The content delivered by Lee Hyun-woo reached the ears of Team Leader Hoo In-soo through Kang Dong-ho.
“What? Are you saying it’s okay to leave it to the local government here?”
(This idea came from the CEO. Proceed without any burden.)
“Oh, yes… I understand.”
After hanging up the phone, Hoo In-soo scratched the mole on his lip and thought for a moment.
‘What is this? He says to do it without any burden, but why do I feel so burdened?’
After Jungle’s expansion into Taiwan and Hong Kong, Hoo In-soo felt like he was spending half of each month in China.
Of course, there were times when he visited Hong Kong and Taiwan and then came to Guangdong Province, but he also made stops in major cities like Beijing and Shanghai to get a sense of the situation.
It was because the information obtained in big cities was more accurate.
However, he couldn’t shake off the feeling that the Chinese government was still wary of portal sites, so he was always cautious when talking to the Guangdong provincial government officials.
The next day was no different.
When he met with Go Soo-yeol, an executive from Guangdong Communications, Hoo In-soo cautiously proposed Lee Hyun-woo’s idea.
Naturally, Go Soo-yeol’s eyes sparkled.
“You mean you’ll operate the portal site according to our guidelines?”
“Yes, that’s right. So if you could send a dispatched official at any time, we could work together on this. Actually, our focus is more on games and MP3s rather than the search engine.”
He slightly diverted the conversation.
In truth, Jungle’s search engine was bound to be profitable.
As public institutions and various companies’ websites began to emerge in China, they could naturally sell the accurate search engine for money.
‘What choice do I have? Saying it this way makes it sound sincere.’
Even if not, it would give Go Soo-yeol a reason to tell his superiors.
For the record, Hoo In-soo had been investing a lot of effort into Go Soo-yeol for a long time.
If you want to do business in China, ‘guanxi’ is essential. He had been meeting Go Soo-yeol as often as having a meal, spending half of each month here.
‘Please help. Isn’t it time to reap the fruits?’
Hoo In-soo looked at his counterpart earnestly, as if speaking with his eyes.
Was it because of that earnest wish?
“It’s a very good idea. Alright, let’s do it that way.”
“Really?”
“Hey, why would I say something I don’t mean? I’ll take care of it with the higher-ups, so proceed immediately.”
“Then I’ll trust you and go ahead.”
“A man’s word is as good as gold. Don’t worry.”
Seeing his confidence, it seemed really certain this time.
Suddenly, various emotions surged in.
The biggest among them was a sense of achievement.
‘I’ve finally done it! I’ve finally done it!’
To share this joy, Hoo In-soo called Seoul again.
The next day, Kang Dong-ho briefly conveyed the news from Hoo In-soo at Lee Hyun-woo’s house.
Lee Hyun-woo was delighted.
“This is great. We need to proceed immediately when Team Leader Hoo arrives.”
Thinking, ‘In this life, everything just works out!’ he arrived at the company and then thought,
‘Since it’s come to this, I should go big in China.’
At the same time, he recalled an impressive case from his past life and began to write a group email.
Dear employees of Jungle, this is CEO Lee Hyun-woo.
I would like to strengthen our camaraderie by holding a sports event this coming spring.
After the event, a company dinner will be arranged where we will declare our competition with Macro Soft.
Until then, please stay healthy and continue working hard for our company. I extend my gratitude through this email.
The content was full of curiosity.
And anyone who read the email might think,
‘Compete with Macro Soft at a company with just over 500 employees? No matter how well Jungle is doing, isn’t that dream a bit too much?’
In fact, this email was almost a copy of the email sent by Allen Smith, the CEO of Single, in his past life.
He was deeply impressed after reading Allen Smith’s book, ‘How Single Works.’
Allen Smith was already a big-name CEO before he became the CEO of Single.
When he accepted the CEO position at Single, he saw that the overall atmosphere of the company was suffocating.
The haphazard space arrangement and the unsupervised work environment, while intended to foster creativity, clearly had limits.
However, tightening things up immediately would have ruined Single, as a free work style was closely linked to creativity.
He had been called as CEO to connect ‘freedom and creativity’ with ‘sales and profit,’ but it seemed like nothing would change before and after the Allen Smith era.
So, he boldly highlighted a competitor.
He planted the IT giant Macro Soft, which was already at the top, in the employees’ minds as a target to beat.
‘It was a perfect success.’
After that, discussing the ‘details’ would be too long.
The overall context was to instill a strong competitor in the employees’ minds.
But why now?
The influence of Macro Soft in China was so strong that it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say they dominated the market.
This was, of course, due to the operating system Windows.
‘Macro Soft will still be much more advantageous in China in the future.’
The reason he thought so.
Windows 97, the operating system of Macro Soft, included the web browser ‘Internet Ex Cross.’
No one could deny that web browsers were gateways to portal sites. Competing with Macro Soft in portal sites was like playing Go with a handicap.
Even with their own web browser, ‘Forest,’ they had to struggle constantly.
