Chapter 187: Vicious Conspiracy
Translator:Nyoi-Bo Studio
Editor:Nyoi-Bo Studio
Since the World Internet Conference ended and after Chen Jin rejected Google's founder twice, Chen Jin, along with Xing Hai Technologies, had become the needle in the eye of Larry Page, and even some western authorities.
Larry Page, a few renowned political figures from the M nation, and a number of representatives from large Western consortiums, held a special conference to discuss how they should deal with Xing Hai Technologies.
Larry Page said, "Give them a sanction immediately! Let's cripple that company from Z nation who refuses to cooperate!" His face was red, his pride still burning from the insult he received from Chen Jin.
A paliament member said in confusion, "Mr. Page, aren't you overreacting a little? They are just a regular company from the Z nation. Indeed, they have some good tech in their hands, but can't we make that ourselves? Especially with Google's powerful technical strength, can't Google come out with the tech on intelligent learning within six to twelve months?" He thought that Larry's reaction was overexaggerated, and that he was just in a panic because the Z's were ahead of them for a little while. He figured that Larry just wanted to sanction them to get revenge against the company from Z… he thought that this was a little too ridiculous, and even considered it shameful. Because only the weak would resort to despicable means to stop the strong. Was M nation that weak?
Larry had no choice but to say, "My apologies. With Google's current technical strength, we might need around 10 years to be able to come out with the tech on intelligent learning. The Z's had an excellent showcase of their astonishing wisdom this time around. They have done what we couldn't. The tech on intelligent learning has grave importance, it is even comparable to an industrial revolution! Countries who own the tech can increase their speed of producing talents and achieving technical breakthroughs tenfold. Their intellectual development will far exceed our imagination. The scarier thing is that this tech was born in Z nation. With their population paired with the intelligent learning technology…" Larry Page took a deep breath. "In at most 10 years, Z could become as powerful, or even surpass, M nation. This is simply a nightmare that became reality. If a middle-sized country had come out with the technology, I would even suggest using military force to snatch the tech ourselves or straight up destroy it! But it's the Z nation we are talking about…" Although Larry Page's solemn tone and speech, admitting weakness, made everyone in the room feel dull and vexed, they still considered his words.
They began to look at this matter seriously and became fearful towards Xing Hai Technologies. They quickly reached a consensus. The company must be sanctioned and held back! But a problem arose. Xing Hai Technologies was a local company in Z nation. They had no business overseas, they had not earned even a single cent from them, they did no harm towards the M nation's national security and their citizens' privacy, and had no affiliations with terrorist organizations and rogue states. So… what could they use to impose a sanction on them? Nothing! But of course, as the descendants of criminals, bandits, pirates, and being 'God's chosen people', they never needed any excuse in sanctioning others.
"Xing Hai Technologies is very unfriendly to us." Even this excuse would suffice. Then, they could madly launch sanctions and lay down blockades.
However, after these 'gentlemen' probed around using a magnifying glass, they realized that the places that they could exploit to drag Xing Hai Technologies down were quite limited. The localization rate for the Little Star Second Gen learning machine was near 100%.
It was just that due to the lack of the production capacity of domestic manufacturers in Z, 70% of their flash memory chip supply needed to be imported from Samsin. This was the only fatal flaw on Xing Hai Technologies. In fact, it was not "fatal," just more "significant."
"Ask Samsin to cut off the flash memory chip supply this instant, wean Xing Hai Technologies immediately! Jeopardize their ability to mass produce their intelligent learning machine!"
The mission to contain Xing Hai Technologies was handed to Gorea's Samsin Company. Facing "daddy's" demands, of course, the Goreans would not dare to defy. Samsin's chairman Li Jianrong, bent over and assured his "daddy" that he would complete his mission. But after he hung up the phone, he immediately fell into a difficult spot.
Xing Hai Technologies was Samsin's important customer. The company's order of over 100 million 4 gigabyte LPDDR4X chips was worth tens of billions of dollars. If they broke the contract and ceased supplies halfway through, Samsin would lose billions of dollars. Besides, Purple Ray Technologies from the Z nation already possessed the ability to mass produce the LPDDR3 chip. Although their production capabilities and conformity rate were low, it didn't stop the Z's from showing off their deep pockets. They built five to six large scale NAND storage factories which cost hundreds of billions of dollars at one go. It was also the same for DDR storage factories, which they had built three to four of them concurrently. This made Samsin feel enormous competitive pressure.
