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‘That was a great idea, you have a very sincere and warm personality. You must have a good marketing team,’ Charlie cut in with a smile.
Michael turned to her and responded with a smile of his own. ‘Thank you.’
‘Tell us about this specific marketing campaign that started the problem, please,’ I cut in before they could derail the subject again.
Michael faced my side of the room and clasped his hands on the table. To my annoyance his body was still slightly facing towards Charlie.
‘So, with our marketing team we made a plan for publicity and marketing to send one of our prototype cars to a few hand-picked people and give them access to it for twelve hours. The first two people had no problems and everything was great. The third person, a reporter, Kylie Combs, received the car next. Three hours into it she has an accident. She was driving the prototype and the car showed over fifty percent battery left when it was actually almost out of juice. She was stranded at night and while she was trying to figure out what was wrong, another car hit her.
‘She got hit when she was still in the car?’ Trisha asked.
‘No. No, she was outside. The prototype is fine. She got hit when she decided to stand in the middle of the road to stop someone for help. The whole thing was recorded because she was going to use it on her website to talk about her experience with our car. I saw the video and the cockpit clearly shows the fifty percent battery left.’
‘The police are involved, I’m guessing?’
‘Yes. They haven’t found who hit her yet, the video only shows her getting hit. They have the car model, but no news as of today.’
‘You brought the video with you, right?’ I asked.
‘Yes, I brought it with me.’ He searched in his pocket for something, then slid a thumb drive towards me. ‘This is a huge opportunity for our competitors to run a smear campaign against EVA and I have no idea how to handle the situation.’
‘How is Kylie Combs doing?’ Charlie piped up.
Michael shook his head. ‘Sorry, I should’ve mentioned it. She is… not fine of course, but it could’ve been worse considering the whole situation. She injured her leg, broke her ankle. And she has bruises and cuts. She is suing us.’
‘Let’s talk about the battery,’ Stan said. ‘Did you see the prototype? Do you know why it malfunctioned?’
Michael started to talk about how they had designed their own batteries and were working with a third-party battery developer. It was their design that was going to set them apart from others.
‘EVA has a set of code, a set of data we put into the car’s computer. It is unique and only for our car batteries. This is what we programmed. So, a simple answer to your question is, yes, it is our fault that this has happened. But the problem here is that it shouldn’t have happened. I went over everything myself and I found something in the software, I don’t know how to explain it without giving you a headache, but the codes were wrong.’
‘So, this was completely EVA’s fault.’ Trisha commented matter-of-factly, putting a pause in the conversation.
I was thinking, but I felt eyes on me, so I looked up. My eyes caught Charlie’s and she gave me a barely-there smile before quickly looking away and taking some more notes.
I frowned.
Michael sighed and ran his hands over his face. ‘Yes and no.’
We spent another hour discussing every little detail, everyone taking turns asking their questions to Michael to try and cover the missing parts. When a worn-out Michael left to catch his flight back to California, it was just the five of us left in the room. I couldn’t exactly say why it bothered me that Michael had lingered over Charlie when he was taking his leave and they had both laughed at something Charlie said, plus they had shaken hands longer than anybody else in the room. That wasn’t exactly what bothered me, but I wasn’t a fan of getting too close to the clients. Specifically, romantically involved. Maybe that was something else I’d have to talk to the entire team about.
‘Gayle, I need you to look into the software company. And try to get in touch with the ex-best friend and now ex-partner too while you’re at it,’ I suggested. Her eyes still on her notes, she gave me a nod and left the room. I realized I was going to like working with the no-nonsense Gayle, because every question she had asked in the meeting was smart. The whole team had done very well.
‘Stan, Trisha. I need you two to try and get ahead of this. All of this, Mrs Comb’s accident, happened only a few days ago. Somehow they managed to keep this between them, but I don’t think that’s how it’s going to stay, so prepare the statements we need and show me what you’re thinking in terms of media relations. I’ll get you in contact with a few people.’
