At the end of 2020, Huawei Ren Zhengfei went to Shanxi Coal Mine for a field trip, changing the previous style of modest behavior, and performing extremely "high-profile". Not only did he lead a team that was unprecedentedly strong, involving six business group presidents and general managers, but he also personally made field visits to the 500-meter-deep underground.
The environment in the coal mine is not good, wet, cold, gray, very boring, but these did not stop Ren Zhengfei's footsteps, he inspected very carefully, and constantly communicated with the leaders of the coal mining company underground to express his views.
So the next day: Ren Zhengfei went to Shanxi to dig coal, Huawei laid out the coal industry and other keywords were suddenly on the hot search.
Many people are puzzled: coal mines are not a typical sunset industry, Huawei, as the leader of China's high-tech enterprises, even in a desperate situation, should not waste their energy to survive, right?
To sum up, if Huawei goes mining, is there still hope for the future of Chinese technology?
At that time, many people sent me private messages asking me to make a video, but I didn't do it right away, because I wanted to let the bullets fly for a while, and the result often took time to judge.
3 months later, Ren Zhengfei came to Shanxi again to participate in the unveiling ceremony of the "Intelligent Mine Innovation Laboratory", at which he once again changed his previous low-key style, laughing high-profile: "Now, my confidence is greater", this sentence was quickly used as the title of the article by mainstream media such as Xinhua net.
Two field visits and two high-profile visits are enough to show that Huawei is very optimistic about the coal mining industry.
Until this time, I roughly understood what Huawei really wanted, and after in-depth understanding, I understood that Huawei was exploring a way out for itself, and Huawei's coal mining was actually leading a big change in Chinese science and technology, and if this big change went smoothly, it would seek a century-old future for China.
Why? Today we will talk in detail about the Chinese dilemma and opportunities behind Huawei's layout of coal mines, click to watch: video version; Huawei's coal ambitions
How much does Huawei attach to China's coal mining industry? I'll say the next three points in time, and you can see it.
The first time point is: on December 31, 2020, ren Zhengfei went to Shanxi Coal Mine to investigate just half a month later, And Huawei established a coal group!
And appointed Zou Zhilei as the president of the group, Zou Zhilei is the former president of Huawei's operator business group, he joined Huawei in 1998, has been working in the global sales market for a long time, and has a strong business development ability.
Zou Zhilei
Just like when it was making mobile phones and chips, Huawei set up a special business group, which means that Huawei will officially enter the coal industry.
By February 2021, it was rumored within Huawei that Huawei was about to establish a coal army, which was the first time Huawei introduced the concept of a team, and it was clear that Huawei's emphasis on coal had risen another level, and it was really a tough battle to fight it.
The third time point is in April this year, Huawei Coal Corps was officially established, which is a special team composed of Huawei scientists, technical experts, product experts, engineering experts, sales experts, etc., it can be said that the elite legion of Huawei, Huawei will eventually set off a terrifying wave in the coal industry.
From the inspection to the establishment of the coal army, Huawei only took half a year, and the fast pace made Zou Zhilei sigh: "We have a monk before we have a temple." ”
Time is short and the pace is fast! During that time, the hot search was all About Huawei and coal mines, and Huawei's entry into coal mines was almost a foregone conclusion.
For Huawei's layout of the coal mining industry, in the eyes of most people, it is a gorgeous turn for Huawei to solve its own problems, but this will make many people lose their jobs; some people are not optimistic, thinking that Huawei is at the end of the road: it is to grab coal jobs in coal mines; there are more pessimistic people than this: Is the coal industry still worth grabbing?
To sum up: Huawei is a high-tech company, but now do not do serious things!
But Panda wants to say a word for Huawei: Huawei is not here to mine, Huawei's entry into the coal mine is a perfect self-help strategy, but also a major technological change, if they can succeed, will win the advantage of Chinese industry for decades or even a hundred years.
Why?
We also have to start from the misunderstood coal industry and the new infrastructure in China, after reading it, everyone will know how Huawei entered the coal mining industry.
Speaking of coal, let's do a small survey: China has been emphasizing reducing carbon emissions, so which do you think is more important for China's energy in the next 30 years?
Nuclear, hydrogen, or coal? You can choose for yourself.
In fact, the answer here is coal power, I don't know if it is unexpected, but it is true.
China has been developing clean energy over the years, and will be carbon neutral to the level of national strategy, many people subconsciously feel that coal will be eliminated sooner or later, in fact, the answer may disappoint everyone.
