Becoming a Russian Oligarch After Rebirth
Chapter 1339 - 1069: Heavyweight Product_2

Chapter 1339: Chapter 1069: Heavyweight Product_2

For example, enlarging the image on the phone and then just displaying a specific part of it on the screen. This action was easy to achieve on the newly launched Apple phone: all you needed to do was spread two fingers apart, and the image would immediately enlarge. Then, by holding the screen, you could freely view any part of the enlarged image.

Perhaps a decade or so later, this would become a commonplace feature, seen as the most basic function of a smartphone.

But in early 2007, none of the phones on the market dared even dream of such a feature...

So many people said that the Apple phone had "reinvented" the mobile phone. Although it may sound exaggerated, there certainly was some truth to it.

After casually trying it out for a bit, Wang Ye passed the phone to the eager Nova and Nalan Yaqi by his side to play with.

Cook saw Wang Ye’s seemingly indifferent process and thought he wasn’t optimistic about this phone, so he cautiously asked, "Mr. Mikhail, do you think this phone is not advanced enough? Are you pessimistic about its sales?"

Wang Ye smiled, shook his head, and said, "No, I am very optimistic about the sales of this phone. In my opinion, even if it is only sold in the North American region this year, the sales of this phone are still expected to reach five million units!"

The figure he mentioned startled Cook.

Five million units, what kind of concept was that? Although for the mobile phone giants of the time, such as Nokia, Motorola, Samsung, and Ericsson, five million was trivial, their sales were often tens or even hundreds of millions.

was the most glorious year for the mobile phone giant Nokia, with a staggering 350 million phones sold throughout the year, capturing 38% of the worldwide mobile phone market—clearly unmatched!

Nokia’s annual revenue also reached over fifty billion Euros. At that time, nobody would have thought that this titan would collapse within a few short years, even selling off its mobile department—including Boss Qiao and Cook never dared to think so!

Of course, this did not include Wang Ye...

However formidable the giant Nokia was, the largest proportion of its sales was still low-end phones.

A simple calculation will show: with an annual revenue of fifty billion Euros and 350 million phones sold, the average price per phone was only around 150 Euros.

In contrast, the Apple phone’s price was much higher than Nokia’s—at 499 US dollars, with only that one price point!

If the sales could reach five million units as Wang Ye said, that would mean a revenue of 2.5 billion US dollars—a great success, to say the least.

After all, this was the first year of the Apple phone’s release, and it was only sold in the North American region.

What about the second year, or when it starts to hit the global market? Wouldn’t the sales figures skyrocket exponentially, reaching twenty million, fifty million, or even over a hundred million in a year...

Honestly, even Cook himself never dared to imagine the new phone selling so much in its first year.

According to his and Boss Qiao’s predictions, although they felt that the product was technologically ahead of its competitors, they had no heritage in the field and were new to the race, so it was unlikely to catch fire immediately.

Since the first year’s sales were limited to the North American region and the market capacity was only so large, coupled with not very ample production capacity, selling one million units would be a great success!

Even in the best-case scenario, that would be around two million units—at most—beyond that, they didn’t dare to dream.

But now, Mikhail had started with a figure of five million units, truly astonishing Cook.

Seeing the bewildered look on Cook’s face, Wang Ye knew he couldn’t believe it or perhaps even Boss Qiao wouldn’t believe that number. But he didn’t offer any more explanation.

There was no need. The future sales data would prove whether he was right or wrong.

Besides, a first-year sales figure of five million wasn’t actually too high. He remembered that in the past life, the first year sales of the Apple phone were indeed not high, seemingly only a little over a million units.

But this life was clearly different.

In the past, although Apple held a conference in early January ’07 to officially unveil the new phone, due to various reasons, the official release didn’t happen until half a year later, and the company didn’t dare invest too much capital in stockpiling inventory. The supply chain wasn’t fully integrated, which resulted in just over a million units being sold.

This time around, with the strong backing of major shareholder Wang Ye, Boss Qiao and Cook were brimming with confidence, and capital was abundant. Integration of the supply chain had already begun, and sales would start directly tomorrow, effectively lengthening the sales period by an entire half year.

Under these circumstances, Wang Ye believed that reaching five million in sales would not be a problem at all.

Once production ramped up, Apple wouldn’t limit itself to the North American market but would also enter the European and Asian markets with Wang Ye’s help!

After all, it was Wang Ye’s own business venture, and of course, he was willing to offer some help.

...

When the time was nearly upon them, Wang Ye and the others were led by Cook to the new product launch venue.

The event was held in a theatre in the San Francisco downtown area.

Apple’s call to action was significant; this time they had spent a lot of money and effectively invited all mainstream media from Europe and the United States, especially those in technology news and magazines, not missing a single one!

Combined with the spontaneous participation of some die-hard fans, the entire theatre was already buzzing with noise and was quite lively.

Backstage, Wang Ye finally met Boss Qiao, who was dressed in his signature style, a black turtleneck sweater paired with jeans.

Seeing Wang Ye, a smile emerged on Boss Qiao’s lean face, and he came over for a big hug with Wang Ye.

He was genuinely grateful for the young major shareholder. After all, it was Mikhail who had extended a helping hand during his most difficult time, investing a substantial amount of cash to buy into Apple and become a major shareholder. Instead of interfering with the company’s internal affairs, he provided unconditional support, allowing him to push the company’s development according to his own ideas.

Hence today’s successful hosting of the new product launch!

"The phone, I’ve already seen it; this product is sure to be successful. It can truly be said that Apple has reinvented the phone; other phone brands will imitate and follow Apple’s lead," Wang Ye said with a smile, patting Boss Qiao’s arm to encourage him.

He also felt regret in his heart because Boss Qiao didn’t have much time left...

A few years prior, Boss Qiao had been diagnosed with cancer and had been receiving treatment, but even with all the money in the world, there was no cure for such a terminal illness; one could only try to delay time.

Boss Qiao himself was aware of this, but he didn’t seem to care much, still working and living as usual.

Perhaps for someone like him, how long he could live was not important; what mattered was whether he could fulfill his dreams, leave something behind in this world, or change something.

Hearing Wang Ye’s words, a smile spread across Boss Qiao’s face, "Reinvented the phone? That’s a great way to put it; I might borrow that line for the event later."

Wang Ye was momentarily taken aback. It seemed like the phrase was something Boss Qiao himself had said at an Apple event in a previous life, which he remembered. He had just subconsciously repeated it.

Now it was being "borrowed" by Boss Qiao to use at the launch, so who would it actually be attributed to...

However, these were unimportant details since the launch was about to begin.

Led by staff, Wang Ye, Nova, Nalan Yaqi, and the others were seated in the front row of the auditorium, with Cook joining them.

Although it hadn’t officially started yet, the hall was already bubbling with excitement. The vast majority of those present were media reporters, all curious about what new product Apple would unveil today, especially since they had gone to the trouble of organizing such a large-scale event, which was quite unusual.

After all, in the past, even if Apple had new products, they wouldn’t hold such large-scale launches, at most just a small press conference at the company headquarters.

Looking at it this way, Apple must have some heavy-hitting new product to announce this time!