game trailblazer

Chapter 37 Bringing Down IBM
With a "snap", a document was thrown onto the coffee table in front of the sofa.Yang Xinxin took a sip of coffee, and then said: "Microsoft has already done it. This is the agreement signed with them. Now you should be able to tell me why you want to acquire such a company that is about to go bankrupt."

Zhang Lexing still admires Microsoft. Although some methods of Microsoft are contemptible, but from a small company that started with the BASIC language to an empire of hundreds of billions of dollars, Gates himself was also the richest man in the world for a while. These are clearly not a matter of luck alone.Gates, Ballmer and others are not idiots who hit the jackpot. Their own abilities cannot be underestimated if they can achieve such a level.Although their situation is not good now, maybe they can find a new way out after the company goes bankrupt. Instead of having multiple competitors in the future, it is better to turn them into our partners. Multiple friends are always better than multiple enemies.Of course, these words must not be said directly to Yang Xinxin, otherwise Zhang Lexing might turn into a magic stick in her eyes.

After careful consideration for a while, Zhang Lexing made up a few plausible reasons: "Well, Microsoft's current situation is not good, but this does not mean that their technical strength is not good. After the acquisition, we can use Microsoft to strengthen ourselves. In addition, we have only been in the United States for a few years, and our personal connections are relatively shallow, but Microsoft’s Gates, Ballmer, Xue Li and others are all local leaders, and their interpersonal relationships are much stronger than ours. It is also of great help to us. After the acquisition of Microsoft, we can basically monopolize the PC platform in the operating system market, and the only remaining competitor is IBM, which will pose a greater threat.”

After hearing Zhang Lexing's so-called reason, Yang Xinxin nodded and said, "What you said seems to make sense. I hope your vision is the same this time as before."

……

After completing the acquisition and reorganization of Microsoft, Zhang Lexing formed a listing consultant team to push the new Microsoft into the listing process.Successively passed registration review, promotion roadshow and other barriers. In March 86, Microsoft was successfully listed on the NASDAQ market. On the first day of opening, the stock price soared from the issue price of 3 US dollars to 21 US dollars, and finally closed at 33 US dollars. .Gates successfully entered the rich list with his 30% equity, and VisualSystem also received hundreds of millions of dollars in development funds.

After Microsoft was successfully listed, Zhang Lexing sent his fund manager to contact Sandy Weil, who was currently at a low point in his career, and invited him to jointly invest in a commercial credit company in Baltimore.Sandy was reluctant at first. He thought that he was the one who founded Hilson Company, served as the president of American Express, and fought for Bank of America.Later, Sandy agreed, because he was not reconciled to his failure in American Express, and he was very eager to find a company to manage, so as to revive his career.After that, the two parties each invested 400 million US dollars to jointly take over the troubled commercial credit company. Sandy served as the CEO of the company, and a business myth was slowly born.

But at this time, Zhang Lexing found that he was running out of money. Over the years, he had invested in many projects piecemeal. Although the results were good, they had not yet entered the harvest period. Zhang Lexing was not willing to exhaust his resources.Including the dividends from VisualSystem over the years and deducting his own consumption, Zhang Lexing still has US$3000 million left in his Honghe Fund account.This amount of money is not small, but if it is placed in the stock market crash next year, it will seem like a drop in the bucket. Fortunately, the World Cup is coming again.

The hosting of the 1986 World Cup can be said to have gone through hardships. It was originally held by Colombia, but had to give up due to financial problems. Fortunately, Mexico took over in time.Unexpectedly, another major earthquake occurred in Mexico a year ago, which claimed the lives of more than 2 people. Fortunately, the Mexican government and people are strong, and the World Cup was finally held as scheduled.

In this World Cup, Zhang Lexing is relatively clear. Although he does not remember the scores of each game, Denmark's magical three-game winning streak, the quarter-finals caused by the old horse God's hand, Argentina defeated England 2-1 and Argentina finally defeated I still remember the times when West Germany won the championship and so on.

Before the game started, Zhang Lexing asked someone to open more than ten accounts, and then started the betting journey of this World Cup through a regular betting company.The final result of the game was exactly the same as Zhang Lexing remembered. Even the old horse ran for more than 50 meters in the hinterland of England and even scored six goals. Zhang Lexing was also lucky to earn a bonus of [-] million US dollars. .

……

Here, Zhang Lexing's life is getting better and better, but on the other side, IBM seems to be going against the grain, and gradually loses its foundation by relying on IBM-PC/XT and IBM-PC/AT.

