Reinventing the Millennium.

Chapter 1446 The Wolf is Coming (4k)

For Bing Xin, the traditional festival seemed to disappear in just a short period of one night. Fang Zhuo, who was in the factory, continued to receive calls. However, unlike previous years, this year he responded to the concerns and comforts of many friends and leaders.

Yike is not having an easy time after losing the American market. The outside world is constantly counting down for the company's future. Some people even set up a website to count the bad news Yike is experiencing.

——On February 2, Yike mobile phones were out of stock on Deutsche Telekom’s online ordering channel.

——On February 2, it was confirmed that Selfy mobile phones would no longer be sold in Europe, and only a small number of products were available in the Chinese market.

——On February 2, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Florida, NDFla., accepted the securities fraud case filed against Yi Ke.

——On February 2, Yike’s market value on Nasdaq fell below US$9 billion, setting a new historical low.

Because of the authenticity of the news, this website gradually spread on Twitter and was called "KILL YIKE" by many people.

Fang Zhuo noticed the existence of this website, but didn't know who was behind it. However, when Kong Yu called to wish everyone a happy new year on the first day of the Lunar New Year, he guessed that this was a test by a short-selling institution.

"KILL YIKE" shares public and undisclosed information in great detail. Some of the sources of the latter are not likely to be obtained by personal resources. According to the short positions disclosed by Nasdaq every month, the number of short institutions building positions has continued to increase since the end of December last year.

Currently, these short positions are not large, but they are indeed on the rise.

Kong Yu suspected that this method of publicly spreading bad news was used by short-selling institutions to create momentum and observe the situation.

Before November last year, there had been news coming out from Washington claiming that YiKe might withdraw from the US market. However, although some short-selling institutions were ready to move at that time, not many of them eventually entered the market.

Although several years have passed since the Yi Ke short squeeze case, it left a deep impression on Wall Street. The most fatal factor was the connection between Yi Ke and the White House.

Before BIS officially kicked Yi Ke out, or even if BIS officially announced it, many institutions were observing whether the White House would take any action this time. It was precisely because of this concern that the decline in Yi Ke’s stock price only allowed some small and medium-sized institutions to make a profit.

To date, although Yi Ke’s stock price is still falling, it has stabilized. It is even difficult to say whether the current stock price has fully reflected Yi Ke’s production capacity difficulties in June.

Therefore, measuring the true value of Yike involves many real interests, and suppressing Yike’s stock price is a pursuit of interests.

Kong Yu asked his boss a key question during the New Year's greeting call: "Mr. Fang, when will the photoresist be ready? Many organizations are paying attention to and discussing this matter. If there is a definite time, we can make a lot of pocket money."

"The problem now is that we can't give an exact time." Fang Zhuoxian answered this first, and then said, "Xinyang has recently made an optimistic but unreliable statement. There may be hope this year, but it may not be until next year or the year after next."

He thought for a moment and continued, "Xinyang has already conducted joint research and development with Bingxin. In addition, the original jointly developed 'core material' has made all the research and development data public in the industry. Keda has also jointly established the 'Keda Optoelectronic Materials' company with Yike, but the one with the greatest hope of solving the problem at the moment is Xinyang."

If possible, Fang Zhuo hopes to have more weightlifting champions, also to ensure the stability of the supply chain.

Kong Yu was silent for a while, and then said, "I can't give an exact time, and I can't give a way to play. This year or next year, it's a good idea. We can try the story of the boy who cried wolf a few more times. Short-selling institutions always need to observe, and they are also afraid of a real breakthrough. Didn't DuPont say that as long as there is a breakthrough in the ice core, it can get a license?"

He pondered and said, "Mr. Fang, as long as Xinyang's photoresist can be used, it doesn't matter even if the effect is not so good. Once there is a breakthrough, we will contact DuPont. We will then find friends to build momentum and return to the US market. We can always make some money."

As long as the production capacity is resolved or the news of the end of the production capacity crisis is released, and then friends in Washington are called upon to make efforts, the short sellers can be forced to short sell in one fell swoop.

Anyway, our friends in Washington are just discussing it and don’t need to actually implement it, so they won’t lose anything and they can even earn some appearance fees by participating.

If the cry of "wolf" is heard a few more times and the supply of Yike products is cut off, the short sellers will always enter the market.

Kong Yu doesn't know anything about photoresist, and he has no interest in research and development. He is only good at doing work within his ability in the financial field.

As for why it is short again...

Kong Yu didn’t know whether these institutions still remembered what Mr. Fang once said, “Greed is a sin” and “Don’t short YiKe”, or maybe they had forgotten it long ago.

There is nothing new under the sun, and human greed is always difficult to control.

Fang Zhuo didn't expect to hear the gasoline man's dirty plan on the first day of the Chinese New Year. As for the direction of this plan...

Those institutions are not so bad, are they? They will not leave after making money, will they? They are not really waiting for Yike to collapse, will they? They are not really trying to kill everyone, will they?

Probably not.

Fang Zhuo agreed to the gasoline man's "wolf is coming" proposal.

