Chapter 865: Old Friend Eric Is Back

February 2nd, Thursday…

Pei Qian continued to consider the work arrangements of the various departments in his office.

The new cell phone and smart fitness drying rack had taken care of Otto Technologies, Shang Yang Games, and Deposit Fitness. Pei Qian was very satisfied.

Pei Qian was especially satisfied with the design of the smart fitness drying rack.

No matter how one looked at it, this thing could not be sold, right?

Pei Qian could not help but feel proud at the thought that this idea could resolve the three departments that could backstab him.

However, there were still many tasks.

That was because Tengda Corporation had too many businesses and departments. Pei Qian could hardly manage all of them. However, he could not let his guard down because he did not know which department was preparing for something big. He would be forced to make profits if he was not careful.

Pei Qian still browsed through the work reports of the various departments. He thought about which projects would definitely incur losses to make the profitable departments work on them as he searched for clues.

Pei Qian felt a headache coming on after reading for a while. He took out his cell phone and scrolled through the news.

“Hm?”

“The upper echelons of Finger Games would have a change in personnel? The two data balance masters who was in contact with FRY Club privately had been fired and dealt with. The former head of China Region, Chrétien, has been dismissed. Eric will take over…”

“Eric is back?”

Pei Qian could not help but feel a little surprised when he saw this message.

Eric, my old friend!

IOI’s global finals might have ended but the popularity of this competition had not subsided. FV Team’ popularity and attention had increased unprecedentedly and won the championship. They had suddenly become a world-renowned team from a small and unknown club.

IOI’s market share in the country might have been squeezed out by GOG but FV was still a domestic team after all. Many GOG players had been paying attention to them after they won the championship; not to mention internationally. Foreign players basically recognized this team and its five members.

All sorts of news about the FV Team were dug out after the competition.

On one hand, many exciting things could be dug out since FV Team had always been low-profile. On the other hand, FV’s official Weibo account had been continuously working, and had also obtained a lot of attention for FV Team.

Thus, the content of FV Team being treated differently by Long Yu Corporation, Boss Pei providing them with top food and accommodation, logistics support, the strongest coaching team in history, and so on were all repeatedly discussed.

In the end, the news that two official statisticians of Finger Games had gone to FRY Team to help formulate strategies was exposed. It completely ignited public opinion!

Not only did domestic players protest strongly, the foreign players were also expressing that this was unacceptable.

FRY Team lost even more miserably because of this matter!

It was already very ugly for the finals to be 3: 0. It was worse that they obtained these results even though they had accepted tactical guidance!

Foreign players felt ashamed as well after such an incident was exposed. That was why they were pressuring Dayak Corporation and Finger Games.

Eric’s minions, who were keeping an eye on Chrétien’s faction,also took the opportunity to start an internal strife within Dayak Corporation.

The power struggle within Dayak Corporation was finally settled with the announcement of the official personnel changes.

Many players were still dissatisfied with the results even though Finger Games had fired two statistics balance masters after all. They had also eliminated a higher-up. They had done enough, and the voices of dissent gradually subsided.

However, the negative impact that this incident had on Finger Games and GOG would probably not be made up for a long time.

Pei Qian did not know what kind of power struggle Finger Games had. However, Eric becoming the person-in-charge of the China region might not be a bad thing from the results.

That was because Eric was more direct than Chrétien. Chrétien liked to play games in different ways, while Eric preferred to burn money directly. That suited Pei Qian better.

“Eric being able to return to being the person-in-charge of China this time means that the upper echelons of Dayak Corporation have also approved of his plan. So… is the real money-burning war about to start?”

“I’m suddenly looking forward to it!”

Pei Qian suddenly looked forward to Eric taking over IOI’s local server.

Come, burn money with me!

He was just worried that he couldn’t do it for a lack of reason!

…

At the same time, in the headquarters of Long Yu Corporation in Shanghai.

Zhao Xuming was all smiles as he welcomed Eric into the conference room.

“Mr. Eric, hello, hello!”

“You’ve been on the plane for more than ten hours. You must be tired from the long journey, right? Do you want to have some tea and rest before we start discussing business?”

Eric waved his hand. “No need. I’m very energetic now. Let’s get to the main topic. Let’s talk about the latest cooperation on IOI’s domestic server.”

Zhao Xuming did not dare to say much and quickly nodded. “Alright, no problem.”

