Chapter 205 Going All-In on NAND
The Spring Festival doesn't necessarily bring spring itself, nor does spring mean warmth yet. But compared to the constant gloom before the New Year, a few more rays of sunshine were enough to lift everyone's spirits.
After every New Year holiday, it was always the logistics department's uncles and aunties who suffered the most—they were the last to go on break and the first to return. Of course, the security department was also among the most hardworking, with staff patrolling around the clock even during the festival.
Su Yuanshan had returned to Yuanxin two days early—because Ye Rudai had arrived.
Ye Rudai still favored her simple black-and-white style. She wore jeans, sneakers, and a white down jacket that seemed impossible to keep clean.
Of course, she had a pair of sleeve covers tucked in her pocket at all times.
"Last month's national preliminaries exposed a big problem: our team collaboration skills are terrible," Ye Rudai said as she walked side by side with Su Yuanshan toward the Yuanxin apartments. After not seeing each other for just under a month and going through the New Year, she looked a bit thinner, but her eyes were much more spirited.
The "preliminaries" she referred to were naturally the regional qualifiers for the ACM-ICPC, the international collegiate programming competition, sponsored by Yuanxin.
As an outstanding contestant who had risen through the National High School Programming Competition and later received guidance from Xi Xiaoding at Yuanxin, Ye Rudai's team had secured second place without much difficulty, earning a spot in the finals.
The other two qualifying teams were from Tsinghua and Zhejiang University.
At the end of April, these three teams would head to Philadelphia to compete for medals and championships among more than a hundred teams.
"So your Professor Gao wants you to solo it?" Su Yuanshan teased.
"Hmm?" Ye Rudai looked confused.
"I mean, take on the whole thing yourself," he explained.
Ye Rudai pursed her lips and gave a soft sigh, "Of course he didn't say it outright, but he has high hopes for me. That's why I wanted to come early and train with Professor Xi again—hope that's not too much trouble?"
Su Yuanshan chuckled. "How could it be trouble? You'll be part of Yuanxin sooner or later. Training you now is an investment."
Ye Rudai chuckled, opening her mouth but unable to find a comeback.
It was true. Her plan all along had been to join Yuanxin and work under Xi Xiaoding—she loved the atmosphere here. It was just like a university campus, or perhaps even better: everyone could quietly and diligently pursue what they loved.
After helping Ye Rudai settle her luggage in the dormitory, they headed to the cafeteria.
Since the cafeteria workers had only returned the previous day to clean and sanitize, today's meal offerings were understandably simple.
"Hey, President Shan."
Seeing Su Yuanshan enter, the cafeteria manager, who had returned early, quickly trotted over, rubbing his hands apologetically. "Today's food is pretty basic. Shall I have someone whip up a few quick dishes?"
Su Yuanshan glanced at the serving area and found only three large trays: two vegetable dishes, one meat dish, and a pot of clear soup that looked more like dishwater.
"No need to trouble yourselves, it's cold out..." he began to say but stopped when he noticed the manager's gaze shifting behind him. He turned around instinctively and saw Xi Xiaoding and Qu Hui walking through the door.
"Senior Brother? Sister Qu Hui?" Su Yuanshan turned and greeted them, a little surprised.
The four of them weren't exactly picky about food. Particularly Xi Xiaoding and Qu Hui, who had other matters to attend to, so they had simply asked the cafeteria to prepare a basic tomato-egg soup.
Back during the summer, Xi Xiaoding had bought a house in the provincial capital and had brought his mother over, officially settling down. Qu Hui was a local by birth.
In conversation, Su Yuanshan learned that Qu Hui had dragged Xi Xiaoding here not because the two of them had secretly become a couple—his first panicked thought—but because Qu Hui's mechanical CAD project had run into trouble.
Initially, the vector line drawing tools used for mechanical CAD had been based on Yuanxin's earliest EDA source code.
Drawing a smooth, precise curve was a fundamental skill in graphical design. Yuanxin's early curve tools relied on Bézier curves—sufficient for integrated circuit layout design. However, once transferred to CAD and applied to industrial modeling, Bézier curves failed to meet the continuity requirements needed for true industrial design.
