At his Zhongshan International mansion.
Lu Zhou was in his study room on the second floor. He was reading his research draft papers when he suddenly saw a video call pop up on his laptop.
When Lu Zhou noticed that Xiao Tong was the one calling, he clicked with his mouse and accepted the call.
Soon after, an excited and bubbly face appeared on his screen.
“Brother, you’re popping off!”
Lu Zhou didn’t know what was so exciting, so he paused for a second and spoke.
“I… What?”
Xiao Tong: “Remember that thesis you gave me a few days ago? Professor Krugman did a report for you. Now the entire economics world is researching your L-Z model! Your model is trending on Twitter!”
Lu Zhou: “L… Z?”
Xiao Tong excitedly said, “Yeah! Professor Joseph named it himself!”
Lu Zhou: “…”
F*ck sake!
These economists really are horrible at naming things.
I wasn’t expecting this…
Lu Zhou coughed and said, “This is what you’re excited about?”
“What is that supposed to mean? This is amazing! Also,” Xiao Tong crossed her legs and said with a mysterious face, “apparently, someone sent a recommendation letter to the Nobel committee, so you might win a Nobel Prize in economics!”
Seeing how ecstatic Xiao Tong was, Lu Zhou smiled and said, “Lil Sis, you should focus on your own studies… I would rather win a Nobel Prize in Physics than one in economics. But then again, it’s not that easy winning two Nobel Prizes.”
Xiao Tong pouted and said, “Oh, sorry, I’m sorry for caring about you.”
Lu Zhou said, “Okay, fine, go do your own thing. I’m busy, I don’t have so much free time like you.”
Xiao Tong frowned and said, “I don’t have any free time! I’m busy as well! I just got back to Princeton, and Professor Krugman gave me a bunch of tasks! I have to read two papers a day and write a bunch of notes… I’ve been in school for less than two weeks! This is horrible!”
Lu Zhou was amused, and he said, “I’ll introduce you to some of my students. After looking at their workload, you’ll never complain again.”
Your supervisor assigning you tasks means they’re interested in teaching you. Would you prefer him to assign you brainless and repetitive work?
It seemed like Professor Krugman was quite serious about educating and cultivating Xiao Tong. Lu Zhou would never forget that.
After some small talk, Lu Zhou hung up the video call and placed his attention back onto his thesis.
As he looked at the densely packed equations, he felt a headache and sighed heavily.
“I won’t be able to finish before June…
“Sigh, if only Riemann’s hypothesis is as simple as the L-Z model.”
I was looking forward to the conference at St. Petersburg.
Lu Zhou already chose to do a 60-minute report on Riemann’s hypothesis. If he wasn’t able to present any meaningful research for his report, the mathematics community would still respect him, but he wouldn’t be able to respect himself.
Lu Zhou shook his head and placed his attention back on solving this century-old mathematics problem…
…
While Lu Zhou was busy researching mathematics, Li Tinghui, who was all the way in Star Sky Technology’s Shanghai office, received the first financing contract of his life.
However, he didn’t love the contract…
He finished reading the contract from beginning to end. He reluctantly looked at the female CEO sitting across from him.
“Sixty percent… Isn’t that a bit high?”
Very few startups would give up sixty percent of the equity in their angel financing round, even thirty percent was unusually high.
Signing this contract meant that he would lose his majority shareholder status and give control of his company to Star Sky Technology. Not just that, but this would hugely impact his future financing rounds.
No venture capital firm would invest in a startup whose founders had lost control of their own company. Unless Star Sky Technology had no plans on future financing rounds.
Chen Yushan gave a curt reply to Li Tinghui’s question.
“I think this is the most appropriate arrangement. We will not negotiate.”
Li Tinghui said, “But Beep Beep Charging has an independent research and development team…”
Chen Yushan took a sip of tea and spoke.
“Oh, really? How does it compare to the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study?”
Li Tinghui was intimidated by the CEO, so he had nothing to say.
Chen Yushan tapped her finger on the desk and spoke.
“I don’t agree with Academician Lu’s opinion. He’s not a good businessman. In my opinion, this is straight-up a charity.”
The guy looked around nervously as she continued, “We can do the research and development on wireless charging station technology ourselves. Our relationship with the Shanghai, Jiangsu, and Zhejiang states are good. We can totally do this on our own.”
Chen Yushan smiled and said in a serious way, “What do you think? Want to come work for Star Sky Technology for half a million yuan a year?”
Chen Yushan’s charming smile was layered with a hint of devilish gaze.
Li Tinghui knew that this wasn’t charity; however, he didn’t expect her proposal to be so aggressive.
“Oh, Ms. Chen…”
Li Tinghui took a deep breath and hesitated before finally signing his name.
He had no other choice.
Even though the sacrifice was huge.
The resources from Star Sky Technology were too good to refuse.
Whether it was their connections with the state or their research and development power, like Ms. Chen said, Star Sky Technology could easily create their own wireless charging company themselves.
I knew it…
I’m in no position to negotiate.
As Chen Yushan watched Li Tinghui sign his name, she nodded with approval.
“Good, the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study will set up an independent research institute on wireless charging stations. Arrange for your research team to move to Jinling. As for the people that don’t want to reallocate, fire them.
“As for you, I need you to stay in Shanghai. Move your management team from the small suburban office to the city center.”
“But—”
Before he could finish, Chen Yushan said, “This is your problem, I’m only responsible for giving you the necessary resources. Moving your offices next to ours is beneficial for you.”
This woman is the devil…
Li Tinghui sighed heavily and nodded. He carefully put away the contract and left the office.
He hoped that his decision was correct.
He hoped that he wouldn’t regret this someday…
Chen Yushan smiled and shook his head.
He’s too naive.
Star Sky Technology had the capabilities to start a charging station division, but being capable didn’t mean they were willing.
If Li Tinghui did his homework, he would’ve found out that Star Sky Technology’s main business model was patent management. They had more important things to take care of such as the space shuttle assembly center; they didn’t have time to deploy some wireless charging stations in the Yangtze River Delta city group.
Therefore, acquiring a charging station company was their best option.
This was the same reason why Star Sky Technology didn’t produce electric cars or lithium-sulfur batteries. Why would they take on unnecessary risk when they could just sit back and collect patent fees?
She totally lied about “disagreeing with Academician Lu”, and “can start a wireless charging station company on our own”.
Of course, even if Li Tinghui realized this, he had no other option.
After all, the resources of Star Sky Technology was precisely what he needed. On the other hand, Star Sky Technology didn’t need them.
“Sigh, I want to go back to the head office… The traffic and air qualities here are much worse than Jinling.”
Chen Yushan tidied up the documents on the conference table and stretched her arms. She then rested her head on the table.
She sighed and quietly whispered, “That b*stard, he didn’t even call me when he arrived.
“He’s probably on another retreat again.
“He’s going to live with mathematics for the rest of his life!”
