To be honest, Anxi regretted a little, leaving Nokia's executives alone and joining the newly established Matrix.
In his view, many of Zhou Xin's demands were beyond his understanding.
He couldn't understand just adding a linear motor to a mobile phone, because the physical keyboard itself has a pressing feel.
Adding a linear motor will make the keys feel better, and the double feedback brought by touch will be even more enjoyable.
But you must know that the space in a mobile phone is very small, and it is difficult to stuff so many things into it.
The linear motor can be simply understood as a vibration function. As early as 1984, Motorola installed an ERM vibration motor in the personal pager they launched at that time.
Later, the common key vibration feedback in smartphones was caused by horizontal linear motors, which is currently a new technology.
No mobile phone manufacturer has tried it yet.
Zhou Xin said: “Because we have physical 26-letter buttons, our mobile phone will be larger than ordinary mobile phones, so we can also pack more functions into it.
Unlike other phones, we just don’t add much. "
Zhou's newly designed phone is similar to BlackBerry's peak product, the BlackBerry 9900.
There are a total of 26 letter keys, four function keys and a touch screen that is about the same size as the keys.
This button-sized touch screen allows you to slide up, down, left, and right to control the selection buttons.
For Matrix, from hardware design to operating system design, this is a systematic project.
The hardware is just the foundation, the operating system and the services on it are the soul of this phone.
Knowing what will happen in the next two years, Zhou Xin predicts that this phone will be launched by the end of next year at the latest, and that after its launch, it will be able to capture the "decisive moment" through the camera function in September 2001.
He couldn't guarantee that officials in Washington would use Matrix. If Zhou Xin wanted to take the same popular approach as BlackBerry, he had to find another way.
"What do you think of the feel of this?" Zhou Xin said after picking up the engineering machine and pressing the physical buttons.
Although Anxi feels that this is an unnecessary function, he has to admit that adding linear motors to physical buttons will definitely make a qualitative leap in the typing feel.
Originally, the physical buttons had a laggy feeling. After adding a horizontal linear motor, the laggy feeling became a feeling of joy brought by pinching bubble wrap.
Zhou Xin continued: "You also think this feels great, right?
Including our internal engineers, after making the engineering machine according to my vision, everyone liked the pressing feel very much.
I know your worries. From the very beginning, I felt that mobile phones should not be so big. 9 keys is enough. Why do we need to find another way to make 26 keys. "
As a veteran in the mobile phone industry, Anxi has his own views on this issue: "Yes, boss, I think it is better to use 9 keys instead of 26 keys on a mobile phone, because past experience tells me.
9-key or 12-key mobile phones are better than 26-key mobile phones in terms of sales and user feedback.
It’s not like Nokia has never launched a 26-key mobile phone. Starting from the earliest Nokia 9000, there have always been voices within us that believe that 26-key mobile phones will be mainstream, and 9-key phones are simply heretical.
But the facts after the product was released tell us that 9 keys are mainstream and 26 keys are heresy.
Moreover, there is a discrepancy between the opinions of internal engineers and the needs of actual users.
Our engineers are only a small part of the consumer group. When we were at Nokia, we all thought the product was good, from engineers to testers to products. However, after it was introduced to the consumer market, it had neither word-of-mouth nor sales. has happened. "
Zhou Xin also has his own explanation for this: "Why 26 keys were not successful before was because users did not have the need for high-frequency typing.
I can proudly say that before Matrix, mobile phones were a communication tool, and people only used mobile phones to make calls.
They don't need to send too many messages. They just reply to a text message when it's inconvenient to talk. This kind of typing requirement is very small.
But our Matrix, the built-in application will determine that users have a lot of typing needs.
Typing needs determine that the 26-key design will be more popular. "
Zhou Xin paused for a moment and said, "Anxi, we need to reach a certain level of consensus.
That is, mobile phones are not just mobile phones. Sooner or later, they will become entertainment terminals. When you were at Nokia, you pushed Quora to become the default application on Nokia mobile phones. You should have a deep understanding of this.
When a user can read Quora on his mobile phone, even if he finds it inconvenient to use his mobile phone to answer Quora questions, will he still need to use his mobile phone to comment under the answers?
