Chapter 186 Fast Lane for Lithium Batteries
Following the contents of the CD, Su Yuanshan quickly gathered his core team, including Gao Xiaodi and others, to familiarize themselves with and organize the microarchitecture specifications, frameworks, modules, and functionalities. It was only now that several of the newer core members, who had only heard legendary tales about Su Yuanshan, witnessed firsthand his brilliance in the CPU domain.
The overall architecture of the Sol Core had been proposed by Su Yuanshan, but he hadn't seen the specific module designs from Claude's side before. Yet, after less than a week of familiarization, he had fully digested the entire specification and began organizing the team to move forward with VHDL hardware description.
This was the pre-simulation phase of chip design, requiring extensive simulations, modifications, and validations until the logic was absolutely correct.
After completing this phase, they would enter post-simulation, involving logic translation—transforming HDL code into a gate-level netlist, forming thousands of logic gate circuits.
Since Yuanxin was using TI's 0.5-micron process, validation against the process's library would also be necessary at this stage.
Once all the logic gate designs were finalized, it would mean the front-end design of the chip was complete, leading into back-end design, physical layout generation, and eventually, tape-out.
Because communication between the two sides (Yuanxin and Cyrix) had been complex—and because this was a CPU intended to directly challenge Intel at the high end—both sides had spent a huge amount of time finalizing all technical details early on.
Now, for a brand-new CPU core, the most critical work was already done.
All that remained was workload—and waiting for Li Mingliu's team to deliver the cache subsystem.
...
November, Provincial Capital Stadium.
Sponsored by the Provincial Party Committee and organized by the Provincial Science and Technology Commission, with countless other departments co-organizing, the First World Software Expo opened smoothly.
Maybe it was to open up the domestic market,
maybe it was pure curiosity about what kind of place could foster a company like Yuanxin,
maybe the Provincial Science and Technology Commission had simply sent out exceptionally earnest invitations—
in any case, many global software giants responded.
Even Bill Gates himself came.
This greatly delighted the local government.
After all, Microsoft was already the largest software company in the world.
What pleased them even more was that their local "dragon-head enterprise" Yuanxin didn't embarrass them.
At the opening ceremony's first major announcement, Yuanxin unveiled a powerful new piece of mathematical software:
YXLAB.
"To summarize," Xi Xiaoding said from the stage in fluent Chinese, "YXLAB will bring us unprecedented convenience in numerical analysis, symbolic computation, algorithm evaluation, and engineering/scientific plotting.
It is an indispensable tool for anyone involved in mathematics, engineering, or design."
As he finished, thunderous applause filled the hall.
Seated next to Bill Gates, Su Yuanshan clapped gently.
Gates, pulling his gaze away from the English version of the event materials, gave a polite smile and joined the applause.
"I didn't expect Xi to be this good," Gates said.
"He leads a team of mathematicians," Su Yuanshan said with a smile, thinking fondly of Yuanxin's band of math nerds.
He added jokingly,
"In our culture, the ultimate honor for a scholar is to achieve three immortalities: virtue, achievement, and writing.
My senior brother Xi has already achieved two of them."
Gates raised an eyebrow.
"In our country too," Gates chuckled.
"A true scholar seeks the same honors."
"Haha, looks like scholars are the same everywhere!"
As Xi Xiaoding began wrapping up his speech, Gates stood up and picked up a beautifully packaged floppy disk.
"Su," he said, "remember to clap for me."
"Of course," Su Yuanshan grinned.
Historically, Gates' first visit to China was supposed to happen next year, primarily to promote Windows 3.2.
But thanks to this software expo, the timeline was accelerated.
Thus, Microsoft had little choice but to showcase their latest: Microsoft Office.
(// Side note from the author: I accidentally accelerated the timeline a bit earlier in the story—Windows 3.2 was historically launched during Gates' first visit to China in 1994. Oh well, onward!)
While Kingsoft had been aggressively expanding in Silicon Valley thanks to Xinghai's channels, Microsoft was no pushover. They intended to reclaim lost ground at this expo.
At that moment, a familiar voice called out:
"Mr. Su."
...
Accompanying Ken Kutaragi and his aide, Shiraishi Taku, Su Yuanshan casually wandered around after the presentation, strolling toward the exhibition center's exit.
"Mr. Kutaragi, what's the update on your side regarding the battery technology exchange?" Su Yuanshan asked, glancing at Shiraishi Taku—a young man in his thirties.
Noticing Su Yuanshan's glance, Shiraishi nodded with a polite smile.
Kutaragi glanced around to ensure no one was eavesdropping, then said cautiously,
"In principle, we need to understand your progress and ideas first—only then can we judge whether the exchange is worthwhile."
Su Yuanshan coughed lightly.
"Mr. Kutaragi, we're offering an entire mobile phone design in exchange."
"But the lithium battery team insists that unless they know your breakthrough direction is truly feasible, they'd rather die than yield," Kutaragi said without expression.
Su Yuanshan cursed inwardly.
But he wasn't too surprised.
Sony's R&D teams were notorious for their fierce independence—
hence their endless parade of "black technology" products.
After thinking for a few seconds, Su Yuanshan shook his head.
"Sorry. I can't reveal the full idea.
As for progress—let's just say we've figured out most of it."
Kutaragi gave him a slightly resentful look.
Su Yuanshan shrugged.
"Everyone does it this way—tinker a little, test materials, and maybe, just maybe, you'll get lucky and find something better than what you have."
At this point, Shiraishi Taku spoke quietly,
"Then why did Mr. Su claim you've found a better cathode material?"
"Because we got lucky," Su Yuanshan replied, smiling as he looked at him.
"And because the material is fundamentally different from layered cobalt oxide structures."
"It's an orthorhombic olivine structure," he added.
"It has extremely stable voltage, excellent high-temperature resistance, outstanding compatibility with most electrolyte systems, and better volume-change characteristics when paired with carbon anode materials."
He paused, then grinned:
"And it's cheap."
Kutaragi and Shiraishi exchanged a startled glance.
Their eyes were full of shock.
Shiraishi licked his lips, wanting to say something—but couldn't.
Everything Su Yuanshan had just listed were precisely the shortcomings of current cobalt oxide batteries.
He had even named the crystal structure!
If Su Yuanshan wasn't bluffing,
then Yuanxin truly had made a breakthrough in cathode materials.
Was Su Yuanshan bluffing?
Su Yuanshan blinked innocently.
"Gentlemen, if you hesitate too long, maybe soon...
we won't need to trade anymore."
Kutaragi: "..."
Shiraishi: "..."
Seeing their expressions, Su Yuanshan finally regained his confidence—still bruised from dealing with TI earlier.
Of course, it was impossible to say Yuanxin didn't need Sony's lithium tech.
If reverse engineering were that easy, why would he be here offering a trade?
Still, it was true that Li Xiao's lab was already analyzing lithium iron phosphate cathode materials.
If they could secure Sony's research as a base, Yuanxin would be able to jump straight onto the fast track.
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