During Estridge's period, although there were some unhappiness with many suppliers, he still maintained the concept of an open system.But since Estridge left IBM and returned to heaven, the PC branch has gradually become more conservative.First start from the source, first acquired 20% of Intel's stock, began to dictate Intel's daily management, and then used Intel's influence to place a huge order to acquire all of Intel's 286 processors.In the view of Eke, the new president of IBM's PC branch, this is a brilliant idea to attack compatible machine manufacturers. With one hand, it not only keeps IBM's supply stable, but also makes those damn compatible machine manufacturers lose their processor sources. Become water without a source and a tree without roots.Eke was very proud, and lightly shook the lupine in his hand, which was said to have come from China.

Grove feels a headache now. Although after IBM acquired 20% of Intel's stock, Intel seems to have acquired a wealthy family, but Grove understands that IBM's move actually caused Intel to lose more. free.In the past few years, Intel has been continuously squeezed by RB manufacturers, and its memory business has gone from bad to worse. Even in the United States, it has begun to lose its rank. Grove broke his wrist and made up his mind to spin off and sell all of its memory business.During this transition period, Intel had to endure years of losses. At this time, the newly developed 386 processor suddenly became the straw for Intel to find profit growth points.

But unexpectedly, after the 85 processor came out with samples in 386, no matter whether Grove sent someone to communicate with the PC branch or went to the IBM headquarters for public relations, IBM seemed to turn a blind eye to Intel's new product, the 386 processor.Through Grove's own personal connections, he finally figured out what IBM was thinking.It turns out that the previous 286 processor had many errors, which is one of the reasons why Grove resolutely switched to the 386 processor. In IBM's view, this is a manifestation of Intel's weak design ability.Since you can't even design the 286 processor well, how can you make a 286 processor that is more complex and better than the 386? Eck even suspects that Intel's purpose of promoting the immature 386 processor is to let IBM come Be this guinea pig.Eck believes that instead of using those immature 386 processors, Intel might as well sell more 286 processors, so that his plan to draw salaries from the bottom can be realized as soon as possible.Of course, IBM's resistance to the 386 processor also includes their mainframe department, because the 386 is a 32-bit processor, and IBM is worried that it will invade the mainframe market.

Grove became angry when he realized that IBM had so many tricks.The furious Grove remembered the VIC alliance in 84, and it was time to have another party with his allies.After almost a year, the three allies of the VIC Alliance met again, but the meeting place changed from Houston to Silicon Valley near Santa Clara.

Among the three companies, VisualSystem has the best life. With the Kylin system, it dominates the market share of the operating system. Although IBM claims to develop a new operating system by itself, the finished product is a nondescript operating system plug-in. It must be run on the Kylin system.Since Compaq became a thorn in IBM's side, it has been suppressed many times, and now IBM has resorted to the loss of buying all 286 processors, and it seems that it is about to die.And Intel is even more pitiful. After being acquired part of the equity, it will almost become a marionette of IBM.

The two bitter companies hit it off, and of course VisualSystem will not let go of such a good thing. The VIC alliance has finally begun to become a real alliance.In order to attract more people to fight against IBM, Compaq also came forward to contact other compatible device manufacturers. Unfortunately, only Dell from Texas and Acer from Taiwan joined in because of IBM's coercion.

1986年5月VisualSystem公司收到康柏的工程样机，开始进行操作系统的实机测试，1985年7月又陆续收到戴尔和宏碁的工程样机。1986年9月，康柏率先推出386电脑，紧跟着戴尔和宏碁也分别推出自己的386电脑。1986年9月底，能够充分发挥386芯片实力的新版Kylin操作系统正式上市，并且宣布会预装在康柏、戴尔和宏碁新推出的386电脑上。

At this time, IBM was guarding his large pile of 286 chips and could not respond, because IBM didn't even have a single 386 chip.It was not until six months later that IBM's IBM Personal System/386 (PS/2) based on the 2 processor arrived late, pre-installed with the OS/2 system that IBM placed high hopes on.However, IBM made another stupid move and actually used its own patented micro-channel technology. This time, if they want to maintain compatibility, they must pay IBM the patent fee. As a result, many compatible machine manufacturers who are still on the sidelines have been handed over by IBM. Pushed to the opposite, IBM has thus become a loner, gradually being marginalized from the original dominant manufacturer.

(End of this chapter)