Pulse 04 En

2018-01-04

: Tp-Link Pulse 04 En Pulse_04_en pulse resources

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Cover Story

Table of Contents

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Cover Story Showcase

Japan: Fighting Fit in the Land of the Rising

Sun — Exploration of a Retail Market

Technical Support: When Wi-Fi is Down,

We're Always Around

Headquarters: AEO — Together We Can

Smart Home: Stand by Me — Together We

Embrace a Limitless Future

Smartphone: Rebooting Our Smartphone

Business

Colombia: Heroes at the Front

— The Neos Trade Marketing Team

Czech Republic: How to Choose an Ideal

Router — A Microsite for End Users

Brazil: Marketing With Emotion — Bidding

Farewell to a Wi-Fi Legend

Australia: Diligence Redeems Ignorance

— Eorts Do Pay O

Germany: Facebook Marketing on a

Shoestring Budget

Networking BU: Marketing Materials

— The Unsung Hero

Networking & SmartPhone : A Baptism

of Fire — Training the Class of 2017

Getting the Small Things Right

Networking BU: AC5400X Gives Gamers the

Router They’ve Been Waiting For

Networking BU: The Crisis of Trust in

Pakistan

R&D: Getting Closer to Users

Networking BU: The Mystery of MiFi

— Mobile Data Tech Explained

Who

Lives

Manufacturing Department: Strengthening

the Foundation of Our Company

Canada: Keep Calm and Call HR

Brazil: A Mother’s Story

HQ General Aairs Department: Hail to

the Bus Driver

Russia: Become Your Own Personal Lead

UK: It’s Not Just Santa’s Elves Working

Overtime in Q4

An Encounter with the Kitten Family

Triumph in the Skies

Life Through a Lens

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Getting the Small Things Right

During my business trip to America, I learned a proverb:

"Take care of the small things, and the big things will

take care of themselves", meaning that when we focus

on getting the small things right, the larger things will

naturally follow. It’s a simple concept, and should be a

guiding principle for our work today. Some of us tend to

get caught up in larger goals, chasing instant success,

focusing only on huge technological developments and

dreaming of "big wins", but forget that the realization

of goals and the success of a business stem from the

accumulative eect of doing many small things the right

way.

To c o n t i n u e t o d o t h e s m a l l t h i n g s r i g h t i s to u s e t h e

lowest expenditure possible to bear fruits as big as

possible: eectiveness and eciency. This requires

the correct method, attention to detail and hard work.

These three are indispensable. The correct way does

Jerey Chao

not necessarily mean sticking to professionalism or the

industry practices dogmatically, but to keep thinking

and correcting our way of doing things by observing the

actual results.

To succeed in doing the small things right, we have to,

rst of all, listen to real voices in the market, continue

healthy business development, remove any false

elements in sales, and bear in mind that increased

point-of-sale competitiveness is essential for channel

growth and that a good product is the one that can

solve the pain points

of consumers. Meanwhile, do not rush in blind; stay

knowledgeable about our industry. Secondly, we

have to focus on details. For example, we have to

check if the product features we design grasp the

essence of the users’ pain points or not, that the

message on the product package is attractive and

Cover Story

convincing, that the assortment of products provided

to retailers is competitive and can sell out, and that the

content on the online product page is useful, helps

to increase consumers’ condence in us and makes

it easy for consumers to make the choice. Finally,

we have to keep working hard and never be afraid of

trouble. For instance, if we had worked harder, instead

of holding back with hesitation and fear, we could have

created an EAP community forum sooner. The R&D

department is forever bargaining with the Sales team

over minor changes to products. If they spent less time

in discussions and used more time on practical things,

those things would have been done much faster.

2017 is almost behind us. Standing at this crossroads,

we have to start planning for the future. In the next year,

which business areas should we make breakthroughs

in? Which channels? Which small shops? Which

products? Which customer pain points? What is the

foundation of future growth? Where is our Achilles’ heel?

What are the invisible opportunities around us? What

are the shortcomings, problems and the breakthrough

points we have neglected? To answer these questions,

we need to re-examine and to know ourselves. This

year, what business opportunities have we missed? Do

we really know how to do business? What mistakes or

successes have been made in product pricing, product

portfolio, new product promotion, channel policies and

retail management? On these issues, don’t be afraid to

reanalyse, to summarize, and to constructively criticise

and reect.

The Sales team is labelled by some departments as

the one that shouts the loudest, crying for attention.

Well, I think the noise they create is not loud enough,

and the criticisms they send are not ery enough, not

enough at all. We should be solely responsible for

the work itself, and be accountable to the customers,

sales channels and the end users, rather than the

leaders and headquarters. Our work should focus

on solving “the smaller problems”. This has to be

formalized and promoted in the subsidiaries, so that

all departments are well coordinated, and problems

can be easily discovered and solved. It should

become part of the fabric of our company culture.

Each day we should seek out the small problems.

The management team of each subsidiary should

step out of the oce, into the market, to observe,

communicate with and listen to customers.

Here, I advise all overseas salesmen and each

member of the management team in our subsidiaries

to spend two half days each month in point-of-sale

shops. Although in some markets language could

prove to be a barrier when communicating with the

end users, it will not prevent us from observing their

purchasing behaviour and interaction with sta.

Keeping in close touch with our market is the most

ecient and scientic way to collect evidence on

which to base our decisions. In the future, we have

to move “the oce” to the forefront of the market.

Getting the small things right starts from here.

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Fighting Fit in the Land of the Rising

Sun — Exploration of a Retail Market

One and a half years have passed since TP-Link entered the Japanese market in early 2016. At the beginning,

business revolved exclusively around online stores such as Amazon, Rakuten and Yahoo. We were totally unknown

in Japan at this point, retailers not so much as batting an eyelid at our arrival. During a year of toil, tears and sweat, we

achieved signicant growth online, climbing to a rank of second on Amazon for routers. Retailers’ interest was nally

perked and we fortied ourselves for several rounds of tough negotiations. A breakthrough came in March 2017, our

products landing on the shelves of two of the biggest retailers: Yodobashi and Bic Camera. Today we can be found in

more than 200 retail stores all over Japan.

Here I want discuss some of the diculties we faced on our bumpy road to success, and the measures we took

to overcome them.

Retail Team, TP-Link Japan

Firstly, it’s important to point out that Japanese

people have a strong national identity. The majority

of Japanese are under the impression that without

exception ‘Japanese national brands are the

best!’ Unfortunately, even with the progression of

globalization and with most Japanese manufacturers

now dependent on Chinese OEM companies, that

stereotype is still deeply rooted, and prevents us from

making a smoother transition to this island nation.

Netgear and ASUS, strong competitors of TP-Link,

still struggle badly on these shores even though they

made their entry into this market much earlier. Netgear

entered retailers at one point but ultimately failed and

retreated. ASUS also failed to make headway, giving

up on selling gaming routers and focusing on low-

end products specialized for the local market instead.

By stark contrast, the Japanese national brands like

For the rst few months almost no retail sta knew

TP-Link, so of course they didn’t promote us. To cure

our problems in such a market, we needed a dose of

strong medicine. In the IT area, Yodobashi commands

an impressive market share of almost 10% with only

22 stores, while other retailers at the same level have

hundreds of stores. Thus, we chose Yodobashi as

our breakthrough retailer. From April, we grabbed

the attention of Yodobashi buyers with all kinds

of promotions and gradually gained their trust. As

August rolled around, we gained a chance to run two

weeks of promotions with Yodobashi – pushing sales

Understanding the Market and

Facing up to the Challenges

Use a Dierent Strategy for a

Dierent Retailer

Bualo, Elecom, NEC and I-O Data enjoy weighty

market shares. This was the situation we faced when

we arrived on the scene.

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Establish Bases behind Enemy Lines

Strategy is important, but when your eyes are on

the stars, you also need to remember to keep your

feet rmly on the ground. We established our own

roaming team to maintain and improve displays in

the shops, and build closer relationships with shop

sta. The roaming squad consists of four members

currently, distributed among three of the biggest

economic zones: Tokyo, Osaka and Hokkaido. In their

daily work, our roamers go round the stores one by

one, educating sta on our products. In addition,

more than 10 training sessions are held every month

for our retailers, convincing them to buy into our

brand slogan: “Reliably Smart”. Up to September

2017, we’ve trained over 210 sta. They are the

foot soldiers on the ground, and remain key in the

A roaming squad member improving the display

traditional consumer channels. Each retail worker

has the chance to inuence hundreds of people per

month. Training sta is something we will continue

to do, with the belief that they will communicate the

virtues of our brand to increasing numbers.

Training shop sta alone is not enough. Most

customers will select products by themselves.

Thus, in-store marketing methods are denitely

signicant. This proved tricky in Japan. Japanese

customers are very picky and inquisitive. This is the

reason why local brands’ packages always include

so much information, while our packages are too

“clean”. To make a better impression, we developed

lots of special localized marketing materials. For

example, a “World’s No.1 Most Popular” sticker for

the boxes – Japanese tend to choose the champion,

and this impactful message helps to draw the gaze

of passersby and gain their all-important trust. A

“Wireless Speed” sticker highlighted the strong

wireless performance of our products and made

them easier to compare. Besides these, we also

made some specialized popup stands and product

catalogs. We learnt as much as we could from

our local successful competitors and tried to do

even better, believing our greater store marketing

experience would be a solid base for our future

success.

of Archer C9 and Archer C55 and winning 11% of the

total store sales. Although that 11% doesn’t seem

like a massive deal, it’s already sevenfold the share

of ASUS, which entered the retailer much earlier than

us. For another big retailer, Bic Camera, it proved even

harder to gain the trust of their buyers. Undeterred,

and condent of the capabilities of TP-Link’s sellers,

we sent sales promoters to work at four Bic Camera

stores. Currently, our sales promoters contribute to

nearly 50% of our sales at all Bic Camera stores.

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Conquering a new retail market is a mission that challenges everyone beyond their limits. This includes not

only our retail team but also support from our whole company. To gather the opinions from dierent teams (e.g.

designers and support), we held an event. Every month, a company member needed to visit stores to observe

and give feedback. The three best roamers were selected and won prizes. We got all kinds of useful feedback

related to displays, marketing and so on and, more importantly, after three months of store visits the sta felt

more condent with themselves and knew our brand better.

We will go on promoting our brand and products to both stores and customers. The word “brand” can be

translated to " ㅷ晥 " (Pinpai) in Chinese. " ㅷ" means "quality" and " 晥" refers to "name recognition" in Japanese.

We aim to increase our market share in the Japanese market and prove our quality as a manufacturer. Our

ultimate target is to grab the No.1 spot in terms of market share in the next 5 years. With belief in our products

and in each other, there’s no reason why we can't!

Best Roamers Award

Our retail team

Encourage Members to Oer Ideas and Suggestions

Keep Striving to Forge the No.1 Brand

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"Ding——”

“Hello! This is Clare from TP-Link Technical Support.

How may I help you? ”

It’s 3:00 a.m. The technical support engineers are still

alert, their focus unwavering as they assist people

from every time zone via a 24-hour hotline and live

messaging service.

On the other end of the line, a user explains his issue,

the urgency detectable in his voice. The Deco M5

(3-pack) he bought doesn’t work after an update. He

needs access to the network immediately, as he has

some critical work to deal with. The technical support

engineers understand his emergency, oering several

solutions at once: restart the modem and Deco, reset

the congurations. None of them work.

There’s no time to lose. The technical support

engineers immediately export the user's telephone

communication record, conduct a detailed analysis

When Wi-Fi Is Down, We’re

Always Around

Networking Bu Technical Support Team, edited by Estela Ji

and discuss the solution. As promised, the user

receives a call back via Skype and is given remote

guidance, conrming each step as he goes. Finally,

he conrms the Wi-Fi is back up and running – "I’m

grateful for your help". The support engineers breathe

a sigh of relief, their tense faces transforming into

wide grins.

With the aim of improving service quality and user

satisfaction, the engineers work in shifts from morning

to evening, weekends and holidays. When midnight

falls, a light can always be seen from a window in the

oce, inside which the engineers are busy solving the

troubles of users the world over.

"We are going to hold a party at the weekend, but the

Wi-Fi doesn’t work. What should we do?"

"Travelling abroad, roaming is too expensive. Only a

SIM card can access the internet, but I want to share

my network with my computer. What should I do?"

"I work at home. Suddenly the network is down and I

have a pile of papers to write!"

"To build a wireless network for a large conference

room, what kind of product should I select?”

The technical support engineers are facing these

questions every day, some of which have been

answered hundreds of times. But they understand

that for users, each question is urgent and deserves

to be answered considerately. Chatting with users

from all over the world, from dierent cultures, and

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Professionalism Derives from

Every Tiny Eort

To be able to solve problems relating to a whole

range of products, technical support engineers must

possess a deep well of knowledge.

From the beginning of the one-month product training

to answering their rst phone calls, a great deal of

work is needed. Nearly 100 outstanding recordings

(cases) have to be analyzed, combined with "talk"

training, high-level English and other relevant courses.

Every newcomer is striving to lay a solid foundation

of skills. Some of them choose to do additional

English listening practice in their spare time, in order

to communicate with users more eectively and

therefore solve the problems faster.

with unique characters and needs, they always follow

the same principle: professionalism and sincerity.

The entire team is making unremitting eorts to

improve the quality of service, from meetings where

cases are shared with the group to the product

training and Q&A organized by the department. Daily

e-mail eectiveness checks, weekly recording checks,

monthly professional knowledge reviews along with

laboratory testing and user scenario simulations

underpin the team’s eorts to constantly improve.

With every detail counting towards our image, the

professionalism of the technical support team as a

whole has been recognized by our users.

In addition to product knowledge, managing emotions

is another way the professionalism of the technical

support team shines through. Facing so many

anxious users and their complaints, you’d be forgiven

for thinking the engineers would be driven crazy at

times and erupt like an angry volcano. “Never let the

users’ emotions aect your own” is a guiding principle

that every engineer must bear in mind from the very

rst day. However, that’s easier said than done. It’s not

easy to keep a patient attitude and a smile on your

face for every user, especially when emotions can

change rapidly from call to call.

To prepare for this emotional rollercoaster, the

department arranges a professional course named

“Emotion Management”, aiming at helping team

members learn how to rule their emotions and stay

professional in all situations.

Organizing regular meetings to share experiences

and tea parties to get to know one another better

are good ways for the team to gain encouragement

from others and get help in solving problems. All

instructors and team leaders are proactive in making

sure every member is feeling good about their work,

and are happy to have heart-to-heart talks where

personal diculties can be worked out.

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Sincerity and Making Friends with

Users

If a professional is to win the consumer's trust, the

aim has to be to make every user TP-Link’s friend. At

the other end of the wire could be an elderly, anxious

employee desperately in need of a network, or

someone who’s already called seven times to track

our troubleshooting progress. Those who turn to us

for help deserve our patience and best analytical

eorts. Support engineers and users can build strong

relationships even though they have never met

before.

" I still remember a user from Singapore, who told

us his wife was on a business trip in Shenzhen

after we’d solved his problem. When he found out

our headquarters was in Shenzhen too, he at once

proposed a dinner with him and his wife. Although

we haven’t had the chance yet, the meal invitation

was most welcomed, and he spoke as though we

had been friends for many years. Looking forward to

meeting him one day. " —Leah

"There was a Turkish user who couldn’t speak English,

but translated the thank-you note via Google into

English and sent it to us to express his sincere thanks.

Though some grammatical mistakes were inevitably

included, the love and support for TP-Link shone

through between the lines. It gave every member of

the team encouragement. " —Jasmine

"Sometimes a user can be very angry when their

network access is out, don’t cooperate with the

troubleshooting and talk to us impolitely. But most

of them regret their attitude afterwards, and call us

back or express their apologies and thanks in

the livechat. " —Zeplin

"When I initially conversed with the US user David

Harrer, it was via Livechat. Since Livechat is

inconvenient when holding a two-way conversation, I

Receiving appreciation from users is another source

of positive energy for the technical support team and

can give everyone a big boost. Aside from a standard

"thank you" on the phone, especially grateful users will

even sometimes send special thank-you notes.

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immediately called David and assisted him with

his problem. When the user praised me in my role as

"the face of TP-Link" and said he had picked the

right product, I got an immediate sense of

accomplishment. " —Anna

These wonderful thank-you notes from users are like

medals, regarded as recognition for the hard work

that goes into each case. The members who receive

thank-you notes are regarded as positive examples

for the team, inspiring their colleagues to keep up the

good work and never stop improving.

Unremitting Eorts to Provide

Ecient and Diverse Service

In recent years our user base has expanded rapidly.

In order to be closer to the users and react to their

needs faster, our company this year established

the Philippines Call Center. This is just one part of a

strategy to up our game when it comes to customer

service.

Another is an initiative of the technical support

personnel to think as a user, estimating the problems

that users may come across when using the products

and then shooting a series of product conguration

and troubleshooting videos. These have won plenty of

praise. Users can solve common problems in a timely

way simply by watching the videos. The Technical

Support Team also benet since they have more

time and energy to solve the more urgent and tricky

problems.

Currently, the videos have over 400 000 views on

YouTube, oering help for a great number of users.

Now the technical support team has an ecient way

to serve users and subsidiaries: that is, send the video

links as a reference rst. There is no doubt that this

initiative has greatly improved eciency.

We believe that there will be more support videos,

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remote control and high-tech operations being

applied into the technical support service in the

future. Continuously improving the interaction,

eciency, quality and reputation of our service, we

know that although the technology may change, our

professionalism and dedication will not.

TP-Link’s Technical Support team will always be able

to handle the pressure, take the initiative and promote

a positive image of the company.

Users choose TP-Link among tens of millions of

brands. Every phone call, Livechat, successful case

and thank-you note is a great endorsement for the

team, cementing the bond between our company and

its customers to grow our base of loyal fans.

The original article was provided by Leah, Zeplin, Clare

and Catherine

To watch the YouTube videos, please scan the QR

codes below:

Network Card PLC

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AEO — Together We Can

Rosalind Rong, with translation by Teresa Xu, HQ Oce Department

TP-Link was rst certied as a Shenzhen Customs

AA Class Enterprise back in 2010. Then, in 2014,

came promotion to an AEO Advanced Certied

Enterprise. By complying with strict criteria during the

re-certication examination, TP-Link made history

in August 2017, becoming the rst company in the

Shenzhen Customs Territory to pass re-certication

as an AEO Advanced Certied Enterprise at the rst

time of asking.

