Regarding the future of smartphones, after the launch of the Mphone App Store, more and more people will realize that smartphones will become the mainstream of future mobile phone forms, at least one of the mainstream.
Compared with iPhones and Mphones launched by Nokia, there are far fewer applications. Nokia's brand has still gained a large audience, including the smartphones launched by Motorola in the middle of the year. More and more traditional mobile phone brands are targeting smartphones. Mobile phone market.
Samsung has launched a touch screen smartphone with a pen. This resistive touch screen has a particularly poor texture when touched by hand. It can only be controlled with a stylus with a conductive soft rubber tip.
Compared with Nokia and Motorola, Samsung's touch screen mobile phones are welcomed by more users.
But two years later, Mphone still maintains an advantage over other mobile phones in one area, and that is mobile phone chips. A1E is still the most powerful CPU in the current mobile phone market.
It’s not that other chip manufacturers can’t produce chips with better performance than A1E. After all, this is just a mobile phone chip using a 0.13 micron process. The most advanced process has reached 90nm.
But because we are only in the early millennium, the research and development of mobile chips is far less vigorous than that of later generations. From Qualcomm to MediaTek to Samsung and HiSilicon Kirin, major manufacturers are working hard to achieve a balance between performance and battery life.
Manufacturers like Samsung can design mobile chips with better performance than A1E, but they cannot commercialize them. When trying to turn to commercialization, they face problems such as too high costs and too fast power consumption.
Zhou Xin is not the only one who knows the importance of app stores and opening development platforms to developers and allowing them to participate in the creation of a smartphone ecosystem. Samsung, Motorola, and Nokia are all aware of this.
But once they did this, the chip did not support it. Samsung tried to use the most advanced mobile chip process, but found that too many applications would cause power consumption to be too fast, and the original one-day battery life would be shortened to 4 hours.
Whether it is mobile phone manufacturers or consumers, they can tolerate a day's battery life at most, and they will not accept it if it is shorter.
Therefore, after more and more smartphones appeared, Silicon Valley technology magazines rated the performance of these mobile phones, and Mphone still firmly occupied the top position with the help of the A1E chip.
Zhou Xin said: "I don't know if Mr. Li understands my model of building wafer fabs in China. He should have a general understanding, right? Because if I remember correctly, Temasek invested in the chip foundry business of New Core Technology. .”
Zhou Xin knows very well that companies like Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase will accept this kind of cooperation because they need something from him.
NewPay is about to start its next round of financing. As the importance of electronic payments and mobile payments increases, NewPay also needs to further distribute its benefits so that it can continue to ensure its monopoly position.
NewPay is undoubtedly the most watched unicorn among unlisted companies in the current capital market. Both Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan want to have more investment shares.
Because of this, they are willing to accept unreasonable investment plans and invest in fabs in China.
You must know that there are great risks in the wafer factory where control is firmly in Zhou Xin's hands. The risk here does not mean that they doubt Zhou Xin's business ability.
Venture capital institutions have no doubt that Zhou Xin, who owns Matrix, Xinxin Technology and Xinyun, can make the chip business prosperous. Bluetooth chips alone are enough to support these fabs.
Instead, he is worried about no or low dividends. Zhou Xin has the control to distribute more of the money he earns to engineers and invest it in R&D and new factories. Then he will just let the money sit on the books without paying dividends.
In this case, the money they invest will always be only book assets.
For a country, there is no need to worry about this.
As long as Zhou Xin builds the wafer fab in the Lion City, the tax revenue, job opportunities, and the driving role of upstream and downstream enterprises that it will bring to the Lion City will be enough to recoup his capital.
In later generations, the price of office buildings in Huaguo was much lower than that of residential buildings, which was entirely based on the same logic. Only when there are businesses and jobs can the surrounding residential land be sold at a high price.
Lee Hsien Loong naturally knew this truth, and he nodded after listening: "I know that Temasek spoke very highly of you when it invested in New Core Technology, believing that New Core Technology has the top scientific research team and first-class engineers.
Including later, after Temasek invested in Xinxin, they sent people to investigate the wafer fab jointly established by Xinxin and Huahong. They believed that although it was only established recently, it could already rank among the wafer fabs of TSMC and UMC. "
Zhou Xin said: "Yes, I plan to adopt the same cooperation method as in China. I only want to control the company, and Lion City needs to bear most of the investment share.
