Chapter 429: Company System and Future Planning

In September 1982, Shenzhen's air still retained the lingering might of summer heat, but mornings and evenings already carried a hint of autumn.

Along the central avenue of Pingshan Industrial Park, the newly planted camphor trees had taken root, their leaves gleaming with an oily sheen in the sunlight.

At the end of the avenue, the white eight‑story R&D building stood like a drawn sword, pointing straight at the azure sky. On its roof, the six gilt characters "Wanshang R&D Center" shone brightly in the morning light.

At 8:30 a. m., more than thirty people were seated in the meeting room.

The front rows held the factory directors and deputy directors of each plant, the middle rows the department heads, and the back rows the technical backbone. The air was filled with the smell of fresh furniture paint, ink on paper, and a certain tense, anticipatory feeling.

When Li Ping'an entered the meeting room, everyone rose to their feet.

"Sit."

He walked to the main seat, sat down without any pleasantries, and directly opened the folder.

"Today's meeting will cover only three items."

His voice was not loud, but each word struck like a nail, driven into the silent air.

"First, the piece‑rate wage system for the garment factory."

"Second, Wanxiang Group's corporate governance system."

"Third, the R&D direction for the next five years."

The garment factory director was Zhou Minghua, forty‑five, a native of Sheung Cheng; he had worked twenty years at a state‑owned garment factory, rising from seamstress to production section chief. Three months earlier, when Li Yaozong had lured him over, he had still hesitated—private enterprise, unstable.

But now, looking at the "Implementation Details of the Piece‑Rate Wage System" in his hand, his hand trembled slightly.

It was too detailed.

So detailed that it broke the making of a pair of jeans into twelve processes: cutting, overlocking, sewing the front piece, sewing the back piece, joining the side seams, attaching the waistband, riveting, sewing on buttons, making buttonholes, ironing, inspection, and packaging.

After each process, the standard time and base wage were listed.

"Cutting: standard time three minutes, base wage four fen five li."

"Overlocking: standard time two and a half minutes, base wage four fen."

"Sewing the front piece: standard time four and a half minutes, base wage seven fen……

Zhou Minghua quickly calculated in his mind.

A skilled worker, working eight hours a day minus breaks, has seven effective hours. If he spent all that time sewing front pieces, he could make ninety‑three pieces, earning six yuan five jiao.

Yet the fixed wage he currently gives workers is only forty‑two yuan per month.

That averages to one yuan four jiao per day.

"Manager Li," Zhou Minghua could not help raising his hand, "these wages…… are they too high?"

Everyone in the meeting room turned their gaze toward him.

Li Ping'an lifted his head.

"High?"

"High." Zhou Minghua said, forcing himself to speak, "It's more than three times what the state factory pays. Moreover…… moreover, the processes are also graded."

He pointed to the annotation on the document.

For technically demanding processes, such as sewing the lapel of a suit, the wage is increased by fifty percent; for simple repetitive processes, such as sewing on buttons, the base wage applies; for labor‑intensive processes, such as sewing cotton‑padded jackets, there is an additional subsidy.

"That's exactly why it needs to be high." Li Ping'an set down his pen, "If it's not high, how do we motivate enthusiasm? If it's not high, how do we retain good workers?"

He walked to the whiteboard and drew a table.

"Let's do the math."

"A pair of trumpet pants costs 3.5 yuan for fabric, 0.5 yuan for trimmings, total piece‑rate wage 1.2 yuan, apportioned management fee 0.5 yuan, total cost 5.7 yuan. Wholesale price 8.5 yuan, profit 2.8 yuan."

"A skilled worker can make twenty pairs of pants a day, earning 24 yuan in piece‑rate wages. Working twenty‑six days a month, that's 624 yuan."

A chorus of sharp intakes of breath sounded in the meeting room.

Six hundred twenty‑four yuan.

That equals the annual salary of a state‑factory director.

