The research and development of optical storage technology can be traced back to the early sixties. But the first truly practical disc player was the LD DVD player launched by Philips in 1978. However, Philips did not take advantage of its first-mover advantage at that time, even if it developed a set of technical standards for the system.

Seeing the opportunity, Japan's pioneer company quickly began to follow suit, launching its own LD player standard in 1981 and competing fiercely with Philips.

Later, Philips learned from the experience of LD discs and teamed up with Sony in 1982 to launch the RedBook standard for CD-DA laser discs. Unlike LD discs, which use traditional analog signal systems, CD-DA discs are the world's first digital discs that introduce digital processing technology for the first time.

There were two main applications of the CD-DA standard throughout the eighties, the first of which was as a music storage medium. So less than three months after the launch of the CD-DA Red Book, Sony launched the world's first CD player, the CDP-101.

It's just that the price of CD players was expensive when they first came out, and they could only target the high-end market. But there have been LP vinyl records in this field for decades. Compared to vinyl records, CD players are not only not attractive enough in terms of price, but also have no obvious improvement in sound quality.

As a result, sales of the CD player were not satisfactory, but Sony quickly figured out a way to deal with it, which was to launch a simplified portable version of the CD player. So in November 1984, Sony launched the world's first portable CD player, the D-50.

The D-50 is only about 4 CD cases thick, and it quickly became popular among young fashion-conscious people. And Sony also deliberately named this small portable CD player Discman, which formed a high and low configuration with the Walkman, and completely controlled the entire portable music playback market. It wasn't until twenty years later, after the advent of MP3 and iPod. It ended Sony's monopoly in this field.

In addition to being a music record, another major application of CD-DA is as a data storage medium for personal computers. Philips and Sony have long targeted the emerging computer industry. Compared with traditional floppy disks, CD discs have the advantages of larger storage capacity and faster read rates.

However, as early as the advent of the CD-DA Red Book standard, the Oriental Research Institute also began to follow up on the formulation of computer disc technology standards. And the Oriental Group's Aikang company has a firm grip on the technical standards of personal computers. So Philips and Sony want to promote optical discs in the field of personal computers. The support of the Eastern Bloc must be enlisted.

Therefore, the Oriental Research Institute quickly reached a compromise with Philips and Sony, obtained the technical authorization of all key patents in the field of CD, and became one of the standard setters of the CD-ROM Yellow Book.

Li Xuan's plan is not only to get a share of the pie in the field of computer discs, but also to prepare for the subsequent commercial development of VCD and DVD. The first generation of VCD technical standards formulated by the Oriental Research Institute is actually based on the CD player, adding a video decoding system.

In another time and space, VCDs are not so much invented by the Chinese as assembled by the Chinese. So after VCD came out in the early nineties. The real profits from this industry are foreign companies such as Scooper, Philips, and Sony, which have mastered core components such as movements and decoding chips. China's VCD manufacturers have only drunk a mouthful of broth, and this broth has quickly become devoid of any nutrients with vicious price competition.

There is a saying on the Internet in another time and space that Anhui Wanyan Electronics Company, which was the first to develop VCD, failed to apply for a technology patent in the first place, thus losing control of the entire VCD industry.

This view does not grasp the essence of the problem, and Wanyan Company has only innovated in some peripheral technologies of VCD at most. And even if they apply for a patent. Other companies have a way around it.

The two core parts of the VCD player are the movement and the decoding chip. The data stored on the disc is read through the movement. Then it is restored to a video signal through the decoding chip, and finally transmitted to the TV for playback!

The most delicate part of the movement is undoubtedly the laser head in the disc drive that reads the data. Philips was the first manufacturer to invent the optical disc player, and its accumulation of bald head technology is very strong. Until the later DVD and Blu-ray era, Philips was still one of the best movement manufacturers.

Previously, in order to promote optical drives on personal computers, the Oriental Group reached an agreement with Philips. Successfully obtained a large number of patents for bald head technology. Of course, it is impossible for Philips to come up with all the good things that have been pressed at the bottom of the box, but the Eastern Bloc is not without any foundation.

In fact, whether it is an LP DVD player or a CD player, RCA, a subsidiary of the Oriental Group, has followed up. The purpose of obtaining a patent grant. In order to be able to independently produce core components, so as not to be affected by patent fees, but also to be controlled by others in terms of production capacity.

