I Found A Planet

Xing Hai Technologies’ top executives were in their conference room discussing what they should charge for Work Assistant 1.0, which would soon be introduced to the market.

“Mr. Chen, Work Assistant belongs in the software category. The hardware involved is only a supercomputer with an operating speed of 1 million million times per second and several cloud servers for data storage. Hardware costs are still relatively low. Unlike the Little Star learning machine, we don’t have to manufacture hundreds of millions of clients. We won’t have to worry about getting choked by hardware suppliers.”

“Indeed, doing hardware is too much of a hassle. Setting aside the risk of getting choked, the taxes imposed, the follow-up maintenance… All of them are very troublesome, and the actual profit we gain is not very high.”

“If you want to know how profitable software is, just look at Microsoft. Bill Gates topped the Forbes World’s Richest People list more than 20 times, and he’s never fallen from the top three. Software is much more profitable than hardware,” said Hou Xiao Feng. He had advised his boss about this a long time ago—capitalize on the company’s technical advantages and develop more software products—but it was not until now, when the company had produced marketable software, that they fully appreciated the huge profits to be gained.

At the head of the conference table, Chen Jin nodded. He was well aware that software development translates into huge profits, but he also understood that everything must be strategically staggered. If too many profitable products were released too closely, he would not be able to manage all of them.

After listening to each executive’s analysis, he determined that Xing Hai Technologies’ core source of profit needed to be shifted to software. Even if they didn’t want to switch, they soon would be forced to anyway.

Xing Hai Technologies’ Wa-wah cleaning robots had a lifespan of 10 years. The Little Star learning machine was designed to provide around 5 years of use, while the Bang Bang robot had an average service period of more than 10 years. The quality of these products was so excellent that the company needed to retain their devoted consumer base with expanding technology to maximize profits.

For example, in the M nation, a company was selling hiking shoes of superb quality. The soles would show no wear even after five years of use. In addition, their affordable price point attracted an extraordinary number of customers, but this ethical and popular company collapsed after five years, because their customers’ shoes performed so well the company went bankrupt due to excessive inventory backlog.

Xing Hai Technologies’ products were not inexpensive, but they were definitely of superior quality, so after the market had been flooded, Xing Hai Technologies would definitely face a massive plummet in sales.

Fortunately, Chen Jin had considered this issue. Their new Work Assistant 1.0 would be Xing Hai Technologies’ new steppingstone to further boost their profits.

According to statistics provided by the CSDN, there were more than 5 million programmers in the Z nation, which implied a market with 5 million users; this market must be considered based on size alone.

Programmers generally belong to a high-income group; those in the field for three or more years on average had an income of 10 to 15 thousand dollars or more. Trading one-tenth of their monthly pay for 10 times their current work efficiency plus a substantial boost to the quality of their coding would be extremely worthwhile.

Sales manager Li Yuan Liang said, “Mr. Chen, let’s set the subscription fee at 1,500 dollars per month. If all the programmers purchase it, we’ll see a revenue of 7.5 billion dollars every month—similar to that of the Wa-wah robot, but the net profit margin will be more than 50%!”

“Fifteen hundred dollars every month?”

Song Bojun shook his head and said, “This pricing is a little off the charts. Veteran programmers will be able to afford it, but a good portion of programmers are rookies with only one or two years of experience. Their pay isn’t that high; they wouldn’t be able to afford 1,500 dollars a month.”

“Junior programmers shouldn’t use it. Let them focus on improving their skillsets for two years. It won’t be too late for them to buy Work Assistant after that.”

“No, they won’t have the chance to learn.”

Song Bojun said solemnly, “They will be sacked immediately! After Work Assistant is launched, coding efficiency will become so high that many companies will fire a good portion of their programmers just to save costs! At least half of the programmers would be dismissed, causing a few million people to lose their jobs.”

Li Yuan Liang’s jaw dropped. Millions of programmers losing their jobs? This is…

As much as Xing Hai Technologies was driven by profit, they could not stand idly by watching so many people lose their jobs.

Before releasing Work Assistant, they must consider its influence and impact on society and avoid destroying the livelihoods of too many people… Profit should come second.

After another round of discussion, the executives finally came to a negotiated decision: They decided to implement “a guarantee” and “a restriction.” They would guarantee that the software would be affordable for every programmer while also restricting some of Work Assistant’s prowess.

Song Bojun said to Chen Jin, “Mr. Chen, when Work Assistant is generating algorithms, it requires computing power. The more complex the algorithm the more computing power required.”

