Chapter 263 We're not taking their food: How did it end up in her bowl?

The radiator by the window hissed and leaked air, making the clivia on the windowsill droop and look listless, showing none of the liveliness that winter green plants should have.

Director Feng's enamel mug slammed against the table, causing the "List of Weak Links in my country's Electronics Industry," printed during the Gulf War in 1991 and placed under the glass of his desk, to ripple slightly along with the jasmine tea inside.

Yes, this flower tea was specially prepared by Director Feng to entertain the female comrades.

Normally, he only drinks large-leaf tea.

Now, immersed in the rich fragrance of jasmine, he nodded slightly and turned his gaze to Yang Tao: "Well then, comrade, tell me, what exactly are these two routes?"

Yang Tao is a typical good student.

Her thinking may not be broad enough, but as long as you give her a question and tell her the direction, she can always answer it well.

Now, when talking about the benefits of her family's introduction of Soviet chip technology, she didn't just start talking; instead, she used the standard slides for academic high-achievers—or rather, she directly presented charts and graphs.

Okay, charts are hard to read aloud, so let's explain them in a simpler way.

"In terms of equipment costs, Soviet production lines could use second-hand equipment from Eastern Europe, with purchase prices only 1/10 of new equipment. Shougang, on the other hand, used brand-new NEC equipment, with a single etching machine costing over $3 million."

"From the perspective of technological autonomy, the Soviet Union's technology could be fully open-source and could be locally improved, such as by using domestically produced photoresist; Shougang's technology, due to restrictions imposed by Japanese patents, would likely be prohibited from reverse engineering or process adjustments."

"From the perspective of maintenance costs, the Soviet mechanical structure was simple, and the technical workers in township enterprises could operate it after a short training. Shougang's, on the other hand, required Japanese engineers to be stationed on-site, and the estimated cost of a single maintenance was over $50,000."

If there were slides to display visually in the meeting room, her explanation would obviously be more effective.

But Director Feng has an exceptional ability to grasp key information. Just by listening, he could easily make Director Feng shake his head: "What you're saying is meaningless. It's not a matter of choosing one or the other now; Shougang has already started introducing production lines. They're rich and powerful; they don't care about the money you're talking about."

Yang Tao panicked, realizing she had missed the point, and quickly tried to salvage the situation: "The key isn't money, it's technology. Even if Shougang imports the production line, it won't acquire the real technology. Take Hitachi's color picture tube technology, for example. Beijing Electronics Factory has had it for several years, but it hasn't truly mastered the core technology."

Director Feng then took it seriously and stopped interrupting her.

Yang Tao composed herself and continued to explain, "The Soviet Union's microelectronics institute has extensive experience in reverse engineering. The famous reverse engineering of the Intel 8080 resulted in the КР580 chip. Through reverse engineering, we can achieve 100% domestic production of calculator chips and break the monopoly of UMC in Taiwan."

But these words did not move Director Feng. He frowned slightly and turned his gaze to Wang Xiao: "President Wang, let me put it this way, I will not treat you as an outsider, and I will speak frankly."

“If you want to achieve domestic production of chips, we will definitely support you.”

"But I'm afraid you won't be able to keep it going."

"Shougang can succeed not only because it has money, but also because it can capture the market."

"When the time comes and your two companies produce their chips, and you ask what technology they used, Shougang will say it's new Japanese technology, completely copied. You'll say it's Soviet technology. I'll ask you, as a consumer, which one will you buy?"

Wang Xiao laughed: "Of course I'll buy from our store."

Director Feng waved his hand, both amused and exasperated: "Don't act impulsively. We're just discussing the matter at hand."

Wang Xiao's smile deepened: "Let's stick to the facts. Our technical manager just explained the differences between the two production lines from a technical perspective, but she didn't have time to mention the market positioning issue."

"Shougang's introduction of NEC production lines will not affect us, because its market is the military industry and the high-end market such as communications, and it follows a high-precision route."

"What we want to do is fill the gap in the low-to-mid-end electronics market. For example, consumer electronics products such as calculators, radios, digital watches, and rice cookers do not require Japan's 1.2-micron process; they only need mature 0.8-3-micron processes. The focus is on low cost and rapid mass production, rather than cutting-edge performance."

"As I just mentioned, the reason I would buy our product is this: it's inexpensive and the performance is sufficient. It achieves 80% performance with 20% of the cost."

“We have calculated that the production cost of Shougang’s 1.2-micron chip is about $2.50. Even if it is sold to calculator and radio manufacturers at the original price, the latter will not have any profit margin.”