When it comes to AEO, many colleagues may

not know its signicance. AEO, which stands for

Authorized Economic Operator, is a voluntary

compliance program that issues certication for

enterprises’ credit status. Advanced Certication

is one of the highest honors awarded to import

and export enterprises, and is granted by customs

organizations of countries and regions, including

within the EU, ASEAN and in North America.

Armed with such certication, TP-Link can enjoy

clearance facilitation among international customs

oces and has the trust of customs in all AEO-

recognizing countries. Benets include an ultra-low

inspection rate for goods, simplied documentation

examinations and priority when going through

import and export clearance formalities. With our

markets spread all over the world, the certication is

a great help with the logistics and distribution of our

products. Within China, we also get VIP support from

39 government departments. To sell our products in

overseas markets more eectively, AEO certication

is a must.

The Headquarters Oce Department began working

intensively towards the certication in May. The AEO

certication criteria are divided into ve categories, 18

articles and 32 total entries. The ve categories are

Internal Control, Financial Condition, Law Compliance,

Trade Safety and Additional Standards. Enterprises

may only be certied once they reach the benchmark

in all graded projects and their total score is 95 points

or above. The team knew nothing less than perfect

co-ordination between the headquarters and every

relevant department would be necessary to pass.

In the event, all involved rose to the occasion and

delivered. TP-Link was given a near perfect score, and

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even picked up some additional points, taking our

nal tally up to an impressive 102!

Aside from investigating enterprises’ daily operations,

AEO certication also provides a good opportunity

for enterprises to complete internal reviews and

optimize their processes. During the three months

of preparation for the AEO certication examination,

the team at headquarters has shown responsibility,

professionalism and discipline in equal measure.

Attention was paid to every detail, from optimizing

the work space to the development and launch of

the ERP system from scratch. Each colleague set

the highest standards for him/herself and made

unremitting eorts.

For three months, in rain or shine, on workday or

weekend, colleagues volunteered to work overtime

to make sure the company was fully prepared for the

AEO examination. There was a time when the oce

was under decoration, and the pungent smell of

paint was unavoidable. Wearing a mask, wiping tears

from smoked red eyes, the commitment from sta

was unwavering. Among them was Qiong Zhang, the

Warehouse Director. She has been with the company

since its founding 21 years ago. The midnight oil

was burned more often than not, as Qiong reviewed

every phrase of all-important documents. There were

new operation specialists and international logistics

specialists too, who had little experience but bags

of energy. Selina Wang, from the Administration

Department, was eight months pregnant at that time

and worked late right up to her due date. She gave

birth to a healthy “AEO” baby, just after we passed the

certication. The AEO project brought out a strong

sense of responsibility, collective pride and seless

dedication as unsung heroes worked diligently

towards a common goal. It showed us that we really

push ourselves, we can achieve more than we could

have imagined.

This September, TP-Link attended the Shenzhen

Customs General Meeting as a delegate of the Top

Ten Enterprises in the Shenzhen Customs Territory

and the representative company of the Nanshan

Government. At the meeting, the Vice Chief of

Shenzhen Customs, Fang Tu, was quick to laud our

achievements: “During the AEO certication process,

TP-Link has been a fantastic example of a law-abiding,

trade compliant, highly trusted and safely managed

enterprise in the industry. It is a model enterprise

when it comes to AEO Certication in the Shenzhen

Customs Territory.”

Each and every colleague involved in getting the

AEO certication should take a huge sense of

achievement and satisfaction from their work, bred by

pushing themselves to the limit to achieve something

big. Although there are still many challenges ahead

of us, our team will always take “value creation” as our

core working principle, staying rock-solid at the back

end of the company to boost business at the front!

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Stand by Me — Together We Embrace

a Limitless Future

Sonia Zhang, Smart Home BU, with translation revised by Ifti Anees

The TP-Link Smart Home Business Unit achieved outstanding results over the 31-hour Amazon Prime Day

online shopping event. TP-Link Smart Plug sales gained the most momentum; sales of Smart Wi-Fi Plug HS100

exceeded 50,000 on Amazon US, and they were also a favorite in the UK.

Looking back on the past year, the TP-Link Smart Home Business Unit has grown from a nobody into a

somebody in this rapidly developing industry. Our achievements are the product of the hard work of everyone in

the team. Together we will carve out a future without limits.

Strict Quality Control

By May 2016, our Kasa product line had gained brand

acknowledgement from consumers, gaining popularity

in part thanks to native support for Amazon Alexa.

Promotions were ran too which reaped bountiful rewards.

Sensing an opportunity to press home our advantage

in terms of market position, we made a request for

increased supply from the manufacturing side and

readied ourselves for a close race with competitors.

At the end of that month our QA factory inspector, Gong

Xue, was performing her usual tasks, making the Final

Quality Assurance (FQA) inspection on smart plugs. That

day, her shift involved a check of the signal lights. Among

the 200-odd machines tested, she noticed that the light

on one HS100 repeatedly stopped blinking. Without

hesitation, she agged up the issue with a high-level

manager.

An immediate call-to-action followed from the Quality

Assurance Department, Product Department, and

Engineering Department at the factory and R&D

engineers in the Smart Home Unit. Testing yielded

a denitive conclusion, and it wasn’t good news: the

capacitance of the DDR memory was insucient for it

to function correctly, which would mean users couldn’t

control the plug! If the inspector hadn’t spotted that one

malfunctioning light among the sea of LEDs, hundreds

of thousands of defective products would have shipped,

resulting in countless customer complaints and lasting

damage to our brand image.

Fast-forward to today and that inspector has been

promoted to leader of FQA in the Quality Assurance

Department. Looking back on the day she examined the

product casings, she had inspected them one by one,

nding issues without a clue which technical component

had gone wrong. She showed diligence, attention to

detail and a determination to thoroughly check every

single product assigned to her and report even the

smallest abnormality.

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Cooling Down and Speeding Up!

At the start of 2017, TP-Link smart plugs held a

dominating position in the US market. However, smart

home products in Europe are not nearly as popular. We

believe our success in the US market can be repeated

in Europe. After all, it’s surely a matter of time until

voice assistants (Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant)

become popular there, and our integration with them will

lead us to success.

Localization in Europe is not easy as there are

multiple countries with dierent safety standards and

certications. A domestic certication agency are

responsible for checking our products meet these

requirements. However, due to the agency’s lack of

attention when performing thermal tests, our eorts to

make progress with our smart plugs in Germany were

hampered. With adjustments urgently needed, the

R&D team wasted no time in discussing solutions in

an attempt to get the project back on schedule. After

multiple attempts, the thermal specications were good

to go and we had that all important certication.

Once bitten, twice shy. The R&D Hardware team worked

closely with the certication agent. Engineers made

a special trip to Guangzhou to supervise the thermal

test process and eliminate any possible source of error.

With attention early on, our smart plugs now go through

certication for the German market without issue. R&D

Hardware team subsequently changed their approach to

regulation testing too. German safety testing is very strict,

with engineers now checking both Chinese and German

texts to make sure not a single word is overlooked.

To further expand their eorts, a regular meeting every

other week was scheduled. The idea is to keep up to

date with local information. All materials that may impact

the certication process are reviewed from back to

front. That includes the packaging, user guide and

installation guide on top of our original responsibility of

laser carving information on products. The problem-

solving process was optimized as well. The old linear

workow of “R&D-Testing-Factory” has been rethought

with the cooperation encouraged between any two of

these three parts. Samples for testing were increased in

number. They expect to lower the future defect rate and

even contribute to the company’s product development

processes.

The R&D team are like a family. The smart plug squad

has grown from a trio into a dozen. When a new issue is

found at the end of the shift, the team are happy to start

over again without a single complaint. A new dad in the

team who needed to rush home and take care of the

baby was supported by other hardworking colleagues.

Encouraging, considerate, supportive, diligent — that’s

them. A pleasant work environment keeps the team

motivated and productive.

Our products wouldn’t do even close to as well as they

do without the R&D team’s endeavor. Better quality

products ensure a tighter bond with our users and

build up our reputation as a brand. Users may never

know about the hours that go in backstage; one thing

that’s for sure is that these unsung heroes always exert

themselves to the fullest to make a dierence.

David Li, in charge of the TP-Link Smart Home Business

Unit, made a special trip out to the factory and thanked

Gong Xue in person. “What you did could be regarded

as a life-saving rescue for our business unit. Thank you

for such professional, rigorous quality control and your

attention to minor details at the factory!”

Highlight

Supplying the World

Today, the demand for our smart home products

has multiplied several times over compared to when

we rst launched them. Keeping up with demand is

a challenge in itself. Enter Lucy Yang, Verna Wang,

and Echo Lin – the Product Management Engineers

(PME). They coordinate overseas subsidiaries, the

factory, R&D, purchasing, and suppliers. Their phones

are ringing constantly, with no time to waste when it

comes to dealing with requests.

Attention to detail, ecient coordination and accurate

forecasting are a must in this team. They say the

biggest challenge for now is to seek a balance

between the supply and demand in peak and quiet

seasons. Not much is available in the way of past data

since the business unit is still a young one. Extreme

caution is taken when it comes to gures. One more

“0” in a column results in mountains of dead stock

while one less causes shortages everywhere, both

very damaging. Furthermore, if a defect is discovered

after shipment the details must be passed to R&D and

the factory immediately to rework a solution. From

there it’s a race against time to avoid a gap in supply.

From last summer, smart bulbs were outsourced

for production. Finished products were sent back

to our own factory’s Quality Assurance Department

for QC check. The back and forth frequently cost

time and eort, impacting on eciency. Facing an

incoming shipping request, Lucy and Verna decided

to shake things up and change the status quo for the

better. They urged their QA colleagues to move their

oces to the location of the bulb supplier. The switch

immediately made a dierence, guaranteeing higher

product quality borne out of more rigorous inspection.

From March this year, to better match shipment

volume with overseas sales volume, they started

to keep an eye on the quantity sold and customer

Highlight

The Cloud Is Here with Us!

We successfully concluded the Amazon Alexa Q4

bid with a quantity of 11 million units, and concluded

the agreement with Best Buy in store. It’s an exciting

season for us and hopefully is a sign of things to

come in the next year.

Rapid development inevitably brings pressure. With

improved brand recognition and an increasing range

of devices, the challenges grow larger. In the aptly-

named “Fully Best” building in Shenzhen, the Cloud

and Smart Home departments are close neighbors.

Necessarily so, since the cloud platform provides

reliable connections for all our smart home products

and supports the IoT cloud in the US.

Smart home products rely heavily on user experience.

reviews on Amazon. Excessive stock was diminished,

and the stock balance has been improved ever

since. In July, smart bulbs began selling on Amazon.

Designated contact persons were identied at each

stage of the production cycle in order to delegate

responsibility and ensure orders were fullled on time.

A sense of responsibility and common goals are

what motivates these ladies. Recently, we reached

an agreement with BestBuy. The Smart Home

Department is very excited about it; it’s the rst time

TP-Link products will be sold through BestBuy, so it’s

a big breakthrough. The PMEs are about to get even

busier.

For this reason the Cloud Department customize

their services to match the specic needs of the

Smart Home Unit. They have even set up an LED

screen in a corner of the oce to supervise the

cloud server 24/7. It displays one of three characters

who act as watchmen, reporting the status of the

cloud. Doraemon the cat, Pac-Man and a Minion from

“Despicable Me” have become key personnel. They

take it in turns to report “I’m okay” and will promptly

trigger an alarm whenever an error crops up. The

Cloud Department’s availability is another reection of

their commitment. Even at midnight, cloud colleagues

are only a WeChat message or email away. For last

year’s “Black Friday” in the US, the shopping rush

came at nighttime in China. The cloud team dealt with

it that time by doing an overnight shift in the oce.

If any abnormality was found, they would be woken

up by one of their digital watchmen and be able to

resolve the situation on the spot.

March 2nd: Smart home devices began disconnecting

from the server one after another. It was the most

complicated and serious situation the cloud team

have run into. With overwhelming reconnection

requests, the cloud server crashed. The team seized

every second to restore the server. They rst allowed

all users to reconnect at the front-end and then got

them back on the server. Dealing with the fall out

afterwards, the Smart Home Unit proactively replied

to bad reviews. We also sent PR emails to our list of

US Kasa users, provided by the cloud team. Overall we

made a pretty good job of minimizing the grumbling.

The cloud service architecture was upgraded within

a month to avoid a similar situation in future. We in

Smart Home are incredibly grateful for the tireless

work our friends in the Cloud Department put in to

ensure our products can work as they should.

From yesterday’s zero to today’s hero, our feats could

not be achieved without the support and hard work

Highlight

of every colleague. Not everyone in our department

is a genius, but this group diligently stick to their work

by constantly seeking improvements and maintaining

unwavering focus.

To g e t h e r w e b r i n g d i e re n t i d e a s a n d i m p l e m e n t

change. Faced with intense competition in the smart

home eld, we sail a steady course. The eld is vast

with many future discoveries awaiting us. We want to

push onwards and ensure TP-Link Smart Home can

make a lasting impression on consumers.

Gratitude goes to colleagues interviewed: Gong Xue,

Huang Weijie, Lao Changwei, Lucy Yang, Verna Wang,

Lu Maoxiang, Wen Yong.

Highlight

Neos: Rebooting Our Smartphone

Business

Learn from the Past for a Brighter

Future

At the end of September 2017, the Smartphone Business Unit hosted a business training and sharing

conference. Our smartphone sales executives, country managers and regional directors convened at

TP-Link’s headquarters in Shenzhen to discuss the latest developments in the Neos journey.

For the past two years, TP-Link has been exploring

various development models for a successful

smartphone business. We’ve made some steps

forward, although admittedly not as many as we’d

like, and we still have a long road ahead of us. The

conference provided an opportunity to reect.

We discussed policies, shared the lessons of our

experiences and dened an overall strategy for

the smartphone business area — no small task by

anyone’s standards.

Back when Neos was still in its infancy, the idea

was to target the middle and high-end of the market.

Our brand promotion, channel expansions and retail

materials were all tailored to give the impression of

an upmarket product. Growth stalled though due to

limited product range and poor execution when it came

to market positioning among other factors. Salesmen

were nding it tough.

Part of the problem was that smartphone business

executives have had the misconception that as a new

brand, Neos must suer from poor brand recognition.

Therefore, promotions were run in which prices were

dropped to attract attention. This was far from ideal,

and came with its own set of consequences; Neos

was dragged into a perpetual price war with low-

budget rivals, which moved it away from our original

Yuki Li, with translation by Joicy Huang and Michonne Wang, Smartphone BU

Highlight

Keep Calm and Implement

Strategy

Attendees discussed several topics, including the

essence of business, classication of consumers and

basic business tactics. Thus, a simple but eective

strategy was formulated.

Unity is key — four unities to be precise: a unied

working language, unied industry understanding,

unied team culture and unied competitive strategy.

To succeed in this business, cooperation is needed

from top to bottom, from headquarters to subsidiaries.

We have to nd the optimum position in the market

and set benchmarks. This business is huge. Only by

focusing on a specic part can we carve out our own

space for the brand. In the past, our business has

been scattered. With more focus, we can control our

business better.

Last but not least, a simple but eective combination

of tactics are needed for business. Subsidiaries

should adapt their tactics according to local

conditions, focusing on one channel, one client and

one product. Breakthrough with channels supported

by retail, and increase awareness by marketing. We

can build up the reputation of Neos as a brand and

increase sale volumes using simple but eective

methods.

vision for the brand and stied our development. To

regain the initiative, the Smartphone BU adjusted the

overall operation strategy, going into "cost-eective"

mode.

The head of Smartphone BU, Jason Xu, kicked o the

meeting by looking back at the reasons why TP-Link

entered the smartphone business in the rst place. He

explained how smartphones have entered an era of

extreme homogenization. An excellent manufacturer

not only must achieve the ultimate quality, but also

needs to have excellent ability in cost control and

operational management. These three aspects give a

smartphone company the tools to survive and thrive

in any era, which is exactly why the Neos brand will

prove successful. With a culture of exceptional quality,

cost control and operational management inherited

from TP-Link, Neos’ steadfast management and quick

response to the market will see it climb to the top of

this emerging market with the perfect combination of

high-performance products at aordable prices.

A strong company culture is needed to create the

conditions in which a brand can thrive. Building a team

that’s "active and positive, open and enterprising,

practical and realistic and open to constructive

criticism" is the aim. Reection is the most eective

way to learn from experience. It requires sta to be

down-to-earth, to review and introspect, to look for

improvement, and nally to grow and progress.

By revisiting the lessons of the past at the meeting,

the sales team gained a clearer understanding of the

current situation. Three necessary evolutionary stages

for the smartphone business emerged: "to survive, to

stand rm and to ourish".

Highlight

The Fruits of Practice, the

Beginning of Success

Buoyed by the conference, subsidiaries set about

putting the lessons and requirements into practice.

Business began to thrive.

In Malaysia, we concentrated resources into the X1

Lite. Products were distributed in batches to sales

channels and we marketed more aggressively. We

held a launch event to release the product and made

full use of our famous brand ambassador to increase

awareness. On the retail side, we redecorated our

VIP stores, putting a spotlight on the X1 Lite. The

hard work paid o. In October, the number of sales in

Malaysia broke the 6000 barrier for the rst time.

Over the border in Singapore, we focused on our key

channel – the high-street IT retailer Challenger. We

targeted Xiaomi, attempting to outdo them product

for product. Samsung was our inspiration for in-store

marketing and materials. By October, we were in all

Challenger stores. Increased sales gures provided

the perfect endorsement for our newly devised

strategy for Neos.

In Ukraine, MOYO electronics store was the target.

By this stage, MOYO was about to remove Neos

products because of their poor sales during the rst

half of the year. We had to turn things around. First, we

introduced fresh marketing materials into the stores

to help consumers get a better understanding of what

the Neos brand is all about, then went on to launch a

promotion campaign to generate interest. Our sales in

MOYO doubled from November to September before

increasing by a further 43% in October.

The plan in Colombia was to cooperate with a

distributor, who placed a welcome order of 1000 units

in the end. When they ran into a problem with a self-

developed app, we worked tirelessly to get it xed

and solved the issue within a week. The reliability,

fast responses and excellent customer service

are what impressed the distributer most about the

Neos team, and they expressed a strong interest in

continued cooperation.

