2003: Starting with Foreign Trade

Chapter 425 Electronic Payment
As one of the earliest people to return to China to work in the internet industry, Huang Ming was in the same group as Zhang Chaoyang, and he has a very high profile in the internet circle.

Since news broke that he was dealing with his own website's shares and preparing to join Flash ByteDance, it has attracted considerable attention in the internet and investment circles.

ByteDance's advertising platform was previously only known in the lithium battery industry, with no achievements or reputation in the internet sector.

If it weren't for Huang Ming, no one in the internet industry would have paid any attention to such a small investment firm, and no one would have understood why Huang Ming would choose to join such an investment firm that had nothing to do with the internet.

It's still not very large, so what's the point?

However, after news broke that ByteDance's advertising platform was a subsidiary of Flashpoint Group specifically responsible for investment, people in the industry suddenly realized that it had gone to join Tan Jincheng's cause.

That makes more sense. After all, Tan Jincheng has Orange Technology, which is currently very popular. It's common for internet companies to make investments in related areas after they reach a certain size.

Tan Jincheng, known as the "Miracle Boy," stirred up the electric vehicle industry during the last few days of the May Day holiday. He used over 6000 million yuan of real money to attack all his competitors, making things extremely difficult for both leading manufacturers and small workshops.

Within the business world, electric vehicles are actually a relatively low-profile business. The market is huge, and many companies have crossed over into the electric vehicle industry, but they have made very little noise. Everyone seems to adhere to the principle of making a fortune quietly.

However, since Tan Jincheng entered the industry, major news has emerged from time to time. From the earliest time of finding celebrities to endorse products and associating them with the then-popular Super Girl contestants, to the subsequent large-scale marketing activities, more people have come to know about this industry.

From the very beginning, Tan Jincheng seemed to be playing the role of a disruptor in the electric vehicle industry, and this persona was pushed to its extreme on Labor Day this year.

This feat not only caused a sensation in the electric vehicle industry, but also attracted extraordinary attention from all sectors of the domestic industry. Even the internet industry, which is known for its massive spending, has never done anything like this before.

The layman looks at the excitement and the insider looks at the doorway.

Anyone would have a headache if they encountered such an unscrupulous business partner, but if you were to ask which industry is most concerned about Tan Jincheng's extravagant spending, it would definitely be the internet industry.

Although Flash Group also brands clothing in addition to electric vehicles, clothing brands are not like electric vehicles. You can't offer refunds for clothing; that kind of practice doesn't apply to clothing.

The group that buys clothes is much larger; it's not reasonable to ask everyone to give them a refund so they can exchange it for a new piece of clothing, is it?

Aside from its apparel business, Flash has not established a brand for its other products. Its battery business is more often categorized as a component industry. For products without a brand, they can only rely on quality and service to operate honestly, without resorting to too many tricks.

The remaining option is the internet industry, which has a long tradition of burning money. Orange Technology, backed by large investment institutions, has no shortage of money to burn, and burning money is not a big deal for investment institutions.

They'd love for you to burn as much money as possible, because if you burn a lot, the investment institutions will be short of funds and can get more shares.

Tan Jincheng can burn through more than 6000 million yuan at once just playing with two-wheeled electric vehicles. What will it be like when Orange Products goes public?

Although Orange Products is still in the internal development stage, people in the industry already know what Orange Technology's newly launched project is actually doing. Zhang Xupeng, vice president of Flash Group, has signed cooperation agreements with major footwear and apparel brands one after another.

Orange Technology has established warehousing centers in various locations, and recently it has been reported that it has joined forces with SF Express to discuss cooperation with the Yiwu government.

All signs indicate that this is an online e-commerce website primarily selling shoes and apparel, which is quite interesting.

Since last year, e-commerce GMV has surged, and this year's growth rate is even more astonishing. Whether it's self-operated malls like JD.com, comprehensive e-commerce platforms like Taobao, or other vertical e-commerce types, they have all increased their investment this year.

The e-commerce market has undoubtedly opened up, and Orange Technology's decision to enter the e-commerce market at this time is undoubtedly very delicate.

You should know that this guy has always had a very keen sense of smell. Back when his clothing trading business was booming, he chose to start his own business and make electric vehicles from scratch.

The partnership, which was then called Jinpeng Trading, was already on the right track, but instead of making a comfortable living in the US dollars, Tan Jincheng went to work hard to set up a factory. From an outsider's perspective at the time, it seemed like he was just asking for trouble.

However, looking back at Tan Jincheng's actions from God's perspective now, they seem incredibly impressive.

Just like the currently booming stock market, Tan Jincheng's entry into the electric vehicle industry coincided perfectly with the start of the electric vehicle boom.