Due to some restrictions, it is impossible to build a wafer factory with the most advanced process in China, but there is no such restriction in the Lion City.
My company Matrix has a large demand for advanced process chips, and this demand exists for a long time. As long as Matrix has enough market in the smartphone market, this demand will exist.
Previously, the most core chips in Matrix needed to be produced in the wafer fabs of Texas Instruments and Samsung. I hope that in the future, more of them will be produced in Xinxin Technology's own wafer fabs.
This requires Xinxin to successfully cooperate with the Lion City. "
Zhou Xin received extremely high courtesy in the Lion City because the Lion City needed him and there was a lot of room for cooperation between the two parties.
Lee Hsien Loong also knows that this is a rare opportunity, because natural resources are scarce, labor costs are expensive, and the chip industry is highly biased. These factors together mean that there will be no next new chip willing to put the most advanced chip foundry business in the Lion City. .
In the past, whether it was Texas Instruments or IBM, the chip foundries established in the Lion City were all engaged in mid- to low-end businesses, or businesses like packaging and testing that did not have much technical content.
It is even less likely that TSMC, Samsung and UMC, the top three companies in the current chip foundry industry, will build factories in the Lion City.
Even if they have the idea of lowering costs and diversifying investments, it is far more pleasant to build factories in China than to come to Lion City.
"Xinxin will choose the Lion City because I have few choices and China has too many constraints."
Korea and Wanwan, where TSMC and Samsung are located, have no such constraints.
There are not many opportunities like this. I don’t know when I will meet next time. For a place like the Lion City, high-end manufacturing is the most precious, because labor in the Lion City is very expensive, and the service industry and financial industry give The remuneration means that only high-end manufacturing can retain people.
"Xinxin Technology will build a factory in the Lion City, with a total investment expected to be US$2.8 billion."
"Xinxin Technology continues to expand its R&D center in the Lion City"
“NewPay’s Southeast Asia headquarters has landed in the Lion City. NewPay in the Lion City will expand its business throughout Southeast Asia.”
"Xinyun will invest US$1 billion in the Lion City to build the largest data center in the Asia-Pacific region"
This time Zhou Xin went to the Lion City, which benefited both parties a lot. In this cooperation package, Zhou Xin himself did not have to pay much money, and most of it was funded by the sovereign fund of the Lion City.
Lion City hopes to invest in NewPay, at least in NewPay’s branches in Southeast Asia. As a price, they need to invest in New Cloud together.
Asset-heavy businesses like Xinyun are still losing money. This is about packaging good assets with not-so-good assets and letting the Lion City buy them together.
Considering the investment in Xinyun, Xinyun's data center will be located in the Lion City, which is also good for the Lion City, so the Lion City agreed to this plan.
Naturally, the outside world did not know that this series of cooperation was funded by Lion City. They thought that Zhou Xin was betting heavily on Lion City in order to spread risks.
The media in the Lion City have even reported on this series of cooperation, focusing on Zhou Xin’s unfailing record in the past and the major benefits of these cooperations landing in the Lion City.
China is very concerned about the development of the Lion City, and a large number of Chinese cities are benchmarked against the Lion City. Coupled with the recent Hanxin scandal, Chinese media also reported extensively on Zhou Xin’s investment in the Lion City.
It's just that their focus was on the Hanxin incident that angered Zhou Xin, causing Zhou Xin to transfer a lot of investments that were originally supposed to be in China to the Lion City.
"Affected by the Hanxin incident, Zhou Xin questioned China's scientific research environment and business environment, which led to the transfer of some investment projects that were originally supposed to be in China to the Lion City. The Hanxin incident will become a milestone in the history of the development of integrated circuits in China. landmark event."
A large number of media began to report on Hanxin again. This time the target was not only Chen Jin, but also the big guys behind Chen Jin.
Because Chen Jin did not get a lot of benefits from Hanxin like later generations and could leave calmly. Now Chen Jin has lost his job and is infamy, and all the scientific research funds he received from Jiaotong University have been returned.