As a result, the demand for mobile phone typing is greater than before.
And when there are more and more similar applications, the demand for typing will also become more and more strong. The 26 keys are based on this logic.
I know that a 9-key mobile phone can be made thinner and lighter, and can be more portable, but what the 9-key phone loses is the functionality of the mobile phone as an entertainment terminal.
We can sacrifice thinness and portability to a certain extent for functionality. "
After Matrix was established and the company's employees were in place, Zhou Xin spent most of his time traveling between Berkeley and Matrix.
Because Matrix is the only one he needs to pay more attention to. The products Zhou Xin needs seem to be too advanced now.
If a consensus cannot be reached, it is absolutely impossible to achieve the effect Zhou Xin wants.
NewPay has Peter Thiel keeping an eye on it, and Riot Games’ business model and company operations are already very mature, so he doesn’t need to pay too much attention to the situation of these two companies.
On the eve of the launch of Matrix's first keyboard at the end of October, Zhou Xin once again went to New York.
"Newman, congratulations. You are the fastest person I have ever seen to become a billionaire. After this handover, you should be the man with the most cash assets in the world."
The final payment from Time Warner’s acquisition of Quora has finally arrived after a long process.
The market value of Time Warner has been rising since it acquired Quora. Therefore, both investors in the US stock market and the major shareholders behind Time Warner are willing to complete the handover of the final payment as soon as possible.
In this time and space, Time Warner has no risk of being acquired by AOL. Instead, Time Warner is now discussing internally whether to acquire AOL.
They have tasted the benefits of acquiring Quora.
Before acquiring Quora, Time Warner was a remnant of the old era, and the new era had no ship to carry them.
Who would have thought that a plane would be brought directly to them, and they would tell their previous traditional media colleagues that I will not go to the new era by boat, but I will fly there directly.
In an era without Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram, Quora was a dimensionality-reducing blow to current Internet products.
On the good foundation established by Zhou Xin, Quora attracted the largest number of users and the best quality users, making other competitors unable to compare with Quora.
Quora has formed a snowball effect. The more high-quality content there is, the more paying users it will attract, and the more formal users it will attract, and more high-quality content will be produced.
Zhou Xin smiled: "I regret seeing Time Warner's market value soaring. I feel that I should have accepted the share swap proposal at that time."
This is just a polite comment. Compared with Time Warner stock, money can bring more value to Zhou Xin.
NewPay has always wanted to open the European market. Even more anxious than NewPay is Time Warner. Only when the European market opens electronic payment permissions can European users pay for Quora content.
They now have a large number of European users, but the proportion of revenue generated by these European users is completely incomparable to Amerikan.
After investigation, it was found that it was caused by the inability to pay through NewPay in Europe.
Therefore, Quora's income in Europe comes entirely from the income generated after European official users answer questions and the answers are listed in Quora's golden election. They spend this part of the income on Quora.
Jerrill said: "If you are willing, we can facilitate the private placement of Time Warner shares to you. Anyway, you now have tens of billions of dollars in your hands."
Zhou Xin said: "Forget it, I have spent too much money recently. You should know that I have a product launch conference in New York this time.
The first product of my Matrix is about to be released, and we will have a series of products in the future. "
Jerel nodded: "I heard, this is your first time to hold a product launch in New York, and I have also seen Matrix's official website.
Judging from the pictures on the official website, it looks like a very cool keyboard, and I have the urge to buy it.
It's better to be young, you will have various ideas and try them out. At my age, I just want to stay at Goldman Sachs until I retire, and I have no idea of going out to make a career. "
“Goldman Sachs is such a great company. When I first came to Berkeley, if you had told me that I could work at Goldman Sachs in the future, I would have been very happy.
Jerel, I will give you an invitation later. If you have time, you can come to my product launch. Zhou Xin said.
Jerel said: "Okay, no problem, I will definitely come when the time comes."
Jerel was thinking to himself that he had never heard of any manufacturer holding a press conference for a keyboard.
In his impression, the products that usually hold press conferences are computers, game consoles, or operating systems.
As for the keyboard, he had never heard of any special keyboard brand.
Jerrel continued: "Newman, when will NewPay raise Series A financing? We would like to participate in NewPay's Series A financing."
