“Manager Feng, have you thought of some new ideas and need us to tackle the technical aspect together?” Jiang Wanmeng laughed and asked.
Whenever Feng Yu has new ideas on electronic products, he will gather all of them together. The company that is most familiar with the technology Feng Yu has in mind will head this project, and the rest will provide support.
When all the companies work together, they can develop new technologies faster and train new research staff.
But this time is different. Japan’s AIWA and Aiwa Little Tyrant are not participating. Instead, it was Changhong’s Chief Engineer that came.
Changhong’s Chief Engineer used to be very proud and arrogant. After all, Changhong is China’s market leader in the TV manufacturing industry. They are still holding the most market share in China, while another company manufactures wind and Rain brand of TVs.
The Chief Engineer felt Wind and Rain’s Super fan, Super VCD, etc. are because they are lucky and own the patents, or else, many companies will overtake them.
But after the Chief Engineer visited Wind and Rain Electronics’ smart showhouse and research center, he was humbled. Wind and Rain Electronics’ showhouse is too miraculous. He had never seen such a high-tech house and felt he had traveled to the future.
Have Wind and Rain Electronics perfected these technologies? Even though many of the technologies used in the showhouse are still in the experimental stage, it’s still amazing. Also, Wind and Rain Electronics owns lots of patents, and many of the patents are the most advanced technology in the world!
“Chief Engineer Yang, Changhong owned some optical related technologies and had used it on some electronic products. How many times are your optical zoom, and what is the maximum pixel your cameras can capture?”
“We can produce 300k pixels digital camera with two-times optical zoom!” Chief Engineer Yang replied proudly, but when he remembered the achievements of the people at this meeting, he lowered his volume.
After Chief Engineer Yang replied Feng Yu, he saw Feng Yu frowning and doesn’t look happy.
“Chief Engineer Yang, I am talking about the results from your research center.”
“I am referring to our latest technology from our research center.”
Feng Yu: “……” Their research center’s technologies can only reach this standard? Seems like he was too optimistic with Changhong’s technologies.
If this technology is used on Wind and Rain’s mobile phone, the phone will be gigantic.
The trend for mobile phones now is small and thin. It will be a joke if the Wind and Rain mobile introduces a phone that resembles a brick!
Chief Engineer Yang saw Feng Yu is not happy and immediately say. “We still have a digital focus technology that can increase the focus by three times!”
Digital focus?! Haha… this is a stupid technology and can only enlarge a portion of the picture at the expense of the pixels.
This technology will be useful in the future when the cameras reached a few million pixels. But now, the pictures are only 300k pixels, and it will be blurred.
“How long have you all been working on these technologies?”
“Five years.”
Feng Yu almost choked. You all had spent five years working on this, and this is the result? Even when you all have started from scratch, the progress should not be so slow. It should be the top management are not willing to invest money into this research.
“What about you all? Any one of you is confident to succeed in developing digital camera technologies?” Feng Yu looks at the rest.
Everyone, especially Chief Engineer Yang, kept quiet.
“What if I say we spare no expense at developing this technology?” Feng Yu continued.
“Manager Feng, even so, it will still be impossible. The overseas digital camera technologies are more advanced, and lots of patented technologies are involved. Even when we spend money to develop this technology, we will not be able to use it because of the patents.” Jiang Wanmeng reminded me.
Jiang Wanmeng had bought a digital camera some time ago, and he thought of letting Wind and Rain Electronics to research into the technologies used. But later, he realized the components are too complicated as it involves optical technologies, mechanical, engineering, data transfer, storage, etc.
Wind and Rain Electronics do have image information-related technologies. They had researched this technology when they are developing the VCD and DVD players. Still, they do not have any experience with optical technologies.
It will be extremely difficult to venture into a new area with many patented technologies in their paths.
Feng Yu is troubled, as he had not thought about this problem brought up by Jiang Wanmeng. This is the same situation faced by other companies for the VCD and DVD technologies. This is no longer a matter of the difficulty of the technology, but the patents. Other companies are unable to produce their own VCD and DVD players because Wind and Rain own the patents.
Many companies in Japan, Korea, the US, and Europe, are manufacturing digital cameras. Almost all of the related technologies have been patented.
Even if Feng Yu is willing to spend money to develop this technology, the technology cannot be used on his products, and it will infringe the patent. He will have to pay damages to other companies, and his brand reputation will be affected.
“Manager Feng, how about we buy the related technologies from those digital camera producers?” Chief Engineer Yang suggested.
Buy technologies? Feng Yu brightens up as he suddenly remembers a company. This company had developed the world’s first digital camera. In 1991, this company had developed a 1.3-megapixel camera, and they are the pioneers of the digital camera industry.
But this company is the global leader in traditional film cameras, and they are not focused on the digital camera market. They only started to focus on the digital camera after film cameras are obsolete. But it was too late as they are lagging behind other digital camera companies. In Feng Yu’s previous life, this company ends up in bankruptcy.
Feng Yu does not know how good this company’s digital camera technology is, but it should still be one of the most advanced in the world. The only problem is this company’s annual profit is almost 1 billion USD and is also the global leader in the camera industry. They will be demanding an astronomical amount for their patents and technologies!
Maybe we can speak to this company and see if they are willing to authorize their patents to us? This will be much cheaper, but our future developments will have to depend on this company, and they might control us.
Feng Yu thought for a while and felt he should send someone to contact this company first. If the patented technologies are not expensive, he will buy it. After all, this company’s main focus is not a digital camera, and maybe they are willing to sell.
“Alright. I will contact an overseas company and see if we can buy their patented technologies. Our next focus is to combine digital camera technologies with our mobile phones. We will produce a mobile phone with a camera function!”