The guiding principles that emerged from the

Neos conference have helped us to rediscover the

inspiration that gave birth to the brand in the rst

place. Acting on these directives is already generating

tangible results in our global oces, giving us the

encouragement to look forward to a bright future with

condence.

Highlight

Heroes at the Front —

The Neos Trade Marketing Team

Hope Chen & Gustavo Agudelo, TP-Link Colombia

Building Up the Forces

How do you go about assembling a brand new team,

starting with only yourself? Since the beginning of

2017, Juan Valendia, Neos Manager, has been

working towards doing just that. After screening a

pile of resumes and interviewing more than a dozen

candidates, two outstanding individuals were selected

to come aboard in February. They were to be the rst

recruits for the innovative Trade Marketing team.

In March, we invited Gustavo Agudelo to join us

as Supervisor and assist Juan with management.

In addition, three more promoters were picked

up. Our “1+5” (1 Supervisor + 5 Promoters) team

supported the key POS (points of sale) provided by

the Panamericana store. With strong promotions in

March, we achieved record sales of 340 units, with

promoters involved in 59% of these.

In April, we began business in Cencosud, forth largest

listed retail company in Latin America, and recruited

nine more promoters. Our team morphed into “1+14”.

After some survival training in Panamericana, the new

promoters entered Cencosud in May raring to go. We

made sales of 766 units and promoters were even

more instrumental this time, contributing to 71% of

the sales.

The next step is to look towards generating more

business in the northern cities. In August we hired

a promoter in the Panamericana Cucuta store. The

impact was immediate; sales jumped from 6 units per

month to 27. The strategy has been so successful

Focus on Details AND on

Customers

In their daily work, promoters must have an eye for

details. Every day they need to prepare their samples,

give product demos, prepare the POP (point of

purchase) materials and so on. These details matter

since they will improve the image of our product and

brand, while going a long way towards attracting

consumers.

Of course, the main job is to engage with consumers

actively and give sound advice on purchases

according to consumers’ requirements. The key is to

not bore the visitors with specications, but reveal the

benets instead such as battery life, camera quality

and merchandising gifts.

Promoter introducing Neos and clinching a deal

that in Q4 ve more promoters will join us for the

season

Highlight

Never Stop Improving

Improvement is continual. We have our sales

meetings on Wednesdays every fortnight. During

these, we study the new models, learn the key selling

points, check the sales gures, exchange sales

experience and discuss our competitors. After work, if

we come across anything interesting from our Neos

Facebook page or any other way, we share it with the

team at the next opportunity.

Everyone in our team has a shot at promotion. After

Q2, we promoted three team members who worked

well over Q1. They were assessed in the following

aspects: examination, presentation and sales target

completion. In their new roles as Specialist Promoters,

they will take on additional responsibilities to help out

our manager.

“Neos is challenging me every single day. I have A Promoter Presentation

become more competitive, and faster at making

decisions, with a good understanding of what needs

to be done. It wasn’t easy at the beginning, but today

people know the brand and we are no longer "one of

the others" in the market. We are NEFFOS!”

— Ingrid Martinez, Specialist Promoter at Metro

Soacha

“Being part of the Neos team improves my

knowledge, stimulates personal growth and gives

me opportunities to move into higher level positions.

There’s no doubt in my mind that we are going to

become one of the leading brands.”

— Andrés Sánchez, Specialist Promoter at Jumbo

Hayuelos

“When I started with Neos eight months ago I didn’t

know too much about the brand. Time has shown

me that my choice was a good one. We have won a

better market position in a short space of time, with

Neos now recognized as a highly competitive brand.

My ambition is to accompany Neos on its journey

to stardom, doing everything I can to help the brand

reach its potential.”

— Juan Moreno, Specialist Promoter at Jumbo Suba

Highlight

Gustavo preparing the POP materials and training an external promoter

“A Professional Team”

“When Juan Velandia invited me to join his Neos

team, it was a proposal that I was delighted to accept

since I foresaw an exciting professional challenge

ahead”, says Gustavo Agudelo, our Supervisor. “We

started to build a promoter team, selecting personnel

based on experience and sales attitude (key for this

position). The point of sales team we assembled was

born to shift stock. We’ve built strong relationships

with store personnel too, ensuring we get allocated

prime store positions and a good amount of space to

maximize our impact.

My daily work is centered around promoter

management:

- Training internal and external promoters.

- Supporting their activities such as promotion

implementation and merchandise distribution.

- Tracking sales and pushing sellouts.

- Gathering the price map and sales reports,

giving feedback about the market and promoters’

performance.

At the beginning, we were a fresh team and problems

such as low sellout rates, lack of inventory, bad

promoter performance and lack of training hindered

our progress. We needed to react, to work harder

than other teams and make up the dierence. Our

eort was reected in the results. Nowadays, Neos

products occupy the rst and second positions

in terms of units sold in the top stores covered by

promoters. This can be put down to how closely

our team are working together and helping one

another. Also, we are working from a strong strategic

plan devised by the Neos Manager, who is always

alert and ready to switch things up in response to a

dynamic market.

I believe the key to leading the promoter team is

to consider the promoters’ opinions. This means

maintaining strong lines of communication and

taking their feedback on board. After all, these are

the guys on the frontline of the market every day

and understand it well so their feedback can oer

valuable insights. It’s also important to make them feel

condent and committed to the brand.

I’m proud to be involved with Neos and results are

looking good from my side. Big opportunities await

Highlight

The Best Month is Next month

Tr a d e M a r k e t i n g Te a m i n N o v e m b e r

Here in the Colombia Trade Marketing Team, we never

rest on our laurels. At the end-of-month summaries,

we stand by a favorite saying from Christian An, the

Manager of TP-link Colombia:

“Which month is our best month? Next month!”

If this month we’ve smashed the sales record? It’s

worth celebrating, but we know it’s just the beginning

for us. We need to be ready to go again next month

and never get complacent.

Here, I would like to express my gratitude to all the

members of the Trade Marketing Team whose hard

work has contributed to TP-Link Colombia's every

success:

VIVIANA VARGAS, WENDY GOMEZ, IOAM SANCHEZ, JUAN

MORENO,INGRID MARTINEZ, JUAN ARBOLEDA, ANA VERGARA,

FELIX OSPINO,DIEGO JIMENEZ, DEISSY ACOSTA, DARWIN

ALDANA, JUAN CORREA, OSCAR PARRA, YORLENI BARRERO,

MARIBEL JARAMILLO, YENIFER APONTE, PATRICIA PUELLO,

JULIE ROJAS, YENIS DUARTE, PAOLA GOMEZ, CARLOS JIMENEZ,

CRISTHIAN CARVAJAL, RONALD BERNAL, NEDITH ZABALA,

FREDY CADAVID, JESICA HOYOS

with the chance to branch out to an ever greater

number of retailers. I will do my best to keep up the

sales gures and guide this dynamic and diligent team

to the best of my ability.”

Highlight

How to Choose an Ideal Router —

A Microsite for End Users

Tereza Houdková, TP-Link Czech Republic

With an incredibly diverse range of router products on oer here at TP-Link, customers can have a tough time

deciding which is the right one for the job. We organized a brainstorming session with our top partner, e-shop Alza.

cz, to think about how to create a useful tool to give customers a helping hand. The aim was to make it easy for

customers to choose a new home router based on their needs, and at the same time to educate them about the

benets of our products and show them that the cheapest option is not always the best.

We imagined a simple microsite where, after the customer answers several easy questions, an ideal router for their

home is displayed. Our partner Alza.cz expressed enthusiasm, but then hit us with the bad news; since their coders

were already fully deployed on other projects, it would take over a year for them to develop such a tool.

Undeterred, we approached the agency that manages our partner portal to see whether they would be able to do

something. We were in luck.

1. What type of connection does your internet

provider oer?

a. Fixed connection by telephone line (ADSL/VDSL)

b. Fixed connection from local internet provider

c. Mobile connection using the LTE SIM card

2. How many devices will be connected to the

wireless network?

a. 0-8 devices b. 9-15 devices c. 16 or more

3. Do you use a fast connection (1 Gbit/s), by LAN

cable for instance, to connect to network data

storage?

a. Yes b. No

4. Do you want an option to set up a separate network

for guests and control access for children?

a. Yes b. No

5. Do you play online games and watch HD videos

over the internet?

a. Yes b. No

6. Are you going to use the router in a densely

populated area with a high concentration of wireless

networks ?

a. Yes b. No

Questions were designed to identify the network environment of the end user and assess the performance

and features needed to support their online activities:

Highlight

After the rst draft, we knew we wanted to roll out this tool to other partners as well, so we designed it

accordingly. The customer is redirected from our partner’s website to the microsite. After he/she answers the six

questions, an ideal router for them will be displayed. A “Buy” button is displayed below the recommended router,

which then takes the customer back to the partner’s website and, more specically, to the product page of their

dream router so they can make the purchase.

Currently, we implement the microsite on the websites of all our partner retailers. We have a special microsite

for each of them with links to and from their websites, while the product list remains identical. Most trac to the

microsites originate from banners on homepages and also from individual routers' banners on the sites. The fact

that the microsites run on our domain allows us to keep a close eye on them. Since the launch in August, we’ve

already had hundreds of visitors keen to discover their ideal networking match.

In the next few months we will aim to ne-tune the tool to the specic needs of our partners. That way, we will

be able to oer our customers even better pre-sales support, which is one of our main objectives.

1. ADSL/VDSL routers

a. TD-W9970B

b. Archer VR400

We created a list of routers that included bestsellers from each category and ensured there was a suitable

model for every possible user scenario. For our microsite the list includes the following models:

2. LTE routers

a. TL-MR6400

b. Archer MR200

3. Wi-Fi routers

a. Archer C20 b. TL-WR940N c. TL-WR1043ND

d. Archer C1200 e. Archer C7

Highlight

Marketing with Emotion —

Bidding Farewell to a Wi-Fi Legend

Ana Carolina Zugaib, Ana Laura Vassoler and Julia Barros, TP-Link Brazil

The demand for high-performance routers has been

growing at a healthy rate over the last two years

in Brazil. In November 2016, sales of these next

generation products overtook the gures for the older

150Mbps routers.

With a large population and the increasingly

widespread availability of the internet, the Brazilian

market holds great potential for broadband expansion.

At TP-Link, we’re betting on more ecient products,

such as 300Mbps and AC routers, to win over

customers with the superior Wi-Fi experience they

provide.

Video and music streaming, online gaming and 4K

movies already feature in the daily lives of some

Brazilians. However, a smart TV isn’t so smart when

you need to wait around for it to load up the content.

Similarly, your favorite online games just aren’t as fun

when you lose your connection and the match.

To get the best performance from devices, the user

needs solid network infrastructure. That's why the

new 802.11ac technology, with the promise of ultra-

fast Wi-Fi and minimized interference, has gained

such high levels of popularity in a short space of time.

Last year, TP-Link Brazil received a call from the

commercial team informing us that we would stop

retailing our range of 150Mbps routers in Brazil. The

process of withdrawing them from the national market

has been happening since the beginning of the year.

The plan is to have no TP-Link 150Mbps routers

available for purchase by the end of 2017.

“My dear 150Mbps router,

All those years we spent together were incredible.

We have so many good memories: the day we met

for the rst time, and you connected me to the world;

the information I accessed through you to learn new

things; easily connecting with my friends; the online

chat nights... good times! But today I see how much

the world has changed and how you struggle to be a

part of it.

I’ve become so much more connected. Today I

have a smartphone, a tablet, two smart TVs and two

computers. That’s not to mention when all my friends

come home! It's a party of electronic gadgets. The

power of the internet is growing and it’s sending you

more data than you can handle.

In order for users to understand the message and be

receptive to the arrival of more advanced devices in

the market, TP-Link Brazil's marketing department

created an emotional movie to appeal to Brazilian

families. 150Mbps routers have served families well

over the years, and like every good professional,

there comes a time when it's right to retire and let the

younger generation take over. But not to worry — we’ll

always remember the good old years when 150Mbps

routers connected thousands of homes. Now that the

TP-Link AC router has arrived on the scene to help

with the task of getting families online, the 150Mbps

router can nally enjoy a well-earned beach vacation

(or perhaps a skiing holiday, if that’s his thing).

Highlight

Today I met the new TP-Link AC router, which is

prepared for everything the latest technology has in

store for us. Thank you for the incredible work you've

done, my friend. I will always remember you!

Kisses of your eternal #TPLover”

The script was written and then combined with a

video featuring simple hand-drawn pictures. The

video was then posted to our social media accounts.

With pride and just a hint of sadness, we realized our

goal had been achieved; we had created an emotive

tribute to our great companion of many years.

The next step for our marketing department is to

reinforce the features and benets of AC technology

in the minds of potential customers. By engaging

with people across all forms of media, we hope to

educate customers about their data usage and

network requirements. We believe that by providing

knowledge, the consumer will feel more condent

in buying a device that matches their online needs.

Customers will then make TP-Link their point of

reference, adding to the perception that we are a truly

reliable choice.

Some fan comments:

"I can’t believe I cried for this router"

"I cried! What an exciting story!"

"A digital tear-jerker"

Script and text: Ana Laura Vassoler (Marketing Executive)

Voice: Lucas Ishii (Training Analyst)

Illustrations and video editing: Ana Carolina Zugaib (Graphic

Designer)

Direction: Julia Barros (Marketing Manager)

Total reach: 241 738

Likes: 970

Shares: 231

Comments: 99

YouTube link: http://bit.ly/2kXLBYT

Highlight

Looking back at where we were 10 months ago, it’s

fair to say that we essentially started from scratch

when it comes to NBN. Here are just some of the

issues we faced:

-Customers: We lost our contract with our largest ISP

partner which became defunct in August 2016. We

had supplied ADSL products to the company for over

three years, and this now caused an annual revenue

shortfall of one billion dollars.

-Quality: Due to quality problems concerning software

versions failing to pass ISP tests, we were facing

customer complaints, thousands of refund requests

and a mountain of work to do to patch up the issues.

-Products: We had a lack of products that met

the NBN specications, causing us to lag behind

the major competitor for more than 18 months.

Discussions relating to additional demand weren’t

concluded for nearly half a year.

Diligence Redeems Ignorance —

Eorts Do Pay O

Teddy Wu, TP-Link Australia

I joined the Australian subsidiary at the end of last

year. Frankly speaking, we didn’t have much inuence

on mainstream ISPs in Australia at that time. Our

relationships with customers were becoming more

and more distant because of various problems. It was

no longer the era of "selling the comb to the monk".

Were we going to stand by and just let our customers

walk away?

Changes had to be made! A sentence I had seen ten

years ago in front of the entrance to a company came

back to me now: “There never exists an immortal

emperor – everything depends on ourselves.”

First of all, let’s get down to the essence of our

business. The ISPs can provide reliable and stable

network service while we can provide reliable and

stable network terminals. We’ve delved deep in this

market and done our best to solve our customers’

problems. We’ve also realized that NBN deployment

is the new trend, and updating our terminal products

is our biggest opportunity for expansion. But what

The game is changing here in Australia. A nationwide infrastructure project is under way with NBN (National

Broadband Network), a government-owned corporation, tasked with expanding and speeding up Australia’s

connections. NBN is a monopoly wholesale provider of broadband access. This means ISPs have to make

contracts with NBN to access the network and provide internet service to end users. For TP-Link, this boils down

to our products having to comply with a very specic set of standards.

We began to sell NBN-compatible products to ISPs in November 2016. We’ve now put pen to paper on deals

lasting the next two to three years, valued at millions of dollars. This represents the rst time our high-class

VDSL products have made a breakthrough in Australia and, more signicantly, the rst time in the global ISP

market too.

Highlight

management in order to reduce the development

delays and the complaint frequency, which were

usually caused by over-ambitious promises to the

customers. Outside the oce, we normalized our

commitments to customers and put stricter controls

on releasing new products and new versions, so

that we can guarantee the product quality meets our

standards.

As for business development, it’s about matching

the magic combination of good products and brand

image. We improved products for T3 customers,

established the brand for T2 and became a trendsetter

for T1. To work with a T1 ISP, it usually takes two to

three years of product development and bidding. We

didn’t concentrate too much on speed; instead, we

made a long-term development plan for three years

from the outset. As the local team here has a long,

established relationship with TPG, a leading ISP, we

had an opportunity to open the door to customers on

our new NBN products after a short space of time.

should we do if we don’t have any experience and

brand presence in the NBN market?

Keep cool and advance step by step. Having fallen

behind with our product line, we didn’t waste a second

in researching customers and opponents. Within

a month, we analyzed nearly all the products from

the major competitors. What’s more, with the NBN

development plan, we devised a product strategy

that plays to our strengths and can satisfy market

demand. The joint advantages of performance and

cost-eectiveness provided by Broadcom and MTK

chip manufacturers respectively met requirements

for T1, T2 and T3 customers (referring to large-scale,

medium and small network operators respectively).

When it comes to improving the quality of our

products and building our ISP brand, identifying the

issues and coming up with solutions is the only way

forward. For instance, regarding the release of ISP

software, we devoted ourselves to rening our project

Highlight

The market strategy from the frontline has been

supported by technical know-how from headquarters

all the way. Various problems relating to the TR069

technical specications and Wi-Fi performance were

solved in the blink of an eye.

• In January 2017, Archer VR1600v was developed,

adhering to NBN specications.

• In February 2017, TPG received our bid involving

Archer C1200.

• In April 2017, after three months of access tests,

Archer C1200 obtained TPG's rst PO, marking a

breakthrough in NBN Green Field.

• In July 2017, after six months of development and

access tests, Archer VR1600v got the rst PO of

TPG while the product hardware and software were

not yet mature, regarded as a breakthrough for our

company’s NBN products.

There have been twists and turns along the way.

After the rst deals, we came across problems like

changing MAC labels and dealing with software

bugs. For the MAC labels, the ISP team changed

the MAC labels of some 5500 machines in the

customer warehouse within two days. To enhance

Wi-Fi performance and debug the current network

problems, the technical sta debugged day and night

for several weeks in the client room. By constantly

learning lessons, we are advancing step by step.

There is no success story for us to copy in the ISP

market. Only by making achievements, building a

reputation and setting benchmarks can we promote

our products and stories to a larger market, and even

the world.

There’s no need to fear a late beginning because, in

the end, hard work most denitely pays o.

