Rebirth of America, this is my time

In fact, when he decided to produce home consoles, Ethan already knew that the scale of Michael Blanco Manufacturing Company at that time would not be able to handle the crazy influx of orders.

Only by expanding, expanding, and expanding can they meet market demand.

But in order for the manufacturing company to generate a good self-operated ecosystem, Ethan did not participate in the reform there, but just pushed all orders for Destiny Games to them.

After that, he didn't care whether it was self-operated production or outsourcing.

Judging from the current situation, people like Michael Blanco are doing a good job.

Yes, the production scale of the manufacturing company made me discover the role of Chrysler. Ballmer smiled and nodded without hesitation. The bigger they do it, the stronger we are.

Ethan strongly agreed with this view, and after he read the report, he realized that the operating income of more than one billion US dollars and the operating profit of as low as two points made him understand that Michael Blanco made a fortune from the money earned by the company. Most of it, only a small part is reserved for the company's daily operations.

This decision brought great benefits to the workers. After a year of busy work, the average annual income of the workers reached US$7,630. Although this number is not enough when compared with the per capita salary of US$9,451 in the United States in 1978, if compared with the median salary of the same year, the salary issued by Michael Blanco Manufacturing Company It has exceeded the social average level by more than 10%.

This salary can already enable many people to support a family of three.

It can also give them a talisman to solve the problem of employment.

Good job. Ethan closed the report and said to Ballmer with a smile: Since the manufacturing company is running great, the incentive plan can be officially launched.

Reward them with 5% of the equity in the first phase. Spend some time writing a plan and try to get them the reward in the first half of the year. I think they like this more than simple praise.

Okay boss. Ballmer nodded quickly, I will contact Michael later.

After browsing the financial reports of Michael Blanco Manufacturing Company, the only company left that can express its operations numerically is Western Design. They sold a total of 8 million chips last year, with operating profits exceeding 12 million. Of course, they were able to sell so many products because of Destiny Games and Apple.

After deducting the 7.75 million chips purchased by Destiny Games, the remaining 250,000 chips were the sales of Apple computers last year. And this is also true. When Steve Jobs handed over Apple's 1979 financial report to Ethan in early February, the computer revenue that had exceeded 300 million corresponded perfectly with the shipments of Western Design. If external disks were added, , their revenue last year was close to 600 million.

Sorry?

While reading the report, Ethan also asked casually.

What's the meaning?

Classmate Xiao Qiao didn't understand.

Let me ask you, do you regret it? Ethan shook the report in his hand and said, If we use this result to negotiate, Xerox will get even fewer shares.

Oh - Jobs understood, sighed, and said: To be honest, I do regret it, but I know that even if I had to do it again, I would choose this way. The graphical user interface is really shocking. , if I hadn’t incorporated it into the company earlier, I guess I would have been losing sleep.”

“Until you get it.”

Compared with half a year of insomnia, the financial expenditure is nothing at all.

Also, the earlier we get it, the earlier we can develop it, which is more beneficial to us. More importantly, after we studied it, we found that although the minimum configuration of the graphical user interface is not It’s high, but it’s not easy to put it together smoothly.”

Take 16-bit chips as an example. We may not be able to use Intel processors...

Why? This question made Ethan very confused, Is it because its performance is not good?

In Ethan's memory, Apple embraced Motorola in his previous life.

If this situation cannot be changed now, then the problem will become big.

As for the reason?

I understand everything.

No, No, No. Jobs shook his head in denial.

Because it's too expensive. Jobs said straightforwardly: Even if we told Intel that we could process hundreds of thousands of chips a year, the price they quoted us would still be as high as sixty-nine dollars a piece. If we follow Apple's Calculated based on last year's sales, the cost of the central microprocessor after replacing Intel chips will be as high as 17.25 million. Last year, our expenditure in this area was only 1.5 million US dollars. Because you supplied the goods.

Jobs looked at Ethan seriously and said, So...

We urgently need an own chip now.

When Western Design took over Chuck Paido's supply banner and provided MOS 6502 to Apple, the price of the chip that Ethan gave Jobs was actually lower, only six dollars a piece.

Among them, there are two dollars of production cost, one dollar of production profit, which belongs to Michael Blanco Manufacturing Company, one dollar of design commission, which belongs to Western Design, and two dollars of follow-up research and development support, which allows Bill Gates Shi received R\u0026D funding.

