For most women, a phone camera isn't judged by raw pixels but by how kindly it paints their faces, and Heifeng keeps that fact at the center of every roadmap. Duowei Mobile—a company built on "beauty-cam" magic but now bleeding cash—has exactly the portrait engine he wants, so when Secretary Xiao Ai delivers the latest numbers, he listens without looking up from the spec sheet he's annotating.
"One hundred million yuan."
"A small goal," he mutters, borrowing the meme about outrageous fortunes, yet his tone stays flat. One hundred million for a shuttered factory, a fading brand, and a design team that hasn't released a hit in three years feels padded. He calls Operations Chief Liu Jianyu. "Talk them down. Eighty million or we walk."
Eight zero zero—hard ceiling. If Duowei refuses, China Star can always spend money expanding its camera lab. Chief Liu heads off to negotiate.
Duowei's boardroom smells of stale coffee and desperation. Founder Fan Jiaxin, once hailed the "pink-phone king," lays out China Star's offer to a room of weary directors. Duowei shifted a million glitter-painted handsets at its peak a year, but a 2024 overproduction gamble left half a million units aging in warehouses and ¥200 million of red ink on the books. Cash is gone, assembly lines are idle, and salaries are months behind. Fan reads the figure—¥80 million (≈ $11.0 million)—then looks for defiance. None appears; each director is already calculating how much debt that check would extinguish. "Sell," someone whispers. Nods ripple around the table. A silent vote seals it: Dove Mobile, as a brand, is finished.
Negotiators meet in Shenshi. The talks are swift because the weak have no leverage. Only one non-price demand survives: all engineers must stay employed for at least a year. Heifeng agrees before the sentence is finished; the people are the real prize. Contracts fly across the table, pens scratch, and cameras flash. Fan Jiaxin smiles as he shakes Heifeng's hand, but defeat hangs over him like a damp coat. The transition team will need a week to inventory assets: forty-odd software engineers, two aging SMT lines, tens of thousands of unsold phones, and—most valuable—a proprietary low-light beautification engine that has no equal in domestic brands.
Heifeng leaves the paperwork to the legal and boards the late flight back to Jiangcheng. Every hour saved is an hour closer to market.
He walks into design headquarters before dawn, hooks a fresh sheet on the whiteboard, and writes in thick marker:
Series name: Hongmeng L
Core feature: AI portrait engine (Duowei code)
Target finish options: Lavender Dream / Mint Frost
Price window: ¥ 2,499 – ¥ 2,999 (≈ $340 – $410)
Launch day: Qixi Festival, nationwide "Confession Phone" campaign
Head of ID design Yang Qiang arrives, coffee in hand, and reads the list. "That overlaps the S-series a bit."
"Only if we fumble the messaging," Heifeng answers. "S is fashion-focused, but L is emotion-focused—romance, selfies, gifts. Two lanes, no crash."
Yang nods; the distinction is subtle yet sharp.
Later that morning, Liu Jianyu returns with final procurement numbers for the third-generation Hongmeng S. Marketing begs for a 35-watt SuperCharge headline, but that tech belongs to the high-end X-series; diluting it would blur brand tiers and steal thunder from the upcoming X3 after a moment's thought Heifeng rules: 25-watt fast charge max, full battery in under two hours, still better than any rival in the price class. He signs the component order and glances at the clock—Samsung's Galaxy S6 Pro is rumored to launch early, Huawei and Xiaomi plan Snapdragon 815 flagships, and Oppo's selfie line will surely spin a rebuttal. China Star must hit the market in two directions: brute-force performance with the X3 and flawless portraits with the L-series.
In the afternoon, he visits the newly acquired team's temporary workspace. Most engineers are young women, many balancing motherhood with night-shift bug fixes; their monitors glow with TensorFlow kernels and patchwork datasets of real faces. Heifeng speaks briefly: "Your code makes people feel beautiful. That is power. Use our hardware to amplify it, and we will set a new standard together." The applause is tentative, then genuine. Jobs have been saved; futures reopened.
That evening, the first integration timetable lands in his inbox:
March 15: Port Duowei beauty engine into HarmonyOS camera core.
April 10, Hongmeng S EVT samples delivered with Kunpeng A2 Lite and 25 W charge.
May 20, Hongmeng L industrial design freeze; pastel glass finalized.
Early August Joint launch rehearsal—X3, S3, L1 on the same stage.
The numbers add up; the pressure feels right. He sends one final instruction: no delays.
Outside, Jiangcheng's skyline blurs into orange dusk. Competitors will strike from every side, but tonight, Heifeng owns the beauty niche outright and paid less than the cost of a single Samsung billboard to secure it. He closes the office blinds and lets the city lights fade. Tomorrow brings a new prototype, another battle, and fresh ground to seize. For now, victory tastes like the quiet hum of engineers turning borrowed code into a flagship killer.