The next day, just as Maverick expected, the world woke up to headlines that made last night's unveiling sound like the turning point of an age. Every newspaper that had been invited to the presentation splashed it across their front pages, the Caesar One looking less like a simple Mobile Phone, and more like a cultural turning point.
"A Leap Into Tomorrow: Caesar One Shatters Mobile Boundaries" – The New York Times
"Touchscreen Revolution Ignites a New Era in Mobile Technology" – The Guardian
"From Buttons to Brilliance: Caesar One Upends the Phone Industry" – The Sydney Morning Herald
"Mobile Industry Stunned by First Ever Phone with Built-In Camera" – The Asahi Shimbun
"The Future Has Landed—And It's Changing Everything" – Le Monde
Even papers that hadn't been invited were quick to jump in once the news spread, each scrambling to ride the wave of attention. In just 24 hours, "Caesar One" and "Caesar Technologies" had gone from mysterious names to sensations all around the world.
Tech companies around the world were blindsided. The product hit like a punch to the gut—a wake-up call that came out of nowhere. The name "Caesar Technologies" hadn't been on anyone's radar before this. No leaks, no rumors, nothing. One day they didn't exist, and the next, they were holding up a device that looked like it had fallen straight out of the next century.
At first, the disbelief was almost comical. The executives from major tech companies weren't shocked by the individual technologies themselves—they knew all of those existed in some form already. But they were very different things. Cameras were common, and touchscreens were mostly limited to niche uses like ATM machines, airline check-in kiosks, and large-scale computer systems. Never had it occurred to them to combine those technologies and especially in to a phone.
Aren't mobile phones supposed to be for telecommunications? If you want to take a picture of someone or something, couldn't you just use a camera? They were bewildered by the radical approach of this mysterious company's new product. Of course, much of their reaction was regret, because judging by the hype it was already gaining worldwide, those very radical ideas were bound to be a huge success.
And along with their envy came doubt. How on earth was it possible to pack all that technology into a single handheld device... sell it for just $999, and still turn a profit?
"That's impossible."
"Won't they lose money?"
"Quick—find out everything about this Caesar technology. I want to know whose business it is…"
"Could they have found a breakthrough?"
"It's a gimmick—it has to be."
Within days, boardrooms of every major technology company across the world lit up with tense discussions. Some executives scoffed, others speculated, and many were already issuing orders. Every company wanted to know the same thing: who exactly was behind Caesar Technologies, and how had his company pulled this off?
Investigators, analysts, and market researchers were set to work. At the same time, every competitor shared one urgent goal—get their hands on the Caesar One. Engineers were told to buy it, strip it down, and study every circuit and screw. They needed to know how it worked… and whether it could really be sold at that price without sending the company into bankruptcy.
Maverick, of course, had predicted every reaction. Let them reverse-engineer it, he didn't care. Even if they figured it out, they couldn't match his production costs. They would have to compromise somewhere—either in features, quality, or price—and by then, he would already be several steps ahead.
At the same time, he didn't mind there being competition—in fact, he welcomed it. After all, without rivals, the hype would not last.
Moreover, it wasn't only the tech companies that were scrambling. Network providers from across the globe began reaching out as well, some already betting big on the phone's success before the product had even hit the market. The reaction from the public was just that big.
Within days, collaboration offers poured in. Of course, Maverick had anticipated this too, and his managers had standing orders to accept any deal that made sense.
And when the product finally hit the market one week after the launch, the customer base exploded. Maverick did not yet have a store in every small city of every major country, but he had at least one on every continent. In particular, the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, and China each had several stores, as these countries had the largest populations paired with the strongest economies.
Maverick used every trick he knew, from both his previous life and this one, to market it as hype as possible, and sales poured in from the very first day. His warehouses were swamped. Fortunately, there were no issues with stock shortages, as he had made sure supply would meet demand long before the day of the presentation.
Soon, scenes from across the globe began making headlines. In New York, office workers were spotted crowding around one phone, laughing at the novelty of taking a photo and seeing it instantly in full color.
In London, a teenager recorded her first video message for a friend and nearly dropped the phone in shock when it played back with perfect sound.
In Tokyo, a businessman used the touchscreen to scroll through his contacts with a swipe of his finger, his colleagues leaning in to watch as though it were magic.
Families in Moscow passed the phone around the dinner table, marveling at the tiny moving images on its screen. In Shanghai, a young couple took a photo together in the park, holding it up to admire the vibrant colors.
The only downside was that Multimedia Messaging Service wasn't quite ready yet. The true age of the internet was still on the horizon, so the pictures they took could only stay on their phones. To share them, people had to transfer images to a personal computer, then either print them out or save them to a floppy disk to send to someone else.
Still, for the time being, it was more than enough. Maverick recalled that in his old world, MMS—Multimedia Messaging Service—only became commercially available after the new millennium, and the first mobile internet services, like 2G and GPRS, didn't arrive until around 2000, nearly a decade later from now. Overall, the technology available to the general public—and the timing of its availability—was not that different from his previous life, even though this world was more advanced in some aspects.
However, Maverick had a feeling it would all come much sooner now that the Caesar One was out in the world. Integrating technologies like GSM, GPRS, and MMS wouldn't be difficult, and the hardware he had released was more than capable of supporting those features. He planned to give some of the network carriers a heads-up about it, and once a few made it possible, the rest would undoubtedly follow.
Nonetheless, it was still the early 1990s, and the general public couldn't yet imagine such possibilities. For them, now, simply being able to capture a moment and carry it in their pocket was more than enough. That said, the next generation of the Caesar One would at least include infrared data transfer capability, allowing users to share media without needing to sit in front of a personal computer.
And now, with the release of the Caesar One, Maverick's name became known worldwide for the first time. He was already a celebrity in the magical world, but now he was making waves in the non-magical world too—becoming a figure neither side could ignore. News outlets scrambled to tell his story, the public buzzed with excitement about his genius, and whispers spread of the mysterious innovator behind it all. Yet, just a day after the presentation, the man in question seemed to have vanished without a trace.
It was only by talking to people at his company that the media uncovered who he really was—a Brit, and not just any Brit, but a genius even in his school and university days. To top it all off, he was also the son of the current English Prime Minister. Though no one could secure a direct interview with him, the headlines kept running stories about his life, and newspapers made sure the whole world knew his name—even if he himself stayed silent.
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Tracking back to the weekend of the product launch, after the presentation, Maverick vanished with Isabella and left everything to the capable hands of his company's management. He was confident that his carefully chosen team could handle everything, and he didn't need to involve himself in the day-to-day operations.
Though still the CEO, Maverick was more like a hands-off shopkeeper, and the company was practically run by COO Jackson—a marketing genius Maverick recruited long ago (Chapter 90). The man was fully capable of steering the ship, and Maverick trusted him completely to deliver on every expectation.
With that settled, Maverick spent the rest of the weekend with Isabella, and when the new week finally rolled around, he headed straight back to Hogwarts—where the real work was waiting.
It was early December now, and he had midterm exams to prepare for four grades. On top of that, the script for Sirius Black was also set to begin within the month.
It promised to be a busy, event-packed final stretch to the year.
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