Steal the enemy's base at the start and build a technological empire.

Chapter 422 Launch of Cloud Computing Strategy

January 25, 2003, Xinghuo Group.

Ling Yun called Jiang Feng and Wang Jianguo to his office. The three of them sat on the sofa, with three cups of tea steaming on the coffee table.

"The database is the first step; next, we'll move on to cloud computing." Ling Yun picked up a pen and wrote three words on the whiteboard: IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS. "In the future, businesses and individuals won't need to buy their own servers. Computing resources, storage resources, and software services will all be rented on demand. That's what public cloud is."

Jiang Feng asked, "Our current team mainly focuses on databases and application software. Cloud computing is on a completely different level. The investment scale, technical difficulty, and operational complexity are all an order of magnitude larger than databases. Do we really want to do it now?"

Ling Yun said, "If we don't do it now, it will be too late to do it in three years. Amazon is already doing it; they have an internal project called AWS, and their internal plan is to officially launch it in 2006. We need to get ahead of them, or at least not fall too far behind."

Wang Jianguo asked, "How exactly should it be broken down into steps?"

Lingyun drew a timeline on the whiteboard: "In 2003, we launched the 'Nebula Elastic Computing' prototype, which supported virtual machine rental. In 2005, we launched a complete cloud service platform, including database cloud services, application hosting, and CDN."

Jiang Feng thought for a moment and said, "The technical team needs to be expanded. Right now, Nebula Technology has less than two hundred people, but we need at least five hundred to do cloud computing. We also need to build data centers, at least three, in Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen. Each data center will require an investment of at least several hundred million yuan."

Ling Yun said, "Money is not a problem. I will allocate two billion US dollars from IceCloud as seed funding for Nebula Technology. You can recruit the team, choose the data center, and determine the technology roadmap. I only have one requirement—speed."

Jiang Feng was silent for a few seconds, then said, "I understand."

Wang Jianguo raised his hand. "President Ling, in the area of ​​cloud computing, the operating system level needs to cooperate. Virtual machines, containers, and network virtualization all require kernel support. What can our System Technology team do?"

Lingyun said, "You and Nebula Technology will establish a joint laboratory. System Technology will be responsible for kernel optimization, while Nebula Technology will be responsible for the upper-layer platform. The two sides will synchronize weekly and solve problems together."

Wang Jianguo made a note in his notebook.

Jiang Feng suddenly said, "President Ling, there's something I need to mention beforehand. There's currently no clear policy or regulatory framework for cloud computing in China. Data security, privacy protection, and cross-border data transfer are all gray areas. The faster we develop, the more likely we are to be the first to run into regulatory obstacles."

Ling Yun said, "I'll handle the regulatory matters. You just focus on doing a good job with the technology."

After the meeting, Ling Yun sat alone in his office. He picked up the sticky note and looked at the three words on it: IaaS, PaaS, SaaS. These three words would redefine the entire IT industry in the next decade. And Xinghuo aimed to be one of the definers of this era.

He picked up the phone and dialed Chen Zhongming's number.

"Mr. Chen, could you please arrange a meeting with the leaders from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology? We need to discuss the cloud computing matter with them beforehand."

Chen Zhongming said, "Okay, I'll make the arrangements right away."

Lingyun hung up the phone. Outside the window, winter in Jinan wasn't over yet; the branches of the plane trees were bare, swaying in the wind, but spring was just around the corner.

On February 10, 2003, Lingyun received good news from Fingerworks and immediately rushed to Newark, Delaware.

When Ling Yun got out of the car, Wayne Westman was already waiting at the door.

He was wearing a gray fleece jacket, his hair was longer than the last time I saw him, and he had a stubble beard, but his eyes were bright, almost excited. He walked quickly over and extended his hand.

"President Ling, we succeeded."

The two entered the lab. On the table sat a circuit board, smaller than the one they'd seen before. In the center of the board was a silver-gray chip with the Fingerworks logo printed on it. Next to it was a transparent glass panel, about the size of a laptop touchpad.

Wayne connected the glass plate to the computer, and the outline of a hand appeared on the screen. He placed his fingers on it, and five blue dots appeared on the screen, each corresponding to one of his fingers. He pinched it with two fingers, and a window on the screen shrank. He swiped three fingers to the left to switch to the next application. He swiped four fingers upward to open the task view. The movements were smooth; the blue dots moved in real time with his fingers, without any delay.

"We've integrated the sensor and controller onto a single chip. This has reduced costs by 40%, power consumption by 50%, and the size by two-thirds. Now this chip can be installed in a mobile phone."

Ling Yun looked at the transparent glass panel. "Could we integrate the sensor directly onto the phone screen?"

Wayne paused for a moment. "Theoretically, it's possible. But two problems need to be solved. First, the transparent conductive material. The ITO we're using now has good light transmittance, but its resistance is too high, which will cause delays when making it large. Second, interference resistance. The area around the phone screen is full of antennas, batteries, and processors, creating a complex electromagnetic environment that will reduce the signal-to-noise ratio." He paused again. "Give me a year, and I can solve it."

Ling Yun said, "I'll give you two years. Money, people, equipment—you name it. The goal is to create a transparent touchscreen that can be operated directly with your fingers. This screen needs to be able to fit into a mobile phone."

Wayne nodded. "I understand."

Just as Ling Yun was about to leave, Wayne suddenly called out to him. "Mr. Ling, there's something I need to tell you."

Ling Yun turned around.

"Someone from Apple came to see me last week."

Ling Yun paused for a moment. "Jobs?"

"It wasn't Steve Jobs who came directly; it was a senior vice president from their hardware division. They said Apple was working on a new product that needed multi-touch technology. They had seen our patents and wanted to acquire Fingerworks."

Ling Yun looked at him. "What did you reply?"

"I told them that the company had already been acquired by Spark, and I couldn't make the decision. They then asked how much Spark was offering, and that Apple could offer double that amount."

Ling Yun was silent for a few seconds. "What do you want?"

Wayne looked at him and said seriously, "Mr. Ling, I've told you before, this technology is my achievement. Apple has money, but they don't understand this technology. They just want to buy it, stuff it into their products, and then slap on the Apple logo. You're different. You understand this technology. You gave me direction, money, and people, but you never interfered with how I did things. That's why I replied to them—Fingerworks is not for sale."

Ling Yun stared at him for several seconds. Then he reached out his hand.

"Thanks."

Wayne shook his hand. "You're welcome. I just want to perfect this technology. Working with you increases the chances of success."

It was already dark when Ling Yun left the lab. He got into his car, took out his phone, and sent a text message to Steve Jobs: "Steve, I heard your people went to Fingerworks."

A few minutes later, Jobs replied: "Ling, business is business. If you offer the highest price, I'll back out. But you should know that Apple won't give up on multi-touch."

Ling Yun looked at the message and replied: "Our Xinghuo Group will soon be able to implement multi-touch technology and have products available soon. You can place an order with the factory according to your needs."