However, the technical requirements for manufacturing DDR chips were much higher than that for NAND memory chips. There were six to seven companies across the globe that were capable of manufacturing NAND memory chips. But there were only three companies that had what it took to produce DDR chips: Samsin, SK Hynix, and Micron Technology. Although Purple Ray Technologies was on the list, they only mastered the production technology of DDR3/LPDDR3. They were two to three generations behind Samsin's DDR4/DDR5, and even their DDR6… they were at least 10 years behind the most advanced technology. Their conformity rate and production efficiency were also incomparable to large makers like Samsin.
The reason behind the high technical difficulty of the DDR chip was that this chip, which was used as a memory chip, was an important channel for data transmission between the CPU and the storage medium (hard disk). It was classified as "non-volatile memory" but its data throughput was exceptionally powerful. For example, for a 4-gigabyte dual channel DDR4 chip, the data throughput when it was transmitting data to the CPU or vice versa was 20-35 gigabytes per second. For the dual channel DDR5 chip, its data throughput was over 40 gigabytes per second.
On the other hand, for NAND memory chips, which were classified as "non-volatile memory," the mediocre ones only had data rates of 100 to 800 megabytes per second while the high-speed NAND memory chips could only attain 1 to 3 gigabytes per second.
In terms of data processing capabilities, the difference between the two was at least ten times apart. For this reason, it was much more difficult to produce DDR chips than NAND chips. The technical requirements were more demanding, and it was difficult to improve its conformity rate. Conformity rates couldn't rise, but the number of factories could. In that way, with more talents and R&D environments being produced, the tech itself would improve slowly. It was like when one plants an orchard, they would never have to fear going out of stock.
Facing the Z nations "Sea of Factories" tactic, Li Jianrong often woke up with a start in the middle of the night. The Z nation was so f***ing scary! Therefore, after he was tasked with the mission to contain Xing Hai Technologies, he felt very conflicted.
Cut off the supplies. Indeed, Xing Hai Technologies' production capacity on their Little Star Second Gen learning machine would experience a sharp plunge, but it would not completely put the production line on halt. The LPDDR3 chip supplied by Purple Ray Technologies had 50% worst performance than Samsin's LPDDR4X, but it was not unusable. Furthermore, users basically would not feel any difference between them both under normal conditions. When the other few DDR factories in the Z nation went into operation, Samsin would never get a chance to earn that money prior to the 'Sea of Factories' strategy.
But still, daddy's task must be completed. Their technical license and controlling interest were still in their daddy's hands. They must do whatever daddy instructed them to do. After watching for some time, the final exams arrived. After the finals ended for the elementary schools, junior highs, and senior highs in the Z nation, the result comparisons were announced. The parents in Z who did not manage to buy the intelligent learning machine were almost driven crazy looking at the mass gap between the results.
"We found it! This is the best time for us to act!" Li Jianrong was ecstatic. He thought of the ultimate way to doom Xing Hai Technologies to near death.
...
At Xing Hai Technologies, in the executive conference room, the voice of exasperated inhalations could be heard.
"They could cut off our supplies at any other time, but they chose to do it now of all times!"
"How cruel they are. The Goreans gave us a direct gruesome blow right on our pulse."
"After the statistical comparisons for the finals were released, now is the time when students and parents are most anxious and emotionally unstable, especially those who haven't got an intelligent learning machine. They could explode at any time… and the Goreans pulled off such a feat."
"Now, the production over at Chang Cheng Electric is reduced to about 60 thousand units per day. But within our country's boundary, there are approximately 12 million sixth graders and 9 million ninth graders, totaling at 21 million students. Among the students, 14.5 billion of them still does not have an intelligent learning machine. Our original plan was to address the needs of these 14 million students within two months, but after the Goreans cut off our supplies, I'm afraid that we can't even produce that many learning machines even after the Senior High School Entrance Examination and College Entry Examination ends."
"But if we can't fulfill our promise and tackle the issue within the specified time, at least 10 million parents would lose their patience with us. What would happen to Xing Hai Technologies…" This executive member took another deep breath; he dared not imagine the horrifying consequences. He could only let out a string of expletives. "Goreans, I ******!"
After Chen Jin, who was sitting at the main seat, heard the number 10 million, he could not help but visualize a scene where they were surrounded by a horde of frantic parents. All of a sudden, he had an idea!
You Goreans are ruthless! But…Did you really think that Xing Hai Technologies had no way out from this?"
He instantly picked up his phone and made a call. "Hello, is this Mr. Zhao from Purple Ray Technologies? My call went through, so have you arrived in Shang Hai?"
"Yes, Mr. Chen. I just got off the plane!" A thick voice could be heard from the other side of the call. From his voice, one could hear his excitement.