game trailblazer

Chapter 47 The Hidden Crisis

The plane landed smoothly at San Jose International Airport, Zhang Lexing dragged his luggage out of the airport, and the accompanying bodyguards watched the surrounding environment vigilantly.Not far away, a young man was holding a sign with the words "Zhang Lexing" written in Chinese. Looking at the strokes, he knew that it was Yang Xinxin's own handwriting. It seemed that the company sent him to pick him up.Seeing Zhang Le walking out, the young man put down the sign and waved enthusiastically towards Zhang Lexing.At the same time, a brown 84-year-old Dodge Caravan drove over and parked in the aisle. A bodyguard carefully checked the license plate and the driver. After he gave the "OK" signal, Zhang Lexing followed another bodyguard and got into the car. And the young man holding the sign just now opened the other side of the car door and got in.

The car has a large space, which is more than enough for Zhang Lexing and his party and luggage.After the bodyguards outside the car put away their luggage, got in the car and sat down, the car quickly started and drove to the VS company headquarters.After the car started, the young man who came to pick him up introduced himself, and Zhang Lexing knew that his name was Fang Shaozhuo (English name Michael Fang), and he was a third-generation Chinese.Fang Shaozhuo only joined the company at the beginning of last year. He started as a clerk. With his outstanding ability and good performance, he has now been promoted to Yang Xinxin's administrative assistant.The pick-up this time was a task arranged by Yang Xinxin. It was not because he was worried that Zhang Lexing could not find the new headquarters building of VisualSystem, but because it was convenient for Zhang Lexing to grasp the company's recent business situation earlier, so Fang Shaozhuo brought a lot of relevant information information come over.

Considering Zhang Le's convenience in driving, Yang Xinxin did not prepare a lot of information, mainly a brief introduction of VisualSystem's operation and foreign investment from the second half of 86 to the first half of 87.Zhang Lexing flipped through it roughly. Judging from the data alone, the company's development during this period is quite good.During this year, VisualSystem's own business developed rapidly. The market share of operating systems and office software in North America increased year by year, and the overseas market was also gradually expanding. In 86, the revenue increased greatly, breaking through 10 billion US dollars for the first time.During the same period, the company's foreign investment income was good. Since the beginning of foreign investment in 82, the projects invested gradually began to enter the benefit period. By the end of 86, the annual income brought by the investment had exceeded 5 million US dollars, especially the equity acquisition of Microsoft in 85. , After Microsoft completed the restructuring and adjusted its product line, it not only brought hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue every year, but also obtained hundreds of millions of dollars in cash through the company's IPO listing.

After reading the materials, the car also came to the underground parking lot of the VisualSystem headquarters building.The bodyguards can retire, and Zhang Lexing takes the elevator directly to the 10th floor where the conference room is located.Stepping out of the elevator and walking through the corridor, Zhang Lexing came to the meeting room at the other end, where Yang Xinxin, the company's executives and technical directors were waiting.Today's meeting is very important, it is related to the operation of the company in the second half of the year.

Pushing open the door of the conference room, Zhang Le walked to the round table, opened an empty chair and sat down.Yang Xinxin smiled at Zhang Lexing as a greeting, and then she announced the official start of the meeting.

First, Yang Xinxin introduced the company's business situation some time ago. The content was more detailed than what Zhang Lexing read. Then the company's technical directors began to introduce the development status of the projects they were in charge of.

The first one to speak was Bill Joy, who introduced: "The operating system jointly developed by our company and Sun has launched SunOS3.0. Bug, is currently developing the next version, plans to add support for the SPARC processor developed by Sun, and will add virtual memory technology, this virtual memory technology is also planned to be used in the upcoming new version of Kylin system. KylinWindows2.0 The .11 release is planned for November and is now in beta testing..."

The next speaker was Kildare. The professor flipped through the information and said: "Kylin3.1 has been officially launched in May this year. The main improvement is the addition of support for large-capacity hard disks and IBMPS/5. The next version Kylin2 .4.0 is planned to be launched in March next year, and it has entered the Alpha testing stage. The main improvements are support for the new memory management mode of the 3 system, the application of virtual memory technology, etc..."

Then Kevin introduced the development of office software: "Currently there are two main pieces of office software, one is the graphical interface VisualOffice launched on the Mac according to the agreement with Apple, and it has obtained more than 80% of the North American market. One is VisualOffice with a character interface on the PC platform, and its market share in North America has exceeded 90%. VisualOffice under KylinWindows, a key project on the PC platform, is limited by the performance of the current PC and cannot fully utilize all the functions of the software. According to our technical analysis, if the performance of the new generation of processors launched by Intel can be improved by more than 30% in terms of integer operations, it will basically be able to run VisualOffice under the kylin Windows platform.”

