Chapter 33 White Box Testing
The National Day holiday hadn't yet become a "Golden Week," but the three-day break still gave people, who normally worked six days a week, enough time to relax—and incidentally boosted pager sales.
Motorola's Chinese-character display pagers re-entered the public eye through its established channels, but their former aura of "high-tech prestige" had faded—launching their product two months after the domestic models, they no longer had the nerve to claim superiority. As a result, the worrying situation Zhang Ke had feared didn't happen.
Instead, both brands tacitly agreed to set similar prices, taking advantage of the production ramp-up period to grab profits first.
After the holiday, Su Yuanshan received a call from Pan Xiaojun.
Pan had traveled south with a "planting flags as he went" strategy, setting up Yuanxin branch offices in both Shanghai and Shenzhen—the two major semiconductor hubs—and successfully recruited new employees, quickly opening up the market within just two months.
"Little President Su, UMC suggests that instead of meeting in Hong Kong, they'd like to send a delegation directly to Yuanxin headquarters."
"Huh? Have they lost their minds?" Su Yuanshan stared at the phone, confused.
At that time, cross-strait relations were still complicated. Although "Three Links" were often discussed, in practice, business and family visits had to go through Hong Kong.
Su Yuanshan had initially agreed to meet in Hong Kong precisely to avoid causing trouble—he hadn't expected UMC to be willing to take the risk.
Pan Xiaojun laughed over the line. "I don't know. Maybe they really want to check us out in person."
"Heh, if they're willing to go through all that trouble, fine. But tell them if they're coming, they better hurry—on the 20th, we're heading to Las Vegas."
After hanging up, Su Yuanshan opened a file folder and sorted through the patents they would file during the Las Vegas trip. Then he walked into the finance office.
"Sister Tang, how much foreign currency do we have on hand?"
Tang Wenfang, the finance officer, a woman in her early thirties with a neat short haircut, answered without hesitation: "Five point three seven million yuan—we transferred 500,000 to Zhongxin, which hasn't been paid back yet."
Yuanxin's strong foreign exchange reserves were largely thanks to Yang Yiwen's family connections and Yuanxin's tough negotiating stance.
If worst came to worst, Yuanxin could still operate through an offshore company, and customs couldn't stop it.
"Alright, Sister-in-law, help me calculate how much we'll need in U.S. dollars," Su Yuanshan said, handing the folder to Yang Yiwen and slumping onto the sofa, rubbing his forehead.
Yuanxin EDA wasn't like the foreign companies that sold one version per license. Su Yuanshan wanted a "continuous drip" model—constantly releasing updates to bind customers tightly to Yuanxin EDA.
Thus, the need for patent applications was massive.
The core competitiveness of industry software was functionality and forward-thinking.
In a gaming analogy: when others were still modding basic cheat codes, Yuanxin would have already developed god-mode hacks.
While others caught up, Yuanxin would have moved on to cloud automation.
—This ruthless model would utterly crush their competitors.
"Total of eighteen patents. If we go through agents for full service, it'll cost about 300,000 USD," Yang Yiwen quickly calculated based on previous quotes.
"Those blood-sucking agents…" Su Yuanshan grumbled.
Yang Yiwen shrugged. "No helping it. Western lawyers are expensive. Not like here."
"...True," Su Yuanshan said, unable to argue.
"By the way, Sister-in-law, does Senior Brother mind you coming to Vegas with us?" he teased.
Yang Yiwen smirked. "He's thrilled. Asked me to bring him back a pair of sneakers—no idea why. Does he even play sports?"
Thinking of the increasingly chubby Tang Wenjie, Su Yuanshan laughed.
"Honestly, Sister-in-law, how did you fall for Senior Brother?"
Only someone like Su Yuanshan—still technically "underage"—could ask such a cheeky question without sounding rude.
Everyone thought Yang Yiwen, with her looks and background, was clearly out of Tang Wenjie's league.