Coal plays a pivotal role in China's energy strategy, both now and in the future.
In 2020, coal occupies a 63% share of China's energy structure, occupying a dominant position and providing an absolute guarantee for China's industry, so in the energy industry, people often use "ballast stone and stabilizer" to describe the role of coal in energy supply.
The role of this ballast stone will not fail in the next 30 years.
By 2035, coal's share of energy will drop to about 49 percent, and then to about 30 percent around 2050. From 63% to 30%, its proportion seems to be declining at first glance, but coal is still the most demanded in the energy mix.
That is to say, although we are reducing the use of coal, in China's energy structure, whether it is now or in the next thirty years, coal will still not become obsolete, and even in China's planning, coal mines are still developing continuously, upgrading industries, rather than phasing out.
Behind this industrial upgrade is a major change in China's science and technology, which is the main reason for Huawei's layout of coal mines.
What is a technological change? It is to really change the existing technology and solve the worst pain points in the industry, many people are saying that Huawei is not doing the right thing, in fact, this kind of technological change is Huawei's best play, to understand this, but also to return to the pain point of the coal mining industry itself.
There are many problems in the coal mining industry: pollution, safety, poor environment, low profits, etc., and among them, the safety problem is the most prominent, and it is also the most headache.
For coal mining enterprises, it is often a matter of time to talk about the past, as long as there is a large coal mine accident, a company may only compensate will be bankrupt in situ, and the high-risk type of coal makes many people daunted.
Some people on the Internet say that Huawei's layout of the coal mining industry may make many people lose their jobs.
This sentence is typical of not knowing the suffering of others.
Now the slogan of young people is: I would rather deliver takeaway food than work in factories, and this slogan coal miners can not enjoy, for the coal mining industry: killing improper coal diggers is the first problem of most coal mining enterprises.
The average age of the downhole workers in some coal mining companies is more than 40 years old, which is the fatal problem in coal mines in China and even in the world: there is no successor.
In recent years, in order to solve the safety problems of coal mines, China has closed thousands of black coal mines, integrated resources to improve the technology of coal mines, the conditions have become better and better, and the mining industry has undergone earth-shaking changes.
However, the ideal is very full, but the reality is very bone!
China's coal industry has a gold standard to measure safety called: million tons of mortality, which means the proportion of deaths per 1 million tons of coal produced, if according to this indicator, China has actually made very good results.
The million-ton mortality rate fell from 22.5% in 1949 to 0.059% in 2020, and in 70 years, it has dropped 380 times, and there has not been a single particularly serious accident.
Source: China Coal Network
But the point is, although the million ton mortality rate has been declining, but the coal industry is too special, once an accident occurs, the survival rate is very low, and the number of employees is too much, in 2020, China has more than 5300 coal mines, the huge base is doomed to a low mortality rate has a large number of casualties, in 2020 China still has 225 people died in coal accidents.
Just like when we drive, everyone knows that a car accident is a fatal person, but as long as it is a person, it will make mistakes, and some mistakes are fatal once committed.
The same is true of the coal mining industry, if you open the investigation of coal mine accidents in China over the years, you will find that many of the causes of accidents are avoidable, but because people or machines make mistakes that cause accidents.
So in a high-risk profession like this, would you like your children to pursue this profession in the future? I'm sure a lot of people don't want to, because no one wants to trade their lives for survival if they're not forced to do so.
The same is true of China's attitude toward the coal industry, resolutely eliminating every hidden danger.
In the past, China's method was actually very simple, that is, to minimize the number of people, or even no one.
Over the years, the way China digs coal has gradually changed, from the early manual coal mining, to mechanization assistance, to automated coal mining, you can replace the place with machines, try not to use people, the need to go down the well of coal diggers is less and less, the purpose is to reduce the casualties of workers, but the underground environment is very complex, some places are still unable to operate remotely, the need for manual intervention.
So how exactly can we change it in order to solve it completely?
This question is destined to be the first to be eaten by a few technology companies such as Huawei, and the answer they give is: smart mine!
In December 2020, the coal mine that Ren Zhengfei investigated was the "China's First 5G Smart Coal Mine" in Shanxi, which is a sample of smart coal mines jointly built by Huawei, Shanxi Huayang Group, and operators.
This is a sample of turning traditional industries into China's large-scale technology shows, a big technological change.
"3 1 + N + 5" intelligent mine overall architecture
First of all, let's talk about what is a smart coal mine, as the name suggests, it is the comprehensive intelligence of the mine.
