137: Trip to South Korea 5

At the negotiation table, the two parties sat on opposite sides. LG was very keen on this collaboration with Red Star, so they had made all the arrangements exceptionally formal.

However, no matter how much importance they placed on it, Zheng Dongxiu still felt that he should maintain the dominant position, especially regarding the price of the screens, which should be decided by LG.

After all, LG's panels were currently considered top-tier in the entire mobile phone industry.

"Mr. Tang, we are very willing to establish a strong partnership with Red Star. Therefore, our Board of Directors discussed and decided yesterday to provide your company with 1 million screens at a price of 23 billion Korean Won."

Tang Mang frowned. Had these Bangzi people planned this? They immediately quoted over a thousand yuan per screen.

However, having already discussed the strategy with CEO Chen yesterday, Tang Mang remained calm and collected. Instead of responding to Zheng Dongxiu's price quote, he first brought up the disparity between LG and Samsung.

"The quality of your company's screens still lags behind Samsung's to some extent, but I believe Samsung's screen production technology is actually inferior to yours."

"The reason Samsung's screens have superior visual quality is simply that they were the first to master a better screen arrangement method."

"Samsung independently controls the patent for Diamond Arrangement, preventing you from using it. This results in your company possessing excellent production technology but being unable to achieve the same screen quality as Samsung."

"Am I right, CEO Zheng?"

Tang Mang's remarks to the LG representatives left the people on the other side completely bewildered.

What did he mean?

Weren't they just talking about screen procurement and collaboration?

Why did he suddenly drag their company and Samsung into the conversation?

Although Zheng Dongxiu and the others looked confused, they generally agreed with Tang Mang's assessment.

LG and Samsung started almost simultaneously in the field of oled screens. When faced with the superior Diamond Arrangement method, LG wanted to register the patent for it, but the patent had already been registered by a USA company.

When LG tried to contact the USA company, they discovered it had been acquired by Samsung. This instantly left LG Company completely helpless.

They tried negotiating with Samsung for authorization, but Samsung, unwilling to see a competitor grow stronger, outright refused. When LG tried to register patents for other arrangements as a fallback, they found those patents had also been registered, this time by a company from China.

This is why LG's screens, despite being technically and technologically on par with Samsung's, cannot achieve the same visual quality as Samsung's screens.

"If Red Star can enable LG's screen quality to reach Samsung's level, I wonder if your company would be willing to engage in deep cooperation with Red Star?"

Tang Mang's sudden turn in conversation stunned Zheng Dongxiu and the others. At that moment, a thought surfaced in his mind.

Could it be that Red Star registered the patents for the other excellent screen arrangement methods?

This was the content of the discussion Tang Mang and Chen Chen had last night: Since domestic companies currently couldn't produce the screens Red Star wanted, and Samsung was making exorbitant demands for Yangtze River Battery technology, the fallback was to procure from LG and first give Samsung something to worry about.

"What?!"

Zheng Dongxiu looked at the Patent Grade Certificate on the phone Tang Mang handed over, his face filled with disbelief.

He truly hadn't expected that, besides Samsung, the technical patent for this kind of Diamond-like Arrangement was actually acquired by Red Star.

Tang Mang and Dr. Zhou watched Zheng Dongxiu intently staring at the patent certificate on the phone, feeling a bit smug.

Didn't those damn Samsung Bangzi people want to rip off Red Star with exorbitant prices?

Well, you can play with LG first. It'll be much more interesting if you fight amongst yourselves.

"Manager Tang, this..."

Zheng Dongxiu's eyes were still glued to the phone in Tang Mang's hand, wanting another look at the patent certificate, and his attitude toward Tang Mang became completely respectful.

As a manager who had worked at LG for 20 years and led a company department for over ten years, Zheng Dongxiu naturally understood the significance of this patent and the meaning behind Tang Mang's recent actions.

It was nothing more than Red Star wanting to use this patent as a bargaining chip to be included in the terms of the negotiation.

"CEO Zheng, this is a brand-new arrangement method similar to Samsung's Diamond Arrangement. This arrangement is absolutely no weaker than Samsung's Diamond Arrangement. If this new arrangement method is applied to your company's oled screens, your screen quality will experience a qualitative leap."

"It will be even more popular than Samsung's screens!"

Tang Mang said, staring at Zheng Dongxiu with a smile.

The initiative in the negotiation had now shifted to Red Star. It must be known that the struggle between Samsung and LG was fierce. Samsung, as the largest Chaebol in the South Korea, held absolute status, while LG, the Perennial Runner-up, was constantly suppressed by Samsung.

Not only in terms of domestic Chaebol status, but also in mobile phone business and screen business, Samsung was superior to LG.

No one wants to be the Perennial Runner-up. Naturally, LG's executives were extremely displeased with this situation, and they had only one goal: to overthrow Samsung.

"Manager Tang, how would your company like to cooperate?"

Zheng Dongxiu now treated Tang Mang as his equal, genuinely wanting to discuss business with Red Star.

After all, if they could obtain this patent, the screens they produced would be completely on par with Samsung's. As long as they could surpass Samsung, LG was willing to pay a price.

Seeing that the other side had finally adopted a proper posture and was willing to talk, Tang Mang unhurriedly stated the plan he had discussed with Chen Chen long ago.

"First, LG must become Red Star's screen supplier, providing at least 15 million top-tier Diamond-like Arrangement screens annually."

"Second, LG Company makes from selling screens to Red Star must not exceed 20% of its cost, including hardware costs and labor costs."

Tang Mang's meaning was that LG should provide it at cost price, but Red Star wasn't so harsh as to be stingy; naturally, they couldn't let LG work for free, so they offered a 20% profit.

"Of course, in return, we will license the patent for Pearl Arrangement to LG."

"What about the duration?" Zheng Dongxiu asked.

"Two years, with an annual licensing fee of 20 million."

Zheng Dongxiu was stunned after hearing Tang Mang's demands, feeling that the other party's conditions were somewhat difficult to meet.

The first condition was manageable. LG's oled screens were currently only used in their own mobile phones, but LG's mobile phone market share was constantly decreasing, making it impossible to fully absorb the screen production capacity.

It should be noted that LG's mobile phone shipments were much, much lower than Samsung's, but the screen production line capacity did not have such a large gap compared to the phone market share.

Therefore, selling off excess capacity was understandable; after all, higher screen shipments could help smooth out the cost of each screen.

But the second condition made Zheng Dongxiu somewhat uncomfortable.