Traversing the courtyard

Chapter 429 Proposals
Ruan Tao was dumbfounded. That was IBM. Could it be that Weidong wanted to surpass Big Blue?
Virginia exclaimed in surprise: "Oh, my God!"

Then he said: "Boss, that is the most valuable company in the beautiful country with a market value of 350 billion US dollars."

Both of them couldn't believe that Weidong dared to surpass IBM, the blue giant. This idea is too radical and arrogant!

Weidong also knows that this is a bit of a shock to people. Now Weidong's assets are not much. Even if all assets are listed, they are at most 3-5 million US dollars, which is only 1% of IBM.

He emphasized: "What I mean is that if it really reaches the ceiling of an industry and can affect the survival of a large number of companies in the market, the officials of the beautiful country will definitely restrict and suppress it."

Virginia does not comment on such issues. She just got up and took a soda and came back. After opening it, she inserted a straw. Ruan Tao took a sip before saying: "Even if our company is really capable of reaching that point, It does not prevent us from investing in the name of Qiuyu Group now."

Wei Dong said: "Then what shall we do then? No one knows when we will be restricted."

Ruan Tao asked back: "According to your plan, when will you reach the point where the government will fear you and want to restrict you?"

Wei Dong suddenly got stuck, yes, not to mention the mobile phone era, the growth of Intel still needs to be 486 and 586 to gradually grow into the leader in the industry, and it will be in the 90s by then, even if he owns shares in Microsoft, Then I still have 20 years of development time. Microsoft also launched the epoch-making 95 and 98 systems to gain a firm foothold. It also competed with Apple's systems before. So it seems that I have at least ten years of peaceful development?

Before Weidong was only affected by the various suppression methods of the later generations of the beautiful country, he wanted to cut some assets first. Now that Ruan Tao asked this question, he realized that he could invest in some allies first, and wait for the company to grow to a certain scale. , It may be better to do some processing of the company's assets.

"You mean to invest first, and then cut assets after reaching a certain scale?"

Ruan Tao said: "Yes, there will definitely not be restrictions on the initial stage and the growth stage, and it is fine to make adjustments when the scale becomes larger in the future."

Wei Dong said: "This is also a good way, I will think about it more."

Thinking about things in the future, when I returned to Qin Xiayue's villa in the evening, Weidong began to prepare dinner. Qin Xiayue, Yan Jiedi and Wen Xiuyun accompanied Weidong to make some preparations. Wen Xiuyun also helped the family since he was a child. Work, do everything with style, and chat with Weidong as long as he is in charge.

The next morning, I sent off the three girls and two bodyguards who were going to play in San Francisco. I and Ruan Tao and the three girls first came to the factory where the Intel production line is located. Now there are still the last batch of students who have not returned to Hong Kong. Since they came Of course, I want to visit them. These people are the most valuable talent reserve of Yixin Technology Company, and they are also the actual operators of the chip production line in the future.

On the way, Mi Xiaozhou briefly introduced the situation of the production line leader Yu Yingfa. He was a college student who graduated from the Department of Electronics of Xiangjiang University. After working for two years, he was recruited into Yixin Technology. manage.

Ruan Tao had already contacted Intel before, and entered the factory smoothly. Mr. Twin Thomas, the supervisor, received Weidong and his party.

Although Qin Xiayue is in charge of the shares, the door of Intel also knows that the actual controller is Yi Weidong. Director Tewen opened the car door for Weidong himself and said with a smile: "Mr. Yi, welcome."

Wei Dong smiled and said, "Mr. Twen, we meet again."

Wei Dong introduced Ruan Tao to Te Wen, and after some pleasantries, he entered the office of the base. Mr. Te Wen briefly talked about the situation of the production line, mainly introducing the learning progress of Wei Dong's dispatched students, and now they have entered the final stage of practice.

Seeing Twen’s speech, Weidong hesitated and guessed that this group of people was used as free labor. Weidong sent this group of people to Intel without any extra money, and they were all free labor. East still has to bear all the living expenses, but who made Yixin Technology have no relevant talents, and now it has to spend money to study here.

After a while, Yu Yingfa came in, and was pleasantly surprised to see Wei Dong and Ruan Tao. After polite greetings, Ruan Tao asked:
"Team Leader Yu, how are the students practicing?"

