association
As a company founded in 1984 by the Institute of Computing of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lenovo once had an incomparably brilliant history, and compared with the doubts of many people about its scientific and technological research and development, it is undoubtedly very regrettable. Many people think that Lenovo only has a computer business, but they do not know that in the 1990s, Lenovo's telecommunications equipment business was also very powerful, even overpowering Huawei.
Academician Ni Guangnan, a communication equipment of "seven countries and eight systems"
Back in the 1980s, the domestic telephone communication business had just risen, and due to weak technical strength, all from rural telephones to the national backbone telephone network were monopolized by foreign communication equipment manufacturers. Most of the old telecom people know the "seven countries and eight systems" - NEC and Fujitsu from Japan, Ericsson from Sweden, Nortel from Canada, Siemens from Germany, Lucent from the United States, Alcatel in France and BTM from Belgium have divided up the Chinese communication equipment market.
Foreign manufacturers are not only expensive, but also incompatible with each other in the standards of many manufacturers, which also makes the domestic installation costs and usage tariffs very expensive, which has also caused a great impact on the development of the domestic communications industry. In the face of this dilemma, many domestic manufacturers have begun to enter the field of communication equipment, not only for the development of their own enterprises, but also to break the rule of foreign enterprises.
Academician Ni Guangnan
Among these enterprises that are trying to break through, there is Lenovo. Under the leadership of Ni Guangnan, the chief engineer of Lenovo at the time, Lenovo set up a project to develop a digital program-controlled switch in 1992, and the main person in charge was a doctoral student brought out by Ni Guangnan, who graduated from the Department of Computer Science of Tsinghua University. Thanks to Lenovo's investment in technology research and development on personal computers and the accumulation of ASIC chips in Hanka, lenovo finally developed the first switch, LEX 5000, with a user capacity of 2.5 times that of Huawei C&C08 2000.
Lenovo LEX 5000 switch
At that time, Lenovo's sales had reached 1.7 billion, and it had a lot of technical support from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, so Lenovo won a big victory in the competition of the first generation of products. At that time, the total domestic communication equipment market was as high as more than 10 billion, and if Lenovo continued to insist, then its achievements were bound to be unlimited.
However, after the first hit, Lenovo's second-generation program control machine fell into a dilemma, the main reason was that Lenovo was in a split at that time. As the chief engineer, Ni Guangnan advocates taking the "technology industry and trade" route, while general manager Liu Chuanzhi advocates taking the "trade industry and technology" route. Program-controlled switches have become victims of this struggle: Lenovo Chairman Zeng Maochao, Chief Engineer Ni Guangnan, Deputy General Manager Hu Jingyu, etc. have repeatedly jointly requested Liu Chuanzhi to allocate funds to the program-controlled switch division, and even the amount is only 5% of the microcomputer department led by Yang Yuanqing, but liu Chuanzhi has refused.
Huawei C&C08 switches
In the end, Huawei quickly came up with the second generation of C&C08 million door machines with the strong support of Ren Zhengfei, swept the domestic communication equipment market with more advanced technology and low prices, and reached 800 million in sales in 94 and 1.5 billion in 1995, eventually becoming the largest sales switch in the history of the world, so Huawei also officially began its own rise.
On the contrary, Academician Ni Guangnan was dismissed from all posts on June 30, 1995, and all the technologies and projects he led were also hidden and abandoned.
"Around 1994, when we entered the communication field, the brand, capital and technology and other aspects of the conditions were much superior to Huawei. After the second program-controlled switch was sold, the development fee was earned back. But because I stepped down, Lenovo did not support it. I stepped down alone, but a large number of scientific and technological personnel who were close to me also left under pressure. ”
Write at the end
The former Lenovo undoubtedly had better opportunities and conditions than Huawei, but unfortunately, because Liu Chuanzhi finally chose the "trade industry and technology" route, it was completely abandoned. If Lenovo at that time could treat Academician Ni Guangnan and those R&D personnel kindly, then Lenovo's achievements today would never be just that, it can only be said to be too regrettable.
Resources:
【1】. "Lenovo Bigger, Huawei Stronger", Tao Yong, 2016
【2】. "Losing Associations", Wang Yukun, 2004
【3】. "Trade and Industry Technology Delayed Lenovo for 7 Years", Ni Guangnan, 2005
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