At the beginning of August, Guangzhou seemed a little deserted. After all, 4 months have passed since the Spring Canton Fair, and overseas buyers and suppliers from various domestic provinces have returned home. Only in October, around the time of the Canton Fair in autumn, will Guangzhou become lively again.

At this time, the factory of Guangdong Xiaobawang, more than 300 front-line production workers on the production line, can already produce 3,500 Xiaobawang hosts per day.

This is also because the production technology of the workers is not very skilled, and the average person only produces less than 12 products a day. When the workers' technology is mature, coupled with the timely supply of electronic components, then the production efficiency can be increased several times.

There are 300 front-line production employees in the whole Guangdong Xiaobawang. There are only more than 40 people in the factory's administrative management, sales, public relations and so on.

Although Zhang Shaojie is the general manager of Guangdong Xiaobawang, Guangdong Province has only dispatched some financial personnel such as accountants and cashiers, which has a financial supervision effect on Xiaobawang enterprises.

The remaining more than 170 technicians are the essence of the entire company.

Among them, the R&D team of the game console, led by Robert, has about 52 people, including 14 technical talents recruited in the United States, and the remaining 38 people are R&D personnel from some electronic research-related units mobilized by the Guangdong Provincial Government, which is also one of the commitments of Guangdong Province.

In addition to the designers related to game consoles, another important team is the game programming team, which is led by William Lin. Because the main members of the team are students recruited from universities in Guangdong Province, the whole team is relatively young.

Because Zhang Shaojie himself could not participate in the actual management for a long time, he dug up Mi Zhen, an MBA master in an electronic watch manufacturing company in Hong Kong.

Mi Zhen is a professional manager who has worked as a project manager in various industries such as steel mills, chemical plants, pharmaceutical factories, electronics factories and so on in the United States, Singapore, and Singapore. At present, Mi Zhen, who is only 47 years old, belongs to the energetic and experienced age stage for the position of a professional manager in a large enterprise.

Mi Zhen had just arrived in Guangzhou on August 2, and he was still relatively unfamiliar with this company. However, Zhang Shaojie enthusiastically introduced the company's current situation to Mi Zhen, hoping that Mi Zhen would enter the working state as soon as possible.

Even if you are a reborn, participating in regular management is a thankless task. Therefore, Zhang Shaojie feels that he can grasp some business opportunities and strategies, and the specific management ultimately depends on professional managers.

"At the moment, you're making a relatively stupid decision!" Mi Zhen criticized mercilessly, saying, "For the time being, China is not a consumer market for video games, but a consumer market in Japan, the United States, Europe and other places. If you put the factory in Guangzhou for the so-called cheap labor cost, it can be described as a failure - freight, tariffs and other expenses are enough to offset most of your cost advantage. In addition, the R&D department and management department are far away from the market, and they cannot adjust their strategies and improve products in a timely manner according to the opinions of consumers. So many mistakes have been made, and as a result, you actually say that the goal is to surpass the Atari"

"Hehe" Zhang Shaojie was criticized by professionals, and he blushed a little, "So, according to your opinion, what should you do?" ”

"As soon as possible, we will turn the enterprise into a multinational company, and set up R&D departments and branches in the United States. Recruit talents from the United States and the United States, participate in R&D and sales, only the local people in those countries can better understand the local market! Mi Zhen said categorically, "Fortunately, it happens to be in the shipping industry depression now, and the transportation cost is very low." The average shipping cost of each game console is only $1.78, and Guangzhou Xiaobawang acts as an assembly and production department at most, but it is not the whole focus of the company! This production also refers to OEM production! For our companies established in the United States, Ben and Europe, please note that those branches established in Europe and the United States are the real 'producers' - the Guangzhou branch accepts 'OEM' orders. Then our products will be exported to the United States in the name of American products, and exported in the name of the original skin, which is conducive to reducing the cost of tariffs."

Mi Zhen said, and had already placed the information he had prepared in front of Zhang Shaojie's eyes. On July 10, Mi Zhen was favored by headhunters, and he did not join Xiaobawang for a long time, but he was doing market research. Atari became the focus of Mizhen's analysis, and eventually Mizhen concluded that Atari was arrogant and made a bunch of mistakes, such as players complaining about the poor quality of Atari's games, the lack of variety, and the monotony of game music, but Atari did not pay attention to these players' complaints.

Some third-party game production companies have also complained that Atari has suppressed third-party game development companies, and have expressed their reluctance to develop games for Atari.

If you take advantage of Atari's faintness and give him a strong attack, maybe you can really kill Atari.

It was precisely because of this conclusion that Mi Zhen quit his previous job with a monthly salary of HK$10,000 and joined a new position with a monthly salary of HK$15,000 offered by Xiaobawang.

During the conversation, Zhang Shaojie and Mi Zhen entered the game development team to inspect the development progress of the game "Super Mario Bros."

"Super Mario Bros. Bros." is regarded by Zhang Shaojie as a killer feature and has high hopes. The company is the top management, and it is all clear.

Mi Zhen also hopes to see if this game is really worth Zhang Shaojie's expectations

—————————— August 5, 1981, in Amunch, New York, USA, dozens of IBM executives had gathered in a laboratory owned by IBM.

Outside this laboratory, there are more than 200 security guards, who are strictly guarded, and even the president of the United States will be banned without IBM's credentials.

