Reinventing the Millennium.

Chapter 1444 Differences (4k)

On January 2016, 1, Yike held a grand signing ceremony, where co-founder Yu Hong, YMS President Qi He, YWS President Wang Jian, EBG President Zhang Yaqin and leaders of six cities including Shanghai, Jinling, Changzhou, Suzhou, Luzhou and Ningbo signed a cooperation agreement aimed at promoting the "Smart Yangtze River Delta" strategic cooperation project.

This project will optimize resource allocation, reduce duplication of construction, lower IT costs, and enhance the government information sharing and business collaboration capabilities of the six major cities.

In the future, more cities in the Yangtze River Delta will be encouraged to integrate into this framework, accelerate digital transformation, and improve the efficiency and quality of public services.

It is reported that the order amount obtained by Yike this time exceeded 100 billion, setting a record for domestic cloud services in government data services.

Yike started its cloud service very early, and also serves many small and medium-sized enterprises in Europe and establishes localized data centers. This time, it is tantamount to widening the gap with domestic competitors again.

This news from Yikeyun also attracted the attention of Wall Street when reported by domestic media.

Although Yike has withdrawn from the US market, it is still a well-known Nasdaq-listed company with a large amount of traffic. At present, there are still many users on various platforms criticizing Washington's unfair restrictions on Yike.

"Many analysts believe that Yike's revenue from the U.S. market in 2015 exceeded $400 billion, which is undoubtedly good news."

“But the bad news is that Yike lost it in 2016.”

"Just yesterday, Yike received a huge cloud service order from the Chinese government, with a total value of more than 10 billion US dollars. This is even Yike Cloud's full-year revenue two years ago. Moreover, it is not ruled out that it will continue to increase new city orders in the future within the cooperation framework it has built with the government."

"We have always said that Yike will do its best to make up for its revenue losses, and it is clearly able to do so, but if the gap in such an important market as the United States could be filled so easily, Yike's stock price would not have fallen so much."

"The consequences of Yike losing the US market are not over yet, but may just be the beginning of a complicated process."

"At the very least, Yi Ke and Bing Xin will both face a real trial in June. This is just part of the chain reaction."

"What these two companies need to solve are the basic and core equipment, raw materials and other thorny issues. But by the time they can really be solved, Yike will have lost its competitiveness. This is what Washington wants to see."

"It's not that Yi Ke has no chance to break Washington's blockade, but the probability is 2%, of which 1% is due to the other party's overall respect."

The Wall Street Journal is pessimistic about YiKe's future, which is just the general view of mainstream public opinion. As of January, many influential media and institutions are deconstructing YiKe. On the one hand, they are exploring the competitiveness that YiKe still has, and on the other hand, they are also measuring where YiKe's market value should be.

Yike’s peak market value exceeded US$4200 billion, but now it is only US$2788 billion.

It's so sad that Yike is now equivalent to only 1.85 Intels, or 1.49 Alibabas, or 10.3 Sonys, or 13.2 Ducati!
This is the result of your willful behavior!

However, as Yike Cloud received large orders, there was also some eye-catching news from former Yike R&D personnel.

According to a researcher who wishes to remain anonymous and has already resigned from Yike's Silicon Valley R&D center, Yike has been conducting research on computer CPUs for three years with the goal of creating notebook products that are more suitable for its own ecological linkage.

At the same time, the developer also talked about the recent situation of the Yike project. "Before I left, this R&D project had become the main body of the Huaxia R&D Center, but everyone was hesitant. Hi, it's not what you think. It's because after obtaining AMD's core technology, everyone had differences in the research direction."

"Elder originally hoped to build an ARM chip, and wanted to ambitiously combine it with Yike's YMS to completely build it into a new product that combines Yike's software and hardware innovations from the ground up."

"But AMD's technology is also very good, and it is better than Yike's internal expectations. This provides the company with a new choice for x86."

"Although Yike is facing some problems now, I think it won't be too long before Yike's self-developed CPU is released."

The former Yike R&D director mentioned the name of Elder, the technical vice president, and exposed the surprising R&D situation within Yike.

Because the news was published in the New York Times, it has a lot of credibility.

Others were watching the fun, but Intel was a little confused. After being confused, it quickly grasped the key point: No, why are you asking me to make up for the share that Yi Ke lacks?
Robert Swan, who has been promoted from interim CEO, has strongly questioned why Yi Ke can obtain AMD's core technology?
China is an important market for Intel, accounting for about 30% of its annual revenue. If a Chinese brand like Yike launches a competitive impact, it will probably cause revenue losses.