Zhou Xin said: “Mainly now I am not short of money, even if it is financing, I can raise the money alone.
However, it is also a good thing to have Goldman Sachs take the risk for me. I will go back and study it with NewPay’s executive team. If I want to raise the next round of financing, I will definitely call you. "
From Jerrel's words, Zhou Xin sensed that there must be good news about electronic payment coming out recently.
Because according to his understanding, Goldman Sachs has obviously begun to tighten up in the Internet field recently. They have not invested in new Internet projects for more than half a year.
Judging from the third quarter report, Goldman Sachs has successively reduced its holdings in many Internet companies, and even dropped out of the top ten shareholders.
In other words, Goldman Sachs knew about the existence of the Internet bubble and realized that the bubble was about to burst, but it still wanted to participate in NewPay’s next round of financing.
Zhou Xin thought about it more carefully, and there was a high probability that Europe was going to open up restrictions on the electronic payment field. Goldman Sachs, as the world's top investment bank, got the news in advance.
"Today CAAS is officially established. I am very happy to see so many guests here today."
The establishment of CAAS was held on October 20, and the founding ceremony was held in New York. People from China and Amerikan were present to attend.
At the meeting, Hu Zhengming was the first to speak as the president.
Zhou Xin sat side by side with Robin Li in the audience. He asked in a low voice: "Robin, how is Baidu's recent development?"
After Robin Li learned about the establishment of CAAS, he also joined as one of the first members. Zhou Xin could clearly tell from his complexion that the other party was very proud of himself recently.
Of course, in front of Zhou Xin, Robin Li was still very humble: "We have been developing well recently, and our current click-through rate in the search engine field is on par with Google.
Yahoo cannot be considered a search engine at all. They are a first-generation search engine and their technology is quite backward.
Currently, the only search engines that are smart enough are us and Google. From a purely technical point of view, we are more mature than Google.
Plus we provide services for Quora, which results in our visibility being even higher than Google's. "
Speaking of Quora, Robin Li sighed: "Because Time Warner took over Quora, Jimmy and Larry have been gradually marginalized recently.
I heard that Time Warner is considering replacing Quora’s built-in engine with Google, and Google is also actively promoting this matter. "
If Zhou Xin were still there, he would never let Google become bigger, even if he was one of Google's shareholders.
However, after Quora changed hands, why should others let Baidu continue to be Quora's built-in search engine?
Zhou Xin consoled him: “This is something I can’t control.
The main thing is that I don’t have any shares in Quora right now. If I step forward, it may have the opposite effect.
Wait, actually don’t worry too much, Baidu already has users and its reputation has already been established.
Subsequent users rely on accumulation.
How are you developing the ad distribution system I told you about before?
After the development is completed, for the next round of financing, I will still lead the investment. You can find several investors to follow. This way, sharing the risk will also help you find some resources. "
Why does the advertising distribution system require financing after it is developed? Because the advertising distribution system requires a marketing team and a customer service team.
You need to find a manufacturer that places ads, and you need to have customer service to connect the web page and the manufacturer.
More importantly, search engines will continue to lose money until they find a stable profit model.
Servers and bandwidth all cost money.
Robin Li said: "Internal testing is no problem, and I expect another round of large-scale testing will be enough."
Zhou Xin briefly chatted with Robin Li and waited for Hu Zhengming to finish speaking. He was the second to speak on the stage.
As a founder member and executive director, and with his own halo, it was normal for Zhou Xin to come up and say a few words.
Zhou Xin still values his identity as the executive director of CAAS, because this is also another kind of tongzhan value, and it is always right to stack a few more layers of buffs.
"Today CAAS was officially established, and there were all the big guys in the audience. When I knew that I was going to come up and say a few words, I was very scared and thought that I was not qualified."
Today, due to work reasons, I only have one update, 4k words.
In addition, the last chapter about the Matrix brand cost 50 million. I wrote this number because Motorola had already made two series of mobile phones around this brand in 1999, so I estimated the price. After everyone’s reaction, I It was changed to 20 million.
In addition, the progress will be accelerated in the future. Although there are only 4k words today, the progress is at least 8k!
(End of chapter)