……

After everyone finished talking, Zhang Lexing cleared his throat and said, "Well, everyone has done a good job and their grades are quite good. But it's not time to relax yet. Our competitors are still working hard, so we have to hurry up. Especially the operating system development department. According to intelligence, IBM has now begun to concentrate on the research and development of PC operating systems, and not long ago they released the first version of their research results OS/2."

Some of the participants in the operating system development department laughed out loud: "As far as IBM's broken system is concerned, it is not enough to look at at all. After studying for so long, what came out is still a character interface. To be honest, it is not as easy to use as Kylin3.1, and it is even worse. Needless to say compared to our KylinWindows."

"Although the current first version of OS/2 seems very ordinary, everyone must not underestimate IBM. Their strong human resource reserves are not comparable to ours now. As long as they want to, they can even organize more than 1000 people. The development team did this. The current first version of OS/2 is not good, but they are not familiar with the graphics operating system. After they are familiar with it, then our troubles will come. Ordinary IBM is not terrible, but It is difficult for us to compete with IBM, which is serious and focused on doing one thing. So we must take advantage of our current leading position, increase our research and development efforts, and maximize our leading position.”

Looking at everyone's relaxed expressions, it is obvious that Zhang Lexing's painstakingly organized words are for the air to listen to. This may be because IBM has not shown too much pressure for the time being, and Zhang Lexing can only do his best and obey the destiny.

Suppressing the uneasiness in his heart, Zhang Lexing changed the subject: "Just now the office software business department mentioned the problem of processor (CPU) performance. I believe that Joey also has this idea. If Intel can really develop a CPU with better performance With a new generation of high-end processors, our KylinWindows will be able to run faster and have more comprehensive functions.”

Zhang Lexing took a sip of water, took out a document from his briefcase, and threw it on the round table, "This is the news I just received. Intel has planned to develop a new generation of processors. This document is their research and development. The expected goal, everyone can pass it on.”

Since 85, there has been a RISC (reduced instruction) whirlwind in the industry, and even Intel, which made its fortune on CISC (complex instruction), has been deeply affected.Intel wanted to consolidate its position in CISC processors, but also worried that giving up RISC would miss opportunities. Undecided, Grove simply went to two R&D groups.One is the traditional CISC architecture processor research and development group. According to the naming convention, the code name of the chip is 80486.The other is a processor research and development group based on RISC architecture, the chip code is 860.The two development groups competed within Intel. Interestingly, a Chinese couple joined the two R&D groups respectively. They not only competed in the office, but even at the dinner table at home, sometimes they had to argue about who was stronger and who was weaker between RISC and CISC. debate on the issue.

Intel's two processor research and development teams were established last year. Although they haven't produced the final product yet, they have also gained a lot of technical gains.In order to prevent the processor from being launched without suitable software cooperation, Intel notified the situation to VisualSystem, an important ally, early on, so that VisualSystem can arrange a suitable software development plan in time.

From Intel's point of view, of course, it is hoped that VisualSystem can develop supporting software for both processors, but it is not easy to explain. The 860 processor may be very good, but Zhang Lexing has never heard of it in his previous life. Obviously there is a reason, and Zhang Lexing has already invested in MIPS, which is also a RISC system. Of course, he will not be so stupid to take the initiative to help Intel develop the market.In contrast, the 80486 processor is much cuter. It is a successful product that has been proven by the market, and it is backward compatible with the previous 80386 processor, which is much less difficult for the development of the operating system.

Everyone’s reaction after reading the information was similar to Zhang Lexing’s expectations. Almost no one was willing to support Intel’s 860 plan, and almost overwhelmingly supported 80486, even market and administrative personnel who were not very proficient in technology. It seems that the 80486 processor The top position is really the trend of the times.

Now that the choice has been decided, Zhang Lexing immediately made corresponding personnel adjustments, mobilized some elite soldiers from Joey and Kildare, and arranged them to Intel's 80486 R&D team to assist in the development, so as to be able to grasp the technical characteristics of the chip in time.As for the research and development team under Joey and Kildare, the personnel department will promptly arrange backup personnel to replenish them. The future is very important, but the current project cannot be relaxed.Although everyone doesn't care about IBM, to Zhang Lexing, the powerful IBM seems to be a sword of Damocles hanging over his head, and it will fall at any time.

After arranging the technical matters, Zhang Lexing left Yang Xinxin and other executives to continue the meeting. October is coming. Although many things have already been arranged, in order to better deal with it, we still need to plan carefully.

(End of this chapter)