When Ethan pushed the price of chips to this point, for Jobs, all chips in the outside world were expensive! Especially when he learned that after the switch, Intel's chips sold for 11.5 times more than Western designs, he even felt that Intel's special code was a robbery!

Even though he knows that chip research and development requires a lot of manpower and material resources, when the application methods are not wide and the research and development costs cannot be shared, they will have to bear huge expenses if they want to use the chips.

But even so, he still feels that Intel's price is too expensive!

He wants cheap chips!

It is best to be the same as MOS 6502. While ensuring that the performance is not much different, the cheaper the better!

But this kind of thing...

We can't have this kind of cheap and easy-to-use chip if you want it, right?

Ethan spread his hands helplessly and said: Bill Mensch is already developing chips, but this process takes a lot of time. It's not just that I think he will be good.

Furthermore, even if Bill Mensch can come up with the chip Woz wants in a short period of time, the price of this chip will never be as low as six dollars as it is now.

Why is MOS 6502 cheap?

Because it has almost no research and development costs, and all the expenses are borne by Motorola.

Now, the research and development of new chips is funded by our own money. Even if I will use them a lot in the future, even if I can cover all the costs of the new chips, Apple will not not pay.

If there are only three of us shareholders in the company, I can give you the lowest price.

Because I don't care about this little money, and whenever I need your help, you will always come to help me, but when there are more and more shareholders in the company...

Steve, you should understand what I mean, right?

Ethan winked at Jobs.

Of course! Jobs nodded.

“We ourselves can negotiate, but others must pay!”

Yes, that's what I mean. Ethan put down the report.

Just when he thought that the discussion about chips would pass like this and that Steve Jobs would find a way to solve the cost problem of chips by himself, Jobs suddenly stood up, opened the door of Ethan's office, and looked around. Then close it carefully.

Ethan's eyelids jumped at the sight of this situation.

Jobs returned to his seat, lowered his voice and said: Ethan, although Bill Mensch can't come up with a 16-bit chip for the time being, even if he does, we at Apple won't be able to get it at a low price, but this Not that it matters, because I heard something recently.”

“A tip to get Intel chips cheap.”

... The words that sounded like a thief made Ethan stunned on the spot.

The next second, the corners of his mouth twitched, and an ominous premonition came to his mind.

Steve, you don't want me to go to Intel to recruit people, do you?

Just poach all their R\u0026D teams?

No wonder Ethan would think so!

Because high-end business wars are so unpretentious and boring!

Ninety-five percent of OpenAI's R\u0026D staff have just threatened the company's board of directors to resign and bring back Sam Altman. Microsoft has already offered 10 million per person, a total of 8 billion, to poach people. . And because the incident occurred in San Francisco, California, it was completely legal.

When the entire development team can be absorbed by the minimalist approach, if you want to get Intel chips at a low price, you only need to evacuate the Intel R\u0026D team!

Let them do what they have done again!

This is much more cost-effective than acquiring Intel directly!

Ethan's words made Jobs think deeply.

After a few seconds, he nodded with difficulty and said, If you are willing...

Go away, go away! Before Jobs could finish his words, Ethan flew up and kicked him. Stop your dangerous ideas! This will make you lose your ability to innovate!

Ethan would not admit that he actually wanted to take Intel into his arms.

The real reason for not doing this is actually that we can’t afford it.

Intel's current market value has exceeded 2 billion. Everyone in the core R\u0026D team has shares. If you want to poach them all, you will definitely not be able to rely on the cash in Destiny Game's hands. Only by using shares can you do it. To do it all, but alas...

It is impossible for Ethan to poach people with shares.

After forcibly killing classmate Xiao Qiao's crazy idea, Ethan finally heard what Jobs wanted to say about how to obtain cheap chips, and this matter was related to Bill Gates.

After obtaining the WYSIWYG patent license from Xerox and technical support for the presentation from Hewlett-Packard, Steve Jobs summoned Bill Gates, hoping that he could tailor a set of Apple-owned products for Apple. Featured office software.

Since this set of office software needs to run on a graphical user interface, Jobs showed Bill Gates Apple's latest technology, and then...

It’s the same as the countless little stories Ethan heard in his previous life.

This top student who dropped out of Harvard...