“That supercomputer that Work Assistant uses has computing powers of approximately 1 million million times per second. By dividing it into 100-million fractions, we can sell computing power in 100-million portions.

“Each portion of computing power can be sold at 500 dollars per month, with add-ons available if needed. Each account can stack up as many as 100 portions of computing power.

“According to our tech staff’s calculations, even with just 1 portion of Work Assistant’s computing power purchased, a programmer’s productivity will improve by a factor of 2.5. For common intermediate programmers, 10 portions of computing power would basically suffice. Only senior programmers would use more than 100 portions of computing power.

“Therefore, for a junior programmer, spending 500 dollars per month for 1 portion of computing power will be enough for performing some simple operations… This is within the price range they could afford.

“For intermediate programmers, they could opt for the overlay package. It could be 1, 2, 10, or even 100 portions. The more computing power they stack, the more powerful Work Assistant will get!

“But they will have to spend more…”

For example, the tech staff had calculated that buying 100 portions of computing power would improve a programmer’s work efficiency 10-fold, but the expenditure on Work Assistant would be 50 thousand dollars per month. Instead of paying these expenses, employers would logically recruit five additional junior programmers and let each of them use Work Assistant. This would definitely hasten their progress by having more personnel, rather than a single expert, to work on any given project.

The quality of the algorithms generated by Work Assistant was very high; therefore, recruiting junior programmers would be more or less the same as recruiting intermediate programmers. This could also prevent a scenario where a whole slew of junior programmers gets dismissed; of course, as work productivity did improve, it was inevitable for a portion of programmers to lose their jobs. Xing Hai Technologies could only strive to minimize this impact.

Chen Jin nodded after hearing this analysis coupled with a solution. “Let’s settle this then! We can’t let employers from IT companies get the idea that Work Assistant is more economical than hiring actual programmers. We must let them know that programmers who know how to use this tool have even greater value! However…”

“If we can’t prevent a trend of programmers losing their jobs, then Xing Hai Technologies will establish a few additional software centers, recruit some 10,000 programmers, and let them work on our local Visual Effects Engine OS, our office software… If the others aren’t developing this software, Xing Hai Technologies will do it ourselves! On the one hand, we’re filling in the blanks of these fields; on the other, we can amass a large staff of unemployed but promising individuals. We will be killing two birds with one stone!”

“Well thought out, Mr. Chen,” Song Bojun agreed. “We have too many voids in the software industry. If there are IT companies within the country that are willing to pitch in, the Z nation would need an additional 2 million programmers. Now, with the launch of Work Assistant, if there are programmers who don’t want to lose their jobs and are enthusiastic about coding, allowing them to bridge the gaps might just be the better alternative for them… This is why we don’t need to be afraid that there’s a lack of talent in the Z nation’s software field.”

The executives were all nodding their heads, having agreed on an acceptable number of jobs that would likely be impacted. This, in effect, fixed the pricing of Work Assistant.

The release day for Work Assistant was scheduled on March 22nd. At that time, all programmers would be able to download the Work Assistant client and pay in exchange for computing power. But unforeseen circumstances were to arise.

On March 20th, Google released its latest Android 12 and, from that day onward, the Android system’s era of free usage ended. In the future, all new equipment that used the Android system would pay Google a certain amount.

Google’s CEO Sandal Pichai explained, “Imposing a certain amount of fee is for us to create better products and provide our customers with a better experience!”

This was all within the expectations for companies and netizens in the Z nation.

“Google has been calling out to impose fees for two years. Now, the day has finally come.”

“No matter how much or how little the patent fees are that Google imposes on every device—our phones, tablets, intelligent home products—the price of all our devices that use Android will be inflated.”

“The Android system that once claimed to be open source and free forever has fallen. Is Google really lacking money, or are they intending to milk us for money? Or both?”

“Eh? Why isn’t Xing Hai Technologies on the Android system’s authorization list for Z enterprises? Why are they in the prohibition list instead?”

“Google prohibits Xing Hai Technologies from using Android? Illegal usage will lead to judicial action?!”

“Does this mean that the Little Star learning machine no longer has access to Android? And will it be pulled off the shelves?”

“Why is Google doing this?”

The netizens from the Z nation were baffled and agitated.

…

“Oh? Google’s squelch has finally arrived?”

After learning about the news, Chen Jin was not at all surprised. On the contrary, three words popped up in his mind… Such a coincidence?