7th November 1994
The next day,
Hearing that the interviews were going well, Ajay nodded in satisfaction.
"There are a few colleges in San Francisco that are willing to accept the interview. You've read the details, right?"
"Yes."
"All right, I'll leave the rest to you." Ajay confidently wrote a cheque for $1,000 and handed it over to Vincent.
Vincent looked at the cheque and heaved a sigh of relief. Others might not know Ajay's financial situation, but he definitely knew. So he was a little worried that Ajay wouldn't be able to sustain the spending any longer, but it looked like he didn't have to worry too much.
He put the check in his inner pocket and bid farewell.
With Vincent gone, Ajay began to prepare as well. He met up with Harish Patel, Jim Clark and Mark Anderson at a pizza place.
Jim Clark was exactly as the legends described him, a competent businessman who was ambitious and farsighted. Mark Anderson was exactly as Ajay had imagined as well, a man obsessed with technology who fired off a barrage of questions the moment he saw him.
Ajay even felt a little awkward by how long Mark continued to question and praise him. Thankfully, Jim Clark brought the discussion back to the topic, the patent licensing.
"We haven't obtained the patent yet, but we have already applied for it, and the patent number has been generated, so we can share the technology now and sign the letter of intent, and after the patent is issued, we will write you a legal patent transfer authorisation."
Jim Clark thought nothing of it and agreed. When the session came to discussing the monetary compensation, Ajay simply stayed silent and listened. Harish did all the talking.
He didn't know the price of his algorithm, so it was better this way.
However, when Harish directly opened his mouth and asked for $50,000, Ajay's heart almost jumped. This was money he had never made in his entire life, but to his astonishment, although Jim Clark looked displeased, he did not jump up to refuse. He countered the offer with $20,000 instead.
Ajay was immediately dumbfounded. So the algorithm he casually wrote was actually worth more than the money he had made by touring, selling the song, and working as a creative director combined?
The negotiations continued, and he looked at it with lifeless eyes. The question of whether he had chosen the right thing by choosing the entertainment industry popped up in his mind once again. But this time, he wasn't able to firmly believe that his choice was correct.
Maybe Tjay's death, and the way Bertelsmann Music Group responded to it, had shattered the romanticised image of the Hollywood industry that Ajay had carried in his mind.
That day, he made two major decisions. The first was to license Jay Studios' batch input and output algorithm to the Netscape browser for an impressive $35,000. The second was to stop being so rigid in his thinking. From that point onward, he decided that if he wanted to get involved in the internet and technology, he would do so, and if he wanted to get involved in music and movies, he would do that as well.
In a way, he stuck to his original decision to do whatever he wanted as long as it pleased him, but this time, the context was only broader.
The letter of intent was signed. Ajay received a cheque for $20,000 and was promised that the remaining amount would be paid after the patent was issued and the transfer was officially completed.
The business deal was done, and the meeting was about to end, but Mark Anderson suddenly asked a question that brought everyone to a halt.
"Mr Jay, if you were to design the visual interface of the Netscape browser, how would you do it?"
Even Jim Clark looked at Ajay with curiosity. Although he found the batch input and output algorithm ingenious and believed it could be used much more flexibly throughout the browser to make the user experience more seamless, he was equally impressed by the user interface.
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Mark Anderson had even asked some of their engineers to study the design and come up with proposals to improve the user interface of their own browser.
Still, it was always better to hear the opinion of the person who had designed it in the first place.
Ajay's mind spun rapidly, and he immediately realised this was another business opportunity.
"I apologise, but I haven't seen your Netscape browser yet. Could I take a look at it first?" he asked.
Jim Clark immediately realised his oversight and nodded repeatedly. "Of course, of course."
They walked through the streets of Los Angeles to find a shop or business with a computer, and luckily, they found a computer store that sold Apple, IBM, and Dell products.
Using the pretext of testing it, they were able to use the computer. Mark immediately inserted the floppy disk containing the prototype of Netscape Navigator, allowing Ajay to experience the Netscape browser of that era. And as expected, it was dull, looked bland, was extremely complicated, had too many options cluttering the first page, and suffered from severe lag.