At the same time, Robert also raised a question that has not attracted attention: "What I want to know is that BIS has restricted IceCore International since last year, why did AMD still get a temporary license this year? Why can AMD still cooperate with IceCore International? This is unfair! It should be corrected immediately!"

AMD did not respond to the questions from its competitors. As for this temporary license... Anyway, there is no new movement from BIS, so just use it.

Just as AMD's latest Ryzen chip arrived, its stock price was pushed up again by the news of Yi Ke, and its market value has soared from US$20 billion in the same period last year to US$80 billion now.

What does it do?

It seems that it has done nothing but receive temporary licenses issued to it by BIS one after another.

The new product was launched this month.

Domestic media have also noticed the changes in the computer CPU field and AMD's stock price, and gave an analysis, "Even Yike recognizes AMD's technology, which shows that its technology is indeed good."

Some media even verified the situation with Yike Company, and Elder, the technical vice president mentioned in the rumor, responded generously, confirming that there is indeed a research project within the company, but there is no clear timetable for listing.

Elder also defended the partnership with Intel and praised Intel's outstanding performance in computer chips.

"If Yike launches a new computer chip, will it consider selling it to the outside world? Or will it simply use it for its own products?" The reporter asked a key question over the phone.

Just like Yike’s Zhurong chip is still only used in its own products, which brings a certain moat.

Elder hesitated for a moment on the phone and ended the interview with a rhetorical question: "Can't I choose all? Haha, just kidding. The company has many R&D projects, but it always takes a relatively long process to truly move towards the market."

When AMD's new product launch day on the 16th really arrived, accompanied by a lot of news, when CEO Lisa Su introduced the Ryzen series of chips to everyone, when she compared the Ryzen 7's 8 cores and 16 threads in video editing, 3D rendering, scientific computing and other scenarios, and when she announced that the price was only half of that of competing products, the scene broke out in warm applause.

"This is the starting point for an important decade ahead for AMD. My colleagues and I are confident that we can work with our partners to provide better services to our users."

Su Zifeng is full of confidence and also expressed her hope that manufacturers can provide optimization.

The performance is super strong, the productivity is super strong, and the product price is super strong. Although the pre-orders will not be shipped until March 3, AMD's stock price immediately soared 1% after the press conference, approaching the market value of 18 billion US dollars.

At the same time in the evening, Su Wei came home from an overtime meeting and was reading the latest report on AMD on the way. After entering the living room, she saw Fang Zhuo curled up on the sofa, and the TV, which was rarely turned on, was playing "Swordsman".

"Oh, are you discussing the experience of being an alliance leader with Zuo Lengchan?" Su Wei took off her coat and asked with a smile.

Fang Zhuo: “You…”

Su Wei took a few steps and changed her words: "No, he is not as good as you. Did Zuo Lengchan ask Mr. Fang for advice on how to be the leader of the alliance?"

Fang Zhuo rolled his eyes at Teacher Su.

"No more talking, no more talking. Don't let the situation that Yiguo has worked so hard to create be killed by the orders of Alliance Leader Fang." Su Wei said with a smile, "Ali is very vigilant. Once Douyin's live e-commerce was launched, its expansion in other areas stopped, and its stock price has also been falling this month."

Seeing that the man on the sofa was still silent, she asked, "Do you want money? I'll give you some. Our stock price is doing well recently."

Fang Zhuo subconsciously said, "Isn't it inappropriate?"

"It's really not appropriate, forget it." Su Wei smiled and sat down, "You are not short of money, I can't insult you."

"Once this year's Forbes comes out, I will finally give up my position as the world's richest man." Fang Zhuo sighed, "With the rapid development of the times, Mr. Fang will eventually be eliminated."

Su Wei snorted, "Ali's traffic is a real problem. I think it will be hard for domestic competition to find an angle to attack Yike."

"How can there not be one?" Fang Zhuo said with a smile, "I can easily name one."

Su Wei was surprised and waited for what was to come.

"For example, finance," Fang Zhuo gave an example.

Su Wei frowned. The Yike system was indeed very restrained in this regard. There had been voices within Yike calling for the vigorous development of the financialization of Yizhifu, but this was suppressed by Fang Zhuo, who stated that long-term development should be based on the route of a technology company.

