Taking off his mask and white coat and wiping the sweat from his forehead, Han Gaocai came out of the workshop of Yongtian factory and breathed heavily in the air. Nearly 48 hours passed before I stepped into the workshop door.
Han Gaocai is the architecture leader of Xiaomi's surround screen technology and one of the many engineers in the team. For them, "off-line production" is commonplace, because the exploration of surround screen technology is completely unprecedented, and even every assembly step has to be studied, discussed and polished in the factory workshop.
In August of 20 18, Han gaocai led the team to start the tough battle of surround screen technology. One year later, on September 24th, 20 19, Lei Jun introduced Xiaomi's concept mobile phone Xiaomi MIX Alpha to the whole world, creating a brand-new mobile phone screen form.
Everyone saw the amazing surround screen, but few people saw them walk through the factory floor. But today, they really took the stage. On June 65438+1October 10, Lei Jun officially awarded the Million Award to the surround screen team, which is also the highest award in the 20 19 Xiaomi Annual Technology Award.
On June 65438+ 10/0 in 2020, the new year has just begun, and Xiaomi's first million prize was officially announced. The 10 Xiaomi engineer headed by Han Gaocai will receive a million dollars. This time, they let everyone see the honor and pride of being an excellent technical engineer. It is understood that there are more than 100 technical entries in this competition.
Cui Baoqiu, vice president of Xiaomi Group and chairman of the technical committee, said that there are three main criteria for the selection of the Million Prize. First, it must be original, second, it must lead, and third, it must focus on Xiaomi's "mobile phone +AIoT" strategy. When talking about leadership, he stressed that this kind of leadership is not only reflected in companies, industries and China, but also world-class. Surrounding screen technology is outstanding in these three aspects, so it stands out in more than 100 excellent technical projects.
Cui Baoqiu emphasized that in order to ensure the world-class leading position, Xiaomi adheres to the attitude of "Ningquewulan". If there are not enough technical projects in a certain field, we would rather be vacant than compromise on the selection criteria.
Cui Baoqiu recalled the birth of Xiaomi Group's Technical Committee and the million-dollar prize, saying that it was 2065438+February 2009. On the first day after the Spring Festival, Lei Jun talked with him for nearly three hours. What he remembers most clearly are three key words: technical occupation, standardization and engineer's sense of accomplishment.
It was at that time that Lei Jun put forward a million-dollar prize for the first time, which was regarded as the highest prize in Xiaomi's annual technical award. He hopes that through this award, the engineer heroes behind the scenes will stand in front of the stage. Speak with practical actions, not empty talk about technology.
In Lei Jun's eyes, engineers are not only R&D personnel, but also designers, testers and product managers, all of whom are Xiaomi's engineers. Lei Jun and Cui Baoqiu are both engineers. They know what engineers need, what engineers pursue and how to create a good engineer culture. If Xiaomi wants to go further and further on the road of technology companies, he must master excellent technical talents.
It can be said that the million-dollar prize not only carries Xiaomi's attention to talents, but also reflects the cause of science and technology. And this position also makes the technology that won this award full of gold. Han Gaocai said that the surround screen contains seven industry-first technologies and has applied for more than 100 patents.
Referring to why Xiaomi thought of the form of surround screen, Han Gaocai said, "We want to be above the global fold share, and we will wait for you in the future. Now most manufacturers are competing for the proportion of front screens, but we have already started the era of full-screen ratio. " Surround screen is a future-oriented screen form.
"But we didn't think it was innovative enough or special enough, so we finished it in a hurry. Through bold assumptions and careful verification, after nearly half a year of detailed argumentation, we confirmed that the surround screen project can be carried out. From the very beginning, we have conducted a rigorous demonstration of every link, because what we want to do is an excellent product, not a work of art, "Han Gaocai said." In fact, the most exciting time is when you are sure that the project can go on, not when you receive the prize. "
Through the unremitting efforts of the surround screen team, they broke through the three core technologies of the surround screen: screen fitting technology, antenna solution and interactive design scheme of the surround screen, and really brought the surround screen mobile phone to us.
In the screen bonding technology, Xiaomi independently developed the fixed curvature layered bonding technology, which divided the screen into the smallest units that can be separated at present, and then bonded each layer according to the designed curved surface shape, which can greatly alleviate the "stress" problem between materials. Han Gaocai said that this technology is also the key technology to determine whether the surround screen project can continue to exist.
The design of the surround screen also greatly reduces the space left for antenna layout inside the mobile phone. In the 5G era, the number of antennas has greatly increased, and the arrangement requirements are more stringent. Interference between antennas is also easy to occur in a narrow space. In order to challenge the impossible, the surround screen team recompressed the gap level of the industry 1 mm to 0.8 mm Through the isolation design of the 5G antenna and the dynamic switching assistance of the four antennas, MIX Alpha has excellent 5G performance.
Interactive design around screen is a difficult problem in software. For this reason, the surround screen team built a number of logical display devices, and used data fusion algorithm and the detection of special events in special scenes to intelligently identify the screen, which realized the dynamic switching of logical devices and cross-screen display interaction, and also ensured that the surround screen had a good user interaction experience.