The executives of IBM in the group talked and laughed at each other, and most of the topics they talked about were related to microcomputers, PC computers, and operating systems.

At this time, Don Brown, vice president of IBM and director of the PC computer program. Esrich nervously asked, "How about compatible surname detection?" ”

IBM technician said: "PC-DOS (QDOS) system, compatible with good surnames, only a few flaws, if not a demanding user, will not notice these small bugs at all"

"How long does it take to fix a bug?" Esrich asked.

"Some of the bugs that have been discovered, if all of them are fixed, will take 2 months" says Tim. Patterson said. As the main writer of the QDOS software, he naturally has the authority to speak.

"Excellent! I'm going to take a look! "Don. Esrich sat in front of the PC, although it was a little jerky, but it did not prevent him from mastering the basic essentials of the DOS system.

After more than half an hour of hard work, Esrich has gradually become accustomed to the QDOS system, and he personally tried to write a simple small program on the system.

Esrich smiled, "Very good! In another week, on August 12th, PC computers will be pre-installed with QDOS on the market! ”

"But the bug problem" Huang Tingjun is still a little entangled. As a technician, if you don't find a bug, forget it, but if you find a bunch of bugs that have not been solved, you will inevitably feel a little pimple in your heart when you release the product to the market.

"If it is not listed, when the microcomputers of Tangdi, Apple and other companies end the melee, and there is a microcomputer standard that dominates the world, there will be no need for PCs to go public at that time!" Esrich said grimly, "Even if you go public a week late, you will lose a valuable opportunity!" ”

"Okay!" Huang Tingjun doesn't care. Anyway, IBM had already paid $1 million in cash for the PC System deal. In the future, every pre-installed DOS system on each PC will pay ORD Technologies a licensing fee of $1, which is already a very profitable business.

Plus, the current . The PC computer can become a climate, and the ORD software has one more platform to choose from, so it will naturally be able to have a more transcendent market position

Bug problems, don't deal with them if you don't deal with them for the time being. Wait until a few months later, QDOS version 2.0 will be released, which can be regarded as fixing bugs

—————————— August 12, 1981, IBM officially released a 5150pc microcomputer in New York, this computer is equipped with a 16-bit Intel 8088 chip, the 5150pc low-end model is priced at as low as $1565, and the high-end configuration has excellent color display effect, and the price is as high as $6000. The 5150pc has 16k RAM, which can be expanded to 256K if the user wants. The computer has a more advanced 5.25-inch floppy disk, and the low-end configuration of the monitor is a monochrome display, while the high-end machine is rich in color.

And the 5150pc system is made up of . The company's huge brand influence, with the announcement of the press conference of the listing of 5150pc in New York, the world's major computer media, there was a shock, have rushed to report this news.

After all, in the whole world's PC computer market, all the microcomputers combined, it would be good to be able to sell 500,000 units a year. The market for microcomputers is only less than 5 billion, and it is still the stage of competition among princes from all walks of life.

IBM, on the other hand, dominates the tens of billions of dollars in the more lucrative server market. The influence of IBM as a whole is even greater than that of all microcomputer companies combined.

In addition, IBM has many software and technical reserves in the field of servers. For example, if the more advanced visual graphics software, office software, financial software, and data analysis software on the mainframe are all transplanted to the PC, then the technical advantages of the PC will be incomparable with other microcomputers.

IBM's 16-bit computer went public, and major microcomputer companies began to react.

In the face of media interviews, the president of Tangdi Computer Company disdainfully said: "IBMPC is not great in terms of technology!" ”

At this time, the microcomputer market has not formed a unified standard, Tangdi Computer Company's annual sales of TRS-80 machines exceeded 200,000 units, and the cumulative sales over the years exceeded 2 million units, so it naturally has a certain arrogance.

And Apple Computer is the president of Steve Jobs, and he specially published an advertisement in the "Wall Street Newspaper" with "Seriously Welcome IBM", which seems to be relatively modest on the surface. However, between the lines, it does not show that there is a long and short mentality with IBM, and this article allows consumers to produce - Apple Computer has a corporate image comparable to IBM.

These companies still underestimate the terrible power of the blue giant!

In particular, the PC computer has changed the traditional bureaucratic and monopoly temperament of IBM in the past, but the different departments of IBM itself no longer compete for power and profit but cooperate closely, and IBM is more extensive and modest, attracting a bunch of partners to jointly develop the standard of PC computer.

In front of such a scheming opponent, rookies such as Apple and Tang Di, who only rose in the 70s, are still a little too young to realize the horror of IBM!

At the beginning of August, after going public, IBM's PC sales were tepid, and only more than 200 units were sold in the first week of listing, which seems to be completely inconsistent with the status of large enterprises.

However, from the perspective of the reborn, Zhang Shaojie will know that the wonderful show is in the future, and by October, IBM will drop a heavyweight bomb - announcing the opening of PC computer technology standards, and announcing all the software and hardware technologies of PC computers to partners.

After this heavyweight bomb was thrown, countless hardware companies were attracted to produce hardware for PCs, and software companies developed various software programs for PC platforms.

In a few years, the PC camp will be the general trend, and other technical standards will become non-mainstream street goods. The whole world is mainly IBMPC and PC compatible machines competing for supremacy.

Later, even if IBM itself tried to challenge the PC camp and change another set of technical standards, the result was not corresponding to the majority of software and hardware manufacturers, and it could only be marginalized.

(To be continued)