Highlight

Improving our brand awareness has been a key

objective at TP-Link in recent times, with our

marketing departments under pressure to reach out

to ever greater numbers of potential customers. We

know we have a limited budget to work with, but with

a little creativity, a small investment can make a big

splash.

Here in Germany, Felicitas Binder, our Head of Online

and Social Media Marketing, formulated a cunning

plan to shine the spotlight on our Neos smartphone

range while spending only a tiny fraction of her

budget.

Buying up advertising space on social media is easy,

but that doesn’t necessarily make it the best option.

Your message is simply delivered to a certain number

of people from a particular demographic. The higher

your budget, the more people the message can be

sent to. The trouble with this is that many individuals

won’t take interest in the content, and therefore won’t

interact with it. A better way is to send out content

that spreads organically, driven by interest. People

should like the content they see and share it with their

friends. The best thing about this is, of course, that it

costs absolutely nothing.

OK, so nothing is totally free – Felicitas spent a small

amount on an agency, who searched for the hottest

words and topics trending on Facebook. The result,

intriguingly, came back as “Holiday”.

So how to tie together a holiday theme with our TP-

Facebook Marketing on a Shoestring

Budget

Florian Sohn, TP-Link Germany

Highlight

Link Neos smartphones to create an eye-catching

ad? Felicitas had the answer: great holiday snaps with

Neos’ camera of course!

An amusing video featuring Neos phones quickly

took shape and was shared with the Facebook

community on August 8th. Without paying anything

to push the content, our video began to trend, getting

shared between groups of friends and families. Users

were soon tagging each other in the comments

sections of the dierent clips.

The video was viewed over a million times within

the rst week and the response from the public was

beyond even our wildest expectations. By the time the

campaign had ended, a staggering one out of every

ve German Facebook users had been reached; that’s

5.7 million people without the use of any paid media!

In terms of value for budget, our initial target was a

solid cost-per-view of 0.015 Euros. The campaign

beat that target by 202%, coming in at a thrifty 0.007

Euros per view.

TP-Link Marketing Germany thanks Felicitas for her

creative idea.

The result can be seen here:

More key stats from the campaign:

Views: 2 Million

Reach: 5.7 Million

Total Time Watched: 14001 Hours

Likes: 14978

Comments: 17705

Shares: 3081

Engagement Rate: 1.77%

Reaction: 88% Positive Comments

https://business.facebook.com/pg/neffosde/

videos/?ref=page_internal

Highlight

Marketing Materials —

The Unsung Hero

Networking BU Marketing Department

Capturing the Imagination of

Customers

Marketing materials perennially play the role of the

unsung hero. With the product itself grabbing the

limelight and making headlines, they hang out behind

the scenes instead, rarely discussed despite their

importance in driving sales.

In recent years, consumers have increasingly been

making impulse purchases, reected in the increase in

the proportion of buys that are unplanned. The upshot

of this is that marketing materials, which provide

greater possibilities to stimulate sales, become much

more signicant.

Suppose you are going to buy a new router. Perhaps

you would access the website of a retailer rst to

compare appearance, price and performance. You

may also try to read some articles and magazines

about electronics to get reliable reviews of the hottest

products. But after all these steps, there still may not

be a clear target product in your mind, perhaps just

few brand names or several models that impressed

you in some way. Thus, you decide to head out to the

shops to take a look for yourself.

On the bus, you spy some billboards along the

street. Perhaps one of the brands' ambassadors is

your favorite lm star, and you immediately feel a

connection.

As you walk onto the shop oor you notice all kinds

of ags hanging from the ceiling, colorful display

cases and a myriad of boxes shining on the shelves.

You begin to hesitate, overwhelmed, with dozens of

products to choose between.

“Hi there. Are you looking to buy a router?” A friendly

promoter approaches you, introducing the pros and

cons of the various products, making use of a variety

of promotional materials such as guides, posters,

video demos and prototypes.

All of these guides, posters, containers and exhibitions

belong to the wonderful realm of marketing materials.

Their job is to catch the consumer's eye and convey

useful information that aids the decision making

process.

Back in the day, businesses simply placed boxes,

man-made licensing, print outs with the brand logo,

balloons and other decorations in front of their

shelves. It’s fair to say things have moved on a little

since then. Each brand now provides a lot more

information, and competition for the consumer’s

attention is erce. But with so much content

screaming to be looked at, it’s easy for key messages

to become mixed up and diluted, making it tricky for

customers to make a nal choice.

There was a time when brands began to rapidly

Improving Marketing Eciency

Within the Five Meter Range

Highlight

expand the amount of information they provide to

such an extent that it became detrimental to business.

Attempting to bombard customers with slogans and

stats not only brought more trouble to them, but also

contributed to increased advertising costs.

So striking a balance is important. We should extract

value from our existing resources eectively. During

2017 our team undertook an in-depth analysis of the

motivation for purchases in the Malaysian and Thai

markets. The research proved that many customers

know little about networking products before they

buy, and so make their decision while browsing the

shelves to a large extent.

A survey revealed that streamlining the materials

and focusing on those that can attract customers

from within a ve meter radius is more eective than

putting high costs into advertising and gifts.

Before Deco was released, we produced several Deco

desktop shelves (PDQ) and freestanding shelves.

These conveyed the key selling points, product

images and other essential information directly to the

consumer. They were placed next to the cashier so

all customers making a purchase would notice them

and could be drawn in, maximizing the opportunity

to clinch a deal. Shelves have also been adapted

to meet the needs of dierent regions; for minority

language countries we translate the copywriting, while

for countries with special size requirements, we make

sure those are also met.

The choice of supplier was carefully considered

since we wanted to create the best possible visual

eect and make the biggest impact on shoppers. We

carried out rigorous testing of samples from dierent

suppliers. Taking shelves as an example, we asked our

colleagues to sit on the shelves to test their durability

and load-bearing capabilities. No detail escaped our

attention, from the particular shade of color used to

the texture of the surfaces.

Focusing on the materials within ve meters of the

product not only streamlined our eorts but also

ensured the maximum benet for the smallest outlay.

PDQ for Deco

Localize to Popularize

Our markets are spread far and wide. Since dierent

markets and channels have dierent characteristics,

that means we have to spend more time and eort

adapting our persuasion methods for consumers on

the last mile of their purchasing journey.

The WALN standard known as 802.11ac has been

around for several years now. Although 802.11ac

inherits all the features of 802.11n standard, it's the

introduction of the 5G band that really makes it such

a great leap forwards. One problem we’ve had is that

not as many people are taking up 11ac products

as we had hoped. The old generation of network

products, such as TL-WR841N, only support 802.11n

but still hog quite a hefty market share.

To do something about this, we recently launched

the "Feel the Speed" project to proactively promote

802.11ac standard products. We wanted to enhance

consumers' awareness of the benets of 11ac

over 11n products, persuading them that it’s worth

spending some cash to make the upgrade.

Highlight

Bangkok, Thailand was chosen as our debut city.

We decked out the agship store with a range of

ve-meter promotional materials such as shelves

and selling point stickers, ensuring shoppers in

every corner of the shop would “Feel the Speed".

In terms of design, the HQ and the local marketing

teams worked together closely. Our team in

HQ provided the vision and basic design while

subsidiaries modied their designs based on the

local situation.

Our design centers around explosions of color

to highlight the characteristics of the improved

speeds 11ac can provide. The local team added

further information, photos of the hottest products

and a sales volume gure to make them more eye-

catching.

The Thailand team also worked on local promotional

content focusing on the selling point that "your

phone supports 11ac, so should your router".

Besides that, they formed a list of mobile phone

models and their supported network frequency

bands then posted it on Facebook, which showed

customers that to make the most of their phone’s

Wi-Fi capabilities they would need to step up to

11ac.

Of course, promotion doesn’t magically happen

overnight. This was our rst attempt at it since our

research eld trip. We will explore more options in

the future and continue to think of new ways to glue

more eyes to TP-Link boxes.

Thank you to all our colleagues at TP-Link Thailand

for supporting the "Feel the Speed" Campaign. We

welcome collaborations on this and future projects.

Come and feel the speed with the HQ Marketing

team!

Highlight

A Baptism of Fire —

Training the Class of 2017

Networking BU & Smart Phone BU

July 10th, 2017: thirty-one new sales recruits enter the oce mere mortals; by the time they leave at the end of

the day, work cards are hanging proudly from their necks — they’re TP-Linkers. 20 days of training follow in which

they soak up invaluable knowledge — product specics, business etiquette and manufacturing. On August 4th,

they board a plane to Malaysia, ready for the next stage.

Awaiting them on the other side is what’s become known as the "devil's training" — nearly three months of

it. Throughout August they remain in Malaysia, accumulating valuable sales experience with mobile phone

products. When they reach the mid-way point of their three-month stint — September — they pop over to

Singapore and switch their focus to networking products, before heading back to Malaysia and the mobile phone

business for the remainder of their education.

Due to delays, we arrived at Kuala Lumpur airport at

midnight, just as the clock ticked over to August 5th.

Our plans wouldn’t be altered through, even though

it was almost 3 a.m. When we gratefully caught sight

of our beds, we knew we still had to be up at the

crack of dawn to begin work in our new destination. In

Malaysia, the rhythm of our lives sped up to a whole

new tempo.

We began work at 8:30 each morning, starting with

a meeting in which we discussed sales results, case

studies, our experiences and the problems we had

found the previous day. These meetings were useful

since we could learn from one another’s experiences

and gain a better understanding of how to deal with

dierent types of customer. All in all, they got us up to

speed with the market and made us more seasoned

The Routine of a Salesman

— Mars Chen

Highlight

Maybe it’s because summer is the only season in

Malaysia that the people, just like the weather, are warm

in all situations.

Bustling crowds greeted me upon my entrance to

Lowyat plaza, accompanied with incessant shouts in my

direction of "hello boss". It gave me a sense of déjà vu,

such was the similarity with the Huaqiang electronics

markets of Shenzhen. Lowyat UG is an arena containing

the agship stores of all the famous mobile phone

brands that operate in Malaysia. Beneath the surface, a

close competition was being fought, with every brand

ghting to stand out. Among the retailers is a small stall,

GK003, sitting quietly to one side of the arena. This is

See the Beauty of the World — Allen Zhu

and skillful.

After the meeting, each group would make breakfast.

Those days spent living together in a big house

reminded us of college life. It also made us, 31

channel salesmen, become lifetime brothers!

After breakfast, we made our way to our respective

stores separately and started our daily sales work.

From 1:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. we were fully immersed

in the business world. When the selling was over, we

had to make a summary of the whole day, including

a case analysis, consumer sample collection, sales

condition summary and a daily summary. Never put

o what should be done today till tomorrow! Besides

the work, we also took time to exercise in our free

time. The accommodation facilities in Kuala Lumpur

are excellent and more than met our needs.

Although life in Kuala Lumpar was busy, it was also

rewarding, giving us the opportunity to develop

ourselves and contribute directly to the company’s

success.

Jago’s territory.

Jago rarely talked. Even when promoting, he was

concise and clear, and never wasted a word. He stabbed

at the keys of his calculator like it had oended him,

causing it to rattle loudly with each digit he entered.

Every time a customer came to the store, he’d whip out

that calculator, and I’d hear that familiar rattling sound

again.

From my observations, Jago was a person almost

without emotion. When a deal was clinched, Jago shook

hands with the customer. On the other hand, when a

deal fell through, he just gave the customer a sad smile

and said goodbye impassively.

I remember the rst time we met, I said to him, "Hi,

Jago! I’m new here. Could you please teach me how to

promote?"

"There are no skills. Just let it go.", came the reply from a

head that hadn’t even been lifted.

As I watched Jago strike a deal in his own way, I repeated

his words in my head — let it go? I thought this whole

selling business was simpler than I’d built it up to be...

I couldn’t have been more wrong. It turned out that this

method did not work for me. I sat myself behind the

showcase and waited for the customers to ock to me.

An hour later, a single customer had asked me where

the toilet was.

I thought that maybe I should change my strategy. I

started to keep myself busy by intercepting customers,

striving to actively promote our products. Although this

busyness gave me comfort psychologically, it had no

practical eect, as I still failed to make any sales in those

early days.

My last day at the store arrived, and I told Jago I’d be

Highlight

leaving him soon. I already had the unenviable honor

of a record-breaking zero deals in ve days. On that

day though, I noticed a change in Jago. When I tried to

promote, he came to help me introduce our products.

And when customers were indecisive, he gave them

every selling point to nudge them towards a purchase.

Unfortunately, Jago's newfound helpfulness still didn’t

break my selling duck. Nonetheless, before I left, he

gave me some words of encouragement — “You’ll make

a breakthrough sooner or later." Coming from him, it

meant a lot.

When I hopped out my Uber cab, the bleak surroundings

and rushing cars made me think the driver had taken

me to a wrong place. After checking with the Uber

driver that his GPS wasn’t busted, I headed for the Giant

Hypermarket, where the store I would work at, Maxlink,

could be found. Maxlink is really a magical store. Just as

its name suggests, it links with many customers, and has

a great look-to-buy ratio even though it resides in the

wilderness.

What’s more, Maxlink has an amazing manager —

Nicolas. Nicolas spent most of his time in store playing

the mobile game King of Glory. At one point I even

suggested that he should try to turn professional, as a

rising Malaysia e-sports superstar such as him shouldn’t

be conned to a store. He replied sternly, "No, Neos

needs me to rescue it”, before immediately turning back

to his games again.

For a long time, Nicolas gave the perfect impression of

a layabout. I had to completely rethink my opinion of

him though after a particular customer approached me.

Because I couldn’t understand the Malaysian language,

the customer didn’t think I could be of help to him, and

was just saying “Selamat tinggal” (meaning goodbye) to

me when, at that moment, Nicolas rushed to my side and

began to communicate with him.

Even though I hadn’t the slightest idea what they were

saying, I did see customers nod his head frequently,

which seemed positive. In the end, the customer got up

to his feet and said thanks before walking away — that

scene I’ve seen so many times which breaks the heart

of a salesman.

“Business is business” Nicolas sighed, as he began a

new level on his game.

Located in a mall of the government district, Putrajaya,

Thundermatch Alamanda was a highly productive

retailer for us. My colleague, Hubery, had sold at least

three pieces per day there, which was phenomenal. All

the elements for a great selling environment were there.

The manager there, Roy, was a calm and reserved

person, never letting the success go to his head.

Roy was a tough person with a well-built physique,

honed from years of training. He reminded me a bit

of Fidel Castro in a strange way. Thus, the rst time I

Highlight

saw him, I couldn’t help but say “Hi, boss!” Since Roy

was a reserved character and always busy with store

operations, I seldom had contact with him.

One day, after a complaint by a customer, I came to Roy

dejectedly, knowing he would scold me with no mercy.

To m y s u r p r i se , h e i nv i t e d m e to d i n n e r i n s t e a d .

At the dinner, Roy told me some things about his life. He

told me that all of us can fall down, but all we need to do

is pick ourselves up, make up for the mistake and carry

on stronger than before.

In retrospect, though this August seemed to last forever,

the various people I met and things I did kept me

entertained. I’m wondering, as I write this, whether Jago

is mashing in gures on his calculator, Nicolas is winning

his game and if Roy is still fussing over every detail.

Malaysia’s sunshine really does make people there very

hospitable.

I still remember on my sixth day at Lowyat GK003, when

I had no sales to my name, I turned to Jago and posed a

question. “If a guy always loses, how will he feel when he

gets his rst success?”

“Actually, you will feel nothing. Because you deserve it.”

Maybe life is just like this. The only thing we should do is

learn from the defeats, and then the success is bound

to arrive.

Highlight

Prosperity and Hardship,

Side by Side — Miracle Gao

I was prepared to go it alone, to meet all kinds of

challenges and people, to enjoy the bustling world, and

also to catch a glimpse of life's suering.

When I was in Malaysia, insomnia was like an old friend.

But it was on such nights that I could reect.

I can’t fall asleep, yet again. I get up and open the door.

I see the empty living room with the soft, blue of the

moonlight seeping through the seam of the curtains.

Listening carefully, I can hear the faint sound of snoring

coming from the bedrooms. I open the fridge and take

out a bottle of milk, sipping it beside the window from

a cup. As the cold milk slips down my throat, I feel

pensive. I pull the curtains away a little, getting a view

of the KL Tower standing not far away. The crescent

moon reminds me of the people I have met at work.

One was a wealthy housewife with ve children. She

came to my store with the youngest two, a boy and

a girl, both around eleven years old. They were very

lively and by expressing their enthusiasm had easily

persuaded their mother to buy two Neos X1max

phones. Perhaps now these little guys lay beside their

mother, lost in sweet dreams.

Another was a cleaner in the mall, around 50 years

old, who greeted visitors warmly every day without fail.

The thing that stood out most were his eyes, which

were always lled with joy. He recently got his rst

smartphone and was forever asking me questions

about how to use various apps, like a child learning how

to play with his new toy.

There was the shopkeeper too, who accompanied

me for more than half a month. He was nearly 30, and

very talkative. Being a sociable creature, he had great

business relationships with the people around him in

the store. More importantly, he had a beautiful wife, a

lovely daughter of two, and, I noted a little enviously, a

seriously cool Lexus.

The day I left, he took me out for a drive, taking his

wife and daughter too. We went to a restaurant where

they served his favorite sh and, most importantly, we

split half a box of Tsingtao beer. When the beer arrived

at the table, I felt like I was back in China for a few

moments. I closed my eyes, taking in the aroma of the

alcohol before tasting it. When I opened them, I found

I was ghting back tears. My friend laughed at me as

I was so emotional that I could barely hold my drink. I

was wiping away my tears, and admitted sheepishly

that Tsingtao beer was really great.

I swirl the milk around my cup, pulling me back to the

present. I take a swig, as if it was beer instead. By the

moonlight, I can see there’s only a little left.

I think of the street of bars nearby, awash with alcohol

and hormones. The street was crowded on weekends.

This is where the city’s workers congregated to let

their hair down after a long week at the oce. We once

squeezed our way through the groups of partygoers,

smelling a myriad of exotic perfumes.

There was another street not too far from the bar

street, where sometimes I would stop by after work.

It was a street of long queues. Generous individuals

in red t-shirts distributed bread, water and milk to the

homeless people. They even oered a simple medical

examination. I noted that most of these volunteers

were ethnic Chinese, which made me feel honored.