As I said, if others don’t harm me, I may not necessarily harm others.

Fang Zhuo doesn't have the energy to do these things as his whole focus is on responding to the crisis of Yi Ke and Bing Xin. But since the gasoline man is willing, it would be nice to earn some pocket money and give some appearance fees to his friends.

Of course, he also gave some small feedback to the gasoline man: "Since you want to tell a story of the boy who cried wolf, Yike will hide some chips. Once Xinyang has a breakthrough, we will contact DuPont and supply them to the market while letting Washington release vague information. This may have a better effect."

If Yike products really have to be discontinued for a period of time, then the reappearance of products in conjunction with the news of supply chain breakthroughs will inevitably bring a greater impact, both for the story of "The Wolf is Coming" and to tell DuPont with facts and urge it to take action.

Kong Yu was stunned on the other end of the phone, and said "Hmm" in admiration: "Okay, Mr. Fang!"

Good Mr. Fang, you were born to do this kind of thing!
Fang Zhuo briefly communicated with the gasoline man about the relevant situation to ensure that the entire framework was feasible. As for how much they could gain, it would depend on the short positions disclosed by Nasdaq every month.

The gasoline man is very familiar with doing this kind of thing, so there will be no mistakes.

Fang Zhuo ended the call with Kong Yu, feeling a little emotional for a moment. Sometimes hard solution is not enough, so soft solution has to make up for it.

He didn't take the matter too seriously. He strolled in front of the Bingxin factory and made phone calls to inquire about other jobs in the industry.

Just as the "Core Material" company shared the results of the joint research and development of photoresist, the China Wafer Manufacturing Service Alliance is committed to achieving such effects in more links in the hope of promoting the rapid development of the entire industry.

This can be considered as open source within a certain scope, trying not to be too selfish, but to first raise the level and share the market with foreign manufacturers.

Fang Zhuo walked along Yuhu Road from Fab1-1 to Fab1-6. After a whole morning of phone calls, all he got were a few words on the other end of the phone - it would take some time.

He stood at the gate of Fab1-6, the world's most advanced wafer manufacturing plant, and looked back at Yuhu Road where he came from. It was completely different from what it was when he was brought here by his leaders.

Some people call this place "Ice Core City" because the semiconductor companies here radiate outward layer by layer with the ice core as the center. Others call it the "Sand District" because semiconductors are just playing with sand.

Of course, its official positioning is a national high-tech industrial development zone, a national independent innovation demonstration zone, and a new strategic highland for the national integrated circuit industry.

Fang Zhuo retracted his gaze. It was precisely because time was needed that the conflicts could not be allowed to erupt in a concentrated manner, but rather they had to unfold layer by layer. This would allow for room for continuous strategic development.

Photoresist is the focus at the current stage. Dr. Liang has continued to develop 10nm on SMIC's platform. If all goes well, SMIC's 10nm will not lag behind by too much time, although it may not be the world's number one. After all, it already has the R&D foundation of Bingxin.

It has been confirmed that neither Intel's 10nm nor Taiwan's 10nm will use EUV. They will not introduce it until the next node at the earliest, and the 7nm node will be at least in 2018 or even 2019.

In this way, Bingxin can still maintain its excellent competitiveness in process technology for 3-4 years, and then focus more on improving the level of the mainland industry.

By then, it will be a completely different scene.

Fang Zhuo attracted a lot of attention standing at the factory gate. Just as he was about to go to the cafeteria for a meal, he received a call from Liang Mengsong on his mobile phone.

"Hello, Mr. Fang, why don't you call me and say Happy New Year?" Liang Mengsong said on the other end of the phone.

Fang Zhuo almost thought that the person on the other side was not Dr. Liang. He was stunned for a few seconds and said, "Dr. Liang, I was afraid of disturbing you, so I sent you a text message last night."

"Yeah, I saw it." Liang Mengsong said, "I was just joking with you."

Fang Zhuo felt that the joke was a bit awkward, but he noticed that the other person seemed to be in a good mood, and Dr. Liang himself was a workaholic, so he smiled and said, "Is the progress in R&D good?"

"Many of SMIC's equipment are indeed more advanced than ours. It's a pity to leave them here." Liang Mengsong's tone returned to calm. "I called you to tell you that we do have difficulties using SAQP quadruple patterning technology. The most difficult part is how to maintain low resistance and high mobility with small line width. We encountered many problems when introducing Co materials for interconnection."

Fang Zhuo asked curiously, "Isn't the most difficult problem to solve the improvement of global transistor density by DTCO technology? By applying SDG, the use of traditional Dummy Gate can be reduced and the number of transistors that can be accommodated per unit area can be increased."

Liang Mengsong was silent on the phone for a while, and then said calmly: "Mr. Fang, don't parrot others. Why don't you come here to lead the research and development?"

Fang Zhuo was a little embarrassed: "You say, you say."

"That's it..." Liang Mengsong said these two words and suddenly got stuck. After a moment, he said helplessly, "There are many problems, but I am confident that we can try tape-out by the end of the year, and the fastest mass production will be the first quarter of next year."

