Replay 07: Opening the Temple of Learning

Chapter 316: Collaboration with ulterior motives

Upon hearing this, someone immediately objected.

"As soon as graphene batteries are launched, it will definitely cause an earthquake in the industry. We have to stabilize Shenchuan and Zemeng, and the conditions we put forward cannot be too harsh."

"Who else can the divine ship find?"

"Don't think so. Good products can really ignore the platform. Besides, it's not that Zemeng and Shenchuan are completely unable to run their own factories. They can stop the notebook production line, transfer some manpower, and restart the equipment. It's just that it takes too much time, so Shenchuan thought of this kind of cooperation.

If we don't cooperate with him, he can find others to cooperate with and provide some resources himself, and the effect will probably not be much different. Bidi's advantages lie in product quality and existing scale. We just need to make good use of them and not be too demanding. "

Wang Fu couldn't help but nod again. His brothers were indeed powerful. It seemed that he would have to give him more responsibilities in the future.

After sufficient discussion, Wang Fu made the final decision. This old fox did not follow all of Lu Shan's proposals, nor did he follow all of the opinions of the top management. Instead, he set some conditions and bottom lines on his own after comprehensive consideration, and then notified Lu Shan to come for negotiations.

When Lu Shan appeared again, Zhang Leiming was also there. He was doing market research outside and provided Lu Shan with a lot of valuable information, so Lu Shan was able to make more specific judgments quickly and accurately.

Even if you know the general trend of the times, you still have to grasp the specific contracts to ensure the healthy development of the company.

The cooperation conditions given by BYD are that it can be OEM first, but it cannot only take the OEM fee, because BYD can pay its own customer costs. In other words, BYD can help Lushan promote batteries to BYD's existing customers and reduce the cost of Shenchuan to develop new customers.

On the other hand, Bidi also has to pay technical costs.

Even if Shenchuan arranges technical guidance to transform the production line, in actual production, Biddy still has to explore ways to carry out large-scale production.

This method was not brought by Shenchuan, but was improved by Bidi himself, so Shenchuan has to pay for it.

Based on the above explanation, Bidi needs profit sharing, not just the OEM fee.

The condition offered by Bidi was that in addition to the OEM fee, 30% of the profits would belong to him, and Lu Shan would take 70%.

The second round of negotiations was full of heated discussions from the very beginning. To be honest, Biddy's demands were not excessive. They included helping to introduce customers, standardizing the production process, reducing costs and improving quality control.

With so much work done, he has made a significant contribution to the sales of graphene batteries.

Lu Shan only provided the technology, but there were still a lot of costs on his side, including equipment, manpower, land, and materials. In addition to the money, he also had to spend energy to manage so many people, and all the money he earned was hard-earned.

These are the demands and these are the words, but Bidi’s attitude has not changed at all. He is quite assertive and intends to make money while standing.

Naturally, the Shenchuan could not agree to this. They had no such plans in the first place, so why should they accept conditions beyond the plan?
The reasons Wang Fu put forward were very practical. He was trying to persuade Lu Shan from his perspective, and his negotiation approach was correct from the beginning.

"As Mr. Lu said, mobile power and battery technology will become increasingly important. However, most of the core technologies of this industry are in the hands of South Korea and Japan. Samsung, LG, Panasonic and Sony are all companies in these two countries.

In Xia Country, although there are many companies in the industry, most of them are OEMs and do not have core technologies.

Bidi still has some of its own technology, a complete factory production line and many skilled workers. I think Mr. Lu should understand what this means. "

What this means is that if you have independent technology, you don’t have to pay foreigners patent fees for battery technology, so this part of the money is saved.

The production lines and workers are ready-made, so there is no need for much preparation time, just plug and play.

We also have our own customer base and can expand the sales of the magic ship.

Bidi knew where Lu Shan's confidence came from. His skills were so amazing that no one in the industry could match him.

But Lu Shan doesn't have everything. Only by cooperating with Bidi can he maximize his profits.

If you find someone else to cooperate with, there may be better conditions, it seems that the interests are more secure, and you can make more money.

Behind this are other costs that cannot be ignored, which delayed the time to market. Without BYD's promotion, Lu Shan's losses would be even greater.