China used to be constantly mechanized, using machinery instead of manual coal mining, and intelligence is to go further in mechanization, unite these machines, and then assign these machines a unified brain to dispatch and make a net.
With this net, skilled workers can remotely control the machine in the office, the mining machine under the mine can automatically dig coal, automatically transport, and then the unmanned automatic driving coal truck can be seamlessly transported, truly unmanned coal mining.
It seems to be very complicated, in fact, to put it bluntly, it is still inseparable from the old routine of replacing people with machines, but it is an alternative here
It is no longer limited to the link of coal mining, but from mine exploration, design, monitoring, equipment networking, coal mining, etc., machines are used to replace or assist.
These problems were difficult before, but now they are promising to be achieved, and many of them have already been realized and are being promoted.
For example, monitoring, coal mines in the underground 500 meters deep is more complicated, the general machine can not patrol in place, so safety testing is to send inspectors to manual inspection.
However, manual inspection will miss a lot of problems, familiar with the mine is not familiar with the machine, familiar with the machine hardware is not familiar with the software system and so on, the result is obviously can be ruled out of the problem, but because of personal reasons or skills are not skilled and ignored, resulting in unnecessary casualties.
This problem in the intelligent mine, is by the robot to patrol, a patrol robot installed a lot of cameras, but also with a variety of scanners and other equipment, the patrol robot can shoot the mine, collect the first time after the information is fed back to the system.
The networking of robots here is through 5G technology.
In the past, the inspection was 3 shifts of manual inspection, people will always be tired, will be lazy, and now replaced by a machine can be 24 hours a day, multiple equipment at the same time inspection, safety undoubtedly increased a lot.
There are other links like inspections.
Use big data to store mine data, and then use cloud computing to analyze thousands of coal mines across the country to design better mining plans for coal mines; use 5G technology to connect various equipment links, and apply artificial intelligence coal trucks to transportation links.
Seeing this side, I believe that there are still people who question: no matter how much smart coal mines blow, they can't stop coal from going downhill, and they think that such a large energy to engage in these technologies is not practical.
Then I tell you, if you only have coal in your eyes, there is a high probability that you will not understand the future.
This brings us to the great technological changes that Huawei and other companies I mentioned at the beginning are making in China.
The 5G intelligent mine uses advanced technologies such as 5G technology + cloud computing + artificial intelligence + big data center, which is the concept of Science and Technology in China's 2020 fire and the content of China's new infrastructure.
These technologies can transform a dirty, chaotic coal mine hundreds of meters deep into an advanced intelligent workshop and a Chinese technology show, so do you think it can be in other metal mines? Is it possible to be in a rare earth mine? Is it possible in other industries?
Of course, and China has been doing this, intelligent logistics centers, unmanned intelligent terminals, China has many cases, but these are not enough, what we have to do is to explore a future path for China, this road is also related to another Chinese science and technology project: new infrastructure!
In May 2020, when the epidemic in China had just eased and the economy was still stalling, China proposed a plan to build new infrastructure, which attracted special attention at home and abroad.
The reason why people care about infrastructure is that in the history of infrastructure, every change is a great leap forward in industry: for example, in the steam age, steamships and other means of transportation were born, changing the mode of maritime transportation, and the British Empire became the hegemon of the sea, and was one of the first countries to accumulate original capital;
In the era of electricity, the performance of trains and high-speed rail has been improved, changing the mode of transportation on the road, and many countries have benefited from it, Europe, the United States, and Japan are the priority beneficiaries of road transportation, and these countries have become the world's manufacturing centers, and China is a latecomer.
In the information age, the Internet, computers and other equipment were born, changing the way of communication, and the United States took this leap to become the most developed country in the world.
The new infrastructure is the era of the industrial Internet, and this time it is destined to undergo a major change in the industrial field.
In the past, these infrastructure changes were led by Western countries, and Western countries achieved breakthroughs from 0 to 1, with a leading edge, so China has worked very hard, has been working hard to break through the technical blockade, we have spent hundreds of years to continuously make up lessons, and finally catch up on new infrastructure.
For the first time, China's 5G technology, cloud computing, big data centers, artificial intelligence and other technologies are at the world's leading level.
Since 2020, China has vigorously developed 5G base stations, and in more than a year, more than 900,000 base stations have been built, accounting for 70% of the world, and 10,000 coal mines around the world use 5G technology, more than half of which are in China.
