Reborn America, this is my time

Chapter 36 Cash, No Cows

"What?"

This fact surprised Ethan.

"Why?"

Ethan didn't understand.

And that look of frowning, there is a kind of attitude that whoever stops me from making money will die!

Such an excited performance made Nolan laugh, and he pressed out his cigarette, "Okay~Okay~ Ethan~ don't get excited~"

He put his hands down and said: "Ethan, to be honest, if possible, I also hope that the time to sell the goods can be as long as possible, but this kind of thing is impossible, because if you go east, the cost of selling goods will be higher." It is greater than the profit of the product itself.”

"You should know Ray Kroc, right? He is the father of McDonald's! He created a standardized kitchen! He created a food supply chain system! But even so, they need to find multiple suppliers in North America for their own Restaurants offer standardized products."

"No matter what kind of company it is, if you want to spread your business all over Mimi, you must have multiple factories across Mimi, because factories in a single region cannot deliver across Mimi."

Speaking of this, Nolan paused, pointed to the map behind him and said, "But we, Atari, only have one factory, or in other words, so far only two game companies, Sega and Mirov, have multiple factories in the whole of Mirai. a branch."

"In this way, troublesome things will appear. Take the route you ran before as an example. From our California to Houston and Austin in Texas, the total distance is about [-] miles. One round trip, then It will take a week."

"We don't even count the cost of gas, a round trip of 200 gallons of gas is only a few hundred dollars, and the cost of personnel is also negligible. Even if each of us has a daily board and lodging subsidy of ten dollars, it is only more than [-] for three people a week. "

"But I have to calculate the labor cost of the production staff."

Nolan Bushnell looked at Ethan with a smile on his face, and pointed his left thumb outside his office.

"We at Atari have more than 100 employees. It is their existence that we can continue to produce circuit boards. The weekly salary of these people is 1 US dollars. That is to say, when you take more than 100 When a circuit board worth even 200 yuan goes to Texas, your profit from this trip can only offset our normal personnel expenses at Atari, and at the same time, the income from selling goods for me and Tang is the real source of our share."

"As for why there are no other branch factories?"

Having said that, Nolan stopped.

There was helplessness on his face.

"Ethan, I don't think I need to answer this point?"

"Everyone in the industry knows that electronic arcade machines really don't make much money."

"If we can really make crazy profits and compensate Mi Luohua in full, how can Professor Ralph Bell agree to a settlement? The professor actually knows, or everyone knows, that the electronic arcade is just a reputation It's just pretty!"

"Because the ones who really make money in this industry are those merchants who buy arcade machines!"

Nolan Bushnell's little calculation made Ethan feel a little bit emotional.

In his previous life, video games were globally recognized cash cows. Every time a global financial crisis came, no one who worked on video games could survive it.

Pig farm relies on games, from the era of the three major portals until 2023. Goose Factory also relies on video games, and all the BAs left behind. Mi Huyou even sucked out tens of billions in cash flow. Having said that, the former has always been a blue-chip stock held by Liben National Pension Fund all the year round, while the latter has been rumored to go bankrupt every year, but it was still brought back by the game.

However, making money from video games does not mean making money from arcade machines.

The electronic arcade industry is a one-shot business. Game companies sell arcade machines to various merchants to earn meager profits. Merchants are the real revenue kings because they earn money from players.

When opening up the channel of game companies collecting money directly from players, the video game industry actually seems to be glamorous.

And how to get through this channel?
Professor Ralph Bell has actually told the world.

That is to do home hosting.

Only by truly selling video games to players!Video games need to be cash cows!

But something like a host...

The personal computer just came out~
When Ethan thought of all this, he also put away his anger and laughed, "Nolan, I understand what you mean, the principle of cost-benefit~"

At the same time, he also asked: "But if we don't sell, we don't want the market in the east? You know, people in New York, Chicago, and Boston are very rich!"

"Bring "Snake Game" over there, no matter what, you can earn 200 million!"

"Oh~ Ethan~ This is actually what I want to tell you next!" Nolan Bushnell rubbed his hands eagerly, and said with a smile: "Actually, in the past week or so, the United States has The game producers in the central and eastern regions are all looking for me, wanting to reach a cooperation with our Atari.”

"I think this cooperation is feasible, but the content..."

Nolan didn't finish speaking, but took out a document from the drawer and pushed it in front of Ethan.

Ethan opened it and saw that the first page was filled with the name of the company and their cooperation plan.

A game company in New York proposed to obtain the production authorization of "Snake Game".

For this, they are willing to pay [-]% of the net profit of each machine.

A game company in Miami said that they want to authorize the game board of "Snake Game".

In return, they would give Atari a fixed ten-dollar remuneration for every game motherboard sold.

Since Ethan directly handed over the authorization of "Snake Game" to Atari in a one-year period when signing the contract, Nolan Bushnell didn't have to give him the authorization to follow the normal process. Look at this kind of stuff.

Because no matter what method Nolan uses to sell "Snake Game" to the East Coast, no matter which partner Nolan chooses to sign and what kind of cooperation contract, Ethan will ship according to the price of Atari and the final reimbursement. Quantitatively drawn.Even if others sell it for $[-], he still draws Atari for $[-].But the offer now let him know how much people in this era look down on creativity.

"Eight percent of the profit for each machine, and you want to win the authorization for a price of ten dollars?"

Ethan threw the document on the table directly, "These people really look ugly and want to be beautiful!"

"Pfft!" Nolan Bushnell laughed outright.