Unexpectedly, Yang Yiwen didn't joke around this time. She smiled gently and said, "Have you ever seen the scars on his belly?"
"No."
"We were high school classmates. One night, after evening classes, I ran into two thugs on my way home. You know me—fiery temper—so I slapped both of them. Things escalated fast. Just when I was about to get hurt, your Senior Brother showed up, grabbed a brick, and fought those guys.
He took two stab wounds that night. Lucky for him, none were fatal."
Su Yuanshan listened in stunned silence.
"Yeah, he was quite the hero back then. Even after getting stabbed, he still smashed a guy's face with a brick. I nearly fainted holding him... Sometimes, a little extra fat isn't a bad thing," she added with a laugh.
Seeing Yang Yiwen's pride and happiness, Su Yuanshan smiled.
"Hero saving beauty—classic love story. But you were only sixteen or seventeen?"
"Yeah, so what?"
"Nothing. I'm happy for you," Su Yuanshan said, marveling at how they had maintained a long-distance relationship for five years through high school and university—a rare feat.
After some more small talk, Su Yuanshan returned to his office.
After thinking for a bit, he decided to call Pan Xiaojun.
Originally, he had planned to personally travel to Hong Kong and hire an agency to set up an offshore company in the Cayman Islands—he had even faked his ID to appear a year older, making himself officially eighteen.
But if UMC insisted on visiting Yuanxin, the offshore company arrangement would have to be handled by Pan Xiaojun.
Setting up an offshore company had endless benefits, from tax avoidance to easier international collaborations.
**
Four days later, a UMC delegation of three, accompanied by Pan Xiaojun, arrived by plane from Shanghai.
Zhang Ke, now driving his newly bought Santana, picked them up.
The three UMC engineers—visiting mainland China for the first time—kept mostly silent during the ride, communicating with glances.
Clearly, they still didn't quite believe that a world-class EDA could have been developed amid rice fields and wheat fields.
As the Santana drove into the provincial capital, the city, though gradually reviving, still carried an air of old-fashioned leisure.
Old men chatting at tea stalls, aunties playing mahjong, young people getting ear cleanings on the street corners, beautiful girls with backpacks strolling by...
The whole city seemed to move at a leisurely pace.
Following Su Yuanshan's instructions, Yuanxin operated as usual.
No welcome banners, no ceremonies.
Su Yuanshan simply waited in the lab.
Pan Xiaojun arrived first to introduce everyone.
"Little President Su, these are UMC engineers: Lin Yonggu, Jiang Mingqi, and Chen Zihao."
"Gentlemen, this is Little President Su I mentioned before."
"Welcome to Yuanxin," Su Yuanshan said, shaking hands with the somewhat bewildered trio.
Then he cut straight to the chase: "Shall we get right to the product demonstration?"
The three exchanged glances. Lin Yonggu smiled slightly. "That's exactly what we were hoping."
Su Yuanshan nodded and opened a new project.
...
Half an hour later, after Su Yuanshan had finished simulating a simple switch-mode power control chip, he spun his chair around to face the three stunned UMC engineers.
"Yuanxin looks forward to building a strong relationship with a world-class wafer fab like UMC.
Are you satisfied with Yuanxin EDA?"
Lin Yonggu licked his dry lips. "May I try?"
"Please."
Sitting down, Lin Yonggu mimicked Su Yuanshan's steps: created a new project, designed some registers, entered a few instructions, set up microcode, and added logic gates.
The ease and fluidity made him feel less like he was designing a chip and more like crafting a masterpiece.
"We are very satisfied," Lin Yonggu said, standing up and shaking Su Yuanshan's hand.
"We'd like to order forty sets and request that your team station personnel at UMC to assist us in upgrading our processes and collaborating on improvements."
"Stationing a team is no problem," Su Yuanshan said, smiling. "But I have one request..."
"Please, go ahead."
"I hope your company will allow us to conduct white box testing in your clean rooms."
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