Although, to be fair, that was a problem with every website he had visited so far.
"I need some time. Give me a day. I'll sketch out some designs for you. If you like them, we can discuss them once more."
Jim Clark happily nodded and agreed. Getting home, Ajay didn't waste any time. He immediately took a bundle of paper and started writing algorithms, layouts, and ideas.
He knew exactly what Netscape wanted, so he was going to patent everything that could be patented and then sell it to Netscape for a price.
This took an entire day, and once again, with abundant money now in hand, he visited the patent office with Harish and patented over a dozen mechanisms that would prove crucial to the internet in the future.
These patents wouldn't net him a lot of money at once, but given that thousands, if not tens of thousands, of websites would need these little mechanisms, he could make a lot of money. Maybe he would even become a millionaire in a few years.
He was feeling giddy even thinking about it.
With such monetary resources, he didn't have to depend on the record company for everything. Even if it was costly and wasteful, he could simply throw money at all the news stations, DJs, and magazines to promote his song.
"Why did I have to be so stubborn?" He couldn't help but curse himself. If he had simply developed a random 10-bit game or an algorithm, he would already have the capital to do what he wanted.
Anyway, given that it was his stubbornness that led him to meet Tjay and let him experience all those things, he considered it a learning process and contacted Jim Clark a day later.
9th November 1994
Since Ajay had said that he only needed a day to come up with a proposal, Jim Clark and Mark Anderson hadn't gone back to Silicon Valley. They stayed in Hollywood, and when Ajay contacted them, they immediately responded.
When he came this time, Jim Clark was actually not too eager to look at the proposal put forward by Ajay. He had already received a demo of the layout after observing all the principles of Jay Studios.com from his engineering team via fax.
He was already satisfied with it, and he didn't think Ajay could do any better.
Still, out of respect and a little bit of curiosity, he came.
However, when he saw the design proposed by Ajay, he was dumbfounded. Mark Anderson was no different.
"Amazing!"
They both responded in unison.
"This profile system, how did you think of that? How clever and amazing. Each profile can have its own settings in the browser. Wow, what a clever idea!"
"This password manager. Damn it, why didn't I think of that? We can let the users save all their passwords here, and they could even use different passwords for different websites."
"Wow! This bookmarks bar! Ingenious! Simply ingenious."
Both of them continued to exclaim about the features described by Ajay over and over again. They were so clever that the very design became secondary.
In the end, Jim Clark admitted defeat and humbly asked Ajay what he needed to license all this to Netscape.
Ajay's eyes lit up, and a sly smile appeared at the corner of his lips.
"All of you can already see how useful these features are for your browser, gentlemen. And these features can be implemented across all kinds of websites, regardless of their purpose. So I'm not willing to sell the technology outright, but I am willing to grant Netscape a permanent license to the patents."
Jim Clark was unwilling, but looking at how adamant Ajay was, he admitted defeat. Besides, he also realised that he couldn't buy all the patents with the money his company had. He had just raised around $4 million to start the company, and an investor had joined him a month ago. He brought in some money, so he could make the decision easily if it was just $35,000, but if it went beyond $100,000 or even into the millions, he had no right to make that sort of decision.
After the negotiation, the licensing fees for all 15 patents were decided to be around $40,000.
A hefty sum. Jim proposed to end the deal the same way, by giving 50% of the money up front and the remainder after the patents were issued and the authorisation was legally granted.
However, Ajay suggested something else.
"How about you convert the forty thousand and the remaining amount from the earlier deal into a stake in Netscape?"
Jim Clark was surprised and looked at the young man in surprise. "Are you sure? Our product has not been released yet. It might not be accepted by the users."
Being from the future, Ajay knew what Netscape would become, so he did not need to worry about the risks.
"Since you are integrating so many ingenious features, it will definitely be a huge success in the industry. Besides, I think the idea behind your browser is ingenious as well. I wouldn't mind using it myself."
"So you could say that I'm actually taking advantage of you here."
Jim Clark was astonished because the young man actually meant it. He could see the sincerity in his eyes. In the end, he nodded and shook Ajay's hand, closing the deal.