In order to help Lu Shan make up his mind faster, Boss Bidi personally did the math for Lu Shan. To be honest, if the graphene battery is launched three years later, Lu Shan will lose more. Less profit means a loss.

"Currently, Shenchuan ships more than 10 million units a year, which translates to 1 million units a month. Graphene batteries are sold in packs of five, so that means 5 million batteries.

Mr. Lu, how many people, how big a factory, and how many equipments do you need to meet the monthly output of 5 million?

The technical content of graphene batteries is so high. How much tuition will be required from setting up the production line to achieving mature and stable quality control?
If we cooperate with Bidi now, we can go public immediately, while others can go public two and a half years earlier.

How many things have you missed in these two and a half years?

If Mr. Lu successfully cooperates with other peers to produce graphene batteries, I believe Mr. Lu has also investigated other manufacturers, and he must have visited them three years later. Mr. Lu cannot afford the losses during this period! This is definitely not what Mr. Lu wants to see. "Wang Fu spoke with reason and evidence, and it was all the truth.

Lu Shan had been listening to Wang Leimin's investigation feedback, so he could naturally distinguish the truth from the false.

After listening to Wang Fu's conditions, Lu Shan asked if the conditions could be lowered a little to be more beneficial to him.

Wang Fu understood that this was a test in the negotiation, so he just laughed it off and refused.

It seems that it is still early for negotiations, but this round is indispensable. Both parties must know the direction and focus of their negotiations.

Apparently, the negotiations broke down again.

Wu Jun and Lu Shan left Bidi, saying that they needed time to think about it, and Wang Fugong saw them out.

"This old fox!"

As soon as he returned to the divine ship, Wu Jun couldn't help but complain.

"He's a smart guy and a tough opponent."

Lu Shan fell into deep thought. In the past, during negotiations, they would just discuss the general idea and let their subordinates handle the details.

But this time, there are too many details, and obviously the larger the company, the more complicated the negotiations.

"Then how many conditions should we agree to Bidi? Is there a possibility of equal replacement so that we can benefit more?"

Wu Jun followed the train of thought.

Cooperation is a process where everyone puts forward conditions, compromises with each other, and makes continuous adjustments.

If some conditions are not so good, try another way to meet the other party's needs. The final result will definitely be in the best interests of everyone.

Wang Fu was good at doing the accounting, and so was Lu Shan. So Lu Shan and Wu Jun did the accounting again, calculating the existing problems one by one and trying to find solutions to them one by one.

Now that we know Biddy's ideas and attitudes, we will try our best to solve the problem within the framework.

The most important thing is that the time for graphene batteries to be put on the market cannot be postponed any further, the sooner the better.

After the graphene battery technology was upgraded, Shenchuan has laid the foundation for conquering the whole country and even the world. The next step is to enter the mobile phone battery market and even tablet computers.

Every step must be fast. By 2011, the first generation of tablet computers had become popular among the upper class, and it was only one step away from being used by the whole people. In view of this most practical demand, Lu Shan planned to cooperate with Bidi, but he had to pay attention to two aspects of the cooperation.

The first preparation is to open our own production base with Jiangzhou Laboratory as the center and solve the graphene production problem independently as soon as possible.

Graphene is the trend of the future, and the core technology must be mastered in our own hands.

Completely outsourcing to other companies will definitely lead to technology leakage. If the most core parts are solved by ourselves, then downstream problems will not be a problem.

In addition to graphene batteries, other industries also follow this idea.

You can find a foundry in the early stage, but it’s hard to say about the future. It depends on the iteration of technology or the cooperation with the foundry. It is not impossible to transfer some technology out.

The second preparation is to suspend cooperation with Bidi, which is a means of pulling.

Before suspending cooperation, some profits will be given up, but the technology must not be transferred.

Using this as a basis, you can pull it repeatedly.

Seeing such high profits, Biddy would think twice even if he wanted to refuse.

Lu Shan still hopes to have good cooperation with Bidi, which would be a win-win situation. If Bidi refuses to give in, even if both sides suffer losses, Lu Shan can only go his own way.

If the market changes, you must prepare for the worst.

Bidi also held a meeting to discuss Lu Shan’s reaction today and to study where to set the bottom line for the next step.

Wang Fu set the tone and filled in the details below.