Although Mr. Tewen introduced it just now, Ruan Tao still wants to listen to Yu Yingfa's opinion. If the technology is not up to standard, it will be a big deal if you can't go back to normal production.

Yu Yingfa said: "I have already learned the technology, and now I am in the familiar stage. These days, I am thinking of contacting Manager Bian about returning home!"

Weidong asked about the specific details, and Yu Yingfa explained everything. Besides Yu Yingfa, there are two other students who can also operate the contact lithography machine, and three students can operate it, so Weidong is relieved. , Even if someone has a problem and cannot go to work, there will be a replacement operator.

Besides, we have already discussed with Ruan Tao. After the first batch of operators go back, in addition to arranging the production of chips, they will quickly organize a training class to train a large number of production line operators. Wei Dong copied ten production lines and put them in the warehouse. Waiting here, as long as operators are trained, integrated circuits can be produced.

After the conversation, Wei Dong said: "Then prepare yourself, you will be able to return with us in the next few days, and then charter a flight back."

It happened to be a charter flight when I went back. By the way, I took the last group of people back with me. The price of the charter flight was fixed, and I saved a lot of air expenses for these people.

"Okay, I'll tell them today, we've been homesick for a long time."

After bidding farewell to Tewen and Yu Yingfa, I came to the headquarters of Intel again. The rest of the signboards that had hung outside the building disappeared, leaving only one signboard of Intel.

Wei Dong said: "It seems that the money I invested bought the building."

Ruan Tao said: "Having your own company headquarters is also more secure. Last time you came, there were only more than 20 researchers?"

Wei Dongdao: "Yes, high-tech companies focus on research and development capabilities, and these people are all researchers."

As for the production line, there are blue-collar workers, who are mainly responsible for production. The nature of the employees here is different. The headquarters pays more attention to research and development capabilities, but the company is still a memory research manufacturer, mainly producing memory chips. .

Under the leadership of the front desk, Wei Dong and Ruan Tao came into Arthur Locke's chairman's office. Wei Dong put down the coffee in his hand and said, "Mr. Land sales."

Arthur Locke said with a smile: "We are partners, and we should complete the design task as soon as possible."

Weidong asked politely: "I don't know how the chip development of the electronic calculator we entrusted is going?"

Arthur Locke said: "90% of the workload has been completed. After completing all the designs, there are still some experiments to verify. We will notify you when everything is completed."

Now that [-]% of the design has been completed, Wei Dong is not in a hurry. Electronic watches are just on the market. When they are officially on sale, washing machines will soon be on the market. The time to market of electronic calculators can be pushed back. .

Wei Dong smiled and said: "This news is really great, I hope to see portable electronic calculators sooner."

Arthur Locke said: "This will be an epoch-making product."

Weidong said: "Every small step forward in the field of semiconductors, every invention is great."

During the last design, Weidong rejected Arthur Locke's plan to get involved in electronic calculators. Now I don't know what he thinks. Of course, he wants to say something reasonable first, so as not to bring up the topic of investment or cooperation.

Weidong turned to inquire about Intel's recent research and development work. As a director, Weidong certainly has the right to know the progress of the company's business.

Arthur Locke briefly said that he recently developed a 4001 dynamic memory DRAM, which can store 256k of data, and developed the latest 3010 next-generation new memory based on the 3015 bipolar random access memory.

When Weidong heard the name 4001, he was already shocked and didn't know the north and south. This is so similar to how the first 4-digit CPU 4004 was numbered?

Question: "Mr. Locke, is this 4001 developed by ourselves or entrusted by customers?"

This is the key point. Weidong knew that the 4004CPU was commissioned by a counter company of Neon. Later, after the completion of the design, Intel thought it had a development prospect and bought it for money. It can be used in industries other than counters. However, this chip does not use an instruction set, and its functions are not much more advanced than other chips on the market.

Why does it leave a strong mark in history? The main reason is that this is the first commercial general-purpose chip. Before that, there were some dedicated chips that were developed for a specific application scenario, just like IBM has already developed. There are many chips, but they are all specialized chips for missile trajectory calculation and satellite trajectory calculation.

4004 can only be called the world's first commercial processor, not the world's first microprocessor.The first microprocessor should be developed by the U.S. military and used in the central air data computer composed of 14 chips in the F-6 Tomcat fighter: CADC (CenterAir Data Computer). Of course, its structure is simpler than 4004. The speed is only 9.15KHz.