Fang Zhuo kept it simple this time: "Okay."

Liang Mengsong waited for a few seconds, but received no more compliments.

He sorted out his thoughts and continued to talk about the second important thing he wanted to discuss on the phone: "There is still room for development in the 10nm process. Simply put, we can improve performance by relaxing the size, adding additional Gate Pitch options to the FinFET transistor part, reducing impedance, increasing the drain, and improving channel mobility. In other words, we can continue to build sub-generation process technology. This will be a good choice for us."

Fang Zhuo said simply: "I believe you."

"Do you understand what I mean?" Liang Mengsong asked uncertainly.

"It is equivalent to building the next generation of 10nm using this generation of 10nm process, improving performance and approaching 7nm, right?" Fang Zhuo guessed.

Liang Mengsong praised: "Mr. Fang, you are more than just a parrot."

Fang Zhuo felt honored.

"In short, our technology is guaranteed to a certain extent, but it still depends on the stability of the supply chain. Otherwise, SMIC's technology will repeat the same mistakes, and then we will produce tens of millions of chips and run out of stock again." Liang Mengsong added a few more words.

"Yes, I will let everyone carefully understand Academician Liang's instructions." Fang Zhuo said seriously.

Liang Mengsong heard the teasing intent and said "hmm" before ending the New Year call with his boss. He felt that the message he gave was a good New Year gift.

In fact, Fang Zhuo was so happy after hanging up the phone... that he happily ate two more bowls of rice in the cafeteria!

Science and technology are primary productive forces!
When he was in a good mood, he was able to draw some attention from his colleagues.

Yike discontinued the Selfy series, controlled the supply of the Mars series, and postponed the first half of the year's press conference. These are all extremely obvious signals that the company's production capacity was indeed constrained by the impact of BIS and it had to give up part of the market.

In the past, Yike was China's Nokia and the largest player in the mid-to-high-end market. Now... with this blank space, domestic and foreign competitors are rushing in with eagerness.

For example, OPPO, which has always been hovering in the entry-level and mid-range markets, held a new product launch conference in advance on February 2, launching an upgraded processor equipped with Qualcomm Snapdragon 14, which uses the 822nm process of HKMG, claiming to be comparable to Bingxin's second-generation 16nm.

Oji Senior Vice President Liu Zuohu took the stage to introduce the products to the guests, promoted the global product strength of the Snapdragon flagship, and directly compared its performance with that of friendly competitors.

After the press conference, he accepted media interviews and mentioned the problem of his own chip supply, saying that the supply was sufficient and there would be no shortage.

However, many people were disgusted by his speaking like this.

Liu Zuohu expressed his grievance on Weibo: "The reporter asked me if there was a chip shortage, and I told him the truth. Should I be criticized for telling the truth?" I admit that our competitors' chips are excellent, but they shouldn't be so overbearing. The speaker may not mean anything, but the listener may take it seriously. I objectively evaluate that our flagship product is absolutely top-notch.

Oji's flagship needs a benchmark this time, and Mars, which has limited production capacity, is undoubtedly the best target.

Fang Zhuo met the needs of friendly competitors and generously praised the progress of Chinese domestic manufacturers in the circle of friends: BIS cannot cut off the development of excellent Chinese brands, and O-Ji also has the best products in the world. It may be able to follow Yi Ke’s development path and become part of promoting the development of mainland semiconductors.

The unexpected change of the head of Yike has somewhat surprised and puzzled O-Ji and the outside world. Even a person with such wide influence as Mr. Fang has acknowledged the level of the friendly competitor...

However, after only a few days, Organized Crime and Journalists realized that they had seriously underestimated Mr. Fang’s extensive influence. As a person at the center of public opinion, every word he said at this stage was extremely easy to be analyzed, including by overseas institutions...

I don’t know what BIS was thinking. They even brought the performance of O’s products to the conference table for discussion.

Although it was just a discussion, the management of Oji was really scared. Even Yike, with its size and influence, couldn't withstand the restrictions of BIS. What if...

Not afraid of ten thousand, just in case!

Stop praising me, Mr. Fang, stop praising me...

O记’s leader Chen Mingyong flew to Luzhou overnight to visit Mr. Fang and express his sincere apologies.

"Hey, don't worry, BIS won't do that. You are using Qualcomm chips. You think too much. What do you think of me as?" Fang Zhuo responded so cheerfully to Master Chen's humble attitude.

Chen Mingyong apologized again and again, and said sincerely: "Mr. Fang, our domestic brands are in the same camp. Yike is the leader. We are following Yike and trying to eat more of the market share of Apple and Samsung."

"Who said it wasn't?" Fang Zhuo said with a smile, "Well, the situation is special now. Maybe my words were unintentional, but the listeners took them seriously. I will pay attention."

Chen Mingyong made a final toast and tactfully expressed his opinion on the transfer and appointment of the company's senior management.

Fang Zhuo didn't react to this. It was not his company's business, so it was up to him.

Hey, the speaker may not mean it, but the listener may take it seriously. Hey, when I say your name, you will be startled.

(End of this chapter)