A month ago, Chen Jin was a guest of Jiaotong University and even Shen Hai. Jiaotong University mobilized the whole school to hold a press conference for him. The difference between falling from heaven to hell in an instant was unacceptable to Chen Jin, and he could not accept anything about himself. Even though I didn’t catch it, I spent the rest of my life in it.
If you go back to America, you can't go back. Once you go back to America, you will have to face Motorola's lawsuit. In China, you can settle the matter by paying a few thousand yuan, but if you go to America, you can pay until death.
Chen Jin is the most popular news figure at the moment. His news value is extremely high. A large number of media are willing to pay him to be interviewed. He was not short of money and has made enough benefits from Hanxin. Naturally, he does not need to offend the big boss. Now he can do anything. If you don't have to pay back money to Jiaotong University, you have to take the money.
Instigated by the media, Chen Jin began to accept interviews:
"Jiaotong University claimed to have given me 50 million in R&D funding. In fact, we only had 20 million on the Hanxin R&D team's books. Where did the other 30 million go? I don't know, but I still looked at Jiaotong University It was only after the announcement that I learned that I had been given 50 million R&D funds.”
“I did buy the dsp56800 chip from Motorola in August, and then polished off the logo and replaced it with Hanxin’s logo.
This is because the School of Microelectronics has been urging me, saying that we must produce results quickly. The question is how can scientific research results be produced like other research results?
The leaders of the School of Microelectronics have frequently asked me about my progress since Xinxin Technology held a press conference in Silicon Valley in July to release the latest Bluetooth chip, and asked me whether I can complete the research and development within this year.
It was against this background that I bought chips from Motorola. I made two preparations. If Hanxin can develop the best chip, we will use our own chips. If Hanxin cannot develop it, then we will use Motorola's chip first. "
"As for the falsification of my resume, I did work at both IBM and Motorola. Otherwise, could I get Motorola's source code?"
"Who said those who do chip testing can't do chip design? In fact, there are no particularly obvious barriers between these two fields."
"Have the appraisal experts discovered Hanxin's fraud? Yan Xiaolang and Xu Juyan must have discovered it, because the appraisal meeting lasted for a week. They hinted to me in the evening that they would put their students into Hanxin's R&D team, and they would Get some Hanxin shares.
Of course, they made these requests after repeatedly confirming whether I could finally obtain Motorola's DSP chip technology.
I don’t know whether Zou Shichang knew this, but he never came to me directly.
Think about it, Yan Xiaolang is the head of the integrated circuit task force, how could he not see Hanxin's problems. "
Chen Jin's interview was full of explosive points, and now he was really unbearable.
In particular, only 20 million of the 50 million R&D funds were used. Experts wanted to take advantage of these sensitive enough contents, and the connection with the Hanxin incident directly turned the original academic issue into other issues.
What was even more amazing about Chen Jin was that when Yan Xiaolang came out to refute: "Chen Jin is a mad dog. After he was driven out with a stick, he came to bite us.
It is true that I am the leader of the integrated circuit task force, but this does not mean that I understand all chips. I only judge from the test results of Hanxin No. 1 that it is indeed an advanced DSP chip. It is impossible for me to compare the DSP chips on the market. They all compared it with Hanxin to see if it was fake.
I can only say that my work was not rigorous enough, and Chen Jin was making random claims without any basis. "
Xu Juyan also stood up to refute and scolded Chen Jin.
It's just that he is not academically rigorous and will be criticized at most. If it is really what Chen Jin said, things will be unstoppable.
Chen Jin was self-taught in exposing the paparazzi of later generations, and directly took out two audio clips:
"You can listen to this. This is the audio I recorded in the office. The first paragraph is the conversation between Yan Xiaolang and me, and the second paragraph is the conversation between Yan Xiaolang and Xu Juyan who came to the office to find me."
Chen Jin is also a talent. In later generations, he relied on recording to force the big bosses to protect him and let him land smoothly.
Now under the pressure of Zhou Xin, Chen Jin knew that even if he gave the recording to the big guys, they would not be able to protect him, so he might as well exchange these two recordings for some real-life benefits.
For these two recordings alone, the media was willing to pay him half a million.
After the recording came out, the experts from the appraisal committee began to pretend to be dead.
I was really tired after working overtime yesterday. This is to make up for yesterday.
(End of chapter)