"When workers earn more, the factory earns more." Li Ping'an looked at Zhou Minghua, "Director Zhou, you're a veteran—tell me, if you could choose, would you rather take a fixed wage in a state factory and loaf, or would you rather be here, where you earn more for working more?"

Zhou Minghua opened his mouth but said nothing.

He recalled those scenes from the state factory—the work‑shift bell rang, workers trudged lazily into the workshop. They drank tea, chatted, went to the bathroom, and half a day passed in a blink. At month‑end, when wages were paid, it made no difference how much or little one had worked.

"I…… I understand."

"Understanding is good." Li Ping'an returned to the podium, "This system will take effect on the first of next month. Wages for each process will be evaluated every quarter, adjusted dynamically according to market conditions and worker feedback. Adjustments must be negotiated through the workshop union and worker representatives."

He paused.

"Also, the cafeteria food standard will be raised. Every noon we guarantee meat and soup. Dormitories will be equipped with electric fans. In the park we will build a basketball court, a ping‑pong table, and a chess room. Each month we will organize a movie screening, and on important holidays we will hold cultural and sports activities."

In the back row a young technician muttered quietly, "This isn't a factory—it's a sanatorium, right?"

The person beside him poked him.

Li Ping'an heard it and laughed.

"You're right. I just want workers to feel that this place is not only for work, but also for life."

Over the next two hours, Li Ping'an explained in detail Wanxiang's corporate governance system.

Vertical control, strong project system, high incentives, anti‑involution.

The decision‑making level set up a Strategic Decision Committee, which he personally headed, overseeing technical direction and major investments.

The organizational structure is divided into business units—garments, motorcycles, electronics, home appliances, real estate, finance—each a self‑contained system, yet they share public resources such as R&D, testing, and certification.

"The control feature is strong centralization combined with flattening." Li Ping'an drew a pyramid on the whiteboard and then flattened it, "Core projects are led directly by senior executives. The approval chain must not exceed three levels, from application to approval, no more than three days."

Someone raised a hand.

"Manager Li, with such a flat structure, won't it become chaotic?"

"It won't." Li Ping'an said, "Because we have a core R&D system—the internal horse‑race mechanism."

He then explained the rules in detail.

For the same product direction, set up multiple parallel teams, developing back-to-back. Resources are to be obtained through application and bidding. Each milestone node undergoes review, looking at technology, cost, and mass-production feasibility.

Winner takes all—leading mass production and enjoying dividends.

Losing team disbands, its core members merged into the winning team.

"This is redundant R&D, but it can yield an extreme product." Li Ping'an looked at the eyes of the technical staff below, "In the core track, we will use this cruel method to build a technological barrier and accelerate iteration."

The meeting room was so quiet you could hear breathing.

Everyone understood.

This is not a treat, it's a war.

At noon break, the cafeteria exploded.

Workers holding their food bowls crowded in front of the bulletin board to look at the newly posted "Details of Piece-rate Wage Implementation".

"Cutting four-five? I can cut two hundred pieces a day!"

"Sewing front piece seven-tenths? My hands are fast, I can make fifteen pieces an hour!"

"Any subsidies? Sewing cotton-padded clothes adds 30% to the wage?"

Voices of discussion, exclamations, and calculations mingled together.

An old sewing worker held her food bowl, her hand shaking so soup spilled out. Her name was Wang Xiuying, forty-eight, she had worked twenty-five years in the state-owned factory, her monthly wage forty-five yuan. Now according to this new algorithm, she could earn……

"Five hundred… five hundred plus?" She couldn't believe it.

The young female worker Xiao Chen next to her came over: "Master Wang, your skills are good, definitely not just that! I heard Director Zhou say, someone like you, an eighth-grade worker, could earn eight hundred a month!"

Wang Xiuying's legs went weak, she almost sat on the ground.

Eight hundred yuan.

Enough to build three large tile-roofed houses in her hometown.

In the afternoon, the meeting moved to the dedicated conference room on the top floor of the R&D center.