This time, whether it is technology or conditions, China is ready to lead the world to achieve a breakthrough from 0 to 1. Once the breakthrough of 1 is achieved, China will achieve the same first-mover advantage in technology as the United Kingdom and the United States for a long time in the future, and achieve a hundred years of development time for China's industry.
However, the difficulty of science and technology is often difficult to go to the sky.
This breakthrough is destined to be painful, the leader is not so good, from 2020, China's 5G technology, the Internet of Everything, cloud computing and other concepts are boiling, but what is the result?
It's painful for ordinary people and businesses alike.
The biggest application of 5G technology lies in the Internet of Everything, which is a dividend that ordinary people can enjoy, but with 5G technology, where is the Internet of Everything? These things refer to various devices, and as a result, the equipment is not done, and the operator's 5G cost is first pressed on ordinary people.
5G is a scam that runs through almost every platform on the Internet.
5G technology is indeed our future, but like a thorn in the body of ordinary people, it only raises the pain point, but does not provide effect.
For enterprises are also equally confused, they are accustomed to following the development of developed countries, accustomed to picking up ready-made, 5G, cloud computing, etc. Composed of industrial Internet can indeed change the future of enterprises, seize the opportunity may soar, but the problem is that many Chinese companies have no experience, used to running, there is no courage to lead.
Some people do not have the courage to lead the way, even take the lead to run crooked, claiming to do data center enterprises, hanging a name to run to mining, took government subsidies, to create benefits for others to go, known as cloud computing to empower enterprises, small companies as leeks, cut stubble after stubble.
China's hard-won new infrastructure, taking a lot of detours, the whole world is looking at China, if we can't adjust the direction in time, then the hard-won leading edge will be gone.
China urgently needs a major change, and China also urgently needs a bellwether to explore a path for the future of the industrial Internet and lead Chinese enterprises back on track from the crooked road.
So Huawei and coal companies have joined forces, and the 5G smart coal mine they gave is a model. In 2021, when Huawei's coal mining corps was established, Ren Zhengfei's high hopes for the coal mining corps were: we must explore a path that can change society, and truly make 5G change society a reality.
That's why I said that Huawei is not here to dig coal, Huawei's coal business is the starting point of the industrial Internet project, not the end point, the reason why the coal mine is chosen as the starting point is because the coal mine is a representative of the traditional industry, it is hundreds of meters deep underground, more complicated than any enterprise.
If the industrial Internet can get the coal mining enterprises, other mining, other traditional industries why worry about it?
At present, there are more than 5,300 coal mines in China, and more than 2,000 metal mines, which is a huge market, which is not only in line with Huawei's needs to expand its business, but also as a bridgehead for China to explore the future of industry.
So can this road be opened?
Coal mining companies may seem complex, but problems can be solved.
After several evaluations of China's coal mines, Huawei Coal Corps confirmed that if the coal mine wants to be intelligent, it needs to face four problems: 1, there is no unified industry standard, 2, there is no unified equipment interface, 3, there is no unified operating system, 4, there is no unified database.
The old rule, science popularization, is that the coal mine was small and chaotic, the equipment was seven countries and eight systems, one would be imported and one would be domestically produced, and the interfaces of these devices were different, so there was no way to link these devices together and let the "brain" dominate. And these problems can be solved by Huawei and domestic equipment.
In February 2021, the first 5G smart mine built by Huawei and Huayang Group will have a full set of domestic equipment.
In June 2021, the China Natural Resources Administration issued the "Smart Mine Construction Code", and the concept and standard of smart mine are sweeping the Chinese coal mining industry, and this science and technology show will become bigger and bigger.
In September 2021, Huawei and the National Energy Group jointly released the Minhong Operation Software, China's first industrial operating system in the coal mining sector, which was evolved from the Hongmeng system.
In October 2021, China built the world's first highly reliable 5G dedicated network system for mining.
In other words, equipment, operating systems, industry standards, databases, China all needs, Huawei and China Coal are ready to use 30 years to explore a path for China.
The future pattern of China's coal mines has almost gone smoothly, but the task of Huawei's army has not stopped.
In October this year, Huawei officially established the Customs and Port Corps, the Smart Highway Corps, the Data Center Energy Corps, and the Smart PV Corps after the Coal Corps.
Huawei's scarred plane will eventually lead China on the road to rejuvenation.
And these legions, will they be another legend, and what kind of terrifying waves will they set off in the industry? Next, I will make these contents into a special topic, want to see which topic remember to pay attention to the message, more words give priority to Oh!
Well I'm a panda, we'll see you next time!