Chapter 153: Pride

Cheongun Electronics headquarters, Chairman’s office.

Chairman Park Jeong-tae was looking out at the company’s landscape through the glass window.

A strange silence hung in the chairman’s office.

It was a heavy and solid stillness.

“Did Kang say he wanted to meet with me?”

“Yes, Chairman.”

Chief Secretary Jang Yong-hoon answered quietly.

Moon Seong-il, CEO of Cheongun Electronics, who was sitting next to him, also glanced down.

“He wants us to handle the outsourced production of the Quantum?”

“Since the Quantum is doing so well in the market, it seems like a strategy to outsource the budget line and focus their own production on the premium models.”

“…Hmm.”

Chairman Park Jeong-tae inhaled silently.

He didn’t show it, but there was no way his pride wasn’t hurt.

“I knew he was extraordinary from the first time I saw him, but to grow this much in just a few years…”

“If we had adopted Lunar from the start instead of insisting on our internal OS, the situation might be a little better than it is now.”

“It was a necessary choice at the time.”

Secretary Jang nodded at Chairman Park’s words.

He knew and understood.

“It was a time of fierce power struggles.”

Chairman Park had a premonition that the mobile market would change rapidly after the arrival of the A-Phone and preemptively attempted to switch to smartphones.

Of course, the catalyst was none other than the success of the first touch phone, ‘Proda,’ which Kang Tae-joon had proposed.

But the problem was that the performance of Lunar, made by Dojin, was too overwhelming.

Thanks to KTalk and Ani-pung, which were released with it, the market instantly accepted Lunar as the standard.

Their painstakingly developed OS disappeared from the market without even getting a chance to shine.

“So…”

Secretary Jang cautiously opened his mouth.

“I don’t think we should only see their proposal in a bad light.”

“Why?”

“I’ll explain that part.”

CEO Moon looked up and continued.

“The growth of Lunar and Quantum in the smartphone market cannot be ignored. Market share is also rising rapidly in proportion to production.”

“There’s a high possibility that the future smartphone market will be restructured into a Quantum-A-Phone duopoly.”

Since Lunar had already won one OS competition, there was a good chance that Quantum would become the overwhelming number one.

“So you’re saying we should pick up whatever crumbs fall from the table?”

Though shaken, Chairman Park still looked displeased.

“Chairman, these aren’t just crumbs. This is an opportunity to officially collaborate with the number one company in a smartphone market that will reach 1.3 billion units annually.”

The chairman’s eyes flickered at the unexpectedly large number.

And he unconsciously did the math in his head.

A 1.3 billion unit market.

Even if Quantum only took half of that, it would be 650 million units.

As far as he knew, Dojin’s current capacity was around 90 million units.

So if they could get just 100-200 million of those…

The size of Cheongun Electronics’ mobile division could be two or three times larger than it is now.

“Ahem.”

Having finished his calculations, Chairman Park cleared his throat.

And, unlike before, he asked Secretary Jang with a considerably softened expression.

“So when did Kang say he wanted to meet?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Do we still have that Longjing tea I brought back from Hangzhou last time?”

“Yes, I’ll prepare it in advance.”

“We have an important guest coming. We should show him that courtesy.”

The next day.

“It’s been a while, Chairman.”

“Come in. Is this your first time since the Qatar International Financial District project?”

“Yes, I’m sorry I haven’t visited more often.”

Chairman Park let out a hearty laugh.

“Everyone knows how busy you are. I’m just grateful you contacted me first.”

“As you may have heard, the reason I’m here today is…”

“Ah… I heard about that from Secretary Jang. You want us to handle the outsourced production of the Quantum?”

I nodded.

“Can you help us?”

“Well, you don’t have to ask such an obvious question between us. Of course, we’ll help.”

Even though I was in a position to be sufficiently confident, I deliberately lowered myself.

Camera modules, the Qatar Financial District project, and more.

Cheongun Group, especially Chairman Park, had helped Dojin a lot to get to where it is today.

So instead of saying ‘outsourcing,’ I said ‘please help’ to preserve our pride.

“So…”

“How many do you need us to make?”

Even before I could speak, CEO Moon asked, seeming anxious.

This alone showed that the situation in Cheongun Electronics’ mobile division wasn’t just a rumor.

“Make as many as you can.”

“Huh?”

CEO Moon looked puzzled, not understanding immediately.

I smiled and answered.

“What I mean is that even if you produce as much as Cheongun’s current capacity, we can handle the demand.”

“Wow.”

Not only CEO Moon but also Chairman Park and Secretary Jang gasped.

They knew the Quantum was selling well, but they didn’t expect this much.

“The number we can currently produce is… about 3.5 million units.”

“3.5 million units would be about 40 million units annually.”

It wasn’t a huge number, but it was a reasonable scale.

Just before smartphones came out, Cheongun Electronics sold about 70 million mobile units annually.

Considering the decrease and the current sales volume, the numbers roughly matched.

“If it’s not enough, we can increase our capacity.”

At Chairman Park’s words, I brightened and looked at him.

“Really?”

“Hehe, it seems like the situation has changed strangely.”

“Huh?”

“What I mean is that it’s not you who should be happy, but us who should be happier. Since our production will increase that much, there’s no reason to object.”

“Oh.”

Only then did I understand what he meant and nodded.