Here there are few people, only twenty-plus, but the weight is greater.

Li Yaozong, He Xiao, and Chen Anbang are present. Also there are technical backbones poached from various universities—Tsinghua's, Harbin Institute of Technology's, Northwestern Polytechnical's, Beihang's. Average age early thirties, the youngest only twenty-five.

Li Ping'an did not take the main seat, pulled up a chair and sat in the middle.

"Here there is no factory director, no manager, only engineers and scientists." He got straight to the point, "Today we're talking about the future."

A huge whiteboard hung on the wall, already with several titles written on it:

1. Telecommunications: brick phones and pagers

2. Software: Chinese programming language

3. Chip: independent process technology

"Let's talk telecommunications first." Li Ping'an stood up, walked to the whiteboard, "The phone we use now is a landline. People have to stay by the set, can't leave that line. In the future, phones should be handheld, usable anywhere."

He wrote an English acronym on the whiteboard: AMPS.

"We'll first implement the mobile phone system, abbreviated AMPS. This is the first-generation analog cellular mobile communication technology, already commercialized in the United States."

He drew a diagram of the cellular network.

"Divide the city into individual hexagonal cells, like a honeycomb. Each cell has a base station. As a phone moves from one cell to another, the signal switches automatically, keeping the call uninterrupted."

"The technical core is frequency-division multiple access, FDMA. Each call occupies a pair of frequencies, one for uplink, one for downlink. The operating band is 850 megahertz."

Li Ping'an wrote a string of parameters: uplink 824-849 MHz, downlink 869-894 MHz. Each channel pair spaced 30 kHz.

"Our task," he turned to face everyone, "is to produce China's own brick phone within two years."

The meeting room fell silent.

Everyone knew how important this task was.

"The R&D team will be led by He Xiao." Li Ping'an named names, "Whatever personnel or equipment you need, just file a report. Budget has no ceiling."

He Xiao took a deep breath and stood up.

"Uncle Li, I… I need RF engineers, I need integrated circuit designers, and also…"

"Go poach them." Li Ping'an interrupted him, "If there's none domestically, go abroad hire them. United States, Japan, Europe—whoever has real skill, pay double salary, benefits for family included."

"Second, pagers."

Li Ping'an wrote a second title on the whiteboard.

"Brick phones are expensive, can't be popularized quickly. But pagers are cheap, can be rolled out fast."

He drew a timeline of pager evolution.

"From 1978 to 1980, Motorola's Bravo series, digital display, standby three to seven days. Now we want to make a Chinese pager."

Under "Chinese adapter" he drew a thick line.

"The key technology is POCSAG encoding plus GB2312 Chinese character encoding. The display should use dot-matrix liquid crystal, capable of showing Chinese characters and letters. Standby time should reach five to ten days."

"This project," he looked at Chen Anbang, "An Bang, you take it."

Chen Anbang pushed up his glasses, his gaze firm.

"Uncle, I need experts in Chinese information processing, and also people for low-power circuit design."

"Go find them." Li Ping'an said, "Chinese Academy of Sciences, Peking University, Tsinghua University—they have this talent. If we can't poach them, we'll cooperate. We provide money, they provide people, share the results."

"Third, Chinese programming language."

This statement left everyone stunned.

A programming language? And in Chinese?

"I know what you're thinking." Li Ping'an laughed, "English programming is mainstream—FORTRAN, C, Pascal, all English keywords. But why can't we have Chinese programming?"

He wrote a line on the whiteboard:

If temperature > 30 then turn on air conditioner otherwise turn off air conditioner

"This is pseudocode." He said, "But if our programming language had keywords 'if', 'then', 'else', variable names could be in Chinese, comments could be written directly in Chinese—wouldn't that lower the learning barrier? Wouldn't it let more people write programs?"