Reminiscing is a better method of nodding o than

counting sheep. I shue slowly back to my bed,

dragging my slippers that don’t t me, and lie down. I

Highlight

I never thought I would come to TP-Link, and never

dreamed I would work in Malaysia for half a year

either. Most of all, I never expected to end up making

connections with so-called “gangsters” in my new role.

I spent my third week in Malaysia stationed at a phone

store in Klang, a suburb of Kuala Lumpur. The boss,

let’s call him Ah Kah, wore plenty of gold and silver, and

gave me the impression of a big shot right from the

rst glance.

“Chinese! If you can’t sell more than 20 units, go back

to China!”, was the rst sentence he barked at me.

Before moving into phone retail, Ah Kah had joined

a local underground organization. It’s no secret that

70% of Malaysian Chinese were aliated with dierent

gangs in the not so distant past. The society my boss

had chosen is called HongMen, famous for its support

of Sun Yat-sen and the National Revolution in China in

the 1910s and 30s.

Though Ah Kah frightened me at rst with his less than

politically correct jokes, it was just his way of being

friendly. He took me to taste the traditional food Bah

Kut The, and explained to me the moral codes in his

shadowy society.

“In our company, what gives you authority is not just

the ability to ght, but also morality and virtue. No

matter how high your internal class is, if you don’t have

Walking Forwards with Courage

— Joe Zhang

lial piety, don’t respect or take care of your parents,

or you are disloyal, dishonest and unwilling to help

your brothers, you will be looked down upon and be

penalized under the ‘Family Laws and Rules’ of the Holy

Te m p l e. ”

While listening to his narrative, I realized “gangsters”

is an out-of-date description for these kind of groups.

HongMen is not an underground organization for the

unruly, but a club where Malaysian Chinese men try

hard to improve their reputation and earn the respect

of their fellow brothers. No wonder HongMen translates

to “Chinese Freemasons” in English!

One day he told me the Holy Temple of HongMen

would be organizing a reunion. Images lled my mind

of a cavernous temple in a remote location, lit by

candles mounted on red walls, with dozens of heads

turned towards the all-knowing leader. Above the

leader’s head hangs the portrait of the revered founder,

together with other legendary gures. I couldn’t contain

my excitement and curiosity, and begged Ah Kah to

cover myself with blankets, raise the temperature of

the air conditioner a touch, and close my eyes, ready

for another busy morning

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Friends Never Make a Journey

Alone — Kol Liu

Three months of overseas training may have gone by

in a ash, but there’s one phrase we will never forget —

only full marks is a pass. The fast pace of our working

lives forced us to get up to speed quickly.

At rst, some of us were too shy to intercept and

grab the attention of customers. By the end though,

we could introduce ourselves and our products, hold

demoes and give out yers. The biggest progress is

made when you leave your comfort zone.

The best part for me was making so many friends and

nding a sense of belonging within my new team of

brothers.

At the end of our rst period of training, two groups

were given a physical exercise punishment of 500

“suicide runs” for nishing bottom of the sales rankings.

But when they began running we all joined in, giving

each other high ves at the end. The punishment of

eight people became a shared positive experience for

a group of 31 brothers.

When we rst arrived we simply ate bread from the

local convenience store as breakfast. As time went

on though, we learned to corporate, cooking delicious

food like noodles, omelet and patties.

We did some outings as a team to the imposing

twin towers of KLCC, the atmospheric colonial train

station and elegant Putrajaya. These cultural activities

reinvigorated us, breathing fresh condence and

energy into our work.

May all young TP-Linkers keep their enthusiasm and,

wherever you are, burn like bright stars that together

form an unstoppable re.

take me with him. He agreed.

As is often the way with these things, the reality was

a little dierent. We found ourselves in a gold colored

hall, lled with more than 100 tables. It felt more like

the venue of a wedding banquet than that of an illegal

get-together. On the front wall was written “38th Ghost

Festival Monlam (ceremony) of Universal Salvation in

Middle Klang”. Traditional Chinese believe the whole

month of July is reserved for hungry ghosts, so the

title made some sense to me. Then, up came an

emcee onto the stage, also dressed in gold to match

his surroundings. He began the proceedings of what

looked very much like an auction. It nally dawned on

me why the “headquarters” had gathered all factions

here — they were asking the “subsidiaries” for money

so they could hold a bigger ceremony next time.

Coincidently, I witnessed this kind of gathering again in

Singapore two weeks later.

As a newcomer to Malaysia, and a newbie to the

gangster scene, I was in for a bit of a ribbing from the

senior members. I just concentrated on drinking my

beverage cup by cup as these veterans took it in turns

to make cutting jokes. They killed me! What gave me

strength at that moment was an idea; I would get all the

brothers around this table to become Neos users.

This was entirely possible, for I had strong ally. Ah Yong,

let’s call him, is the son of the leader at this table. He’s

16 years old and worked a part-time job at my store.

He thought very highly of Neos, and was committed

to make the brand a hit in the shopping mall. When my

time at the store was over, Ah Yong took up the mantle

of promoting Neos.

Highlight

AC5400X Gives Gamers the Router

They’ve Been Waiting For

Samuel Li, Networking BU Product Department

Archer C5400X is TP-Link’s first wireless router that’s specifically designed for online gaming fans, who look

for not only a cool-looking product but also ultrafast network performance. A whole lot of eort has gone into

meeting their unique needs. Here’s the low-down on the stand-out features.

Performance Surrounded by

Fine Crafting

Determined to make a high-level product in every

aspect, we believed that cutting-edge hardware

on the inside should be matched by an equally

impressive outside. To meet the tastes of gaming

users, we sought out US designer Whipsaw to create

the exterior shell of Archer C5400X. Whipsaw came

back with over 10 proposals, of which we selected

one to rene. Five rounds of revisions and reviews

then followed over the space of ve months until

we nally arrived at a design we were satised with.

Special attention was paid to details such as the

color of the antenna, the status shifts of the LED

light and the polishing on the thin strips around the

edges. Such care guaranteed a better product for our

customers.

More than Just a Beautiful Shell

Whether it’s teaming up with friends on League of

Legends or entering online football tournaments on

FIFA, gamers expect an immersive experience; that

means no lag no matter what else is happening on the

network. To meet these expectations, Archer C5400X

possesses the most powerful CPU ever used in a

SOHO router. It’s a quad-core, 1.8 GHz processor,

capable of handling all the strenuous tasks a network

can throw at it without breaking sweat.

Archer C5400X still excels when you’re taking a

break from battling your friends too. According to lab

data, Archer C5400X achieves a 66% improvement

in throughput compared with that of the previous

Archer C5400 model. Its advanced features are

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Every Detail Counts

Quality Testing to the Limit

Every time users buy a router, they have to go

through the initial conguration process. To make

this as painless as possible, users complete the

whole set up simply by following steps on our easy-

to-use Tether app. Bluetooth and Wi-Fi provide

alternative connection options for set up. Users no

longer need to turn the router over to search for the

default wireless password either. User experience

lies behind every detail.

As users, we know what a terrible experience it is

to spend time installing eight antennas by screwing

them onto a product, not to mention that they still

might need tightening. We knew there must be a

better way, and we came up with one — push-in

antennas. Since it was a new method, we inevitably

met some challenges; several rounds of trial-and-

error tests were required before we successfully

found a joint that was suited for both easy

installation and antenna stability. Although it took

a lot of eort, every product engineer was willing

to put in the hours to come up with a workable

solution, all in the name of user experience.

A consistently stable and fast network is what users

generally look for in a router, and that’s no dierent

here. The Testing Department conducted no less

than 10 rounds of thorough tests on Archer 5400X.

Sample users were selected from TP-Link employees

for product trials. Real users in the US were used for

the beta test. As ever, feedback gave us valuable

insights into users’ concerns and revealed product

deciencies, including OpenVPN security, initial

conguration guidance, portal functions and others.

We addressed them one by one, with our changes

received positively.

Lastly, I want to express my sincere gratitude to

everyone involved in this project; that includes R&D,

the Testing Department, the project management

engineers and the structural engineers. Thanks in

advance to our front-line salesmen also; I know we

can count on them to introduce Archer C5400X to

the market and make it this Christmas’ must-have gift

for gamers everywhere.

greater in number too. HomeCare not only protects

home networks, but also ensures smoother gaming in

the case of limited bandwidth thanks to QoS (quality

of service). With built-in 16GB storage and available

USB external hard drive, users can secure their les

and access them anytime and anywhere via the free

FileBank app. The security issues and expansion fees

of network disks are a thing of the past. RangeBoost

technology expands wireless coverage, beaming

C5400X’s powerful signal to devices all over the

home.

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The Crisis of Trust in Pakistan

Ben Huang, Networking BU Technical Support

"Emergency! A Pakistan sales agent has discovered that the PPTP

dial-up functionality of TL-WR840N V4.0 doesn’t work. More than

4600 products have been involved, causing a large number of

goods to be rejected!"

The technical support team received this alarming news on

February 21st in the early hours. Our nerves were rattled by such a

large scale problem. The situation was serious.

When It Rains, It Pours

We informed our R&D and testing colleagues in the

headquarters immediately. By coincidence, there

was a rmware version of TL-WR840N V4.0 currently

at the test stage, and a probabilistic bug relating to

PPTP (Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol) automatic

reconnection had just been xed. Without further ado,

we sent this beta rmware to the agent for a trial. The

agent checked the rmware in his oce as we waited

nervously – success!

However, the situation was far more complicated

than we had imagined. Problems cropped up one

after another. Considering that the feedback came

primarily from Pakistan's largest city, Karachi, we

asked the agent about the local ISP providers. It

turned out that 80% of local network service was split

between two ISPs. One is ConnectCom and the other

is FariyaNet. The servers used by these two ISPs were

often in close proximity, and even street to street the

servers could be dierent. This made for an extremely

complex ISP setup.

Both providers gave feedback that the newly arrived

TL-WR840N V4.0 didn’t allow access to the internet

by PPTP dial-up. By utilizing the beta rmware, we had

only solved the problem with the ConnectCom lines

in the agent’s office. The trouble with FariyaNet was

still unresolved.

The agent began to lose his trust in us. He was

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worried that we wouldn’t be able to get a solution any

time soon. We completely understood his concern

of course; it would have taken us at least six months

to test all servers in town. And during that period, we

may well have continued to get refund requests from

customers. Apart from the prot losses, the damage

to our brand image would be irrevocable.

Faced with the situation, the agent proposed that they

stop selling TL-WR840N V4.0 and go back to the old

version, TL-WR840N V3.0. The regression would be a

huge hit for us. What’s worse, the storm would not only

aect 4600 products that had been shipped, but also a

larger amount of goods on the way.

We had no option but to nd a way.

Problems Never Come in Ones

We decided to focus on FariyaNet to gure out the

problems as soon as we could. Although FariyaNet

had various servers in dierent towns, we believed

that once we had a working solution for one case, the

rest would follow.

We asked the agent to nd a user who was willing to

help us with the test. When the user had completed

the testing of TL-WR840N V3.0 and was preparing to

test for TL-WR840N V4.0, his optical ber service was

suddenly cut o due to the overhauling of wiring on the

street where he lived. So no progress yet!

While waiting for the ber repairs, we continued

the tests on ConnectCom lines with the help of

colleagues from R&D and Testing to gure out the key

cause for the PPTP failure. After all, the last test had

only proved that the new beta rmware could solve

the networking problem in the agent’s oce. What

about everywhere else?

After several tests on ConnectCom lines, we nally

sorted the issue and by distance training, we taught

the agent's technicians how to grab the data packets

through WANs, which turned out to be very helpful

for the FariyaNet problem. Even more inspiring, our

professionalism and devotion gradually regained the

trust from the agent.

Three days later, the testing user’s ber cable service

still wasn’t up and running. The situation was critical.

We asked the agent for a new testing environment,

which was surprisingly agreed to readily. In the

afternoon, the agent told us we could run tests in the

server room of FariyaNet! Being able to test directly

in the ISP’s server room gave us huge condence. It

was a perfect environment for the test!

This time we made extensive preparations. The

agent sent two technicians to the FariyaNet server

room while we set up a WeChat messenger group

and added the R&D and Testing team in order to

communicate. Everything was going to plan… That's

until the server room suddenly experienced a power

cut. Our frustrations almost boiled over. We’d been so

close to the key!

We contacted the guys at FariyaNet and were told

that the server room would be out of action for at

least the next two days.

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Problems never come alone!

Luckily, we had saved all the precious test data in the

notebook computer before the power kindly decided

to out. Based on the data we had on hand, we had a

discussion with the R&D team and through our analysis,

nally shone a light on the fundamental cause. The

internet environment of FariyaNet was quite special

indeed: the PPTP servers and the PPP servers share the

exact same IP address (normally, these are dierent). In

this special case, the routing entry of TL-WR840N V4.0

becomes erroneous, impeding the forwarding of data

packets.

Immediately our R&D colleagues set to work, preparing

a new beta rmware. Since the FariyaNet server room

was still in repair mode, we tested the new beta rmware

on ConnectCom in the agent’s oce, the result of which

couldn’t have been better. However, we weren’t home

and dry quite yet with the solution yet to be implemented

with FariyaNet.

After 48 hours of anxious waiting, the server room nally

had power again! All of us were waiting for the nal test

results with bated breath, our complete focus on the

screen in front of us. After what seemed like an eternity,

the agent sent a response. The rmware had been a

success! Our celebrations were muted; we still wanted

nal conrmation as to whether our dial-up users could

now connect successfully.

At 2 a.m. on March 8th, the agent sent us a message

in the WeChat group informing us that users had

conrmed that the solution for FariyaNet now worked!

At that moment, every one of us was relieved.

Later, the R&D team released the ocial version of the

rmware x, to permanently resolve the problem. At the

same time, other products using the same platform

were gradually updated with the rmware.

Follow-up: As mentioned above, the agent worried

that we wouldn’t be able to solve all the problems

in a short space of time because of the diverse ISP

circumstances. It turned out that as long as we solved

one problem, the others would be solved eventually. I

contacted the agent on Skype today (September 12th)

to conrm whether TL-WR840N V4.0 was still working

normally. The answer was an emphatic YES!

Breakthrough

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Getting Closer To Users

Luo Jun & Yang Minghua, Testing Unit of R&D

Purpose: Respect Users

For the TP-Link International Testing Group, users are

sacred. This not only means user experience, but also

putting users rst throughout the whole production

cycle. As we are serving millions of users all over the

world, it's much harder to practice what we preach.

We have to be more stringent and meticulous while

also providing diversity to cater to a wider range of

user demographics.

Regardless of product appearance, performance

and supporting features, for the testers, the user

experience is the only standard we care about. It

can’t be denied that in the past things have been

overlooked, either because of the urgency of the

project, the lack of awareness of new sta or other

reasons, causing quality issues that bring signicant

losses to the company.

In order to minimize the risk of the above, we have

tried a variety of ways to eliminate sources of

mistakes. Among all the measures put in place, test

cases are by far the most eective way for sta

to learn of issues. A test case is when an issue is

discovered after the product has been released to

users. The products are recalled and the case is

investigated in great detail in order to nd a solution.

The downside of this is that test cases come at

a great cost, sometimes thousands of dollars.

For obvious reasons, the information gathered is

regarded as extremely valuable to the department.

Ideally though, we don’t want to have to pay such

a high price in exchange for problem-discovering;

taking preventative measures would be preferable.

Principles: Be More than an Expert

We should take the users' point of view, and stop

thinking like a tech expert.

Thinking as an expert is a trap many technical

engineers have fallen into. Because of the complexity

of the inner workings of these products, it’s easy to

focus obsessively on the technology and ignore the

users' experience.

I remember we were so anxious about the stability

of 3G communications when we tested the rst 3G

wireless MiFi products. But once the product was

released into the market, the most common problem

reported back to us was that the shell surface was

easily scratched.

Since it was the rst 3G MiFi product, it was a big

challenge to grasp the stability of the relevant

How can we take precautions?

It is dicult to solve an unknown issue, since if it is

unknown, how can we predict its presence?

But if we look at this question in another way –

"How do we predict the problems that users may

encounter?" – then we can begin to make progress.

From this viewpoint, the key is to get closer the users

and to accurately grasp their dilemmas when they use

our products.

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Approach: Think as a Customer

When we evaluated our test process a while back, we

found the circumstances in which testing took place

were often far from the environment in which users

usually deploy the product. It’s a common problem. For

example, we used megabyte bandwidth when testing

an ADSL product, but in some African countries the

uplink rate is only 100-200Kbps. This means a single

device can fully occupy the uplink bandwidth, leaving

the line useless for others.

Another example is the English language version of

a router. When it began selling in Russia, the users

couldn’t log in using their Russian web browser. Why

are electronic products limited to certain regions? It’s

because we don’t consider conditions all over the world

when creating it.

Thus, we have to consider the users' circumstances

from every angle. Some ways to do this are to get

feedback from our sales teams on the front-line or

collect users' comments through online platforms.

Moreover, we can keep up with the latest developments

of the major ISP services and then adjust testing

conditions in the laboratory accordingly.

We’ve got a few new tricks for simulating users’

conditions. We can limit bandwidth and change the

language to name just two. For those conditions we

can’t simulate, we can have someone do the tests

locally in what’s either called a Local Test or Beta Test.

technology, but we ignored the fact that as a portable

product that would be used outdoors, we should also

concentrate on its durability. Although we had done

a scratch-resistant test on the surface at the R&D

phase and submitted a report that it wasn’t not strong

enough to resist scratches, we didn’t pay too much

attention to this problem, concentrating foolishly on

the high-level tech instead.

If we had been closer to the users, in this case we

would have seen that the shell quickly accumulates

oily ngerprints and scratches, making it look like an

old product after just a short space of time. Explaining

to customers that our choice of material will cause

these problems does not put us in the best light.

There are many more examples just like this.

In the past few years, we have continually improved

our testing methods. For a totally new product, we

have tried to design a number of UX tests and some

less standard tests without incurring the high cost

of user cases. For product upgrades, we have gone

to online business platforms to collect and analyze

user comments and learn from the experience of real

users in the forums.

With the progress of science and technology, such

as the development of AI, one day we believe we’ll be

able to interact with customers pretty much face to

face. Until that day comes though, it’s important to

reach out to customers as often as we can.