"But by using Soviet technology, we can keep the cost of a 3-micron calculator chip down to $0.80. This way, a radio can be reduced by at least $20. That's enough for customers to buy another four kilograms of pork and have a good New Year."

"Moreover, our production line can be split into multiple 4-inch lines to flexibly adapt to small-batch orders. There is no problem of being fixed to the 6-inch specification and having excessively high transformation costs."

"Ultimately," Wang Xiao said with a smile, "Shougang is targeting missiles, while we are dealing with people's livelihoods. Our consumer bases are different, so we are not competitors."

Director Feng was stunned.

The chips produced by Shougang Group are for military-grade missiles. So how could the Japanese possibly give Shougang their core technology?

He gestured to Yang Tao: "Manager Yang, may I take a look at this material of yours?"

Once the documents were in his hands, Director Feng began to study them carefully, word by word.

When he saw the clause on technological autonomy, his pen paused over the words "Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls in Paris," and he subconsciously wanted to underline it.

Fortunately, the pen was still capped; otherwise, leaving marks on someone's documents would have been quite impolite.

The Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (COCOM) may sound strange at first, but its official name is the Coordinating Committee for Export Controls.

That's right, it's a product of the Cold War, established to restrict member states from exporting strategic materials and high technology to socialist countries.

It can be said that in those years, socialist countries really came up with all sorts of tricks to bypass COCOM and import high-tech technologies and products.

Yang Tao, with her keen eyes, immediately and cleverly emphasized: "The Soviet production line is not restricted by the Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (COCOM) and there is no risk of Western technological blockade. In contrast, Japanese technology is more dangerous. If our relationship with Japan changes, we may not be able to get the equipment we need."

Director Feng ignored her remarks that belittled others, pondered for a moment, and then looked up: "How about this, you can leave the materials with me for now, and I'll report to Director Song later, and we'll discuss how to proceed at the meeting. Oh, by the way—"

He pressed further, "So how will you upgrade in the future? As you've said, importing chips is a vicious cycle: import—become outdated—import again. But Japan's chips are constantly being upgraded, and Shougang can continue to import them. The Soviet Union is gone, can Russia upgrade its chips? If they can't upgrade, what will you do when your existing ones become obsolete?"

These are issues he cannot ignore.

The development of a region is not something that can be done simply because your boss is willing to spend money.

If the project you invest in fails to develop, the losses will go far beyond the money you put in; it will also delay the development opportunities for my region.

Wang Xiao smiled: "We use the reverse engineering center as a hub to collect and package the process problems reported by township enterprises, and then experts from the Russian Academy of Sciences provide customized solutions."

She drew a circle with her hand, "This way we can quickly cultivate a semiconductor ecosystem and ultimately achieve independent technological upgrading through the 'rural areas surrounding the cities' approach."

To put it simply, we need to make the most of existing resources to create a complete industrial chain.

Township and village enterprises were her source of strength, and she made the most of them. If there was no market, she would find one herself.

As a cadre within the system, Director Feng found it difficult to adapt to this model that regarded township enterprises as an important, or even necessary, link.

In his mind, township and village enterprises were meant to provide employment for surplus rural labor and facilitate the transfer of outdated production lines to cities. However, they ended up being associated with high-tech fields like semiconductors.

No matter how I think about it, it feels strange.

He nodded, patted the documents in his hand, and put them into his briefcase: "Alright, I'll report this to my supervisor. You can go back and wait for further instructions."

Wang Xiao immediately urged for delivery: "Then I'll trouble you, Director. I hope it can be done quickly. Just like you said, the chip upgrade cycle is very fast, and we don't have time to waste."

Director Feng nodded, saw the person to the stairwell, and then suddenly stopped.

He pulled a photocopy from his briefcase; the edges of the pages were still stained with jasmine tea from the glass plate indentation.

“Mr. Wang, ten years ago I participated in drafting the Seventh Five-Year Plan for Electronics—” He shook the paper, and under the title “List of Weak Links in my country’s Electronics Industry”, which was yellowed, the handwritten annotations from the Gulf War were like earthworms coiling around it. “The first item was ‘Break the COCOM blockade’.”

The setting sun slanted in through the skylight, casting blood-like marks on the item "integrated circuit yield less than 30%" on the list.

The Ministry of Science and Technology office building is quite old; the dark green wainscoting is peeling off small pieces of paint, and the terrazzo floor still bears the five-pointed star pattern laid in the early days of the People's Republic of China.

A wheelchair rolling on it would run over a raised mosaic tile before its wheels even had a chance to turn twice.

Wang Xiao's wheelchair was stuck between the raised mosaic tiles, like a jammed bullet.