He did not say it out loud, but he knew very well in his heart that Eric’s high-spirited manner was most likely due to him being newly reinstalled. He had to cooperate carefully.

Otherwise, he would be in even more danger.

Zhao Xuming and Long Yu Corporation’s public relations department were also exhausted in dealing with the public relations crisis after matters were exposed previously. They did nothing but crisis management during the entire Chinese New Year holiday.

Zhao Xuming was also warned by the higher-ups after they barely managed to suppress the matter.

He might have been fired along with Chrétien if he had not been better at pushing the blame away.

On the other hand, Eric had replaced Chrétien. That was enough to show that he had completely gained the trust and support of Dayak Corporation and Finger Games’ upper echelons. Eric was definitely going to showcase his skills now. If Zhao Xuming held him back, Eric could negotiate with the upper echelons of Long Yu Corporation and replace Zhao Xuming at any time.

Thus, Zhao Xuming did not dare to be negligent. He knew very well that everything had to be decided by Eric now. He could not go against Eric, or he would be the one being carried away.

Eric sized up Zhao Xuming. “Boss Zhao, I’ve heard some things about you. You seemed to have made a lot of mistakes during the promotion of IOI.”

“However, don’t worry. I like to look forward, so I can let bygones be bygones.”

“However, I would like to emphasize that I have a different style of doing things from Chrétien. I hope you can cooperate with me.”

Zhao Xuming quickly nodded. “Of course, that’s my job.”

He knew what Eric meant.

What Eric meant was that Zhao Xuming had his share of the blame for the lack of publicity previously. If Eric wanted to, he could replace Zhao Xuming with some methods at any time. However, Eric did not do that. Instead, he continued to make Zhao Xuming the person-in-charge of IOI’s operations and cooperation department, obviously hoping that he would be 100% obedient.

That was Zhao Xuming’s original plan. Naturally, he did not show any signs of resistance.

Eric was very satisfied with this and continued, “Next, I’ll briefly explain IOI’s new operating strategy.”

“The changes to the new version might have reduced the difficulty of the game objectively, attracted new players, and increased the viewing pleasure of the competition, but it also produced many negative effects. The biggest impact was the convergence between IOI and GOG’s design, which allowed FV Team, who used GOG’s playstyle, to win the championship. Many players now think that GOG’s game design standards and competition level is higher than IOI.”

“That’s difficult.”

“However, it’s impossible to change it back. On the one hand, it would cause players to have a bad impression of us ‘changing every day’ and ‘having a chaotic train of thought’. On the other hand, it would also cause the game’s threshold to rise and the competition’s viewing pleasure to decline.”

“Therefore, we can only make some minor adjustments to the content of the game and take our time to think about it.”

“However, I came here with the winning magical equipment for Tengda.”

“That is… burning money!”

“Tengda’s trump card is to burn money. If we want to defeat them, we have to burn more money than them!”

“I have already convinced the upper echelons of the company to engage in a price war with GOG globally. All of the heroes in IOI will be free from the next version onwards. The price of all skins will be reduced to thirty percent of the original price. We will prepare generous rewards for old players, returning players, and new players. We will also invest a lot of money and resources to promote the game and regain the market share that GOG snatched away!”

“This time, I have obtained a lot of authority and funds from the headquarters. I will burn them until Tengda’s capital chain cannot hold on anymore!”

“As for Boss Zhao, your task is to cooperate with me and do a good job of publicity in the China region.”

“While this action would affect Long Yu Corporation’s income, I believe that Long Yu Corporation would be able to distinguish the long-term interests and immediate interests, right?”

“If we allow GOG to continue fighting a price war, IOI’s market share would be wiped out sooner or later. At that time, no one would be able to earn anything. If we can burn money to win GOG, our prospects would be limitless!”

“Boss Zhao, I’ll have to trouble you to communicate with the higher-ups of Long Yu Corporation.”

Zhao Xuming quickly nodded. “Don’t worry, I’ll settle it.”

He knew very well that while Eric said “please communicate” politely, Long Yu Corporation did not have much room to reject the powerful position of Finger Games.

Zhao Xuming’s heart began to race seeing Eric’s confident expression.

Competing with Tengda Corporation on burning money?

Would it really work?

Zhao Xuming was very doubtful about this, but Zhao Xuming felt that there should be hope thinking about how rich Dayak Corporation was.

In any case, it was very difficult for him to participate in a fight between immortals of this level. He might as well do his job and quietly watch from the side.