Downstairs at the Star Technology Building.
Wang Wei walked out of a Mercedes-Benz. He reached out with his hand and gently straightened his tie. He looked at the tall building and took a deep breath.
He was about to meet an extremely important person.
Even though this man was neither a politician nor a business tycoon, he wasn’t relaxed at all. Instead, he felt a kind of nervousness and tension he had not felt in a long time.
This was because even though this person was not a powerful politician nor a business tycoon, this person was actually more powerful than a politician and businessman combined.
There was only one reason.
Even the most powerful politician could only promote the prosperity of a state or nation. A businessman, on the other hand, was even less powerful, they could only control a company, which was limited to a couple hundred billion dollars in market cap.
But this person was different.
He might not be the richest person in the world, nor the most powerful, but his name would be recorded in history forever.
Just like Times Magazine said, he was an asset to the entire human civilization. He was the pinnacle of the human spirit.
He took a step toward the stairs in front of him. However, he heard a voice coming from behind him.
“Do you want to work at Star Sky Technology? With an annual salary of 5 million yuan.”
Wang Wei turned around and saw a young man smiling at him.
Wang Wei instantly recognized this person. He had a hearty smile on his face.
“Okay, no problem! Five million is three times that of my current salary. Academician Lu, you’re being so generous, how could I decline your offer? I just want to ask, before I get hired, can I change half of my annual salary to the form of shares? After all, paying all that tax is painful!”
Lu Zhou was just joking around. He didn’t expect Wang Wei to actually agree. He smiled and said, “That’s not a good idea, Mr. Wang, you’re worth billions, I’m sure you don’t care about this measly amount of shares.”
Wang Wei sighed and said, “Academician Lu, you’re mistaken. My wealth is nothing compare to Star Sky Technology, I’m sure anyone would love to have a stake in Star Sky Technology.”
Lu Zhou didn’t respond. He just had a smile on his face.
Luck is really an amazing thing.
He still remembered that when he was still an undergraduate student, Mr. Wang, who was already worth tens of billions of dollars, offered him an annual salary of 500,000 to give up his studies and work for him in Shenzhen. However, Lu Zhou did not accept his offer. Instead, he completed his studies, went abroad to teach, and finally returned to China.
It had been almost ten years since then.
Mr. Wang was still worth tens of billions. But Lu Zhou went from being a poor student to a business magnate and a leader of China academia.
He felt emotional just thinking about it.
Honestly, even though an annual salary of 500,000 yuan might not seem like a lot in 2023, it was a huge amount nine years ago, especially for a student who had just finished sophomore year and was still worrying about living expenses. That was almost an irresistible offer.
If the high tech system hadn’t shown Lu Zhou the world, Lu Zhou might have actually accepted the offer and went into the industry.
If he had accepted the offer back then, his life would be completely different…
They didn’t stay at the entrance for long. After a few polite greetings, the two walked toward the building together. The staff members guided them to the VIP reception room.
The assistant in charge of the reception poured two cups of tea, then turned around and left, closing the door behind her.
After Wang Wei took a sip of tea to moisturize his throat, he looked around the VIP room and said, “They say that the reception room is the business card of a company. I can tell from the decor that Academician Lu has good taste.”
Lu Zhou smiled.
He was not involved in the decor of the building. After all, he did not come here often. However, his emotional intelligence was high enough to accept this compliment with a smile.
“Thanks for the compliment.”
“This is not a compliment.” Wang Wei smiled; his tone suddenly became a little emotional. He said, “Actually, nine years ago, I already knew that you had a big future ahead of you. I was wondering if I could tempt you with the offer. I didn’t expect that I actually underestimated your potential.”
“Even though we’re not colleagues, we can still be business partners.” Lu Zhou smiled and said, “Let’s save the small talk for lunch. Let’s get to the main point. I heard my CEO say that you guys have encountered some technical problems?”
“Here’s the thing.” Wang Wei nodded and continued, “We have been studying your paper for a while.”
Lu Zhou said, “Which paper?”
He had published a lot of papers. He had no idea which one CEO Wang was referring to.