"Hopefully this time, you can really tear a hole."

As the wheelchair rolled over the cracks in the mosaic tiles, Wang Xiao looked up.

The setting sun stretched her shadow long, perfectly covering the annotation on the printed document that read "Integrated circuit yield is less than 30%".

"The predecessors who used abacuses to launch atomic bombs back then—" she said, her fingertips lightly tracing the yellowed "Gulf War List," "but they didn't even get the formula from the Americans."

The door to the water dispenser creaked, and the dust, illuminated by the setting sun, floated by, like a sigh that had spanned decades.

Director Feng was taken aback at first, then burst out laughing: "That's right, if foreigners can do it, why can't Chinese people do it? Are Chinese people inferior to them?"

Xiao Gao and Xiao Zhao exchanged a silent glance, then quietly moved a little distance away from Liu Ba.

There's nothing we can do about it; it's a racial difference. The Russian women are all a cut above them.

Director Feng was taken aback, and then a huge laugh echoed throughout the entire building.

The colleague who had spoken to him earlier was leading a Shougang clerk to find a leader for a signature. Seeing this, he also curiously peeked in and asked a question.

Then, Wang Xiao and the representative of Shougang were at loggerheads, and a heated debate ensued regarding the future trend of China's chip industry.

Uh, you're overthinking it. The truth is, there's nothing there.

Everyone is raising funds to develop the semiconductor industry, and we're not competing for the same resources, so there's nothing to argue about.

They simply nodded to each other and passed by.

In Wang Xiao's plan, Shougang is not on her list of competitors, now or in the future.

It's likely that Shougang Group, now a giant in the industry, wouldn't even consider its Soviet semiconductor technology a threat.

After leaving the Ministry of Science and Technology's office building, Wang Xiao looked back and suddenly asked his bodyguards, "What does this place remind you of?"

Xiao Gao paused for a moment, then blurted out, "Like the Institute of Microelectronics."

Xiao Zhao chimed in, "Yes, yes, they do look quite alike."

The same old Soviet-style buildings.

Wang Xiao closed his eyelids, as if talking to himself: "Isn't this a kind of inheritance?"

Lyuba felt a lump in her throat, but quickly suppressed her emotions and regained her composure as a bodyguard.

Yang Tao knew she had messed up again at the Ministry of Science and Technology, and dared not utter a sound, but had no choice but to bite the bullet and ask, "Boss, what's next...?"

"Get in the car first."

December in Beijing is obviously much colder than in Shanghai.

The black Volga sedan drove over the snow on Deshengmen Bridge, the ice scraps making a soft crackling sound under the tires.

Wang Xiao kept staring out the window, making Yang Tao's heart leap into her throat.

She had already drafted an 800-word self-criticism, and as soon as the boss spoke, she could immediately launch into a profound self-reflection.

For example, she should focus on what her negotiating opponent cares about, rather than simply presenting the information and analysis she has spent the most effort finding.

Unfortunately, the boss remained silent.

This made Xiao Gao and Xiao Zhao involuntarily tense up, because the car had already driven onto Qianmen Street.

Well, in the dead of winter, no one was selling big bowls of tea on Qianmen Street, but what was scary was that they were selling other things.

Suddenly, Wang Xiao rolled down the car window, and the sour smell of fried dough rings and fermented bean juice instantly rushed into the car through the wind.

The poor bodyguards are going crazy. Seriously, they'd risk their lives for anything, whether it's stinky tofu, stinky mandarin fish, or even stinky amaranth stems.

But douzhi (fermented mung bean juice) is really unacceptable; let alone drinking it, they can't help but pinch their noses just from the smell.

That damn driver! Why was he so observant as to stop the car? Couldn't he have just ignored it and sped past?

Now you're doomed. You'll be stuck drinking soy milk with fried dough rings alongside the boss.

Yang Tao immediately perked up. She could hold her nose and drink the soy milk, and now was the perfect time for her to show off in front of her boss.

However, neither the bodyguards, who were ready to die, nor Yang Tao, who was eager to try, heard the words they expected from their boss.

Wang Xiao parted her lips slightly and uttered only three words: "Big Brother".

Hey, what's a mobile phone?

Oh, it turns out to be a few scalpers in leather jackets squatting on the post office steps, holding up Motorola phones the size of bricks and shouting: "Twenty thousand a unit! Can be dialed directly to Hong Kong!"

So the boss wasn't eyeing the steaming soy milk, but rather the Motorola in the reseller's hand.