"What is the progress of the upgrade of the conversion technology of the optical drive factory?" Ke Lilun did not look at the documents handed in by everyone, but asked directly.

"I contacted the optical drive factory yesterday, and they are basically ready. An assembly line with a monthly output of 100,000 movements will start trial production next week!" A round-faced female employee wearing glasses quickly began to reply.

After the completion of the capacity transfer, RCA established a new company in Hong Kong called RCA Asia Manufacturing. The newly established RCA Asia Company will be responsible for the management of all of RCA's wholly-owned and joint venture factories in Asia. The original RCA USA company, which was merged into Oriental Trading, became its wholly-owned subsidiary, mainly responsible for the operation of the RCA brand in the North American market.

As early as two years ago, RCA Asia set up a wholly-owned optical drive manufacturing plant in the Deep Sea Special Zone. On the surface, this factory produces optical disc drivers for Aikang's ABC series computers, but another purpose of Li Xuan's establishment is also to prepare for the VCD industry.

Corillan nodded to the round-faced girl, then turned his gaze back to the others in the small room. So another tall and thin male employee quickly turned out the topic and began to introduce the content he was responsible for: "Dongfang Semiconductor has begun to produce the first batch of decoding chips. It is expected that it will be shipped today and tomorrow! Jetta Electronics has also vacated the production line, and after the chip arrives, the production of the decoder can start immediately!"

The movement and decoding circuitry are arguably the two most technical parts of a VCD. But in addition, a complete VCD player also includes other components such as servo pre-play circuit, karaoke circuit, operation display panel, RF modulator circuit, transformer, power supply, chassis and so on.

The production of VCDs was supposed to be in charge of RCA. But Chrillen also knows the next VCD promotion work. It will be the first big test he will face after serving as the vice president of Oriental Commercial Company.

Therefore, he attached great importance to it from the very beginning, and actively coordinated with RCA to follow up the production progress of the VCD player at any time, so as to help him better formulate a promotion strategy.

"This morning's meeting is over, everyone hurry up and follow up on the project they are responsible for!" After listening to the report of his employees, Ke Lilun did not say some nonsense, but simply ended the meeting decisively.

"Ah Wei, you help me call the Peninsula Hotel. Book a table for afternoon tea!" said to the assistant at the door after returning to his office.

At a quarter past two o'clock in the afternoon, Chrillan arrived at the lobby of the Peninsula Hotel ahead of schedule! Not long after he took his seat, two men in suits also came to the lobby café of the Peninsula Hotel.

"Aaron, let me introduce you first, this is Mr. Hao Guoming, a top student at Northwestern University in the United States!" Li Ke pointed to the elegant man beside him who looked polite and bookish.

"Hello Mr. Hao. I'm C. Ronillen!" C. C. Crow immediately smiled and stood up and shook his hand.

"Isn't it a little surprising that you met Ah Ming, Mr. Cai is inconvenient to come to Hong Kong in person. He is Mr. Cai's number one think tank!" Li Ke briefly introduced the identity of Mr. Hao Guoming.

"My boss is very honored to be able to cooperate with Oriental Group. As the plenipotentiary representative of the boss this time, I have come to negotiate with Mr. Ke!" Hao Guoming nodded to Ke Lilun very politely.

This Mr. Cai is Cai Guanrun, the current leader of the Fourth Sea Gang, and the Fourth Sea Gang is one of the three major social groups in Taiwan and the Gulf. However, if you just look at Hao Guoming's appearance, he looks more like a successful urban white-collar worker than a big brother on the road who fights and kills.

And the reason why Corillun would meet such a person with a special background. Nature has its own purpose.

At present, the home audio and video playback equipment on the market is mainly LD DVD players and VCR recorders. Among them, the former does not have a large share in the home market due to its high price, and is mainly very popular in karaoke parlors in Japan and Hong Kong.

Therefore, after the advent of VCD players, the main competitor will be VCR recorders. But VCD hasn't advanced much in technology. On the contrary, in the VCD technical standard formulated by the Oriental Research Institute, the image quality is only 250 lines, which is slightly inferior to that of home video recorders.

This is also one of the important reasons why VCD did not choose the markets of developed countries such as Japan, Europe and the United States as a breakthrough, because consumers in these places have higher economic incomes and are far more sensitive to technology than backward regions.