“The one about UAV logistics system.” Wang Wei sighed and said, “It’s quite unfortunate. The engineers at our research institute spent several years studying your paper. We tried to mimic the blueprint, but we still haven’t seen great results. We can’t find any solutions, other than to ask for your help.”
Oh that paper…
Lu Zhou was a little baffled hearing Wang Wei’s story.
If he remembered correctly, that was one of the ten sub-par papers he published just to complete a system mission.
Even though it took him 25 general points to redeem the paper, other than some half-complete algorithms, he didn’t make any breakthroughs. No wonder Wang Wei wasn’t able to use that paper as guidance!
“… That was just something I wrote when I was a student. It shouldn’t be used as a reference for serious research.”
Wang Wei quickly said, “Academician Lu, you are too humble! But honestly, the research on drone logistics is not entirely because of your paper. We have always invested resources in this research and development area.
“After all, the cost of hiring a courier is about 10,000 yuan, while the price of a drone is around 8,000 yuan. From an efficiency point of view, the drone is more flexible and can easily access difficult to reach areas. We only need to pay electricity and basic maintenance costs for the drones.
“So far, our plan is to start an unmanned delivery pilot in Shenzhen. We have even talked with the local government. However, our research and development team has fallen into a bottleneck.”
After thinking for a moment, Lu Zhou said, “Can you elaborate?”
Wang Wei nodded and spoke.
“We have encountered mainly two problems. One is safety, the other is delivery efficiency. Basically, we have to take into account the safety of goods and the safety of pedestrians, and also adapt to dynamic changes in traffic conditions. For high-density areas such as major cities, air traffic is strictly regulated.
“The agreement between us and the city government is to guarantee a zero pedestrian accident count during a half-year trial operation period. Having no accidents is the only way to extend our license. If a drone or package falls from the sky and hits a person, the license for our drone delivery pilot will be revoked.”
Lu Zhou nodded.
“This is difficult.”
“It’s more than difficult.” Wang Wei smiled bitterly and continued, “We can’t pass any internal tests. The director of our research institute told me that he didn’t know what to do.”
Actually, drone delivery was nothing novel. In remote areas that were inconvenient for people and vehicles to reach, Shunfeng Group tried to use delivery drones a few years ago.
However, because of the high cost, this technology was not widespread.
In recent years, breakthroughs in nuclear fusion technology had completely changed the domestic production capacity and lowered the prices of many industrial products. It also decreased electricity costs to a negligible amount. This increased the possibility of drone delivery systems.
However, they still encountered a lot of problems when applying this technology to cities.
After all, in densely populated areas, especially for areas such as major cities, flying drones was extremely dangerous. If a drone fell and hit a person or a car, the compensation and legal costs alone would almost bankrupt Shunfeng.
Not to mention some low-life people might think of the drones as targets, and use slingshots, stones, etc to attack the drones and steal the packages.
Therefore, they needed a perfect solution for the concept of “drone logistics”. After seeing the news about the completion of the Star Voyage One quantum supercomputing center, Wang Wei wanted to cooperate with Star Sky Technology. Not to mention that Lu Zhou seemed to have studied the drone logistics system before.
After patiently listening to Wang Wei’s words, Lu Zhou lightly tapped his finger on the table. After thinking for a while, he said, “I know where the problem is.”
Wang Wei immediately sat upright and focused his attention. He thought that Lu Zhou would have some great insight, but he was shocked by what he heard.
“Actually, it’s not a big problem.”
“Not a big problem?” Wang Wei said in disbelief, “What does that mean?”
“It means it’s not a big problem.”
Lu Zhou paused for a second before continuing, “Actually, the use of logistics drones… The Jinling high-tech zone has already tried pilot factories, but it is not widespread due to cost and safety reasons.
“For example, the ‘Worker Bee’ logistics drone distribution system we use is provided by Star Voyage One, using cloud computing services. The maximum safe load for a single drone is about 10kg. They are mainly used in combination with automated logistics vehicles, to transfer parts between workshops.”
Lu Zhou looked at his watch and stood up from his chair.
“I’m guessing you can’t understand what I’m talking about.
“Well, it just so happens that I have some free time.
“If you’re interested, I’ll take you to have a look.”