As Han Gaocai said, surround screen is a brand-new field, and every step needs to be explored slowly. Not only the core key technology, but also a manipulator for factory assembly, they all need to personally select and assist in the design, because the surround screen has very strict requirements for the manipulator. He said, "This really can't be bought with money, but we need to go deep into the production line, carefully compare and choose, and discuss and study with manufacturers before we can finally finalize it."
When Han Gaocai recalled the working state of the team in the R&D process, he couldn't help feeling everyone's devotion and tenacity. "What everyone cares about is really making this thing. Everyone consciously does what they are responsible for and has never forced anything. " He said that the company gave them a lot of freedom and gave them a chance to really realize their ideas. For this reason, everyone is grateful.
At the same time, everyone is also an attitude of gritting his teeth and refusing to admit defeat. Han Gaocai said that the back screen of MIX Alpha is divided into two parts, the left side is slightly narrower and the right side is slightly wider. It is extremely difficult to fit the narrow screen due to the "stress" of the material. "In fact, as long as the narrow side is widened a little, it will be much simpler, but we don't want to compromise. It took nearly three months to get rid of this bone, and we just want to be the ultimate. "
"Sometimes in the factory workshop, once in, there is no day and night. Occasionally, you may need a blackboard to take it out. If a problem is not solved, you will lie on the production line until it is solved. " Speaking of which, he said that he would give all the bonuses to his wife. "Really, I haven't spent much time with my family all year round."
Xiaomi saw the hard work of every engineer in the surround screen team. The Million Dollar Award also affirmed these behind-the-scenes heroes in an extremely pragmatic way.
Cui Baoqiu said that the surround screen is only the beginning. In addition to the million-dollar prize, there will be more forms of rewards, so that every technical talent working in Xiaomi has enough sense of accomplishment.
Xiaomi is an internet company and is also on the road of technology companies. Lei Jun said that in the era of 5G+AIoT, Xiaomi will invest 50 billion yuan in research and development within five years. When asked about this year's investment in science and technology, Cui Baoqiu said that it should not be difficult to invest 654.38+0 billion in pure science and technology R&D this year.
In 2020, in this year of deep integration of 5G, AI and IoT, basic 5G technology, AR/VR technology, AI capability of terminal, big data, cloud computing, edge computing and deep learning framework of mobile terminal will all be the key directions of Xiaomi. "In addition to technological innovation, ecological construction is also a very important part," Cui Baoqiu mentioned.
Most of Xiaomi's investment will be in technological research and innovation, but some will also be in ecological construction. Cui Baoqiu said that Xiaomi attaches great importance to the "super Internet". We need to build a cross-cloud, edge and end-to-end AI capability system, and we need to build a people-centered, comprehensive and holistic intelligent service system. Therefore, it is not enough to talk about technology, platform and operating system. Ecology is very important.
In the era of Internet of Things, Xiaomi was laid out in advance and was at the forefront of the whole industry. At present, AI has been deeply and rapidly integrated into the Internet of Things industry. Cui Baoqiu said, "The spring of AI will be very long in 2020. From IoT to AIoT, it is a qualitative change, and this change mainly lies in three directions. "
First of all, in interaction, the traditional GUI (through graphical and gesture operation interfaces) will evolve into VUI (through voice and visual operation interfaces), a multi-modal natural interaction; Secondly, in terms of AI capabilities, independent end-side devices will move towards cross-device collaboration; Finally, simple device interconnection will be transformed into a human-centered overall intelligent service.
Cui Baoqiu raised his wrist and said, "Look, Xiaomi Watch is a small classmate with a micro-screen. The mobile phone is a small screen, the computer is a medium screen and the TV is a big screen. In the future, Xiaomi will continue to exert its efforts around the natural interaction between mobile phones and various smart devices to achieve breakthroughs. "
When asked about the possible changes brought by 5G, Cui Baoqiu said that the high-speed and low-latency characteristics of 5G can make real-time end-to-end touch of AI capabilities possible. This is also one of the key problems to realize multi-device cooperation.
Software, hardware and internet are the triathlon of Xiaomi, and "mobile phone +AIoT" is the core strategy of Xiaomi. Whether it is technology research and development or ecological construction, Xiaomi will use the investment of "real money and silver" to realize their pursuit of science and technology. 50 billion in five years is Xiaomi's confidence and Xiaomi's belief.
In the era of "5G+AIoT", the speed of technology iteration will continue to accelerate, and every manufacturer is striving for the first realization of key technologies.
At present, the technology dispute is the talent dispute. Lei Jun said that Xiaomi will recruit more outstanding young talents and face the world. Whether it is the award of the million-dollar prize or the creation of the usual working atmosphere, it reflects the status of outstanding talents in Xiaomi Company and the warm side of this technology company. Xiaomi gave engineers the courage to be unconstrained and unconstrained, and also gave engineers the opportunity to stand in front of the stage and achieve themselves.
Han Gaocai once said that in the company, everyone would like to call Bao Qiu "Uncle Bao Qiu" because he always gives people a kind feeling, and his office is always full of passion and makes people feel warm.