While hard work and a certain amount of talent are certainly necessary for doing business, vision is arguably the most crucial element. It's about quickly entering a fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) industry in its early, explosive growth phase and rapidly leveraging your business acumen to capture market share. Looking back, it might seem like a difficult journey for the company, but from a superior, omniscient perspective, you'll simply think, "That guy is truly amazing!"
It seems he knew that the electric vehicle industry would explode in a year or two. Other companies have worked hard for so many years to expand their market share, and Lao Ni has offended so many people in order to expand his market share.

He, on the other hand, went all out from the start, selling everything he owned to reap the rewards, achieving sales of 100 million vehicles from 0 in just two years.

Without the desperate measures he took in 2005, how could he possibly achieve annual sales of 50 billion yuan within two years by simply trading clothing in the foreign trade? Dream on.

Today, the internet e-commerce industry is showing a clear upward trend, which is very similar to the electric vehicle industry in 2005. Tan Jincheng chose to get involved at this time. After the first round of financing, he introduced two investment institutions in the B round of financing.

Qiming Venture Partners and Sequoia Capital provided funding for Orange Technology, while Tencent Capital offered more than just funding. As an emerging social media giant, QQ boasts over 1 million users.

The collaboration with Orange Technology has already sparked positive results with Happy Farm, achieving a synergistic effect. It remains to be seen what kind of impact it will have on the Orange Products Club project.

With this guy's marketing skills and extravagant spending habits, what kind of surprise will Orange Products bring this time?
What kind of surprise it might be is unknown, but the first task Tan Jincheng gave Huang Ming, who had not yet joined the company, was to figure out the payment method for Orange Products Club.

Although he hasn't officially started working yet, it doesn't affect the fact that Huang Ming will be investing in ByteDance's advertising platform from the moment he agreed to Tan Jincheng's offer.

ByteDance Engine is now part of Flashpoint Group, but after Huang Ming's joining the company, Tan Jincheng plans to spin it off and make the investment institution independent, which is also due to its role as an intermediary media between the Internet and physical enterprises.

If there are investments in the internet sector, then Orange Technology is inevitably involved. Otherwise, it would be somewhat awkward to be associated with Orange Technology, which is a subsidiary of Flash Group and involves a very large amount of capital.

Of course, the controlling shareholder of ByteDance's advertising platform is still Flashpoint Group. Its independent corporate nature is simply for the sake of convenience.

The most important aspect of e-commerce is payment methods. Alipay, which was founded in 2004, had become a veritable market giant by 2007, processing a large number of payment transactions every day. However, it was actually operating without a license.

Simply put, these days no payment app has a third-party payment license; they're all just skirting the rules.

Payment methods were actually quite primitive back then. Years later, when people born in the 80s recalled their earliest online payment experiences, they probably just went to the bank to get a bank card with Taobao printed on it.

After that, you deposit money into the account and get a USB key or something for online transactions. There may be some minor differences between banks, but the essence is similar.

In simple terms, Alipay is just acting as an intermediary. In reality, the cash flow from users' online shopping still goes into banks, not directly into Alipay. This is done to circumvent regulations.

Jinpeng Industry and GXG have online stores on Taobao. It's such a trivial matter that Tan Jincheng doesn't need to bother with any payment methods. Just use Alipay. Why would he bother making dumplings just for a bit of vinegar?

But now that Orange Products has already rolled out the dumpling wrappers and bought the meat, they have no choice but to make the dumplings. Orange Products uses Alipay? That's ridiculous.

OrangePay has designed five payment methods. The first one is definitely online payment. In the initial stage, we will definitely talk to Alipay about some cooperation. We will integrate with Alipay if possible, since there is no WX payment these days. But it is definitely not the only method.

Anyway, you guys are all playing on the edge, so it's not like I can't either. We'll see if I can get a license later. Besides Alipay, the most important thing is definitely online banking, bank credit cards, and online banking payments.

These days, there aren't many places that accept online credit card payments. Orange Products plans to try and negotiate with the bank to see if they can get one.

Besides the most important online payment method settings, the rest include Orange Card payment, coupon and gift card deduction, cash on delivery, etc.

In addition, we plan to create an Orange Products Wallet, which will be an electronic account wallet. When registering as a member, you will have an exclusive online wallet where you can deposit money for functions such as topping up, paying for goods, refunds, and withdrawals.

These tasks were actually quite demanding, requiring communication with banks, the production of Orange Cards, and the setting of payment methods, among other things. Tan Jincheng entrusted such important tasks to Huang Ming.

Therefore, Huang Ming's first task after taking office was not to invest in a company, but to assist Orange Technology in completing the formulation of electronic payment.

When it comes to taking advantage of loopholes, Tan Jincheng is a professional; he even lets employees who haven't joined the company yet do things outside their regular duties.

(End of this chapter)