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Development: Moving with

the times

We have to keep pace with demand and move

with the times. In the past, we only installed one

NIC (Network Interface Card) driver on each PC.

The chances of two NIC drivers conicting were

very small. Today, with the abundance of network

equipment, the probability of users having multiple

NIC drivers on their PC has greatly increased, causing

conicts that must be resolved immediately.

Keeping up with the times not only means bringing

out new products or features as they are innovated,

but also nding new ways to cope with some old

diculties. NIC drivers produce a new process when

the installation link is clicked on the PC. The new

process will try to continuously start up if the last

process is running or has stopped due to a bug. An

advanced PC can handle this problem super-quickly,

before the users are even aware of it. It can be a

serious issue in a Pentium rst generation PC though

due to its slow processing, leading to installation

failure and even system crashes. We need to broaden

the scope of our testing as much as possible, so

that our products can adapt to a variety of terminal

equipment.

The same goes for our app family. When the iPhone

X came out we immediately made a purchase, then

carried out the rst trials of Tether, Deco and the rest.

There are many ways to get closer to users. Feel

free to contact us with your own suggestions and

questions. Together, let's take the user experience to

the extreme!

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The Mystery of MiFi —

Mobile Data Tech Explained

Kidd Li, Networking BU Product Department

The History of Mobile Communication

Technology – A Period of Rapid Change

Since the advent of mobile communication

technology in 1980, new versions of protocols

have been continually leapfrogging their older

counterparts. In the 90s, the maximum data transfer

rate was only 427 Kbps. The 21st century brought 3G

WCDMA, achieving rates of up to 42 Mbps. This, in

turn, was overtaken by the 150 Mbps of 4G LTE. The

current record holder is 4G LTE-Advanced, able to

shift packets at a surprisingly nifty 1 Gbps.

The most popular mobile communication technology

on the market now is actually a transitional one.

Cat 4 Standard (150 Mbps downstream, 50 Mbps

upstream) is 4G LTE, while Cat 6 (downstream 300

Mbps, upstream 50 Mbps) and Cat 11 (downstream

600 Mbps, upstream 50 Mbps) are usually referred to

as 4G LTE-Advanced.

Technical Prole – Dierent Modes,

Dierent Standards

There are two major modes in mobile communication

technology: TDD (Time Division Duplex) and FDD

(Frequency Division Duplex).

TDD uses the same channel for both uplink and

downlink, but allocates dierent time slots for each.

This might mean that for every three seconds, two

will be allocated for downlink and one will be allocated

for uplink. The frequently-used B38 band works in the

range 2570 MHz – 2620 MHz. TDD uses channels

very eciently, with up to 112 Mbps downstream and

up to 10 Mbps upstream.

FDD, on the other hand, uses separate channels

for uplink and downlink. For instance, the B3 band

works in the 1710 MHz – 1785 MHz range for uplink,

and the 1805 MHz – 1880 MHz range for downlink.

FDD provides speed at the expense of occupying

a greater number of channels, with up to 150 Mbps

downstream and up to 50 Mbps upstream.

The previously mentioned Cat 4, Cat 6 and Cat 11

are dierent technical standards for current 4G

technology, which are distinguishable by the number

of aggregated channels.

Cat 4 uses only one channel for data transmission.

Theoretically, a FDD channel can download data at a

maximum speed of 150 Mbps and upload data at a

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maximum speed of 50 Mbps.

Cat 6 uses two aggregated channels to achieve

higher downstream rates. Two aggregated FDD

channels can download data at a maximum speed of

300 Mbps. Upload speeds are unchanged.

Cat 11 uses three aggregated channels and 256QAM

technology. Theoretically, three aggregated FDD

channels can download data at a maximum speed of

600 Mbps, while the maximum upload speed is still 50

Mbps.

MiFi Products —

Better Portal Hotspots

This brings us to a major beneciary of all of these

technologies: MiFi (mobile Wi-Fi) products, which

are portable access points that accept SIM cards.

Some may doubt the need for MiFi products with the

availability of the hotspot function on smartphones,

but the advantages of MiFi are plain for those who

understand the tech.

A professional chip solution not only guarantees LTE

downstream rates, but also provides a stable Wi-Fi

network for a greater number of devices. From both a

stability and coverage point of view, MiFi represents a

massive step up on smartphone hotspots. Moreover,

due to low power consumption and the absence of

other functions, a fully-charged MiFi product has

enough juice to keep on going for a whole day.

TP-Link has released ve 4G MiFi products. Here’s

what they have in common:

• Embedded Qualcomm chips to provide a wireless

network for up to 32 devices.

• Embedded 2000 mAh/3000 mAh battery that works

for 8/15 hours.

• Supports SD cards to expand storage by up to

32 GB, enabling convenient storage and sharing of

photos, music, videos and other les.

• Easy to use with plug-and-play functionality. The

tpMiFi app means congurations can be changed

with the tap of a button.

M7350 is our superstar product, and is currently

selling well at a high ASP (average selling price).

The average monthly sales are over 10K worldwide,

reaching 25K in some months. Although it only

supports FDD, its exibility more than makes up for

this, as it can be used in many regions of the world.

(The Americas, Japan, Korea, and some parts of the

Middle East and Africa are the only exceptions.)

Our agship product, M7650, supports Cat 11 (up to

600Mbps downstream). Its AC1200 dual-band Wi-Fi

can connect to up to 32 devices at the same time. A

3000 mAh battery enables M7650 to work for up to

15 hours. These advantages mean M7650 dominates

current market, with only one competitor, Netgear’s

AC810. According to data by the esteemed Singtel

Laboratory, M7650 provides 352 Mbps downstream,

while for AC810 it’s only 289 Mbps. One might say

M7650 is still the undisputed the king of MiFi.

Looking Ahead —

Faster Speeds, Similar Prices

The global map of highest LTE-Advanced commercial

trac speeds is shown below, constructed according

to data collected in April 2017. Speeds exceed 300

Mbps in most countries, which is faster than the

speed of VDSL networks and comes amazingly

close to that provided on ber networks. It’s no

exaggeration to say that a wireless network is faster

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than a wired one today.

Although mobile communication technology is highly

developed now, there’s still room for improvement in

two aspects: speed and cost.

First, the speed – 5G technology is coming, able to

reach an incredible pace of dozens of Gbps, as shown

by Huawei’s laboratory test data below.

Then there’s the cost – the need is growing for IoT

technology that’s low-cost, low-energy consumption

and compact. IoT devices don’t actually require

great speeds (no more than 1 Mbps), but energy

eciency is paramount. Cat M or Cat 1 technology,

overtaken years ago, suddenly becomes relevant to

the conversation again. Cat M or Cat 1 technology

use energy at such a low rate, in fact, that two AA

batteries could be run for up to 10 years.

Who

Strengthening the Foundation of Our

Company

Manufacturing Engineering Department, edited by Isaac Xin

The development of a company not only depends on

the strategy and planning of executives, but also lies

with the sta's dedication and commitment. For TP-

Link, the factory is an essential part of operations; it

has the largest number of employees and the largest

density of personnel of any department. Thus, its

development and improvement require the sta to

devote their time, energy and intelligence to optimizing

working methods and boosting eciency. In recent

years, there have been a range of measures to

reduce costs and promote micromanagement in the

factory, which have signicantly enhanced production

eciency. Complementing this, of course, are the

continued contributions of exceptional employees.

Among these devoted and low-key sta, Peng

Chuan, part of the Project Optimization Group in the

Engineering Department deserves a mention. In

the eyes of his colleagues, Peng is a shy and quiet

character. When it comes to technical issues, however,

he becomes someone else; his eyes light up with

thought of a challenge and an opportunity to apply his

impressive logical thinking and technical skills.

Of course, such excellence is not intrinsic; instead,

it is gradually acquired through experience. After

joining the group in 2013, Peng developed a program

comparison system and an anti-error scanning system

for SMT segments, reducing human input and the

possibility of errors. In 2016, he was commissioned

to develop an SMT line-side stock scanning and

tracing system and warehouse scanning reconciliation

system, as well as integrating the subsystems into

a unied MES (manufacturing execution system)

to enhance the overall informatization level and

production eciency of the factory. These projects

save more than a million RMB per year.

It’s normal to experience teething issues when

implementing new systems, so Peng often works

overtime to deal with anomalies. His commitment to

his work never seems to wane; he even rushed to the

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factory at 3 a.m. one night after receiving an urgent

call. Peng harbored dreams at one point of moving to

the city center to experience the delights of an urban

existence, but in the end it was convenience that won

out; he ended up moving to a place a leisurely 10

minute stroll from the factory.

Most of the projects here have no hard deadlines,

and the completion of work largely depends on your

own drive and organization; Peng could have given

himself a little slack. On the contrary, he has become

a workaholic. If he can work overtime for 10 hours

to make a process more ecient and put in place

automation to reduce human input, he will feel great

satisfaction, comparable to the happiness he feels

when he overcomes a tricky technical challenge.

Peng has a few hobbies, but delving into technical

issues remains his greatest passion. When he’s not

taking part in software development, Peng also nds

time to self-develop hardware. A furnace temperature

tester is his proudest creation. Starting from the

analysis of the internal structure, he grasped the

engineering principles and then procured the materials

to assemble it by himself. It’s not just a great personal

achievement either; the company saves 500 000 RMB

per year thanks to this piece of ingenuity.

Speaking of workaholics, it would be a glaring omission

not to mention senior technician Pang Bangqi. The

factory is his second home and is where he spends

the majority of his working time. He may look ordinary,

without any distinctive features, but his experience is

anything but average. Having joined TP-Link in 2007,

he served initially as an employee in the assembly line.

He quickly ascended to squad leader of his group, and

then successfully transitioned to a technician role in

the Engineering Department successively. Eventually,

he was promoted to the level of Senior Technician, of

which there are only a few in the factory.

Always occupied with the next challenge, Pang

feels his 10-year stay at TP-Link has gone by in a

ash. He focuses on capably dealing with things at

hand every day, making him a trusted and reliable

colleague to others, and seldom gets irritated about

the trivial things. His attitude can be summed up in

one word: stability. For example, when responsible for

transferring units from the saddle stitch cartons to

cementing cartons, he drove the program forward at

a steady, sustainable pace. From the smallest network

adapter to our most complex products, each device

was tested individually and only after conrming there

were no defects were they given the OK. Products of

every kind were successfully packaged by cementing

cartons at high accuracy. Due to the massive lot

size and complexity of the process, the methods

implemented had to be mature and sustainable to

ensure the quality of the products.

Stability is not his only characteristic. Equally important

is Pang’s ability to keep calm under pressure. It was a

big step up for Pang when he was promoted to squad

leader in 2008 and then again when he switched to

being a technician two years later. When his ability

was questioned, Pang’s reply was simple: ‘’Give me a

month, and I’ll get it right.’’ Over the following days and

weeks, he gradually became familiar with the tasks and

ultimately achieved satisfactory results, proving his

point.

Stability also refers to exploring problems and

proposing measures for improvement, rather than

just being satised with the status quo. In 2006, Pang

began to implement a project to reduce the defect

rate of 11AC products by changing the process of

assembling the protecting foam of the indicator lights,

which 100% avoided the problem of them getting

Who

damaged. This excellent work earned him the recognition and respect of his peers.

Cost optimization and improved eciency within the factory stems from the joint eorts of all those who devote

themselves to their work. In addition to the projects mentioned above, engineers and technicians have innovated,

among other things, an automatic MAC address writing device, a rotating shielding box and an automatic cutting

machine for tins. Measures have also been taken to cut out redundant work in order to reduce labor costs. A

sense of responsibility and willingness to put in the hard work ensures there’s a nice rhythm to the processes and

the quality of production stays consistent. If the factory was a machine, the dedicated technical sta would be

the engine, driving it relentlessly forward. They are the foundation of the factory’s continued evolution, and of TP-

Link’s.

Who

Keep Calm and Call HR

Queenie Tse and Samina Fung, TP-Link Canada

TP-Link Canada’s team has grown from a ve-

man organization wearing multiple hats to a mature

company with separate departments consisting of

over 30 people. As our business continues to grow in

the land of the maple trees, there’s one department

that tends to get overlooked but is no less vital for the

daily workings of the oce. I am, of course, referring

to Human Resources.

Take out infrastructure, systems and inventory;

people are the backbone of all we do. They are the

engine that operates, controls and manages it all.

As we commemorate seven years of presence

in the Canadian market, we sat down and had a

candid conversation with Samina Fung, human

resources manager. Samina has worked with

several multinational corporations, with experience

in expatriate sta relocation and changes of

management due to mergers and acquisitions. She

continues to invest in her professional development

by taking part-time human resources management

and policy studies. On the weekends, she enjoys

spending time with her family and trying out new

recipes in the kitchen.

Although Samina arrived with a wealth of experience,

establishing a new department and implementing

structure into a historically unstructured team still

comes with its challenges. Here, Samina gives an

insight into what she’s experienced since establishing

the Human Resources Department in 2015.

Queenie Tse, Marketing Manager: What were your

goals when you founded the Human Resources

Department back in 2015?

Samina Fung, Human Resources Manager: Since

To ro n t o i s o n e o f t h e m o s t d i v e r s e c i t i e s i n t h e wo r l d ,

we rst needed to [as an organization] promote core

values, diversity and inclusion while implementing

structure. Since 2015, we have developed and

implemented new policies, streamlined and improved

HR services and made organizational information more

accessible to employees. Ultimately, my goal was to

ensure a positive work environment while continuing

to attract, recruit and retain quality employees from

the market. In the HR department, we have a set of

best practices we refer to regularly and will provide

recommendations to management when it comes to

conict management, employee motivation and hiring.

Queenie Tse: That is a big task. Can you tell me more

about your approach to conict management?

Samina Fung, Human Resources Manager of TP-Link Canada

Who

Samina Fung: Conicts can be avoided if we set

reasonable expectations and communicate goals

and objectives clearly to our employees. The result

of facing a challenging problem is resolution and we

encourage employees to learn by taking ownership of

their conicts. Developing our employees’ problem-

solving skills leads to greater job satisfaction and

makes them more equipped to work with vendors,

partners and suppliers.

Queenie Tse: What are some of the ways to motivate

employees?

Samina Fung: Sometimes we see our colleagues

more than our families and we try our best to

create an inclusive environment where we support

everyone’s professional and personal goals. We

encourage feedback and suggestions and celebrate

milestones like birthdays, work anniversaries and

holidays like you would with your own family. I nd

team sports and activities outside of our core work

responsibilities to improve communication and

promote teamwork. We have weekly badminton

meet-ups and do fun activities like a pumpkin carving

contest at Halloween where employees can team up

with colleagues outside of their own departments and

make new friends.

Queenie Tse: What are some of the criteria you use

to hire employees, or should I say, select your family

members?

Samina Fung: Attitude and enthusiasm are very

important. Both of these qualities are contagious

and rub o on other employees and customers.

Employees who demonstrate all the qualities of

an entrepreneur are often highly successful in any

organization they enter; they are proactive, willing

to learn, help others, go the extra mile and take

ownership of their work. At TP-Link Canada, we

believe everyone makes a dierence and contributes

to the growth of the business.

Queenie Tse: Thank you for your time and insight into

the HR department. Before we end, can you provide

one nal piece of advice to our global

TP-Link employees?

Samina Fung: My advice would be: don’t confuse

movement with progress. We must continue to

progress and improve. Continuing to work hard and

plan [as a team] are small progressions towards a

larger organizational goal.

Who

A Mother’s Story

Tatianna Vasconcelos, TP-Link Brazil

Today I want to introduce Danielle Souza da Silva. For us, her colleagues at TP-Link Brazil, she’s our trusted call

center analyst, but outside of work she’s so much more — a remarkable woman ghting to save a

child‘ s life. This is the story of Danielle and a baby named Sandra.

When an Angel Found Home

As a “Dinda” to the Angel

Two years ago, one evening after Danielle arrivied

home from work, her mother showed her a newborn

baby that a neighbor had left with her. Danielle

carefully picked up the baby, cradling her in her arms.

The baby was so small and fragile. As she held the

baby close to her chest, bright eyes looked back at

her. “What an angel!”, Danielle said to herself. In that

moment, Danielle felt completely attached to the

baby. It was the beginning of a beautiful story.

That baby’s name is Sandra, now a two-year-old

infant. Sandra‘ s biological mother suers from drug

addiction, and did not stop using drugs during the

pregnancy. Tragically, this meant that Sandra was

born premature at just seven months, with nine

dierent deseases including drug addiction in a public

hospital in San Paulo. With almost no blood in her

veins, she received a blood transfusion immediately

after birth. Her mother left the hospital after recovery,

abandoning the baby in the intensive care unit.

Sandra’s grandfather went looking for her. He’d heard

about his daughter going to the emergency room

and wanted to take responsibility. He appeared just in

time; the baby would have been given to the state for

adoption if he hadn’t arrived before a set date. Sandra‘

s grandfather was given temporary custody, while

Sandra stayed in intensive care for 30 days.

Danielle volunteered to take care of little Sandra

from the day they met. After a while, Sandra’s

grandfather asked Danielle if she would like to be

Sandra’s godmother. Danielle’s reply was an emphatic

“yes!”. Since then, Sandra spends half her days

with her grandfather and half with Danielle. Sandra’s

grandfather doesn’t have much in the way of nances,

Who

A Mother’s Seless Love

Tracing Roots for Her Daughter

One day, Sandra began vomiting. The doctor

suspected pneumonia initially, but when looking at

the X-ray scan found something very dierent. One

side of Sandra’s lungs was paralyzed, working at only

at 20% of its capacity. The doctor explained that

the capacity would lower further as she grows up. It

was heartbreaking news for Danielle. What’s worse,

Sandra‘ s grandfather lost his job around the same

time and had no choice but to live in another city

three hours away by car from San Paulo. He brought

Sandra with him in the hope that the superior air

quality would be good for Sandra’s health.

During this period, Danielle went to see Sandra every

other week, making a six-hour round trip each time.

Meanwhile, Danielle bagan saving up money for

Sandra’s surgery. She worked harder, putting aside

most of the money for Sandra. For Danielle, Sandra

is her own daughter. A mother will do everything she

can for her baby.

On December 14th 2017, Sandra had the surgery. It

was a complex operation, taking a full eight hours,

during which Sandra’s left lung was taken out. Danielle

is looking after her, waiting for her baby to become

strong enough to leave the hospital. When that day

comes, Sandra will go home and stay with Danielle

for eight months, enough time for her to make a full

recovery.