Senseless.

Like Steve Jobs, he couldn't believe his eyes!

Like Steve Jobs, he felt that the future was within reach!

When Bill Gates also felt that graphical user interfaces were the future, he asked Steve Wozniak, a technology guru and Apple's chief scientist, about the technological process.

He wants to know how Apple's research and development is going?

He wanted to know, when will Apple embrace the world?

Since the patent was already held and there was no possibility of plagiarism, and Bill Gates was their current partner, Woz did not hide anything and directly stated that Apple could not bring this shocking product to the market in a short period of time. market because they lack hardware support.

Especially the most critical central microprocessor support.

Then--

William said he could resolve the matter.

Steve Jobs looked at Ethan with alert eyes.

Although he didn't tell me how to do it, I believe him, and I guess that he may come to you in the near future and talk to you about this matter in the name of showing financial reports.

I can even guess that what he wants must be the authorization of the graphical user interface. Because in the world now, apart from Apple, you are the only one who can make this product.

At this point, Jobs suddenly stopped.

His eyes were already red.

Ethan, I think you should know my attitude on this matter.

The graphical user interface allows us, Apple, to sweep away all our opponents and become the real number one that GE and others cannot achieve, so I don't want to give this patent to others.

Even if we have to face the antitrust bill!

Even if we have to face the entire Federation! The entire world!

“I don’t want anyone else to taste the same success we did!”

Jobs's guess was absolutely correct. After he left Palo Alto and returned to Apple's headquarters in Cupertino, Bill Gates came to Destiny Game on the back foot and showed Microsoft's financial report to Ethan.

On February 10th, Ethan saw Microsoft's 2079 annual report. Last year, they sold a total of nearly 270,000 spreadsheets, with operating income of nearly 27 million.

In addition, they also have some other inconspicuous income, such as writing a disk operating system for Benzi Electric and designing command line operation interfaces for some other computer companies, but the combined income from these things is not the same. A million dollars is nothing compared to a spreadsheet.

Of course, these things are not what Bill Gates wants to show. After a quick report on last year's work, this gentle-looking guy smiled and mentioned the new technology Apple has.

Moreover, while praising him, he also decisively stated that he could help Apple.

I can help Apple get cheap Intel chips, and my appeal is very simple, that is, I want to embrace a bright future with Apple.

Of course, I know that graphical user interface is a great technology that no company is willing to share, so my goal will not be too high. As long as we at Microsoft can obtain development authorization, after Apple releases graphical user interface products, For two years, we at Microsoft are not allowed to sell our own new products to the market, and I can promise that we will continue to provide Apple with market-leading electronic office software in the future, as long as Apple is willing to license the product to us.

Bill Gates' desire for graphical user interfaces is well known to Sima Zhao. At the same time, Ethan is also curious, is there any way this guy can lower Intel's chip prices? In other words, why does he think he can make Intel suffer?

And when Ethan asked what he was thinking...

A happy smile suddenly appeared on Bill Gates' face.

He knew that when Ethan became curious about this matter, it meant that there was a possibility that Ethan would authorize the graphical user interface, even if the chance was only one in ten thousand! But that’s much better than having nothing! So, he said: Ethan, this matter is very simple. Although I can't make Intel lower prices, other companies can force Intel to lower prices...

This matter actually has nothing to do with me, but if you need it, I can immediately intervene in their negotiations. The specific situation is... IBM wants to get involved in the personal computer industry.

“The fire in the personal computer industry makes them want to get involved, but they also know that they have intervened too late, so they are not going to do their own research, but want to purchase technology from various companies and launch it in the shortest possible time. Commercial products.

Then...my mom helped me get the order for the disk operating system.

At the same time, in the future, when their machines leave the factory, our spreadsheets will be installed in advance.

The price is ten dollars cheaper than the market price, and that's their profit.

Because the disk operating system needs to be specifically written according to the use of the hardware, I knew that IBM wanted to use Intel's chips, but at the same time, IBM also felt that it was risky to let Intel supply chips, so they had an idea. Just to force Intel to license out its patents...

At this point, Bill Gates suddenly stopped.

The eyes under the glasses flashed with pride.

And his words also made Ethan's pupils shrink suddenly!

Because he knows what Bill Gates is talking about!

That is the wealth that belongs to the massage parlor!