Of course, in countries like Korea and the U.S., where ADSL was prevalent and there was no censorship, dot-com companies could create their websites without much restriction, allowing for competition. But in the current China, the operating range was not easy.
In conclusion, to break through difficulties, it was impossible to do it alone. Hence, the decision to hold a sports event to gather willpower.
Naturally, after sending the email, he called Woo Sang-won and the CEOs to explain the general background.
Since he couldn’t talk about Allen Smith, he emphasized the need to solidify their resolve, and they seemed to understand.
‘Yes, if we conquer the Chinese market, we can surpass Macro Soft. Early retirement is not just a dream.’
They would incorporate the details later, and since technology was not Lee Hyun-woo’s specialty, the efforts of these people were needed.
All of them were experienced in development.
After a short meeting, Woo Sang-won and three CTOs gathered to discuss what Lee Hyun-woo had said.
Each of them had different areas of responsibility, so the meaning of entering China varied for each of them.
However, they shared one common point.
“There’s a reason the CEO said that, right?”
“Of course. He must be sensing a big opportunity.”
They had started using Lee Hyun-woo’s language often.
They didn’t originally use the term ‘jackpot,’ but hearing it from Lee Hyun-woo, they began to pick up his linguistic habits.
“But this time, the scale of the jackpot itself feels like no joke.”
“There’s a population of 1.3 billion. Multiply every figure by 1.3 billion.”
“Hey, not all 1.3 billion people use computers. Recently, I read in the newspaper that there are 2.7 computers per 100 people in China.”
“So if you multiply 1.3 billion by 2.7%, you get 35.1 million! Our country’s population is 40 million, so we’re selling almost that much.”
This is where Oh Min-woo shows why he’s considered a genius.
He calculates the numbers faster than anyone and presents them.
“In the end, to dominate the platform as the CEO always says, we must dominate the populous nations. What if someday 1.3 billion people each have a computer in their home?”
Reading Lee Hyun-woo’s thoughts like this caused the other people’s eyes to sparkle.
Of course, Lee Jung-woo, who points out Oh Min-woo’s flaws, is also a comparable genius.
“I partly agree with Director Oh, but we also need to consider China’s counterfeit culture. It’s bound to be a big issue online too.”
In other words, they couldn’t ignore the situation where Jungle’s online products, which should be sold for money, might be copied.
Naturally, Jang Yoo-chul, who was very attached to MP3s, reacted most sensitively.
“Indeed. They will copy a lot.”
“I can’t deny that. But we can’t avoid entering China just because of that fear.”
When Oh Min-woo nodded his head in agreement and questioned Lee Jung-woo, the response came immediately.
“Of course. My point is to overwhelm them with technologies they can’t even dream of.”
Being too young sometimes led these two to steer important meetings in a childish direction, but now they were somewhat in agreement.
“Hacking is the same. We need to prevent it to avoid the ‘one source’ leaking.”
“Right, exactly.”
“Let’s pay special attention to MP3 files. In our country, illegal uploading and downloading are not a joke, so it must be worse there. We need to find ways to prevent copying.”
They were not unaware of the limitations in preventing it.
It’s said that even ten policemen can’t catch one thief.
Among China’s vast population, there would be more than one genius focused solely on hacking.
Still, the reason they were determined was that each leak would result in tremendous losses.
“Alright, we’ve come to a conclusion. We need to strengthen the development team.”
“Fortunately, the first half recruitment is approaching.”
“Since we’re hiring more people, there’s one talent I have in mind.”
“Who?”
“Who?”
“Badoong’s girlfriend.”
Oh Min-woo looked at Lee Jung-woo with an amused expression.
“Badoong” was a slang term he had created, short for “player.”
Lee Jung-woo frowned.
“Girlfriend? What nonsense are you talking about?”
“There’s a rumor going around? You meet someone Ah-young noona introduced to you every day.”
“I heard that rumor too. They say you brought her to the development room yesterday? Should someone like you, who needs to ensure security, do that?”
Jang Yoo-chul immediately joined in, pressing Lee Jung-woo.
For reference, the development room they mentioned was an apartment for telecommuting.
“It’s not like that. I haven’t been going home because of ‘Alkagi,’ so I ended up eating and sleeping in the development room. Since she said she had free time in the evening, she waited outside the development room so as not to take up my time, and the guys saw it and misunderstood.”
“Your girlfriend even shows that kind of consideration?”
“Indeed a Casanova! How can you make a girl fall for you so deeply in such a short time? Spill your secrets.”
“Yeah, I want to know too.”
“Shut up!”
He shouted at his two friends who were spouting nonsense.
Finally, Woo Sang-won stepped in to mediate.
“Alright, alright, why are we doing this again just when things were going well? Alright, let’s conclude the meeting here for today, and take some time to think individually before reconvening in the evening.”
The free-spirited discussion of these individuals had clear pros and cons.
While ideas would pop out during conversations, it could also veer into childish directions due to lack of structure.
That’s why Woo Sang-won always utilized a maturation period to resolve the situation.
His method worked effectively that evening as well.
