"Nikola Tesla Award" winner Zhu Ziqiang: I have always criticized "Tesla"

Xu Tan

If there were two people in the world who had crossed over, one would be Leonardo da Vinci; the other would be Nikola Tesla, a scientist who was worshipped as almost close to God.

Musk named Tesla Cars after him, both as a tribute to his idol and as a declaration that Tesla is a technology-driven high-tech company.

Born in 1856, Nikola Tesla is known as the "father of alternating current", nominated for the Nobel Prize 9 times, to this day, is still full of mystery and controversy, his scientific achievements in the field of electrical are beyond doubt, but where is the boundary between science and business, whether scientists must have entrepreneurial thinking, is still controversial.

Economist Zhang Weiying once said of Tesla in an interview in December 2021: "Nikola Tesla's creativity and contribution are no worse than Edison's. Edison turned electricity into lighting, and Tesla turned electricity into a power, into a mechanical force, and finally replaced the steam engine, which was Tesla's contribution. Tesla ended up poor, he didn't have the qualities of an entrepreneur, he was a scientist, an inventor. ”

Nikola Tesla, an American native of Selvia, showed an extraordinary scientific talent from an early age, supposedly relying on intuition to guide his designs and inventions. Shortly after Edison invented direct current, in 1882, Nikola Tesla invented alternating current.

Tesla worked as an engineer at Edison's company in the early days, responsible for the redesign of the company's DC motor, which allowed Edison to obtain a lot of patent ownership and huge profits. When Tesla asked Edison for $50,000, Edison was said to respond to him: "Tesla, you don't understand our American humor" because Edison broke his promise and the two parted ways.

A classic example of Nikola Tesla's conflict between science and business is his relationship with the financial oligarch J. P. Morgan's disagreement.

After Nikola Tesla left Edison, he founded the Tesla Electric Light and Electrical Manufacturing Company, J. P. Morgan had supported him in building the Warden Cleaver Tower (Wireless Power Transmission Tower) for the purpose of radio communications, and Morgan was interested in business opportunities, not science. However, Tesla's main experiment in Walden Clifford tower is the advanced wireless power supply (wireless power supply refers to the transmission of electrical energy through non-physical contact, which is the third wireless revolution after wireless communication and wireless network, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the United States only began this project in 2007).

On December 12, 1901, the radio information transmitted by the Italian scientist Marconi successfully crossed the Atlantic Ocean, and Marconi was granted a patent for radio. This made Morgan very angry, stopped funding Tesla, and also made Tesla heavily indebted. It is said that Morgan also used the huge influence of the political and economic circles to make all textbooks in the United States delete Tesla's name and contributions, which is one of the reasons why posterity knows so little about Tesla.

Tesla spent the rest of his life as a mad scientist, experimenting with weird inventions that the world couldn't understand, and constantly sending messages to Mars. This should also be the reason why Musk admires Tesla.

Tesla admirers see him as "the man who created the twentieth century", because Tesla is one of the greatest electronic engineers in the United States, and the world's largest professional and technical organization, the IEEE Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, established the "IEEE Nikola Tesla Award" in 1975 to commemorate the founder of electromagnetics, Nikola Tesla, which is like the "Nobel Prize" in the field of electrical, to recognize scientists who have made outstanding contributions in the field of power generation and electricity consumption.

In October 2021, the IEEE Nikola Tesla Award was awarded to a Chinese, Zhu Ziqiang, the second Chinese to win the award in 50 years. In recognition of his contributions to the design, modeling, control and application of permanent magnet AC motors and their drives.

Zhu Ziqiang has many titles, academician of the Royal Academy of Engineering, top professor of the University of Sheffield, director of the Shanghai Electric R&D Center of Midea Group, and so on. Zhu Ziqiang graduated from Zhejiang University and has since worked in the UK. He has been working in the field of electric motors for about 35 years and has long-term cooperation with many international famous companies such as Siemens, Toyota, and BMW.

Recently, the author had an exchange with Professor Zhu Ziqiang on topics such as motors, new energy vehicles and scientific research.

The following is the author's conversation with Professor Zhu Ziqiang:

Academician of the Royal Academy of Engineering

Q: You are the second Chinese person to receive this award in nearly 50 years, for which research did you receive this award? Can you tell us about your experience?

Zhu Ziqiang: I was admitted to university in 1977, studied undergraduate and master's degrees at Zhejiang University, and stayed on as a teacher for 4 years after graduation. In the past 4 years, I have cooperated with many Chinese companies, so I have a better understanding of the urgency of domestic enterprises for technology.

In 1988, I went to work at the University of Sheffield in the United Kingdom, where I have been doing research on permanent magnet motors and forming a scientific research team.

I won the award for my technical contributions in the design, modeling, control and application of permanent magnet motors. My personal feeling should be two aspects, one is academic and the other is applied.

Academically, because I studied permanent magnet motors relatively early, I have been in the UK for 33 years, and I have been engaged in permanent magnet motors here, and the history of permanent magnet motors is less than 40 years.

Another important point is that my current team, the University of Sheffield Motor and Drive R&D Team, is the most famous in the field of permanent magnet motors in the world, and is also the world's largest and internationally leading Motor and Drive R&D team of the University of Sheffield in the field of permanent magnet motor systems, including 89 professors, 32 senior lecturers, 34 lecturers, more than 100 doctoral students and postdocs, in addition, we have also participated in the creation and supervision of a number of research centers.

Q: In the track of new energy vehicles, what is the status of the motor technology of Chinese companies?