She thought carefully for a while. The overall scale of Alibaba's e-commerce is more than three times that of Yigoo. Since live streaming e-commerce has just been launched, it will take time to bear fruit. However, Alibaba is having difficulty solving the traffic problem on the one hand, and is facing the impact of new forms of e-commerce on the other hand...

"Finance..." Su Wei pondered, "It's easy to cause trouble."

Fang Zhuo took a sip of water: "Hey, who knows."

Su Wei glanced at Zuo Lengchan on the TV screen and felt that the leader of the alliance sometimes had to be cunning.

The Lunar New Year in 2016 fell relatively early, with New Year's Eve falling on February 2. While the media was writing articles about AMD's new products and their March shipments, trying to explore the IceCore production capacity supply, the entire Yike system was relatively calm.

Yike's market value basically fluctuates around US$2800 billion, Bingxin's production operations are still running overtime, live streaming e-commerce is thriving, and the development of the ecosystem is not affected.

However, problems in the US market forced Yike to start layoffs in the US, retaining only the minimum service operations other than research and development. However, some of the laid-off employees went to Singapore's emerging computer brand YA, which was considered a small resettlement.

In the domestic market, the BT alliance between DuJi and Penguin provided a certain degree of competitiveness for their online videos. However, Penguin soon encountered a familiar competitive situation and found that many users were increasingly being siphoned onto short video platforms.

As for A, one of the two poles, although Alibaba's stock price growth and expansion momentum in multiple fields have slowed down, its leader is very active and has expressed his views on the future to the media.

——New retail, new finance, new technology, new energy, and new manufacturing.

He believes that the "five new things" should lead future changes.

However, a well-known leader in the industry publicly complained that "apart from the new technology, the rest is nonsense. He is not engaged in the real economy, so what can he produce?"

Someone else cited another example of Y, "If Yi Ke proposed 'new manufacturing' and 'new technology', that would be fine. They have invested a lot of money over the years and have become the world's number one, but now they are being targeted. Don't just talk about it, do something practical."

Despite the minor disputes, Alibaba seems to be serious and is said to be preparing to set up a "Five New" executive committee. This made Qi He, president of Yike YMS, who has been relatively silent recently, couldn't help but repost the relevant news on his WeChat Moments.

But he only commented on one symbol: ?

Near the end of the month, Su Wei took the time to ask Fang Zhuo about this matter: "What's going on? Surrounded by three and missing one?"

She noticed that among the “five new things” there was new finance.

Fang Zhuo just spread his hands and said, "It has nothing to do with me. I'm already exhausted from the news, how can I have the time to spare?"

Every day that passes is bringing us closer to the June dilemma drawn by foreign media and institutions. Although the head of Yi Ke has not appeared in public for a while, some reports show that he has already appeared depressed.

This even resulted in a concerned phone call from Zhang Chaoyang.

"Okay, that's weird." Su Wei felt that the positions that Yi Ke had not occupied might be left to his opponents to do as they pleased, but she knew that there was still a New Year's gift for Ali at the end of the year.

On February 2, six days before New Year's Eve, Sun Tongyu, former Alibaba "God of Wealth" and former vice president of Midian, quietly announced the establishment of a new company "Pinduoduo".

He posted the company’s goals on his WeChat Moments: We want to be a more affordable e-commerce company, meet the needs of a wider range of users, and create the best value for money.

Pinduoduo did not take any large-scale actions before its establishment, but Sun Tongyu's new moves were still noticed by Alibaba.

Although Sun Tongyu's wording is rather euphemistic, the so-called "more affordable" is nothing more than targeting the lower-tier markets.

Alibaba discussed this matter at a high-level meeting before the holiday, and everyone was in a relatively stable mood.

However, after the meeting, Peng Lei suddenly asked the head Feng Qingyang with some hesitation: "Douyin is expanding the e-commerce market boundaries of Yiguo, Pinduoduo is going to sink into the market, we... do we still need to upgrade?"

The route of Yike Group is obviously different from that of Alibaba Group, while the former was praising Tmall and advocating for upgrading in the past two years...

Before Feng Qingyang could answer, CEO Zhang Yong next to him said firmly: "Upgrade!"

The arrow is on the string, no, the first arrow has been shot!
Seeing that Feng Qingyang did not object, Peng Lei acquiesced to Zhang Yong's answer and had to put aside some of his hesitation.

Forget it, Zhang Yong is the CEO now. If he wants to be promoted, let him be promoted.

(End of this chapter)