"Cooperation must be promoted. Even if the profit share is small, we must use the huge and sound production capacity to bind the graphene battery technology. In the future, when peers and the consumer market mention graphene batteries, they will associate them with BYD.

While we are achieving this level, we must also find a way to acquire the technology.

When BYD completely binds graphene technology, we will have the confidence to let Lu Shan transfer the production technology. Because then Lu Shan has to consider the market response factor. "

The logic is obvious. It is nothing more than "labeling" and then just following the trend.

Bidi's team has relatively strong execution capabilities. After the tone was set, no one raised any messy objections, but instead worked according to Wang Fu's ideas.

Soon, the third round of negotiations began.

The bosses on both sides were smart men. In just two rounds, they figured out their own problems and the other side's fears.

The general direction was tacitly determined, and then some detailed clauses were discussed, which did not take a long time. The general direction was determined, and the small details were no longer harmful to the overall situation. Excluding those clauses that might be ambiguous, the third round of negotiations ended quickly.

Both sides have made concessions on their bottom lines, so they can hit it off.

In addition to the OEM fee, BYD received 10% of the graphene battery profits, and the cooperation period was two years.

There is no discussion on technology licensing and transfer for the time being, but when providing technical guidance, Biddy may be able to reverse some technologies.

This kind of thing is common. Being able to learn it is other people's ability, and it is also the reason why our own technical barriers are not high.

The mentality of both sides can also be seen here. One side thinks that they can learn it, so they don’t mention it.

One thinks that the other person can’t learn it, that his own technology is very difficult to learn, and will continue to improve, so he doesn’t mention it, and it all depends on who is faster.

From the interview to the signing of the contract, it took only three days, which was faster than I could imagine.

Wang Fu later joked that Lu Shan was more anxious than he thought, so it would be better to wait a little longer.

The cooperation was reached and the two sides held a grand groundbreaking ceremony.

On one side is a rapidly rising computer brand and a hot young scientist, and on the other side is the leader in the battery industry. This powerful combination provides material for many media outlets to report on.

What everyone is most concerned about is why Shenchuan and Zemeng suddenly want to find BYD to establish a new type of battery production line, and what is so unique about the new battery.

In order to report the event well, many media, self-media, and bloggers consulted a large amount of information, learned a lot of professional knowledge, and finally determined the great significance of this event.

“Can BYD really afford the battery production for the next era?”

“Popular Science: How are graphene batteries better than lithium batteries?”

"A thorough investigation of the graphene industry at home and abroad! Is it only present in reports abroad?"

For a time, reports were everywhere and almost everyone could talk about graphene.

In addition to being curious about new things, ordinary people are more filled with a sense of pride.

Look! Isn't the graphene battery awesome? It was invented by Lu Shan, a Xia countryman! Foreigners brag all the time, but they haven't invented it yet.

Foreigners have been reposting such reports, exclaiming that their own country has fallen behind.

Of course there are different voices.

Some people think that this is a scam, designed to trick the United States and other competing countries into falling into the trap.

After all, when the United States was competing with Russia, the United States came up with a "Star Wars" plan, which allowed Russia to throw money into it and eventually dragged itself down.

Therefore, the United States is naturally wary of things that are too sci-fi in nature, and feels that there are always villains who want to harm us.

Some people in Xiaguo also think so. Some are weak-kneed, and some feel that it is too early to draw a conclusion before seeing the actual product, the test results, and the feedback from customers.

The discussion became louder and hotter, and many platforms, eager to join in the fun, simply started conducting surveys.

More than 80% of the people thought this matter was reliable, because Lu Shan had never disappointed the Xia people. This young man was very down-to-earth in doing things, and it was heard that he had published a paper in Nature.

Some other people don’t know why, but they just think it’s not very reliable and want to wait until the real product comes out before making any decisions.

Since the contract had been signed, Lu Shan immediately sent the technical team to the BIDI factory in Shenzhen, led by Liang Wenping.

Zhang Leimin was called back to Jiangzhou to take charge, mainly focusing on technical improvements while also taking into account the signing of production documents.

It is worth mentioning that several members of Liang Wenping’s team are students from the Institute of Natural Sciences.

This was Lu Shan's instruction. In the future, students must be taken with them to practice when being sent on business trips abroad.

(End of this chapter)