Someone in the audience whispered, "But… international integration…"

"Integration is not the same as wholesale copying," Li Ping'an said. "What we want to create is the 'Cangjie Language'—a full‑scenario intelligent programming language for the future. English keywords, but with all the features of a modern language: high performance, strong security, and support for intelligent‑agent development."

He looked at an engineer in his early thirties.

"Engineer Zhang, you graduated from Peking University's Computer Science department and have built compilers. Do you dare to take on this project?"

Engineer Zhang is named Zhang Wei, a Peking University master's graduate, formerly at a research institute of the Electronics Department, earning eighty‑six yuan a month. He was poached to Wanshang, his salary rose to three hundred, and he was given a two‑bedroom apartment.

He stood up, his hand trembling slightly.

"Chief Li, I… I need a team. At least ten people, who understand compilation theory, Unicode encoding, and English natural‑language processing."

"I'll give you twenty," Li Ping'an said. "By the end of the year, I want to see a prototype."

"Finally, the chip."

When Li Ping'an wrote those two characters on the whiteboard, his hand was heavy.

The chalk scraped the board, emitting a harsh screech.

"This is the hardest and also the core," he turned, looking at everyone. "Without the chip, the flagship is an empty shell, the pager is a toy, the computer is a decoration."

He drew a roadmap for chip development.

Process technology: from 6 µm to 1 µm, lithography moving from contact to stepper.

Storage chips: DRAM iterating from 4 K to 1 M to 4 M, NAND flash memory technology.

Specialized chips: analog chips, digital signal processors, automotive electronic chips.

Equipment and materials: stepper lithography machines, high‑purity silicon wafers, photoresist.

Each line is a heavenly chasm.

"All the computing teams of the Chinese Academy of Sciences," Li Ping'an said, "Teacher Huang leads a team tackling the 1.5 µm process and high‑end storage chips. But due to funding issues, the project is about to stop."

He drew a horizontal line beneath the three characters "Huang Lao."

"I've already used connections to contact Teacher Huang," he said, looking at Li Yaozong. "Yaozong, you go to Beijing yourself. Represent me and invite Teacher Huang and her team to come to Wanshang in full."

"Conditions?" Li Yaozong asked.

"The best laboratory, the best equipment, the highest salaries," Li Ping'an said deliberately. "Whatever they want, we give. There is only one requirement—produce China's own chip."

The meeting went on until evening.

The setting sun slanted through the floor‑to‑ceiling windows, dyeing the conference room golden.

Li Ping'an stood by the window, watching the lights in the park below gradually turn on.

The clothing factory's Workshop still had lights on—workers were working overtime, not forced but voluntarily. Because an extra hour of work earns an extra hour's wages.

The cafeteria wafted with food aromas—tonight there is Red Braised Pork, fish, and winter melon pork rib soup.

On the basketball court, a few youngsters were playing, their laughter carrying far.

This is what he wants.

Strict systems, humane management, cutting‑edge technology, and… steaming‑hot life.

Li Yaozong walked to his side.

"Dad, these projects… the investment is too huge."

"Too big?" Li Ping'an said without turning, "Compared with the future, not big."

"But…"

"There is no 'but.'" Li Ping'an turned, looking at his son, "Yaozong, remember, every yuan we invest now is not a cost, it is a seed."

He pointed at the park outside the window.

"These factories, these equipments, these people, and those researches that haven't started yet… are all seeds."

"Seeds need watering, fertilizing, and waiting."

"Wait for it to break the soil, wait for it to sprout, wait for it to grow into a towering tree."

The sunset completely sank, leaving only a streak of dark red on the horizon.

The lights in the park lit up one by one.

Like stars scattered over this hot land.

Li Ping'an took a deep breath.

"Let's go, eat in the cafeteria. Try tonight's Red Braised Pork."

The father and son walked out of the conference room.

In the corridor, the voices of other technicians argued—whether FDMA or TDMA is better, the syntax design of English programming, the challenges of the 1 µm process…

The voices were young and fervent.

Like this era.

And also like the dawning light of technology.