The 4004CPU is only the first time for commercial general use. It has been purchased by many units for the research and development of their own products. Some early industrial computers, typewriters and CNC machine tools have used 4004. However, with the launch of 8008, 4004 was quickly replaced by 8008. up.

Arthur Locke said: "This is a counter product developed by a Neon company called Busicom. Just two months ago, this company found us and commissioned the development of a counter control chip. After research, we found that the current package The technology did not meet the requirements of Busicom, so it changed to develop four chips, namely 4001 (Dynamic Memory DRAM), 4002 (Read-Only Memory ROM), 4003 (Register) and 4004CPU chips to form a complete chipset."

It’s true, this is the birth of the epoch-making product 4004, but Weidong remembers that the 4004 will not go on sale until November 71. Counting from June, the research and development time is more than two years.

There are only 4004 transistors on the 2, so why does it take so long to develop it?

Weidong pretended to be very interested and asked, "Then what kind of performance can this 4004 chip have?"

Arthur Locke said: "I have a design for you to look at."

Wei Dong took over the proposal, and looked it up, 4004 required this 4-bit microprocessor to integrate more than 2 transistors, the distance between transistors is 10 microns, capable of processing 4-bit data, 6 calculations per second, and the frequency It is 108KHz, and the front side bus is 0.74MHz (4bit).

Wei Dong asked: "How long will it take to develop this 4004 series chipset?"

Arthur Locke said: "It will take about half a year, and it can be developed in a year at most."

Wei Dong slammed his mouth. He clearly remembered that it was launched in November 71. Now Arthur Locke actually said that the design can be completed in a year at most. Is it because of a problem in the design, or is there some accident in the middle that dragged it down? 11 research and development progress?
Weidong has no idea about this kind of thing for a while, since he is still a shareholder of Intel at this point in time, of course he wants to participate in the design of this epoch-making product, and it will be recorded in the future history that the world's first commercial cpu It was jointly developed by Intel and Xiangjiang's Yixin Technology. Such an achievement is the most proud thing in life.

Wei Dong thought happily, but was slightly kicked by Ruan Tao next to him, and asked in a low voice, "Are you trying to talk nonsense?"

Only then did Weidong come to his senses, and said embarrassedly, "Sorry, I thought about some things just now."

Arthur Locke said: "It's okay, it's all normal."

Then he said: "Do you want to discuss some chips designed for you with the R&D team?"

"Yes, I will also learn from experience."

After thinking about it, Weidong waited for some time, waited until noon to discuss the joint research and development, got up and followed Arthur Locke out of the office.

Ruan Tao asked in a low voice: "Why are you so impolite, you can lose your mind when talking."

Weidong smiled: "What do you think about the cooperation between our research institute and Intel? Participating in the chip design work also trained the team by the way."

Ruan Tao said: "This is a good thing, but I don't know if Mr. Arthur Locke will agree?"

"Should be?"

Weidong just refrained from asking directly. It would be bad if he was directly rejected by Arthur Locke, and it would be more difficult to discuss cooperation.

Ruan Tao thought about it and said, "I'll ask later, if you refuse, it's better for you to talk."

This is also a talking strategy. If Arthur Locke rejects Ruan Tao's proposal, it is acceptable for Weidong to make some interest concessions. Weidong wants to cooperate and participate in the research and development of future generations of chips. Intel shared chip technology and established an alliance with Intel from the very beginning. Even if the authorities destroy this alliance in the future, Weidong can carry out follow-up research and development on the obtained technology.

The two agreed on a strategy, followed Mr. Arthur Locke to the office, chatted with the person in charge of the computer chip development, and confirmed that the progress and development functions also met the requirements.

Soon at noon, Arthur Locke, Mr. Gordon Moore, Chief Operating Officer, and Ted Hoff, head of the application department, had lunch with Wei Dong Ruan Tao.

Even when entertaining Director Wei Dong, the food is very simple, such as hamburger, pizza, fried chicken nuggets, cola, etc. Although simple, the quantity is enough, and it can fill the stomach.

During the intimate conversation, Ruan Tao said with a smile: "I think the company is busy recently. We have a research institute in San Jose. I wonder if we can carry out some R&D cooperation?"

(End of this chapter)