wei were so ecstatic that they told everyone they met that they would treat them all to a meal after the New Year.

They had divided the stores between them, and each was credited with nearly a million yuan in gross profit performance.

Calculated at the highest commission rate of 5%, they could each earn nearly 50,000 yuan in commission from this one event. Combined with their performance from routine brand promotions, it wouldn’t be hard for them to make 100,000 a month if they put in the effort.

This drove the rest of the Investment Attraction staff wild with motivation. Their eyes gleamed like hungry wolf pups, and they worked tirelessly from morning to night.

Some of the merchants were factory-direct operations whose workers had already left for the holidays, yet the staff were still hounding the owners to sign up for Spring Festival pre-sale events, utilizing the promotional schedule to its absolute limit.

A week later, on the Little New Year, FoxTao officially began its holiday break.

Chen Yansen was just about to head back to room 0418 to pack his bags when he saw Song Yuncheng, seated across from him, slide a small box his way.

"What’s this?" Chen Yansen asked.

"A birthday present," Song Yuncheng said quietly, afraid others might overhear.

Chen Yansen’s birthday was on February 4, right during the Spring Festival, so Song Yuncheng gave him his gift early.

She wouldn’t dare not give him one; back when she’d used his computer for an interview, he had made a point of reminding her that she owed him.

Chen Yansen chuckled, picked up the gift box, and opened it. Inside was a black MCM wallet, which he guessed cost a little over 1,000 yuan.

"This is pretty extravagant. You planning on going broke?" Chen Yansen teased.

"If you don’t want it, give it back. I can still return it for a full, no-questions-asked refund within seven days," Song Yuncheng said, holding out her hand.

"I get a kick out of bleeding a poor person dry," Chen Yansen said, pulling his old wallet from his pocket and transferring all his cards, IDs, and cash into the new one in one go.

"This one’s for you," Chen Yansen said, casually tossing his old wallet to Song Yuncheng.

"Well... Happy New Year, in advance," Song Yuncheng said from her seat, pursing her lips after a moment’s hesitation.

"Text me if you miss me," Chen Yansen added.

Song Yuncheng stared at him for a moment but didn’t say a word.

Chen Yansen grabbed his laptop, turned to head downstairs, and drove his car over to the faculty apartment building.

「Two hours later.」

Chen Yansen sat in the back of a BMW 750, laughing and chatting with Meng Jie. Wang Zihao was in the driver’s seat.

The three of them sped toward Chunshen.

"Holy crap! Am I invisible over here? I’m already full from all your public displays of affection. Guess I can skip lunch."

Wang Zihao complained loudly, watching the two of them.

"Zihao, I hear you’re chasing after a teacher. Pretty bold of you," Meng Jie teased with a smile, leaning against Chen Yansen.

"I’m not! I didn’t! Don’t listen to Brother Sen’s nonsense! Teacher Liu and I just have a normal teacher-student relationship," Wang Zihao argued frantically.

"Pfft—"

Chen Yansen scoffed, not bothering to expose Wang Zihao. Ever since Liu Muyan’s fiancé was out of the picture, Wang Zihao had been constantly fawning over her under the pretext of "studying." His intentions were painfully obvious.

BUZZ BUZZ BUZZ—

His phone suddenly started vibrating in his pocket. Chen Yansen pulled it out and saw that it wasn’t Song Yuncheng. He pressed the answer key. "What’s up?"

"President Chen, the four of us—Cai Yuhao and the guys—started a game studio, and we were hoping to get a little investment from you, hehe," Liu Wei said, explaining his reason for calling.

They had met briefly in Hu City last time, and only later did they find out that FoxTao had raised nearly 600 million yuan in its Series A round, with a valuation close to 3 billion.

They had originally thought Chen Yansen was a fraud, but it turned out he was a real tycoon.

The four of them had some savings, but game development was a massive cash burn. Even if none of them took a salary, they still needed to buy development computers, graphics tablets, monitors, external hard drives, and other equipment. After some discussion, they decided to approach Chen Yansen.

After all, Chen Yansen had previously promised he was willing to invest in them.

"How much do you need?" Chen Yansen asked directly, not bothering with other questions.

’Miha You didn’t have many funding rounds. Getting in on the ground floor now would be incredibly profitable. There was no reason to pass up an opportunity like this.’

"President Chen, you’ve already agreed?" Liu Wei was stunned. They had spent a week preparing a business plan and a game development proposal, but the man had decided to invest without even hearing them out. This was going way too smoothly.

"How about I refuse for now, and then agree after you present me with a mature business plan?" Chen Yansen joked.

"No need for that!" Liu Wei replied hurriedly, understanding Chen Yansen’s underlying meaning. He chuckled and carried on.

"Alright, give me a number and draw up the equity transfer agreement. I’ll have my lawyer contact you later."

Chen Yansen said in a level tone.

’Miha You’s future market capitalization would eventually peak at 200 billion yuan, but right now, it was just a tiny workshop with a handful of people. Knowing Liu Wei and Cai Yuhao, the absolute most they would dare to ask for was a few million. That was the limit of their imagination.’

"Would two million be okay? We’ll give up 10% of our equity," Liu Wei asked, testing the waters cautiously.

Cai Yuhao, Luo Chenghao, and Jin Zhicheng gathered around Liu Wei, not even daring to breathe as they waited for Chen Yansen’s reply.

"Twenty percent," Chen Yansen replied.

He might be rich, but he wasn’t stupid. A newly founded Miha You was not worth 20 million yuan.

Liu Wei, still on the phone, exchanged glances with his partners.

Cai Yuhao shook his head. Luo Chenghao gestured for him to accept. Jin Zhicheng mouthed the number, "Fifteen percent."

"President Chen, the most we can give you is 15%. Otherwise, we’d rather find other investors," Liu Wei said seriously after a moment of consideration.

"Fine, 15% it is," Chen Yansen agreed without further haggling.

After a few brief pleasantries, Chen Yansen hung up and immediately dialed Sun Tongbo.

Sun Tongbo was Wang Jing’s former classmate and one of the lawyers who had helped bail someone out for him last time.

"Mr. Chen, for a commercial contract case, my fee is 5,000 yuan per case," Sun Tongbo said, stating his price first out of professional habit after Chen Yansen finished explaining.

"No problem. I’ll have to trouble you to handle this for me, Lawyer Sun." Chen Yansen knew you got what you paid for. Sun Tongbo worked at Tiancheng Law Firm, one of the ten most prestigious law firms in Hu City. The man was worth the price.

"Of course. I will keep you updated on the situation," Sun Tongbo replied.

Chen Yansen gave a few more instructions regarding the contract details, then put his phone down.

"Brother Sen, you’re investing in a game studio?" Wang Zihao had overheard most of the conversation and asked curiously.

"A few grad students from Hu City Jiaoda. I think their game design philosophy is pretty solid," Chen Yansen said, pulling an explanation out of thin air.

But inwardly, he was already calculating. ’I need to set up another investment firm to hold the shares of Clound Speed and Miha You. It’s not appropriate to hold them in my personal name, and putting them under Senhai is even less suitable.’

Wang Zihao didn’t dwell on it and changed the subject, talking about how some people in their class were organizing a reunion over the Spring Festival.

"Brother Sen, are you going?"

"What kind of self-respecting person goes to a class reunion? Are you going?" Chen Yansen retorted.

"I’m a very self-respecting person," Wang Zihao said with a grin. It was clear he didn’t want to go either.