dkrc Chapter 372 Recommendations for the Electronics Industry
Chapter 372 Recommendations for the Electronics Industry
When the car stopped at the entrance of the residential area, the sun was still blazing. Ling Yun pushed open the door and got out. A wave of heat washed over him; the asphalt was softened by the sun, and his shoes felt sticky underfoot. He was wearing a white short-sleeved shirt, no tie, and carrying a black briefcase. The sentry at the gate glanced at him, he gave his name, the sentry picked up his phone, said a few words, and then let him in.
Lingyun's uncle's house was an old-fashioned two-story building with red brick walls. Green ivy cascaded down the balcony, its leaves slightly wilted from the sun. Lingyun knocked on the door, which opened. His aunt stood in the doorway, wearing a floral short-sleeved shirt and an apron, her hands dusted with flour. "Xiaoyun's here, come in quickly. Your uncle is in the living room, and your uncle's former boss is also here." She stepped aside to let him in, then went back to the kitchen.
Ling Yun changed into slippers and went inside. Two people were sitting on the sofa in the living room. Her uncle, Ling Jun, was sitting on the single sofa on the left, wearing a light blue short-sleeved shirt. His hair was a little whiter than the last time she saw him, but he looked to be in good spirits.
Sitting opposite him was a man nearing 60, wearing a gray shirt without a tie, the sleeves rolled up to his forearms. This man wasn't dressed like a typical official; he leaned back on the sofa, holding a white porcelain teacup. Seeing Ling Yun enter, he put down the teacup and stood up.
Ling Jun also stood up and said to Ling Yun, "Xiao Yun, you're here. Let me introduce you. This is Minister Sun, the Minister of Information Industry, your uncle's former superior. The meeting you attended at the Jingxi Hotel last time was hosted by their ministry."
Ling Yun strode over and extended his hand. Minister Sun shook it. "Ling Yun, you are truly a young man of great talent. You are doing very well in your overseas businesses, and your Xinghuo Group in China is also quite successful. This time, through your uncle's introduction, we are meeting privately, mainly because I have some questions to ask you, as a professional."
Ling Yun was flattered. "Minister, you flatter me. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time and have achieved some success. If there's anything you'd like to know, I'll answer it to the best of my ability."
The three sat down again. Aunt brought over a cup of tea, placed it in front of Lingyun, and then went back to the kitchen. The air conditioner in the living room was on, and the temperature was set quite high, 26 degrees Celsius, but it was much cooler than outside. On the coffee table was a plate of sliced watermelon, with red flesh, black seeds, and a few toothpicks stuck in it.
Ling Jun began, "After the last meeting, Minister Sun went back and read the meeting minutes several times. He said you didn't say a word from beginning to end, but he read your materials and found them very well written. So he wanted to talk to you."
Minister Sun picked up a briefcase from beside the sofa, unzipped it, took out a document, and placed it on the coffee table. Ling Yun glanced at it; it was the same document he had submitted last time, the edges slightly curled, indicating it had been handled many times.
Minister Sun said, "I've read this document several times. There are a few points in it that differ from others. Everyone else is talking about protecting this and that, but you're talking about focusing on breakthroughs. You said that chips, operating systems, and industrial software are the three key areas, and everything else can be overlooked. Why these three?"
Ling Yun thought for a moment and said, "Chips are the heart of hardware, operating systems are the brain of software, and industrial software is the soul of manufacturing. If these three are controlled by others, no matter how well you do other things, you're still just working for others. DVD players are a case in point. We produce most of the world's DVD players, but the lion's share of the profits goes to foreigners. Why? Because the chips are theirs, the standards are theirs, and the patents are theirs. We're just assembling them and earning a pittance."
Minister Sun nodded without saying anything, waiting for him to continue.
Ling Yun said, "In the chip industry, the most important thing is not design, but manufacturing. Design can be done by people, but manufacturing relies on equipment. We are held back by the Americans in terms of equipment. Once the Wassenaar Arrangement was signed, they wouldn't sell us high-end equipment. What we can do now is to walk on two legs. One is to buy second-hand equipment, modify it ourselves, and fine-tune it ourselves. The equipment that Japan and Europe have phased out is no longer accurate, but the basic structure is still there. We buy it back, modify the control system, modify the optical components, and slowly accumulate experience. The other is to conduct independent research and development, starting from the low end. Electronic watch chips, telephone chips, VCD decoding chips—these have low technical barriers, large markets, and can support the team. We learn while doing, and move up the ranks. Lithography machines, etching machines, ion implanters—we tackle them one by one. It's not something that can be mastered in eight or ten years, but someone has to start tackling it."
Minister Sun asked him, "What's the current status of your Qilu Microelectronics project?"
Ling Yun said, "The design team is set up, with more than 70 people. The process team is also under construction. The 1-micron chip design has been successfully tested, and we are looking for a place to fabricate it. In terms of equipment, we bought three second-hand lines from Japan and are currently modifying them. The lithography machine is a Nikon model from ten years ago, with a precision of 0.8 microns. With some modifications, it can be used to reach 0.5 microns. For anything below that, we will have to develop it ourselves."
Minister Sun nodded and said, "It wasn't easy." He picked up a watermelon from the coffee table, took a bite, and the juice dripped down his wrist, which he caught with his other hand. He chewed a couple of times, swallowed, and placed the rind next to the ashtray. He picked up a handkerchief from the coffee table, wiped his hands, and then asked, "What about the operating system? What's the status of your Star System?"
Ling Yun said, "I've made the core code of the Starry Sky system completely public. It's in the open-source community, and people all over the world can see it, modify it, and use it. It's not that I don't want to make money; it's that one person can't keep this system secret. By making it public, people all over the world can help us write it, modify it, and test it. Currently, there are dozens of teams in China doing secondary development based on the Starry Sky system. Some are doing government systems, some are doing education systems, and some are doing military systems. Everyone is doing their own thing, but the underlying system is the same. This underlying system is in our own hands, so we don't have to rely on Microsoft, and most importantly, we don't have to worry about backdoors."
Minister Sun asked him, "Now that it's public, aren't you worried about others using it?"
Lingyun said, "Don't worry, whoever uses it will have to make it public. If Microsoft dares to use our code, they'll have to make the Windows code public too. They don't dare. So they can only sue us for infringement and theft. The lawsuit lasted for half a year, and what happened in the end? Their own version of the pop-up window displayed the message, 'Exclusive to Starry Sky Code, the thief is utterly shameless!' The whole world saw who stole from whom."
"Although the operating system is important, we have already gained the upper hand. With the Star System, we are not afraid of supply disruptions or competition from them. We are also confident that we can defeat them after entering the WTO."
Minister Sun didn't speak, but picked up his teacup, took a sip, and continued, "What about industrial software? What are your thoughts on that?"
Ling Yun said, "Industrial software is even more difficult than chips. Chips are hard things, you can see and touch them. Software is soft, you can't see or touch it. But when it comes to choking us, it's even more ruthless than chips. Without industrial software, you can't design anything—airplanes, cars, ships, molds. There are very few domestic companies that make industrial software, and they are all small in scale. Most of them use foreign ones: CATIA, UG, ProE, ANSYS, all from France and the United States. If they cut off the supply of these things, our design will come to a standstill. My suggestion is that industrial software should be developed in two steps. The first step is to buy it, buy what you can buy first, and set up the production line. The second step is to imitate, to write your own software based on foreign software. The core of industrial software is data; functions are secondary. Data can only be accumulated through extensive use. Right now, we are using imported industrial software, which is actually helping others build a moat."