Title: Xiaomi founder Lei Jun once said that if you stand in the wind, a pig can fly. After experiencing the three eras of PC Internet, mobile Internet, and Internet of Everything, Wang Xuehong chose to deploy at the forefront of industry trends and do the most difficult things.
At the source of the Internet boom, Wang Xuehong entered the business world
In 1982, the Internet Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP) were born, triggering the first definition of the Internet. After rounds of discussion, the conclusion is to define the Internet as a group of networks connected using TCP/IP. When defining the Internet, you may not have thought that in a few years these protocols and corresponding infrastructure would bring about earth-shaking and revolutionary changes to the information industry and the daily lives of the public.
In 1982, in the terminal carrier field in the early days of the Internet, the computer industry was changing. On the one hand, the American Compaq Computer Company was established and launched the world's first laptop computer, which weighed 14 kilograms. It sounds bulky now, but compared to the desktop computers at the time, it was enough to usher in the era of popularization of personal computers in the name of convenience. . On the other hand, the computer industry has entered an era of global vertical division of labor. Computers produced in the United States may have screens from South Korea, chips from Japan, and OEM work in Taiwan.
At this time, Taiwan was in a period of economic transformation. Through its low labor cost advantage, it undertook PC OEM and parts production capacity transfer from Europe and the United States, realized the prosperity and development of the electronics industry, and jumped to the "Asia Four". "Little Dragon". In the 1980s, Taiwan accounted for almost 90% of the world's computer shipments.
This year, Wang Xuehong, the daughter of Taiwan's richest man and "God of Management" Wang Yongqing, had just graduated from the University of California, Berkeley. Instead of choosing the Formosa Plastics Group where his father worked, he entered the Popular Computer Company founded by his second sister. The company, starting from grassroots sales, has entered into this earth-shaking trend.
Two major trends in the chip industry, and Wang Xuehong’s “chip dream”
Although OEM computer sales are large, profits are very thin and it is easy to fall behind in the industrial transformation. Entering the upstream of the industry through self-research and grasping the core competitiveness is an extremely difficult but worth a try.
In 1988, Wang Xuehong found her business direction and sense, mortgaged her real estate and borrowed 5 million yuan from the bank, acquired VIA Company, established VIA Electronics, and began a difficult entrepreneurial journey. In 1992, VIA Electronics moved its headquarters from the United States to Taiwan, and in 2000, VIA China Corporation was established in Beijing.
In this process, there is also a big industrial background: in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the center of gravity of the chip industry began to shift from the United States to Japan. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, South Korea and Taiwan, China became The main force in the chip industry. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, chip companies in mainland China began to develop.
When Wang Xuehong started out, she caught the first wave of the shift in the focus of the chip industry and was able to recruit people and develop rapidly. In 1999, VIA launched its self-developed PC133 chipset, which once occupied 70% of the global market share and became the only internationally renowned IC company that can compete with Intel.
At this time, mainland China basically relied on imports of electronic components, and Lenovo was still selling Ni Guangnan’s Hanka. When Wang Xuehong proposed "to make the world's first-class Chinese-owned chips and let European and American companies follow our footsteps," Liu Chuanzhi was infected by her entrepreneurial spirit, saw the opportunity, and established the Microcomputer Division in 1994.
Lenovo relies on VIA chipsets to launch cost-effective computers that are half the price of similar products on the market, quickly occupying the domestic market. According to media reports, more than 70% of the chipsets used by Lenovo Group's motherboard companies use VIA products.
Mainland China’s chip development follows the PC trend, and Wang Xuehong is once again at the forefront of the trend, realizing the nation’s technological dream with “Chinese CPUs”. In Taiwan, "Girls should look like Wang Xuehong" has become a widely circulated praise. That year, Wang Xuehong had just turned 40 years old.
At that time, Lei Jun was still practicing at Kingsoft Software, and he had no idea that more than ten years later he would use the same model as Lenovo and use Xiaomi to start the trend of domestic Internet mobile phones; Ma Huateng, Ding Lei and others had just graduated from school and went to work in the telecommunications bureau, and Robin Li also Studying in the United States.
