When Little Ma heard about this, he couldn’t help but let out a few curses. It was unclear whether he was cursing Chen Yansen, Li Yanhong, or both of them.
But Fast Taxi’s market performance was a pleasant surprise.
With average daily orders exceeding five million and a transaction volume of 140 million yuan, the platform’s annual turnover could reach 50 billion yuan.
By then, Fast Taxi’s valuation would soar to between 8 and 12 billion US dollars. If they could defeat DiDi Dache, it wouldn’t be a stretch to optimistically estimate a valuation surpassing 12 billion US dollars.
In other words, the value of the equity held by Penguin would skyrocket from the initial 130 million US dollars to 900 million US dollars, a 592.3% return on investment.
What Ma Wenteng could figure out, Ma Liyun, Zhu Xiaohu, Yu Heng, and the others could naturally figure out as well.
All at once, investment firms like Ah Li, Penguin, DST, Jinsha Venture Capital, Huake, Goldman Sachs, and Huaxin started calling, asking Chen Yansen if he needed capital.
Fast Taxi’s accounts were still flush with cash, so Chen Yansen didn’t agree, but he didn’t refuse either. He simply used the opportunity to sound out their offers and prepare for the next round of financing.
DiDi Dache’s counterattack was fierce. Its daily order volume grew at an incredible rate, increasing from just over one million to more than 1.3 million in only three days.
But to Li Yanhong’s frustration, after entering the Northeast and South China markets, Fast Taxi also expanded rapidly, still managing to hold on to 85% of the market share.
DiDi’s market share didn’t budge an inch; in fact, it even dropped by another 0.2%.
The ride-hailing war between Fast Taxi and DiDi Dache not only stunned people within the industry but also left users completely dumbfounded.
From May to mid-September, a full five months, the two sides had collectively burned through 3 billion in subsidies. At the current rate, that number was projected to soar to 5 billion by the end of the year!
There was no shortage of industry players who privately wanted to enter the ride-hailing race, but almost none dared to actually jump in.
After all, without a billion in cash reserves, you wouldn’t even last three months before being jointly crushed by the subsidy war between Fast Taxi and DiDi Dache.
Competitors like Yaoyao Zhaoche, Yidao Car Rental, and 365 Yueche were washed away by the massive waves and left for dead on the beach without even making a splash.
Who would dare enter the market now?
Now that BAT, state-owned capital, and foreign capital had all entered the fray, it would be nearly impossible to find investors, even if you managed to develop a product.
「Meanwhile.」
「In front of the School of Business in Hu City’s Fengxian District.」
Logically, since the School of Business was located in the suburbs, there shouldn’t have been many taxis around.
But after the subsidy war between Fast Taxi and DiDi restarted, the instant per-order discount for returning customers went back to 12 yuan, and the drivers’ subsidy for accepting an order rose to 4 yuan.
Not even counting the platform’s cut, a driver could earn at least 16 yuan for a single ride.
Especially near the School of Business, students operated under the principle that it was a waste not to take a freebie. Even to get to the snack street just two kilometers away, they would take a taxi there and back.
The passengers paid nothing, and the driver could earn 32 yuan for the round trip!
The situation downtown was much the same. Older folks would call a taxi just to go downstairs to buy groceries.
When you could get a free ride, who would bother walking?
Even though the daily losses exceeded ten million yuan, Chen Yansen felt it was worth it: the capacity of the ride-hailing market was expanding, and users were subconsciously developing the habit of hailing cars online.
In the long run, this would force all taxi drivers to install the app, because passengers hailing cabs from the street would become increasingly rare. If they didn’t use Fast Taxi, they’d have no customers.
But what Li Yanhong didn’t know was that, although the Gray Studios had quieted down significantly after a special operation by the Yanjing Inspection Institute and the "Little Calf" software had been banned, a new ghost order software called "Big Golden Bull" had burst onto the scene after twenty days of silence. It seemed to have precisely pinpointed a system vulnerability in DiDi Dache.
It offered an all-in-one service for clients, including code-receiving registration, automatic IP and device ID switching, virtual positioning, and trip simulation. It sold for 150,000 yuan per set, the same price as Little Calf.
The studio bosses in the North China and East China Regions all secretly speculated that Big Golden Bull and Little Calf were definitely the work of the same person.
Fleecing DiDi Dache was risky, but the profits were high.