Zhu Ziqiang: In the field of new energy vehicles, the motors of foreign companies I think are doing a better job of innovation than we do. BMW, Toyota, Nissan, they all have their own innovative structures in the field of electric motors. But I don't think any of the motors in China's new energy vehicles have innovations.

I have talked to the relevant person in charge of electric vehicles in many domestic companies, their concept and psychology are like this, that is, as long as I can sell it anyway, the foreign motor will be used by me. Research and development takes time and costs money, and then the research and development results are easily infringed on intellectual property rights and copied. Simply not doing innovation is not conducive to the long-term development of enterprises.

Q: I see you've been "criticizing" Tesla for the past few years?

Zhu Ziqiang: Haha, this "Tesla" (Tesla Motors) is not the "Tesla" (Nikola Tesla). Tesla cars started with asynchronous motors, and Musk bragged at the time that the acceleration was fast and that the electric car had a good endurance, and I didn't believe it at first.

Later found that Tesla did not brag, said completely correct, this asynchronous motor has two great characteristics, the first is that its overload capacity is very strong, more than all motors, more than the permanent magnet motor about 2 times. Second, when the asynchronous motor runs long distances, it is very efficient when it is on the highway, so this is very suitable for the United States.

Why did Tesla later change to a permanent magnet motor? Because the current battery life problems lead to the current efficiency of asynchronous motors, new energy vehicles in the city application more, just the city environmental pollution is more serious, so asynchronous motors are not very suitable. In fact, I have been criticizing Tesla before Tesla has changed to a permanent magnet motor, and I have also written an academic paper. Why? I think he used it wrong, there are currently problems with battery life, and the asynchronous motor system is running at about 15% lower than the permanent magnet motor, which is why almost all manufacturers now use permanent magnet motors.

Q: At present, permanent magnet motors account for about 99% of the market share in new energy drive motors, and rare earths are often needed in the materials of permanent magnet motors, and China is the country with the richest reserves of rare earths in the world. This also seems to be where the use of permanent magnet motors is controversial?

Zhu Ziqiang: The current permanent magnet motor is basically a "rare earth permanent magnet motor", and rare earth resources are basically in China, China has more than 80% of the world's rare earth materials, foreign countries are very worried about this, in case of China's card neck what to do.

So the focus of foreign research now is different from the focus of China, we use rare earth permanent magnet motors in China, although foreign countries are also using permanent magnet motors, but he has done a lot of research on how to replace permanent magnet motors.

Some domestic enterprises are also following some foreign programs, which is not necessary, and enterprises themselves need to have judgment in research and development.

Q: The traditional thinking of home appliance companies is "marketing-oriented", and in recent years, Fang Hongbo, chairman of Midea, has adjusted Midea's positioning to a "technology-oriented" company. Is your choice of cooperation with the United States related to Fang Hongbo's strategic adjustment?

Zhu Ziqiang: There are two reasons for cooperation with the United States, on the one hand, the degree of desire of the United States for technology makes me very surprised, thinking that without technological transformation, the enterprise cannot develop for a long time.

There is a common state in China, that is, everyone must engage in scientific and technological leadership, but how to achieve scientific and technological leadership is not clear. It just so happens that our team has experience in this area, which is the experience of working with large international companies. That's why Beauty chose me.

I think the transformation of the United States is to become a company with leading technology and technology research and development, and I think this idea is very correct, so I agreed on the spot. Midea's Shanghai Electric Motor R&D Center is a off-site R&D center of Midea Group.

We once rented a room in a hotel in Shanghai to interview engineers, a bit of a leather bag company feeling, haha. I really appreciated the trust that the engineers had placed in me and eventually established an R&D center.

Q: You have docked with many large international and domestic companies, what are the main points to enhance the company's technical strength?

Zhu Ziqiang: The first is talent, talent is difficult to define, is the person with a doctoral degree called a talent? That's not true. A field must have a top leader, for example, CRRC has several senior experts.

The second is to have technology, since it is a scientific and technological field, technology is very important.

The third is to have a market. How to occupy the market depends on the product. Your innovation must also be reflected in the product.

Q: Some large international companies have a strong sense of patent layout, and have even become a means of setting up barriers to competition?

Zhu Ziqiang: The company needs to have a sense of property rights, and carry out patent layout, the company needs to study the international patent research in the subdivision field clearly, based on this patent layout, superimposed the company itself has a strong research and development capabilities, so as to achieve the ultimate use of science and technology to occupy the market.

Once the layout of science and technology to occupy the market is completed, it will become very difficult for competitors to compete again, and technology transfer fees will need to be paid. There are very few domestic drive motor companies that really do patent layout, although these companies also have invention patents, but they are not competitive in intellectual property competition.

Q: Many of your R&D centers abroad are funded by large companies, and who owns the final intellectual property rights of the research results obtained?

Zhu Ziqiang: I am currently cooperating with enterprises, and all intellectual property rights are owned by enterprises and used by enterprises.

For example, my team works with Siemens, and all the intellectual property rights are owned by Siemens. We have more than 200 patents, and I'm one of the inventors, but none of those 200 patents are owned by me. The company industrialized this patent, and the proceeds were returned to the school and the scientific research team in the form of scientific research funds, and our research center went to recruit new doctors and postdocs.

This is different from the domestic, because it is difficult for British universities to obtain government research funding, and the government's support is not as large as in China, so it is more to cooperate with enterprises to obtain scientific research funds, and our team has done a little better in the combination of academic and application, that is, the industry,000 research has been more successful.

Look closely at many of the companies we work with, not just British companies, but global companies, such as Siemens, which is headquartered in Germany.