Not Giving an Inch

Han Luyi and Su Niannian got out of their ride-hailing car ten minutes ahead of schedule.

Su Niannian glanced up at the sign as she entered the building. "Don't you think their sign is more understated than Azure Peak's?"

"Azure Peak started with consumer-facing products, so their sign needs to stand out. Tianshu mainly serves enterprise clients. The more understated it is, the more solid and reliable it looks," Han Luyi guessed. Su Niannian nodded.

The elevator reached the eighteenth floor, and the two gave their names at the front desk. After two minutes, a man in a light gray suit hurried out.

"Mr. Han, Ms. Su? I'm Zhou Mingyuan. Please, come in."

"Nice to meet you." Han Luyi shook Zhou Mingyuan's hand, and the three of them headed for a conference room.

Zhou Mingyuan looked to be in his early forties, with thinning hair. He spoke at half Liang Yu's pace.

"The strategic investment team forwarded the materials to me. I've reviewed them." He got straight to the point. "Forty-seven paying teams are deployed with us. That's a very good foundation."

"Several of our paying customers on Tianshu Cloud have mentioned wanting native integration." Su Niannian slid her tablet over. "We compiled a summary of their feedback. Please have a look."

Zhou Mingyuan flipped through two pages, then closed it.

"The data source was self-reported by the clients?"

"We conducted a sampling survey."

"Mm." He set the tablet back on the table.

Han Luyi activated Sight.

"Ms. Su, pull up the backend so Mr. Zhou can see the real-time data."

Su Niannian glanced at Han Luyi, opened BugKiller's backend, filtered the platform to Tianshu Cloud, and handed the tablet over.

Zhou Mingyuan took it and scrolled as he looked through it, lingering for a while on the latency monitoring section.

"What kind of pipeline latency do large teams get?"

"Eight minutes," Su Niannian said. "Three to four minutes for small teams, five to six for medium-sized ones. Non-native integration adds an extra relay layer, so every build has to wait. Large teams run dozens of builds a day. The impact is significant."

Zhou Mingyuan turned to Han Luyi. "Mr. Han, how far have your talks with Azure Peak progressed?"

"Azure Peak gave us a proposal for deep cooperation. We're evaluating it."

"I know Azure Peak's style. They come in demanding exclusivity, using guaranteed minimums in exchange for lock-in." He handed the tablet back. "Our approach is different. We want to provide the best customer experience, so I care more about what BugKiller can bring to Tianshu Cloud users."

"Understood," Han Luyi said. "We prepared a cooperation proposal."

Su Niannian switched the tablet to the proposal document Lu Mingzhou had prepared and passed it back.

Zhou Mingyuan scrolled to the section on Tianshu-exclusive adaptation.

"This caching layer was added recently?"

"It went live this week. We optimized the caching layer for Tianshu Cloud's API, bringing large-team latency down from eight minutes to four or five. But to truly solve the problem, we still need native integration."

"Email me a copy of the proposal. I'll take it back and put it through the process. My boss can make the call directly, so it won't need to go through layer after layer of approval." Zhou Mingyuan handed back the tablet. "I'll give you an answer next week."

"Looking forward to it."

In the elevator, Su Niannian let out a breath.

"Why did you suddenly have me open the backend?"

"He didn't believe our report." Han Luyi watched the floor numbers tick downward. "He's a pragmatist."

"Do you think it'll work out?"

"Didn't I tell you? They're all within range."

Once they left the Tianshu building, Han Luyi glanced across the street.

"Come on. Let's eat before heading back. Tell Mingzhou to order takeout for himself."

Su Niannian sent Lu Mingzhou a WeChat message, and the two turned into a noodle shop nearby.

"Do you think Zhou Mingyuan will report to his boss today?" Su Niannian lifted her bowl and blew on it.

"No work talk while we're eating."

Su Niannian smiled and started talking about a post she had seen yesterday on Little Red Book, about a product manager who had switched careers to baking. It had over a hundred thousand views, and the comments were full of people saying, "I want to quit too." Han Luyi said she was basically unemployed now, wasn't she? Su Niannian said this was called entrepreneurship. It was different.