In contrast, in relatively underdeveloped regions, consumers prefer to pursue good quality and low prices. There is no obvious VCD player on it, so you can only choose to fight a price war with a video recorder. But in addition to the price factor, there is another thing that VCD players are very different from other home appliances, that is, they also need to have playback content.

In terms of the distribution channels of DVD players, Oriental Commercial Co., Ltd. has leveraged its own customer resources and CG Company's chain electronic hypermarkets to quickly spread VCD players throughout the Asian market. However, in terms of playback content, VCD has a considerable disadvantage compared with video recorders.

Because VCRs have been around for more than a decade, there is already a mature market for videotape distribution. For example, after a Hong Kong film is drawn, companies in Southeast Asia and Taiwan will immediately come to buy the videotape distribution rights of the film.

The Hong Kong film industry has been booming in recent years, and new film companies have sprung up in large numbers. But there are very few companies that can really rely on the box office to achieve profits, and the income from the distribution of video tapes in other cities is the most important source of profit for a large number of small film companies!

If Oriental Commercial Company wants to successfully promote its VCD players, it needs to provide enough movies and TV series on CD-ROM for consumers to watch. However, after the VCD player is launched, it takes a process to form a sufficient amount of ownership.

When the number of VCD players is not enough, it is naturally impossible to have a huge disc consumer market, and it is impossible to attract distribution companies to take the initiative to distribute VCD discs. Therefore, if the Eastern Group wants to quickly promote VCD players, the best thing to do is to invest a sum of money and take the initiative to be responsible for the supply of disc content before the VCD market matures!

But not to mention that this method requires a lot of capital investment, just to negotiate with the copyright owner to buy the copyright requires a lot of energy. So Corillan decided to choose another path - piracy!

In Japan, Europe and the United States, where copyright protection is relatively well-established, the problem of piracy is not serious. But in other areas where copyright protection is not in place, this has always been a major headache for film companies. For example, in Hong Kong, the pirated videotapes of Hong Kong films are relatively restrained, but the Western videotapes are almost all pirated.

"Mr. Hao, as a company engaged in international trade in the world, Oriental Commercial can purchase a full set of equipment and raw materials for the production of VCD discs for Guanrun Group! But we are a company that respects international rules and will never support any behavior that may conflict with the law!" said to Hao Guoming in a righteous manner.

Clillen is ready to secretly support the pirated VCD disc industry to quickly enrich the content of VCDs. However, it is impossible for the Eastern Group to do this kind of thing on its own, so Guanrun Group, which has a special background, is undoubtedly one of the good partners to work with. Therefore, Ke Lilun specially contacted Mr. Cai Guanrun from Taiwan through Li Ke.

"But in order to show your support for your company, after your factory is completed, your company's factory can be responsible for the production of all VCD products under ATV Group and Asia Entertainment Holdings!" said Chrillun with a smile.

In this way, Oriental Commercial also found an excellent excuse for itself to provide VCD manufacturing equipment for Guanrun Group. The reason why Guanrun Group purchased production equipment was to win orders from Oriental Group. As for whether Guanrun Group will produce pirated discs after completing the order of the Oriental Group, this has nothing to do with the Oriental Group.

"Guanrun Group is a legally operating enterprise! I can also promise your company that if we can have the opportunity to contract the relevant orders of the Oriental Group, we will never produce an illegal disc other than the order!" Hao Guoming said very sincerely.

The Peninsula is one of the most exclusive afternoon tea spots in Hong Kong, and all three men are well-dressed and well-mannered. If you're standing by and eavesdropping, you might guess that this is a normal business negotiation. Instead of a heated quarrel, the two sides reached a friendly cooperation.

"Your trick is really poisonous, after the proliferation of pirated VCDs in the future, it is estimated that half of Hong Kong's film companies will be killed by you!" After Hao Guoming left, Li Ke suddenly smiled and scolded Ke Lilun, who was quietly drinking coffee.

"What does this have to do with me, has the Oriental Bloc done anything illegal! As the so-called people's hearts are sinister, it is not our turn to take care of what others do! Whether the future of the Hong Kong film industry is dead or alive is a question that you filmmakers need to be concerned about!

If you want to talk about this issue, you might as well go to Mr. Zeng Zhiwei!" Ke Lilun shook his head and said very disapprovingly. (To be continued.) )