Shrugging his shoulders, he said, "No way, if Mi Luohua hadn't sued all the plagiarists in the market after we reached a settlement with Mi Luohua, they would probably continue to copy."

Yes, if Mi Luohua hadn't turned into Disney and vowed to give a blow to all infringers, then the sales of "Snake Game" would definitely not be as smooth as it is now.

Only when the iron fist hits these plagiarists, will they know what pain is!

But being beaten doesn't mean they are sensible!

Who really wants to pay licensing fees after making a quick buck!
"So, you don't want to discuss this with me, do you?"

Ethan knocked on the table and asked, "To be honest, after seeing the conditions above, I feel like my own blood pressure has risen."

"Yeah~ brother~ I feel the same as you, I think these guys are very funny!" Nolan complained.

Then he changed the subject and said, "However, among so many companies, there are still two that are full of sincerity."

"One is Midway Games and one is Chicago Coin."

Nolan picked up the documents that Ethan had dropped, flipped through them briefly, and pushed the information of those two families in front of him.

With a glance, the information related to it was also understood by Ethan.

Midway Games, was born in 1958, and Chicago Coin, was born in 1932, they were all doing traditional coin-operated arcade machines before, they have rich market channels, and have certain experience in the production of electronic arcade machines.

As for experience, how did Atari know?
Very simple!
These two companies have both made imitations of table tennis games, and they are both sitting in Mirov's dock!
With the endorsement of Mi Luohua, even a ghost knows that they have made money!
Perhaps it is because these two companies are both in Chicago and have had certain connections, so their cooperation plan was proposed jointly. They are willing to jointly win the "Corruption" of the 32 states in the eastern and central regions of the United States that Atari does not want to involve. For the distribution rights of Snake Eater, they can pay a [-]% cut of the selling price for the whole machine, while for the game motherboard, they are willing to pay a fixed fee of [-] dollars per game motherboard.

If it's just these, then Nolan would not say that they are full of sincerity.

What really surprised Ethan was that they wrote the calculation criteria for commission and fixed fee.

The two companies stated that because the arcade machine "Snake Game" cannot gamble and does not overlap with the traditional business of their two companies, their existing customers will not treat them in the same way as emerging electronic companies.

In order to seize the market, they directly set the price of a game console at [-] US dollars when they released the copycat version of "Pong", which is different from Atari's [-] US dollars. If it is easy to improve, a complete machine can take away [-] dollars from them, which is already their limit. If they are improving, they can't even pay the workers' wages.

The situation of the game motherboard is the same. They want to win "Snkae Game" because they want to occupy the market share of electronic arcade machines in the market, so the price of their replacement motherboard is only 240 US dollars, and the material cost is 150 US dollars. With a cost of [-] dollars, their gross profit is only [-] dollars, [-] dollars will be allocated to Atari, and the remaining [-] dollars can only maintain the company's normal expenses.

Therefore, they knew that their offer might not meet Atari's expectations, but they still hoped to get the authorization.

To be honest, Ethan didn't really believe what they said.

Capitalists don't pursue profit?

Are you doing this for charity?
But this kind of detailed planning made him feel very comfortable.

how to say?

There is a feeling of someone telling you with all their heart, I know your product is good, if you can, please let me do it.

The thirst revealed between the lines made Ethan secretly happy.

Of course.

After he had a good time, he didn't express his opinion.

Throwing the document back again, he smiled and said, "Nolan, Atari is yours."

"This is your company."

"As a partner in a single project, I will only perform the obligations in the contract normally, how can I interfere with the operation of your company?"

"You know, I'm only interested in this right now..."

Ethan raised his right hand, rubbing his thumb, index finger and middle finger together.

"Okay! Okay! Okay!" Ethan's explicit statement made Nolan laugh out loud.

"Split, right? I understand!"

"Give me two weeks, and I will transfer the share of the first phase to you."

"What about the reward for changing boards?" Ethan asked with a smile.

This question made Nolan shake his head with a smile.

Pulled out the company checkbook from the drawer and wrote a check for $5124.

"Here! Here you are!"

　Note: ① The Odyssey, the world's first commercial home game console, does not have a CPU. It is purely the charm of physical photoelectric response. I don't know how Ralph Bell simulated the photoelectric feedback of more than a dozen games with one machine. And it's only the size of a briefcase. The US Patent and Copyright Office has his patent drawings. I can't understand them, but I was shocked. ②Midway Games is a very powerful company, and he made Mortal Kombat. ③The electronic arcade industry is the most garbage industry in the entire electronic game field. This view is recognized by the industry. The most famous one is actually Nintendo. Hiroshi Yamauchi, the president of Nintendo at the time, once thought of making arcade machines by himself, selling and publishing them himself, and then doing After two years, I gave up, because electronic arcade machines are the art of real estate, and the real customers are those who open entertainment venues. Game companies can't earn money from players at all. Therefore, when Hiroshi Yamauchi found out about this situation, he directly So I gave up the arcade market, preferring to authorize production to others, rather than accumulating labor, and then transferred the research and development line to the development of home game consoles.Not only that, but Sega and Atari also actually tried to occupy the arcade field by themselves, but in the end they all stayed in a corner and became the marketing center.It is precisely because they cannot make money that real game companies are crazy about making home consoles. No one is willing to give up the bulk of the profits to middlemen. At the same time, this is also the reason why the game circle respects Ralph Bell. He started Could do arcades, but didn't because he found it wasn't a sustainable business model.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)