Danielle has searched for Sandra‘ s biological mother,

in order to know where she comes from. She tracked

down the mother’s house and was crushed by what

she found. The girl, now 22 years old, the same age

as Danielle, has 1-year old twins. Both have the same

problem Sandra has. Their living conditions are very

poor; one baby sleeps in a crib and the other in a car

seat. They receive food via donations from a neighbor.

She refuses to accept Sandra as her daughter and

still uses drugs even after giving birth to the twins.

Danielle is a commited TP-Link worker and serves

as an inspiration for all of us. Each day she displays

a heart of purest gold, oers encouragement and

guidance to others, shows bravery in her decision

making and is a credit to the company as our bubbly

hero.

so Danielle provided food, clothing and medicines for

Sandra. She fed her, played with her, spoke to her in

soft tones, watched her as she began crawling on the

bed and made her soapy bubble baths at bath time.

She watched her take her rst steps and begin to call

her “dinda”, which is godmother in Portuguese.

Who

Hail to the Bus Driver

Interviewee: Wu Tao, HQ General Aairs Department, edited by Layla Cai

and Karen Luo, HQ Oce

Night is closing in, the last remnants of sunlight on

the horizon having been eclipsed by the regular

illumination of the streetlights. Mr. Wu still holds a rm

grip on the steering wheel, expertly pulling it to the

left, guiding his bus in a tight U-turn, back towards the

factory after the last shuttle. He switches o the lights,

cuts the engine and hands the keys to the guard in

the security booth. Another day over. On weekdays,

Mr. Wu accompanies his vehicle from dawn till dusk.

A forty kilometer route, traversed back and forth what

must be approaching ten thousand times.

“I've crossed the mountains and the seas, and I've

crossed many lives.” The lyrics to the song “Ordinary

Road”, a big hit in the Chinese pop charts, feel like

they were written just for Mr. Wu. Before this job, Mr.

Wu was in the haulage business for several years.

From Shanghai to Xinjiang, a man and his truck shared

the road for four thousand kilometers. In 2009, Mr. Wu

left his hometown of Wushan in Anhui province and

began working in Shenzhen. Introduced by his friends,

he joined TP-link as a company shuttle bus driver, his

occupation for the last seven years.

Every working day from 7:00 a.m. to 7:30 p.m., Mr. Wu

transports employees and items between ve stops:

Building 24, Building 5, Hongfa Factory, Export Factory

and Domestic Factory. Mr. Wu even clocks up miles

at the weekends, shuttling workers doing overtime

between factories. He’s proud of his reliability, barely

asking for leave over the 365 days of the year.

Statutory holidays are the only time he hangs up his

driving gloves.

After nishing a day on the road, instead of sitting in

front of the TV and becoming a “couch potato” like

some oce workers, Mr. Wu puts on his tness gear

and heads to the gym.

Introduced by our mutual colleagues in general aairs,

we caught up with Mr. Wu to nd out more about

his attitude to work, the universe and everything in

between. His relaxed, fun attitude to life is immediately

apparent; “Do what you want to and be happy doing

it”, he tells me. We ask some questions to delve a little

deeper.

Editor: Why did you leave your hometown of

Dangshan in Anhui province and take a job in

Shenzhen?

Wu: I used to drive long-distance trucks, and it was

risky, to be honest. My family worried when I was out

Who

at work each day. My parents asked me to quit the job,

which I did and then sold my car for some additional

cash. My sister lives in Shenzhen, so I thought I could

come over and we could take care of each other.

Editor: Was your rst job in Shenzhen as a bus driver?

Wu: I drove a concrete mixer for over a year when I

rst arrived here. Although the wages were high, it was

messy work shifting the cement. I’m the kind of guy

who prefers to be clean and I don’t like mucky work

too much. In 2010, my colleagues recommended me

to TP-Link and I thought this job would suit me. At that

time, the factory was in Honghualing Industrial Park,

and the HQ oce was in the R1-B building. Only two

buses ran between the HQ oce and the factory.

Editor: What’s your current job like?

Wu: I get out the door at 7:00 a.m. and follow my

morning route, going from Jiazitang Community to

Pingshan Village before reaching Building 24 in the Hi-

Tech Park at 8:10 a.m. I have breakfast there then set

out for the factories (Hongfa, Export and Domestic) at

8:50, arriving at almost 10:00 a.m. After a short break,

I drive back to Building 24. I get there at 11:50 a.m.,

take lunch and then have a rest until 13:30 p.m. When

it hits 13:30 p.m. it’s time to pay a visit to Building 5,

before making a run back out to the factories. I need

to run a trip every hour from 3:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.

The last bus to the factory is at 7:30 p.m. After that, I’m

o work. I make eight runs per day from Building 24 to

the factory. That’s almost 300 km covered every day

from Monday to Friday.

Editor: What about your weekends?

Wu: Generally, I provide service to the Xili area on

weekends for overtime workers at the factory, both in

the morning and evening.

Editor: Is your accommodation arranged by the

company?

Wu: Yes, I have been living in the factory dormitory

since 2011. I have my own room because I drive the

regular bus and my schedule is dierent from truck

drivers. Their work starts at 8 a.m., but I must get up at

6:00 a.m. every morning. Good sleep is very important

since it’s dangerous to drive a bus full of sta if I

haven’t slept well and feel tired.

Editor: It’s exhausting to work over 300 days every

year. How do you keep yourself in such a good

condition?

Wu: Happiness and motivation are the most important

things for a worker. I have been working at TP-Link

for many years, I am familiar with everything and I feel

happy. I try my best at work and try to do things well.

Sometimes I feel tired, but I have a good mentality,

and never say things like “oh my god, I’m so tired”.

Editor: As a bus driver you come across many people.

Do you have an interesting stories?

Wu: Every time I leave the bus, I’ll ask, “Is there

anybody on the bus?” Usually there’s a few who’ve

forgotten to get o because they’ve fallen asleep,

were chatting or have been playing on their phones.

One memory still stands out in my mind. At about

8:00 p.m. one night, after I had already locked the bus,

handed in the key and taken a shower in the dormitory,

I suddenly got a call from the Administrative Section:

“Hurry up Tao! Pick up your key and get to the bus.

There’s still someone on board.”

I answered, “How could that happen? It’s 10 o’clock

now.”

“He fell asleep and just woke up…”

I burst into laughter at that point.

Editor: Does this job make you feel proud and

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dierent from other people?

Wu: When someone asks me where I work and I say

TP-Link, they’ll reply “Wow! TP-link is very nice. A huge

company with a lot of people”. I feel so happy to hear

that.

Sometimes, I’ll say something good about TP-link in

my WeChat circle. For example, I’ll post a short video

to show our domestic and export factories or our

world’s No.1 status in the shipment of routers. Other

people will comment that I’m showing o again. So

yes, I am very proud indeed.

Editor: Have you changed while working at TP-link for

so many years?

Wu: I used to be mischievous and have a bit of a

short temper when I was at home, and I liked hanging

around outside. I had a lot of experience as a long-

distance driver, and not all of it was positive. It’s quite

nice working here. I am a more rounded character

now. I got mad easily when I met some troubles

before, but now, I can make myself calm down.

Editor: What do you like to do after work?

Wu: The gym is my passion. After work I will go back

to the dormitory, change clothes and then do exercise

for an hour and a half. Later I will go home, take a bath

and eat dinner. I hit punchbags every day in the gym

instead of using exercise equipment. I’ve practiced

martial arts and “san da” [a military martial arts style

developed for use by the Chinese military] since I

was a child. I love to keep active and will feel sluggish

without exercise every day. My weight has remained

at 55-60 kg from 16 years old until now. Sometimes

I also like to drink and chat with my colleagues and

friends, but I never drink a lot. I won’t drink a single

drop if I’ll drive either. I have strict self-control.

Editor: How do you nd time for your family? What are

your expectations for your children?

Wu: My wife lives in Bao’an District. Because I only

have to make two journeys during weekends I will

be free during the day. We usually have our meals

together. Both of my children were born post 95s. I

don’t have any great expectations. It’s OK for them

to do as they like and discover things for themselves.

The post-90s children are often thought to be quite

dependent on their parents in China and so are my

children. They ask parents or others for help when

they have troubles, which wasn’t the case in my day. I

hope that they can be more independent and strong.

Editor: Do you have any big plans for the future?

Wu: Nothing special. My hometown is a so-called

"Capital of Fruit" and my family has invested in

cold storage while I also have two vehicles running

logistics operations in Dongguan, so I don’t need to

worry about the income. My family once said to me

that this work might be too tiring for me and they

wanted me to quit. My own experience is that there’s

nothing to do back home and I’m happy to do a few

more years here in Dongguan and Shenzhen because

I’m familiar with the area and have a comfortable life

here.

Though to the outsider his daily work may seem

repetitive, Mr. Wu is satised with the way things have

turned out and keeps his spirits high on the journey of

life. A positive attitude means he’s able to travel every

road with the same enthusiasm and self-discipline.

Editor's note:

For every TP-Linker in Shenzhen and Dongguan,

each working day begins and ends with a ride on

the company bus. These transport links make our

commuting more comfortable, convenient and safe.

The company has been providing shuttle services for

over ten years now, and has been invested more than

Who

10 million RMB every year into it. There are currently 43 drivers and four managers involved in the large-scale

operation. The bus routes cover all

TP-Link’s oce locations including those in Nanshan, Guangming and Dongguan. Bus routes for daily commutes

cover almost every urban area in Shenzhen where employees reside. The easternmost stop is the Longgang

Ailian Station, while to the west you can get all the way to Bao’an Sanwei Junction. The northernmost location

you can reach is our factory in Dongguan.

Who

Become Your Own Personal Lead

Georgiy Bessalov, TP-Link Russia

These days, when you see a headline mentioning Russia and its "lead" or "unsung hero", it will most likely be

about Vladimir Putin or the anonymous hordes of Russian hackers accused of interfering with foreign election

campaigns. This article, rest assured, has nothing to do with either. It’s a brief story about a localization specialist

who, for several years now, has been expanding his horizons, following his interests in the eld of marketing.

Entering the IT Industry

In today’s Russia, people are crazy about technology.

The internet is essential, and the IT industry is hip and

vogue. In 2013, when a former colleague contacted

me and asked if I would like to work for a company

that makes Wi-Fi devices, I jumped at the chance.

At that time, I had been working as an interpreter

at the notary oce in the center of Moscow and

played regularly in a band. I remembered how I had

bought my rst Wi-Fi router back in 2007, and how

I was fascinated by the technology that transferred

hundreds of gigabytes of data over the air as if by

magic. I thought I should join the trend and discover

more.

I started as a localization specialist, taking advantage

of my major in linguistics. For the four years I’ve

worked at TP-Link, I can recall numerous documents

I have painstakingly translated; at rst it was mostly

rmware and technical documentation, then later

came website content and PR copy. When I count up

how many pages I’ve written up till today – it would be

the equivalent of all four volumes of War and Peace.

People might ask – how could you do such similar

work for four years and not get bored? As far as I

am concemed, I found the solution in professional

development and the accumulation of knowledge in

marketing and management. I decided to become

"my own personal lead". It motivated me to take a

postgraduate course in project management in 2014,

a course in creative writing in 2016, and a course in

digital marketing in 2017. If I plan one for 2018, it will

probably be web-design or a programming language.

New knowledge and adding to my work experience

have led me to two conclusions: one should never

stop learning, and that entrepreneurial knowledge

and soft skills are crucial. New knowledge allows

you to nd settings for your ideas, which may grow

into valuable projects (especially if they focus on

implementation of a new technology or business

process optimization), and soft skills allow you to

build stronger ties with colleagues and partners. In my

opinions, well-established communication is the key

to joint eciency.

Never Stop Learning

Who

Not Only a Localization Specialist

Applying a proactive mindset allowed me to eventually

turn my focus to digital marketing work in the

company. For several years I have been responsible

for updating content on the website : adding new

models, updating product resources, changing

banners and various other information. I got interested

in searching and applying dierent internet marketing

tools – I focused on e-news, web analytics, website

usability, SEO and online reputation management.

Within the last six months I’ve been able to get a good

grip of Google Analytics to monitor the behavior of

the website users. Besides ensuring that their number

is increasing every year, it has also allowed me to

monitor how many people visit the newly launched

promo page dedicated to the Archer series. To

improve the process of sending e-news I was able

to congure Mail Chimp – a free newsletter service

which can track subscriber behavior and engagement,

plan future mailing and produce easy-to-read yet

informative reports. Several more features have been

added in the areas of event registration and online

reputation management. Equally valuable have been

the suggestions I’ve received on how to improve the

TP-Link Russia website and the local Partner

Portal. Additionally, the website support from the

team in the headquarters cannot be passed without

mention (guys, you are great!). Most of the above was

beyond my regular content localization duties – and

this made it more challenging and captivating.

So, what's the moral of this story? In Russia, there’s

a proverb – live a century, learn a century. This is

the fundamental principle for those who want to be

Who

proactive and become a "lead" for him or herself. I

once read an article in Scientic American, explaining

four habits that improve performance and motivation:

challenge yourself, think creatively, do things the hard

way and network. This attitude has helped me for

sure. I am coming to the end of my diploma in digital

marketing, which focuses on website promotion

strategies. I hope that the knowledge gained can

nd fruitful application in my current work. And for all

TP-Linkers, I wish you the same – nd your source

of knowledge and inspiration and strive for the best

results possible!

Who

It’s Not Just Santa’s Elves Working

Overtime in Q4

While you’re picking the perfect gift for loved ones,

the Warehouse Team are picking Black Friday and

Christmas orders ready for the busiest shopping

season of the year. With Amazon oering same-day

deliveries and a general expectation that all online

orders arrive next day, spare a thought for the people

who make this shopping magic happen.

Under the watchful eye of Kenny Rice, a six-strong UK

Warehouse Team receive, process, pick and dispatch

between six and eight containers each week. With

more than 200 SKUs (stock keeping units) to keep

track of, often with similar SKU codes, the team is

a well-oiled machine that processes lorry loads

of products every day. At rst glance, it may seem

straightforward to keep our four main distributors

happy. However, Kenny and his crew have to think

one step further down the supply chain to the

requirements of the retailer or e-commerce platform.

Take pallets, for example. Surprisingly, not all pallets

are the same. Many of our e-commerce and retail

customers have dierent and very specic pallet

requirements that TP-Link has to accommodate.

This results in a massive amount of manual picking,

restickering and of course repacking before we

can full each order. By reviewing and optimising

processes, the Warehouse Team is carefully calibrated

to ensure that each order is correct and reaches the

distributor within the pre-agreed 1-hour delivery slot.

“We are the nal piece of the puzzle. The sales teams

generate the orders and it’s up to us to fulll them so

Emma Lattimer, TP-Link UK

Lives

the Accounts Department can send the all-important

invoice”, Kenny explains. “If we make mistakes, it has

a knock-on eect throughout the supply chain which

could result in empty shelves at Maplin, Tesco or one

of the other high street stores. Ultimately, the job is

about customer satisfaction. Experience shows that

keeping our processes simple and transparent can

dramatically reduce errors and if there is a mistake,

it can be easily rectied. At the end of the day we do

what it takes to make sure the customers get their

orders.”

As testament to Kenny’s careful planning and

attention to detail, in the last 12 months there have

been just 5 mis-picks out of 3,261 shipments.

Considering that there are multiple deliveries leaving

the site in Reading each day, that represents a

miniscule margin of error. It’s this level of service

and commitment that builds strong and protable

relationships with our customers.

Regarding the Warehouse Team, Distribution Channel

Manager, Kieran Vineer, said “Getting the right

product mix to the right place, at the right time and

on the right pallets is a logistical feat. And distributors

recognise the complexity of the task, especially

during the peak period in November and December

when orders are at their highest. They especially

appreciate our exibility in oering direct customer

shipments, a service that our UK competitors cannot

oer at competitive prices.”

In his quest for continual improvement and cost

savings, Kenny regularly reviews the service levels

from suppliers and internal processes including

health and safety procedures across the company.

Through this review process he has negotiated an

exclusive contract with a single hauler. Price was not

the only driving factor; Palletways also provide 100%

transparency, so that with a few key strokes Kenny

and the team can accurately track the whereabouts of

any given consignment. This level of visibility means

that valuable stock can be located instantly and

distributors given an accurate time of arrival in the

event of a problem.

To alleviate some of the pressures associated with

the massive increase in order volume during the Q4

peak, Kenny plans to implement a shift system which

would a) increase the number of hours in the working

day, b) provide exible working options and c) ensure

the team remain fresh and motivated during this

particularly demanding time of year.

“There’s no doubt that Kenny and the team are on

Santa’s nice list this year. They’ve done an amazing

job processing hundreds-of-thousands of pounds

worth of stock and making sure it gets to the right

customer at the right time. Without their dedication

and attention to detail, the knock-on eect would be

massive, not least on timely invoicing. I’m sure they’ll

get a visit from Santa this year”, commented Will Liu,

Country Manager, TP-Link UK Ltd.

Out of the Box: To build strong working relationships

and encourage genuine friendships that smooth the

cogs of a well-oiled machine, the team make a point

of going out together once a month. Conversation

may cover work issues in an informal setting but

generally the talk always drifts back to one topic:

football. The friendly rivalries between fans supporting

teams as diverse as Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester

United and Reading F.C. makes for lengthy animated

conversations.

Lives

For new employees, the dining hall of the Fifth

Building in Shenzhen only exists in folklore. For more

experienced sta such as myself, pangs of nostalgia

are still common when we think back to those good

old days.

The Liu Qian restaurant is no more, but the tables

and chairs remain, a constant reminder of the

banter shared among the piping hot dishes. Like

most colleagues, I loved having my breakfast there,

catching up with the latest news and enjoying a

pleasant chat before the start of a busy day.

After the restaurant went, I assumed the area would

remain undisturbed, with only the scuttle of a rat or

cockroach breaking the silence occasionally. One

otherwise unremarkable morning though, everything

changed. Something was stirring in the dining hall, as

three gures loomed into view. This is the story I want

to tell. What was in the hall? Why were they making a

commotion? And how did they capture my heart?

OK, so I exaggerated a bit when I said commotion, for

they were actually very quiet. A louder noise source

was me in my excitement to nd them - a mother cat

with her two kittens. They were lying under a banana

leaf at the staircase, enjoying the warmth of the

sunshine.