Wang Xiao smiled slightly and said, "Only when we can bring the price of mobile phones down to below 2,000 yuan can we truly enable wafer foundries to support themselves."

Before Xiao Gao and Xiao Zhao could react to what was happening, she had already rolled up the car window again: "Let's go, to the Red Star Factory."

What were we going to do at the Hongxing Ribbon Factory? To see the newly acquired 200 acres of land, of course. Oh no, I mean the old factory buildings.

The ribbon factory has now become a construction site.

Wang Xiao didn't get out of the car, but looked through the car window at the row of Soviet-style factory buildings in the northwest corner that hadn't been completely demolished.

Beneath the faded red star factory emblem, a fifteen-meter-high water tower, like a rusty scepter, pierces the sky, standing alone as it guards this devastated land.

She suddenly chuckled and pointed at the water tower, saying to Yang Tao, "Go check the property rights. If it belongs to us, install a laser transmitter on top of the tower and apply for the title of 'China-Russia Joint Astronomical Observatory'."

Yang Tao felt like she had been granted a pardon; the fact that her boss was still willing to ask her to work meant that he hadn't given up on her and that she still had a chance.

"Okay, I'll take care of it right away."

The car continued driving, intending to visit other factories that had not yet been relocated.

The north wind howled past, whipping up ice shards. The gantry crane, half-buried in the frozen ground, swayed in the twilight, the clanging of its chains like the panting of a dying beast. A banner that read "Go all out and move forward quickly" was torn by the wind, and the tattered character for "fast" suddenly broke free and slapped against the car window.

The lead worker's eyes followed the banner, and when he saw the car, his eyes lit up. He hurriedly spat out the cigarette butt from his mouth and ran over across the frozen sewage pond.

"Boss!" A hand, stained yellow from smoke, slammed against the car window, causing the documents Yang Tao was holding to scatter all over the seat. The worker, with a missing front tooth, grinned, "Please, sir, have some mercy and give me a straight answer: when are you going to send us to enjoy the capitalist life?"

The driver rolled down the window, about to curse, when a gust of wind carrying the smell of sweat mixed with the tar smell of Daqianmen cigarettes rushed in.

The rearview mirror reflected even more heads—workers wrapped in military green cotton-padded coats swung shovels and gathered around, their chapped faces turning bluish in the twilight.

Honestly, if it weren't for the white mist rising from their mouths and noses, giving them a living presence, they would have looked like a group of terracotta warriors dug out of the permafrost.

Exactly, the soldiers probably wouldn't be like them, their eyes gleaming with greed, like hungry wolves in the twilight.

Yang Tao was so embarrassed that she wished she could jump out of the car and run away. She could only awkwardly explain, "I'm not the boss. This is our boss, Mr. Wang."

The workers didn't care at all what the boss was; they only cared that the person in charge had finally arrived. They collectively shifted their focus: "Boss, when are we getting on the plane? We can take the train too."

Yang Tao could only explain to the boss from inside the car: "They are all workers from nearby factories who came here to help with the work."

In the words of the former factory director of the Red Star Ribbon Factory, they were so obsessed with going abroad that they weren't even this enthusiastic when they went to work at their future mother-in-law's house.

They couldn't stop them no matter what.

Wang Xiao wasn't angry. Instead, she rolled down the car window and spoke to them gently: "That's fine. Let's earn some money before we go abroad to avoid financial pressure."

The workers didn't care about the meager earnings on the construction site; they were all asking the most important question: "Boss, when are we going to get our visas?"

Compared to the Red Star Ribbon Factory, which has already secured a place with the government and signed contracts, the employees of the neighboring units are still in a state of uncertainty. It's no wonder they're anxious.

Wang Xiao laughed and said, "You all want to go abroad? You're willing to do anything there?"

"Yes, yes, yes!" Everyone chimed in eagerly. "Please hurry up and process our paperwork."

As more and more people gathered around, Wang Xiao, fearing that something might happen on the construction site, simply said, "Let's talk outside."

So the black Volga, as if carried by workers from the factories relocating from the entire district, slowly made its way to the main street outside.

Since Wang Xiaoren was in a wheelchair and had difficulty getting up and down, he simply talked to the workers who had blocked the door from inside the car.

"You are now..."

Before she could finish speaking, a voice called out from afar, "Hey, Lao Gao, perfect timing, you're all here. Hurry up and get to the factory to sign the papers."

The worker who was called over beamed with joy and asked his colleague, "Section Chief Tang, what do I need to sign? Are we getting New Year's gifts again?"

These days, employees of companies with decent profits generally don't buy New Year's goods out of their own pockets; they all eagerly wait for their companies to give them to them.