In less than a week, Brother Hui and his crew, far away in An Nan, had successfully sold twelve sets of the software.
"Brother Hui, counting this last one, we’ve made a total of 1.8 million!"
"Ah Zhen, where’d you find this programmer? His skills are insane!"
After confirming the buyer’s payment, Yaozi and Chaozi looked up and reported the earnings to Brother Hui with wide grins.
"The profit-sharing ratio is going to change this time," Brother Hui announced casually, sitting on a nearby sofa with a Marlboro dangling from his lips.
"Huh!?"
Liu Zi had a strong reaction, shooting to his feet. But he didn’t speak rashly, because he wasn’t sure if Brother Hui’s "change" meant an increase or a decrease.
"For every sale of Big Golden Bull, each of you gets fifteen thousand. Ah Zhen knows his tech, so he gets an extra five thousand."
Brother Hui took a deep drag from his cigarette and blew out a smoke ring.
"Any objections?" Seeing that no one was speaking, Brother Hui pressed, his face hardening.
"Brother Hui, whatever you say goes. I’m good with it," Ah Zhen chuckled tactfully.
"Brother Hui, I don’t get it," Yaozi asked, mustering his courage.
The implication was clear: he thought it was too little.
"How do you think we got this software? You think it’s so easy to find a loophole in DiDi Dache? I’m taking a ten-thousand-yuan pay cut on each of these myself, understand?"
Brother Hui rolled his eyes and swore viciously.
Ah Zhen was a sharp guy, and a flash of understanding immediately crossed his eyes.
’After Little Calf was banned, he had found a group of programmers in An Nan, but the virtual positioning and device ID spoofing programs they wrote couldn’t get past DiDi Dache’s anti-fraud team.’
’Two weeks ago, Brother Hui had suddenly come up with a plan and found the vulnerability in DiDi Dache’s system.’
’He had assumed it was a coincidence, but it turned out there was an insider!’
Seeing that Ah Zhen had agreed, Yaozi, Chaozi, and Liu Zi, though unhappy, dared not show it. They forced smiles onto their faces and reluctantly agreed.
This time, Brother Hui was even more cautious, afraid of leaving the slightest trail.
Thanks to this inside-outside cooperation, DiDi Dache’s daily order numbers grew once again. Li Yanhong was very pleased and attributed the success to the concerted efforts of his various departments.
On September 26th, Orange Pay version 2.0 was released, launching simultaneously on multiple channels including the App Store, various Android app stores, 91 Mobile Assistant, Wandoujia, Yingyongbao, the Xiaomi App Store, and the Orange Application Mall.
It primarily added "Scan," "Payment Code," and "Collection Code" features. This move signified that Orange Pay’s business was expanding from online to offline.
「Luzhou, Huaihai Road Pedestrian Street.」
A street promoter from Kuai Pao stood before the cashier of a mala hot pot restaurant, chatting amiably with the owner.
"Boss Zhou, do me a favor and apply for a merchant collection code," Zhu Zhengchen said straightforwardly.
"Collection code? What’s that good for?" Zhou Junyi asked casually.
If it had been anyone else, he wouldn’t have even bothered to respond.
But Zhu Zhengchen was different. He was the business manager for Kuai Pao’s Group Buy division and handled the merchants on half this street, so of course, Zhou Junyi had to show him some respect.
"There’s a collection code and a payment code. When a customer is checking out, they just open the Orange Pay app, scan the code, enter the bill amount, and the payment is complete in a few seconds. For you merchants, it makes balancing your books easier and reduces the risk of accepting counterfeit money or making mistakes with change," Zhu Zhengchen explained, reciting his well-rehearsed pitch.
"Holy shit! It’s that convenient? Show me how to set it up! By the way, there’s no withdrawal fee for this thing, right?"
"Of course not," Zhu Zhengchen said with conviction, while mentally adding, ’For now!’
The merchant collection codes could significantly improve payment efficiency and operational management. Orange Pay had also added features for automatic account reconciliation and financial analysis.
It was convenient to operate and simple to use!
Zhou Junyi was a quick study. An hour later, he had already printed out the collection code and posted it on his cash register.
Orange Pay’s offline promotion was very low-key. In the first phase, they only approached Group Buy and food delivery merchants, and their progress was exceedingly smooth.
In places like Hu City, Luzhou, and Jinling, paying by scanning a code was gradually becoming popular.