Since my serendipitous discovery of their shelter,

a precious haven in vagrant lives, I couldn’t help

but observe the family through a window from the

second oor in my quieter moments. After a week’s

observation, I had their daily routine pretty well sussed

out. Every morning, the mother would lead the two

kittens to the corner of the staircase, then bask in the

warmth of the concrete platform under the banana

leaf. The two kittens would either play with each other

or suck milk from their mother’s wizened breasts. The

mother is a dragon li breed, with milky white, slender

limbs that remind me of a ballet dancer. One kitten

closely resembles the mother, while the other kitten

has orange fur, perhaps taking after the father. The

orange kitten was slightly stronger than the other.

Considering their housing situation, neither had a

chance of becoming plump. I read later that a female

cat usually gives birth to a litter of ve to eight kittens,

which made me wonder about the others. I couldn’t

imagine what this mother had been through, but knew

she must have had some distressing experiences.

Each day I found myself stopping by after breakfast,

watching them with endless curiosity. Sometimes

the mother’s eyes would dart around, meeting mine

for an instant. I could see that a wondering life meant

extra alertness. I didn’t dare to come closer, for fear

of frightening them away. I could see perseverance in

the mother’s gentle eyes. They could survive without

my help, thanks to her dedication.

What’s the biggest threat for vagrants in Shenzhen?

It’s not food shortages, but typhoons, which regularly

tear through the region in the summer months. The

day arrived when typhoon Hato broke the peace. I was

at the oce when it happened, and couldn’t help but

worry about my feline friends. Were they OK? Did they

have shelter?

I knew better than anyone that the exposed staircase

An Encounter with the Kitten Family

Zhu Haiming, R&D

Lives

wouldn’t oer protection from a heavy storm. Wind

hit the window like ping pong balls, and rain drops the

size of beans were pelting the glass behind me, with

a sound like a drummer striking his kit. I felt as if the

rain drops were hitting the back of my head, again and

again.

I could wait no more. I dashed downstairs, just in

time to see the mother dart through the fence,

with the orange kitten dangling from her jaws. The

other kitten was left behind. Poor thing! Without the

mother’s protection, rain drops mercilessly beat its

undeveloped body, as if trying to blow it down the

stairs. It didn’t seem to notice what was going on, after

all, it had only entered the world barely a month ago. It

couldn’t have been more obvious that this poor kitten

had been abandoned by its mother. In a time of grave

danger, the mother was faced with a choice, and was

experienced enough to rationally choose the stronger

kitten and therefore the one with higher survival rate,

escaping from danger without turning back.

Finally, the lingering kitten seemed to wake up to

its situation. It was being battered by bitter winds,

drenched with rain, and more importantly, was

separated from its mother. Out of fear, it shivered,

trembled, and hopelessly called out for its long-gone

mother. A strong gust of wind blew through. The kitten

was thrown down the stairs. On its way, a sharp piece

of steel ripped its ear, which was instantly bleeding.

It struggled to stand up, caught between two broken

concrete slabs. Weak as it was, it couldn’t even open

its eyes, but still its mouth opened, as if silently calling

to its mother. It was heart wrenching stu.

I’d watched this family for the past two weeks without

ever interfering, not wanting to intrude on something

so intimate and natural. Finally though, I knew the

time for action had come. I could bear it no more! I

bounded down the stairs and scooped up the kitten,

lifting it from the depths of hell. I dried its body with

tissues in the dining hall. To my surprise, the little

kitten wasn’t afraid of me at all, or maybe just had no

strength left to feel fear. I put it in a paper box hidden

at the corner of the stairs, and decided to take it

home after work.

The kitten’s ghting spirit surprised me. Later that

night it seemed somewhat revived, and even started

meowing shyly. The following morning, the mother

and her orange kitten were nowhere to be seen.

Update: The kitten made a full recovery from its ordeal

and now lives happily in the author’s home. It hasn’t

been out in any more storms.

Lives

Triumph in the Skies

“Hey Ralph?”

“What’s up?”

“I have an idea. I want to make TP-Link y.”

“Let’s do it!”

I am Yuriy Polishchuk, head of the Distribution

Department at TP-link Ukraine since 2012. But that

isn’t what I want to talk about today. Today I want

to introduce you to the other me, the creator of

unmanned aerial vehicles. These things aren’t just

pretty models; the real deal is a complex piece of

engineering, able to take o at any moment, reaching

up to the skies.

As an experienced fanatic (I took up the hobby

several years ago), I have built my own workshop,

crammed with every component a vehicle could

possibly need, and complete with 3D printers. In the

early days I learnt by consulting specialist websites

and forums, poring over the information I found there

to discover how to realize my designs. Now, the vast

majority of my aerial vehicles are designed and built

by me alone. From the initial ideas, system design,

component printing and assembly, to the nal coding

and debugging, everything is done by me. They are

complicated projects, which require a systematic

approach. Each vehicle usually takes several months

or longer from concept to ight. Others may think it’s

boring and time-consuming, but for me it’s heaven.

When I gaze up at one of my planes gliding with a

backdrop of blue sky, the excitement I feel more than

repays my eorts.

It’s no mean feat to y these contraptions. Crashes

and wreckages are common. I still remember my rst

Yuriy Polishchuk and Ralph Zhou, TP-Link Ukraine

Lives

plane. For a magnicent 45 seconds it soared like an

eagle, and then, like a kite let loose, plummeted down,

breaking itself into pieces along with my heart. But

where there’s a will, there’s a way. With continuous

learning and a little perseverance, I became more and

more adept at designing and manufacturing. These

days I can independently create aerial planes with

up to 2 meter wingspans, and have even had a go at

quadcopters. What’s more, I can write code to guide

them to any destination through GPS and an autopilot

cruising system.

I’ve also worked out how to view a live HD video

feed from the air. My rst thought was to simply buy

a ready-made system. The low end o-the-shelf

standard analog solutions are low quality though,

while HD video equipment is crazily expensive.

There had to be a better way. And that’s when it

occurred to me to try Wi-Fi. After much research and

experimentation I settled on a workable solution:

-On the transmitter side (in the air), TP-Link’s very own

TL-WN722N wireless adapter with a 9 dBi antenna

is connected to precongured small portable Linux

computer with a camera.

-On the receiver side (on the ground), another TL-

WN722N wireless adapter is connected to a powerful

homemade antenna, and linked to my notebook

computer running Linux. TL-WN722N’s standard

antenna just wasn’t going to cut it here for the kind of

range I needed, so I set about constructing my own

out of aluminum and copper. By taking into account

the wavelength of the

Wi-Fi signals, I was able to calculate the optimum

dimensions for receiving the waves. I could now

watch aerial footage from over 2 km away in beautiful

denition.

To check the eciency of the Wi-Fi solution, I did

a trial in our oce before Ralph and I headed out. I

linked a Linux micro-computer and precongured

camera with our TP-Link network adapter system.

We received real-time video signals through the

new system after initializing it. So far so good. But

after I moved around the corner, out of range of

the antenna, some frames went missing and the

feed became laggy, illustrating the limitations of a

directional antenna. The poor performance in closed

spaces shouldn’t be too big an issue though. In a wide

outdoor space, a directional antenna can cover longer

distances and gives wider coverage, which should let

us receive real-time transmission of the video signals.

The Saturday after the trial, Ralph and I hit the road,

ready to make our maiden ight. We drove out of Kyiv

and headed to an open area. We got lucky with the

weather - perfect ying conditions, with just the right

amount of wind. We nished the assembly on the

grassland, strapping our antenna to the right wing with

rubber ties and glue. To receive the signal, we placed

a directional antenna on the roof of my car where the

coverage should be best.

After a double check of the body, our plane was ready

for takeo. It took to the air gracefully and began its

journey. Ralph placed a ag with the

TP-Link logo on the grassland - we planned to take a

picture of it from the air to put our Wi-Fi solution to the

test. After stabilizing the vehicle, I started to steer it

over the ag area via the remote controller. To catch a

better angle for a photograph, I made several passes.

Our computer started to receive signal from up above

in real-time. As expected, the transmission distance

of the directional antenna increased dramatically in

this open area. Even out at a kilometer, we could still

achieve a clear connection without delays.

Lift o!

Our TP-Link eyes in the sky provided us with a

spectacular view. A distant forest, some luxury

Lives

housing, a swimming pool in someone’s yard — all

was displayed in front of us.

After a while I set the plane to loiter in autopilot

cruising mode, then passed the controller to Ralph.

“Try it! Try it!”

In this mode the plane can keep a steady course by

itself, but the pilot can take over at any time with the

remote controller by sending an overlapping signal. I

wanted to give the fresh hand a chance to control it

while still guaranteeing the safety of the plane.

Ralph was a little nervous at rst, making tentative

movements with his thumbs. But after several minutes

of observing the plane’s responses, he became a little

braver and started to attempt some maneuvers. From

the trees, to the eld, to the houses the plane went —

his eyes xed on it, expressing nerves and excitement

in equal measure. I could tell he loved it.

It’s a successful landing that really puts the icing on

the cake for a ying session. Landing is by far the most

dicult part, and most crashes happen during this

critical stage. Even an experienced pilot can get nervous,

their hands shaking as they grip the controller anxiously.

I made some adjustments to the controls and then

started the landing process, moving the aircraft in slow

circles, spiraling downwards in the same way an eagle

comes to ground. It took great patience. This time the

plane landed on the grass without a speck of damage to

the plane’s body.

Perfect!

Our rst ight had gone well, but we still had to check

the video footage to nd the picture we wanted. And

that’s where we ran into a problem. The white part

of the logo on the ag had become a blur because

the light was too bright, making the TP-Link letters

indecipherable.

As proud TP-Linkers, we couldn’t accept a blurry

picture as our nal one. So we decided to y again.

To avoid over-exposure, this time we would place the

ag on the rooftop of my car. The higher contrast

between the light ag color and a black car, instead of

the green grass, may just do the trick we reasoned.

I also wanted to optimize the Linux camera for our

particular environment. Unfortunately, a sequence of

system bugs rendered the camera useless even for

normal usage. I kept coding till the 3:00 in the morning

to recover the system.

There were other dierences for the second ight too.

We didn’t have the computer to check the footage

this time and the sunshine was so dazzling that we

weren’t able to check the camera’s status light either.

We decided to push ahead anyway and see what we

came out with.

To capture a clearer picture, I attempted to reduce

the speed of the plane as much as possible, even

hovering in the wind for a short time.

We drove back to my at immediately after the ight,

eager to view the result. We were still anxious about

the uncertain status of camera as we opened the

video les on computer. We got lucky again.

And this time, we had pictures from a whole bunch of

dierent angles.

Lives

The Spice of Life

heart”. When discussing the details of the play, we

put ourselves in the shoes of a maid who wants

to become the lady of the house by any means. In

line with the principle "do not deviate away from the

main story line", and that you should "do the horrible

things", we composed a script so dark that it gave us

the chills even as we put it down on paper. In order

to create a creepy atmosphere, we xed the location

Life Through a Lens

Anjol Zhou, Networking BU Marketing Department

There are moments in life that raise the corners of our mouths a little, as we break into a smile. I used to think

about how to preserve these images, whether intentional or unintentional. Fortunately, as a photographer

and image editing lover, I can put beauty in my pocket via a lens.

I have a group of like-minded friends with whom I

make amusing video clips in our spare time. Intriguing

ideas are regularly thrown around and duly recorded

as they come up. The dialogues and plots emerge

organically and are often very distinctive, tending to

thrill and build suspense. After a brainstorm, we will

promptly divide the script into scenarios, which will be

presented through frames.

We once made an adaption of the Cantonese classic

Love off The Cuff, in which the actress Yu Chunjiao

and the actor Zhang Zhiming pretend to be Japanese

and Korean lovers to escape nes. In order to get

closer to the original lm, we sourced costumes that

were as authentic as possible, even dressing the

female lead as Madonna in a golden corset for one

part. The male actor looked convincing while sporting

a police uniform; however, his strong northeast accent

and less than uent Cantonese gave him away. In

order to recreate the well-known police chase scene,

we had some fun tearing through the empty streets

in full costume, without a thought for how strange we

must have looked.

Last year, we attempted to lm a thriller, The Maid,

which was written, directed and cast by ourselves. It

was a brand new experience for us. There is a saying,

“the only thing more terrible than ghosts is the human

Photographer Anjol Zhou

Lives

at an abandoned factory in Guangzhou. The factory

corridor is long, the wall is mottled, and the damp

oor is dotted with moss. We entered in trepidation.

Although the individuals cast as the main characters

were chosen from our circle of friends and weren’t

professionally trained, they performed admirably. For

example, the maid was played by my friend’s sister,

who wore long straight black hair. When fully made

up and in costume, her glance made the hairs on our

necks stand on end.

Whether imitating classics or creating short amusing

videos, we can nd surprises and joy in ordinary life.

Everyone is the director of his own life, and the fact

that we can experience and record ours is the best

thing in the world.

Let Photos Speak for You

I have an idea that I’d like to hold a photography

exhibition in ten years’ time, so that I can convey my

attitude to life and share my experiences through

images. I'm currently working on taking portraits

of everyone around me. Whenever the scene is

interesting, I will press the shutter button to capture

the moment without a second thought. Many

photographers have a revered artist in their heart, and

I’m no dierent. Xiao Quan, who is known as the best

portrait photographer in China, is a master of life and

a hunter who captures light and shadow, recording

the beauty around him.

I am fond of traveling and taking in the scenery of the

journey. My hobby has realized my ambition to go to

Tibet, culminating in my shots of the “Snow Mountain

of Sunrise”. There is a movie from my collection that

still captures my imagination called One Mile Above,

Lives

which tells the story of a young man named Zhang

Shuhao. He suers the misfortune of his brother dying

in his senior year. During this confused time, he come

across his brother’s cycling diary. He learnt that his

brother’s ambition was to ride the Yunnan-Tibet road

and decides to realize his brother’s unfullled dream.

Before that, he has never cycled.

Although the movie was released three years ago, the

panorama of the snow-capped mountains still brings

the movie to my mind. The lm One Mile Above gave

me an idea to do that trip to Tibet and record the

journey with snaps. I was a bit timid but wanted to

prove myself, so I invited two friends to come along

who had a sense of adventure. We started our Tibetan

voyage on July 11, 2013.

National highway 210, better known as The Yunnan-

Tibet Line, stretches 2320 km from Kunming to Lhasa.

The rst stop was Dali, Yunnan, followed by Lijiang

after 145km → Zhongdian after another 152 km →

Deqin 103 km → Yanjing 111 km → Mangkang 359 km

→ Busu 450 km→ Nyingchi 406 km → and nally

Lhasa. After a 13-day, 4,980-kilometer journey, we

came to the mysterious Meili Snow Mountain, the

Snow Mountain of Sunrise located in Deqin County.

On the road to Tibet, I'd heard stories of a Meri Snow

Mountain. Although not as lofty as Mount Everest and

the Himalayas, no one has succeeded in reaching the

peak. One mountaineering team disappeared without

trace after attempting to conquer it. A few years later,

their frozen corpses were nally found. We’d heard

a tale about Meri on our way to the natural wonder;

although all visitors to Tibet wish to see the Meri

Snow Mountain with their own eyes, many never do.

One who sees this majestic natural wonder covered

by sunlight for himself will have good luck for a whole

year.

When we arrived at Deqin County it was already 7 p.m.

With the light dying, we knew we’d lost the chance

to see it for today. Everyone was exhausted by the

journey so we collapsed gratefully onto our hotel beds

to recharge ourselves. Morning came, and with it an

unbelievably dense fog. I was enveloped by it, feeling

buried. We squeezed to the front of the crowd where

a group of tourists were gathered, asking an old chap,

Lives

"Is this Meri Snow Mountain really so magical? Is a

glimpse of the Snow Mountain of Sunrise so rare?" He

replied in a regretful tone. "I have been here twice. This

is the third time, but I’m yet to see it." With this news I

slinked back to the hotel feeling dejected.

We reluctantly made plans to leave for the next

spot: Salt Village. However, with our bags packed

and supplies ready, one of my fellow travelers

began to develop a nasty headache caused by the

altitude which refused to subside in a hurry. With our

companion out of action for now, we decided to wait

it out, spending one more night in the mystical Deqin

County.

On the morning of the third day, I was awoken by

shouts. I had a vague recollection of hearing "Tashi

delek, Tashi delek..." We got up to see what had

happened. It turned out that the evasive Snow

Mountain of Sunrise had decided to make an

appearance at last. And what a sight it was. I roused

my friends in excitement then went back to the

scenery, capturing the dramatic moment with my

camera. It was glorious, taking the breath away. A

giant gold mine seemed to have been unveiled before

us thanks to the color of the early morning light. I

felt so privileged to encounter and photograph this

elusive scenery at last. At that moment, I was the

luckiest guy in the world, and I really believed that luck

would continue for a whole year, just as we had been

told.

When I press the shutter, the camera lens can record

every changing moment, all the pains and joys. There

are stories behind every video and photo. Maybe it’s

about a journey of the soul or a fantastic experience.

Maybe it’s a feeling evoked when I walk down the

street and nd an interesting shadow on the wall. The

camera reminds me that I need to experience more,

taste more, follow my heart and create and appreciate

beauty in daily life.

Editor-In-Chief:

Ann Zhou (ann.zhou@tp-link.com)

Deputy Editor-In-Chief:

Anthony Merrington (anthony.merrington@tp-link.com.cn)

Executive Eidtors:

Jianxiong He (hejianxiong@tp-link.com.cn)

Isaac Xin (isaac.xin@tp-link.com)

Huiling You (youhuiling@tp-link.com.cn)

Mandy Sun (mandy.sun@tp-link.com)

Karen Luo (karen.luo@tp-link.com)

Estela Ji (estela.ji@tp-link.com)

Layla Cai (layla.cai@tp-link.com)

April Yang (april.yang@tp-link.com)

Designer:

Shangchen Zhang (chen.zhang@tp-link.com)

Website Engineer:

Jimmy Chen (jimmy.chen@tp-link.com)

Dear TP-Linkers,

If you would like to share your own writing, photography or suggestions for our next

issue, please email us at pulse@tp-link.com. We look forward to working together

on future articles, as we continue to tell the stories that matter most to TP-Linkers.

Sincerely,

The Pulse Editing Team

Pulse 04 En

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