My colleague waved his hand and shouted, "What are you talking about? Sign here! Didn't we sell our factory land to Singaporeans? The factory manager said everyone has to sign."

This remark was like a drop of water falling into a pot of oil; it caused an immediate uproar.

Old Gao was so excited that his face turned red and his neck bulged. He kept shouting, "I won't sign. Our factory's land can only be sold to this boss."

Other workers chimed in, "That's right, that boss Zhao refuses to help us go abroad."

Honestly, he's a Singaporean. Helping them get to Singapore would be a piece of cake, but he absolutely refuses to get involved, as if they have some kind of filth on them.

Hmph! If we don't get them visas to go abroad, they can forget about taking over their factory land! This socialist country isn't like Singapore; the workers here are the ones who call the shots in the factory!

Amidst the commotion, Mr. Zhou, the general manager of the district development company, came running over, seemingly riding on a colorful cloud—or rather, in the afterglow of the setting sun, his forehead covered in sweat.

"Hey, what's all the noise and commotion about?"

When his gaze fell on Wang Xiao's face through the car window, he immediately felt that he had found the person who had wronged him and who had the right to hold him accountable.

"Mr. Wang!"

The resentment and grievance in President Zhou's voice were intertwined, comparable to Qin Xianglian confronting Chen Shimei in Kaifeng Prefecture.

This made Wang Xiao tremble involuntarily.

General Manager Zhou spoke with a sob in his voice, every word laced with tears: "You can't just do this all by yourself. You took the 40 mu of land from the ribbon factory, and our international friends haven't said anything. Now you want to compete with Boss Zhao for the 50 mu of land from the machinery factory. To be honest, this is really not appropriate."

Wang Xiao looked up, his gaze sweeping over President Zhou, who was wearing a navy blue down jacket, and landing on Boss Zhao's face, which was even darker than the black cashmere coat he was wearing.

Oh, I remember now. When she left Beijing last month, Mr. Zhao, the boss whose 40 acres of land she had snatched from the Red Star Factory, was looking for other plots of land.

What a coincidence! How come the land he set his sights on ended up in her hands?

See how inappropriate this is, how much it hurts the feelings of our international friends.

But Wang Xiao has always been a loner since childhood, and she is insatiable. Once she puts something in her mouth, she never thinks she should spit it out.

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A brief introduction to COCOM (Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls), sourced online: COCOM, officially known as the Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (CO), is commonly referred to as "COCOM." Here is a detailed introduction:

Background: After World War II, the world entered the Cold War. In order to contain the development of socialist countries, the United States and other Western countries adopted a series of restrictive measures in the field of international trade. The Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (COCOM) was established in this context.

Establishment Date and Member States: Established in November 1949 at the suggestion of the United States. The initial member states were the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Canada, Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Denmark, Portugal, Norway, and West Germany. Japan joined in 1952, Greece and Turkey in 1953, and Spain and Australia between 1985 and 1989, bringing the total number of member states to 17.

Headquarters and Organization

Headquarters: Located in Paris.

The Advisory Group is the decision-making body of COCOM, with senior officials from each member state participating.

The Adjustment Committee: Established in 1950, it was the executive body responsible for imposing an embargo on the Soviet Union and Eastern European countries.

The China Committee, established in 1952, was the executive body responsible for imposing an embargo on China.

Purpose and main tasks

Purpose: To restrict member states from exporting strategic materials and high technology to socialist countries, attempting to economically and technologically contain the development of socialist countries and maintain the political and military superiority of Western countries.

Main tasks: compiling and adding to multilateral embargo lists, specifying the countries or regions subject to embargoes, determining embargo approval procedures, strengthening transshipment controls, discussing exception procedures, and exchanging intelligence.

The embargo covers three main categories: military weapons and equipment, advanced technology products, and strategic products, encompassing tens of thousands of items. There are four embargo lists: List I is an absolute embargo, such as weapons and atomic energy materials; List II involves quantity controls; List III covers surveillance items; and there are also special embargo lists for trade with China, containing over 500 more items than the international embargo lists applicable to the Soviet Union and Eastern European countries.

Development and Dissolution: With changes in the international political and economic landscape, Western countries continuously circumvented embargoes for their own interests, leading to a shrinking scope of COCOM's control. In 1990, restrictions on exports of high-tech products to the former Soviet Union and Eastern European countries were significantly eased, and in 1991, the number of embargoed items was further reduced. In November 1993, the meeting of senior officials from COCOM member states concluded that it "had lost its reason for continued existence," and on April 1, 1994, COCOM officially declared its dissolution.