This caused Qu Hui's team to hit a wall, until Xi Xiaoding, returning from a trip westward, brought back the international standard known as PHIGS (Programmer's Hierarchical Interactive Graphics System), which included standard functions necessary for industrial modeling.
—Specifically, Non-Uniform Rational B-Splines, or NURBS for short.
Now a new problem had emerged—using the new functions to draw industrial curves sometimes caused unpredictable program crashes.
"So I'll leave Yezi in your hands, then," Su Yuanshan said quickly, feeling a headache coming on.
Qu Hui shot a glance at Ye Rudai's puzzled face and grumbled, "And what about you?"
"I'm going to work on Hall devices," Su Yuanshan said, laughing.
...
With employees gradually returning, the Tech Park soon regained its vitality and buzz.
On the third day, Monday.
The first high-level meeting after the New Year was held, smoothly chaired by Chen Jing.
By now, Su Xinghe had completely withdrawn from daily management at the Tech Park. Even when he showed up, it was usually to discuss supercomputer design plans with his senior student, Qin Weimin.
Inside the conference room, Chen Jing sat at the head of the table. To her left were the corporate team: Wang Rui, Wan Yongliang, Liu Hongyan, and others. To her right were the technical team: Xi Xiaoding, Su Yuanshan, Qin Weimin, Tian Yaoming, and—finally, after much delay—Li Mingliu.
Although Chen Jing presided over the entire meeting, she remained mainly responsible for the corporate side. After assigning this year's corporate goals, she nodded at Su Yuanshan to begin.
This division of labor had long become an unspoken understanding. Xi Xiaoding, despite his high rank and influence, disliked and wasn't skilled in administrative management; he preferred being a "mascot"—if any issue came up, he usually sent a graduate student secretary to handle it.
"From the R&D Center side," Su Yuanshan said, "this year we have three major tasks."
"First is the integration of the YX architecture with the baseband," he said, looking at Qin Weimin and Tian Yaoming. "Senior Brothers, it's up to you."
Both nodded seriously.
"Second, the CPU team. Senior Brother Gao..." Su Yuanshan turned to Gao Xiaodi, sitting next to Li Mingliu. "By the end of this year, we need to reach the mask design stage."
Gao Xiaodi's expression tightened. He responded firmly, "Understood!"
Su Yuanshan nodded slightly but couldn't hide a faint crease of concern on his brow.
Last year had been Gao Xiaodi's first under Su Yuanshan's direct mentorship. Though capable, Gao still lacked experience. Appointing him to lead the CPU team was a necessary compromise.
This year, Su Yuanshan had too many things to juggle and couldn't dedicate himself fully to CPU development.
Plus, Li Mingliu had already stated he wanted to focus entirely on secondary cache this year—he wouldn't get dragged back into CPU architecture.
And in terms of internal ranking, Yuanxin's best architect was clearly Su Yuanshan himself, followed by Qin Weimin, and then Gao Xiaodi.
"Third," Su Yuanshan continued, looking at Li Mingliu, "Senior Brother Li, you can continue developing secondary cache, but you'll also need to build a new team."
Li Mingliu leaned forward slightly, meeting Su Yuanshan's gaze. "What team?"
"NAND Flash Memory."
Su Yuanshan paused slightly for emphasis. "You could call it a NAND flash storage team. You should already be familiar with the related technology."
As Su Yuanshan finished speaking, all the technical people at the table turned their heads to look at him.
Li Mingliu's eyes flickered slightly. "The one Hitachi is working on? Meant to replace NOR memory?"
"Exactly. NOR is fast but expensive. NAND can be produced much cheaper. And the technology is becoming quite mature now—the only issue is capacity isn't quite there yet."
"And so," Su Yuanshan said with a soft chuckle, "I have a somewhat immature suggestion."
Li Mingliu's expression turned serious. "What suggestion?"
"Go all-in on NAND. Create a new architecture."
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