Halfway through the noodles, Han Luyi's phone rang.

It was an unfamiliar number.

"Is this Mr. Han from Source Code Technology? I'm Chen Kai from Kunlun Cloud's Developer Ecosystem Department."

Su Niannian's chopsticks froze in midair.

"Mr. Chen, hello."

"Here's the thing. We noticed your company has recently been in contact with Azure Peak Cloud and Tianshu Cloud. Kunlun Cloud is also expanding into AI developer tools, so I wanted to ask whether Mr. Han would be interested in talking?"

"I'm interested. When?"

"Would next Wednesday afternoon work for you? We have an event in Haicheng on Thursday, so I'll arrive a day early."

"Sure. I'll add you on WeChat, and we can confirm the exact time there. Is this the number to use?"

Han Luyi hung up and turned to Su Niannian, clearly holding back a laugh.

Su Niannian lowered her head and kept eating without looking up. "No work talk while we're eating."

"So not only did you meet with Tianshu, Kunlun came knocking too?"

By the time they returned to 502, it was almost two o'clock. Su Niannian rattled off everything about Tianshu and Kunlun in one go, and Lu Mingzhou opened his mouth in surprise.

"Neither of them wants exclusivity?"

"Tianshu explicitly doesn't. We haven't discussed Kunlun's terms yet, but they approached us, so their stance won't be too hard."

"Then Azure Peak is all that's left."

"Azure Peak will come back."

At the end of August, sunlight filtered through the branches and leaves of plane trees, scattering patches of shadow over the blue-brick road. The ground floors of the old buildings lining the street had all been converted into shops, milk tea stores and convenience shops crammed together, filling the air with an indescribable mix of smells. Pinewind Teahouse was tucked away at the end of an alley, its storefront barely half a room wide, with a faded wooden sign hanging outside. Chen Kai had arranged the place.

Han Luyi came to the meeting alone.

Chen Kai looked to be in his early forties. His hair was gray at the temples and slicked back, and he wore an expensive gray suit. He looked more like a finance professional than someone from the tech industry.

He poured Pu'er tea for both of them, then set the teapot aside.

"Mr. Han, I'll be direct. Dingsheng's CodeSafe has too much momentum. Kunlun can't afford to have nothing. I came here sincerely."

Han Luyi activated Sight.

Chen Kai pulled a document from his briefcase and slid it across the table.

"This is our proposal. Non-exclusive, an 85/15 revenue split, a monthly guaranteed minimum of 150,000, with promotional resources calculated separately."

Han Luyi lifted his teacup and took a sip.

Once the traffic picked up, the revenue share would be substantial, and the guaranteed minimum would be meaningless. The minimum wasn't worth fighting over. The revenue share was the long-term money.

"The minimum is fine. I'd like to discuss the revenue share."

Chen Kai had not expected him to ignore the minimum. "Eighty-five-fifteen is our standard term."

"Standard terms are for standard products," Han Luyi said. "Mr. Chen, I want 92%."

Chen Kai ran his thumb around the rim of his cup.

"Ninety-ten. I can approve that."

"92%," Han Luyi said. "That's my offer. It won't change."

Chen Kai slapped his thigh.

"Mr. Han, you really won't give an inch. That's beyond my authority. I'll have to ask my superiors." As he spoke, he stood and walked outside with his phone.

Han Luyi sat quietly.

A few minutes later, Chen Kai returned. "Mr. Han, good news. My superiors agreed. Once I'm back, I'll put it through the process and send you the revised proposal."

"Pleasure working with you." Han Luyi stood.

Source Code Technology's executives gathered around a whiteboard in 502.

Tianshu: Non-exclusive / 200,000 guaranteed minimum / 85%

Kunlun: Non-exclusive / 150,000 guaranteed minimum / 92%

Azure Peak: -

Lu Mingzhou let out a breath. "Azure Peak is all that's left."

Han Luyi stared at the blank space on the whiteboard. "Azure Peak will come back."

His phone rang.

Caller ID: Azure Peak - Liang Yu.

502 fell silent. When Su Niannian saw the screen, she sat up straighter.

Han Luyi answered.

"Mr. Han, about what happened last time... we handled it a little too hastily."