“I didn’t think that far because I’m the one in need.”

“Is the shortage that severe?”

Chairman Park’s eyes turned serious.

“With Quantum 2 sales more than double the forecast and Quantum 1-S and 1-A volumes also surging, our current production lines are woefully insufficient to meet demand.”

“Wow.”

“And for Cheongun, this proposal means more than just outsourced production.”

I paused for a moment and looked directly into Chairman Park’s eyes.

“This collaboration will be a crucial turning point for the Quantum brand to replace feature phones. If Cheongun is known not just as an outsourcing company but as Dojin’s global partner in this process, it will benefit us all, won’t it?”

Chairman Park’s eyes flickered slightly.

“…You’re saying that the Lunar and Quantum you created will ultimately set the market standard.”

In a way, it was a very bold statement.

“You know the possibilities well enough, don’t you?”

Secretary Jang and I had already discussed this before Kang Tae-joon arrived.

Chairman Park nodded.

And for a while, he remained silent in thought.

Secretary Jang and CEO Moon also held their breath, waiting for Chairman Park’s reaction.

Then, having made his decision, Chairman Park slowly stood up.

“Whether what you say is true or not is for the market to judge, but Cheongun will join you in that market and see for ourselves.”

“Thank you, Chairman.”

As I stood up and bowed politely, Chairman Park nodded with a satisfied expression.

That afternoon, at Dojin headquarters.

As soon as the news of the contract with Cheongun was announced, Hong Chung-ki and Oh Seong-hak cheered.

“Is this finally giving us some breathing room?”

“I really didn’t think Cheongun would put aside its pride and take on our outsourced production.”

“Chairman Park Jeong-tae made the decision after seeing our growth.”

At Seong-hwan’s words, I nodded.

“He’s been watching us for a long time.”

“Anyway, now we’ll hand over all budget model production to Cheongun and shift our production system to focus on premium models.”

“And please assign dedicated personnel to support Cheongun in starting production as quickly as possible.”

The sooner Cheongun starts production…

The sooner we can dismantle Ahsung’s stronghold—that much was obvious.

Six months later, at Ahsung Group’s chairman’s office.

Slam!

Chairman Cheon Ho-tae slammed the table hard.

A heavy thud echoed through the chairman’s office, along with a tense atmosphere.

“You call… this garbage a performance report?”

His voice was low, but filled with anger.

In front of him lay the recent performance report of the mobile division.

The chart showed a sharply rising curve of Quantum 1-A shipments…

And in stark contrast, a plummeting curve of Ahsung feature phone shipments.

“Dojin’s budget model sales last month alone were a whopping 15 million units.”

“I didn’t expect Dojin to release so many Quantum 1-A units.”

Cheon Jun-young wiped away his sweat and spoke.

It had been six months since Cheon Jun-young took over the mobile division from Senior Vice President Moon Yong-wook.

But there was no sign of recovery.

“So what are our shipment numbers?”

“Smartphones are at 1.2 million units, and feature phones are… 8.7 million units.”

“Hmph.”

Chairman Cheon Ho-tae’s expression hardened.

Shipments, which had been over 15 million units per month, had dropped by more than 30% in just six months.

Director Kim Seong-jae cautiously added an explanation.

“…In most emerging countries, the Quantum 1-A is overwhelmingly outperforming our feature phones, so we need to come up with a response.”

Chairman Cheon glared at Kim Seong-jae, annoyed.

“It’s your job to find that method. So what’s the plan?”

Director Kim slowly inhaled.

If he couldn’t present a clear strategy here,

he might be demoted like Senior Vice President Moon.

“…The feature phone market has already reached its structural limit.”

“What?”

“While there’s still a demand of around 400 million units annually in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Africa, that demand is rapidly being replaced by low-cost smartphones.”

“Like Dojin’s… Quantum 1-A?”

“Exactly. Feature phones, which only offer texting and calling, are no match for the Quantum, which offers app compatibility based on Lunar, user experience, and… design completeness.”

Chairman Cheon silently looked at Director Kim.

It was a silent signal to keep talking.

“It’s no longer possible to maintain competitiveness with feature phones. We need to reduce production and resources. Instead, we should focus all our efforts on developing smartphones, especially the premium model, Titan 4.”

Cheon Jun-young nodded slightly.

He, too, knew better than anyone that they had to recover their lost smartphone market share.

“How’s the Titan 4 preparation going?”

This time, Cheon Jun-young spoke up.

“The Titan 4 is being developed with performance that’s not even comparable to the Titan 3.”

Cheon Jun-young brought up the data and continued his detailed explanation.

“We plan to significantly boost performance centered around the next-generation mobile processor, A-Core X4. Compared to the X3 in the Titan 3, CPU performance is improved by 40%, and GPU performance by over 70%.”

“What about storage?”

“It will feature UFS 3.1, two generations ahead of UFS 2.0. The write speed is up to 1,200 MB/s, and the read speed exceeds 2,100 MB/s. Although Quantum 2 caught up with SDRAM caching, this gap is absolutely unbridgeable.”

Cheon Jun-young’s face was full of confidence as he explained the Titan 4’s specs.

And Chairman Cheon, listening, seemed to think it was quite possible.

This time, he instructed them to focus all their efforts and definitively bring Dojin down a notch.