The brightest star in Android phones, the ups and downs of HTC
Wang Xuehong is a Christian. Even if she is on the top of the wave, her devout faith has given her an air of calmness. posture. Her father's business management skills from scratch also taught her to stay calm and tenacious in fierce business battles.
She believes in her father’s words: “Behind the current peak, there is always another peak; behind the trough, there is always another trough.” It is this calm vision that allows her to always succeed in the industry. Accurately adjust combat postures during times of change.
During the peak period of VIA, Wang Xuehong was reborn in the patent battle with Intel and successfully developed her own X86 CPU chip. At the same time, she also did an important thing that laid the foundation for the future. In 1997, Wang Xuehong founded her second company, HTC, and the following year developed the wireless smart device Kangaroo Palm PC, which was the world's first handheld computer certified by Microsoft's NSTL.
HTC may not know when the mobile Internet era will arrive, but it knows that users have higher demands for the convenience of smart terminal devices. Its decade-long investment in R&D in the field of handheld computers has allowed it to become a leader in smart phones. When the mobile phone trend comes, become Google's first partner.
In 2008, the 3G era officially arrived. Apple's first-generation iPhone had been launched. The user experience was not very good, but industry giants had already sensed that a change was coming: the mobile Internet trend.
This year, HTC teamed up with Google and the US operator T-Mobile to launch the world's first mobile phone G1 with Android operating system. It entered its highlight moment as the king of Android phones and became the No. 1 sales volume in the Android mobile phone market. , facing competition with Apple.
Immediately afterwards, in 2011, HTC surpassed Nokia with a market share of 9.1 in the global mobile phone market, becoming the smartphone brand second only to Apple. Nokia and Motorola, the kings of the feature phone era, are gradually withdrawing from the market.
In 2012, global PC sales began to decline, which represented the decline of the PC Internet era and the rise of the mobile Internet. At this time, in the Chinese market, Samsung, Apple, and HTC are the three major international mobile phone brands. The "China Cool Alliance" is in power, Xiaomi has started to take off, and OPPO and vivo are still working hard in the third to fifth tier markets.
Regrettably, in the United States, the world's largest smartphone market, HTC was attacked by Apple's patent war and left alone; in China, the world's second largest smartphone market, in the process of upgrading 3G to 4G, It was also surrounded and suppressed by mainland Chinese brands.
At this time, Wang Xuehong has passed the age of "knowing destiny". To her, success or failure is like smoke in the past. Regrouping is just a matter of talking and laughing. Faced with doubts from some investors and media, Wang Xuehong quickly found a new track.
Bet on VR and welcome the dawn of the Internet of Everything era
Changes in communication networks will bring about industrial opportunities, accompanied by changes in interaction methods.
The determination of the Internet protocol, and the keyboard and mouse touch interaction that came with Microsoft Windows system, brought about the global PC Internet trend; the evolution from 2G to 3G, and the touch interaction led by Apple mobile phones, Bringing about the mobile Internet trend. Every industrial change brings about changes in the entire industry pattern.
4G to 5G is regarded by the industry as the next biggest wave and is expected to arrive in 2019. Entering the 5G era, communication bandwidth and speed are no longer limitations.
Coupled with the blessing of artificial intelligence technology and the application of a large number of sensors, the physical world and the online world will be more easily integrated, and intelligent terminals will develop in a generalized manner. So, which or what are the core intelligent terminals?
She shared at the meeting the case of Evan, a cerebral palsy patient, who actually "walked" again through Vive. The moment Evan took off the Vive, he said excitedly with tears in his eyes: "I haven't skied since I was fifteen years old." "VR will be a very good experience for anyone with a disability. I think VR can open the door to the world for people.”
Also this year, HTC joined the “5G Terminal Pioneer Program” launched by China Mobile, standing at the forefront of a new round of communications industry changes. Welcome the coming dawn of VIVE REALITY. And this dawn was filled with Wang Xuehong’s determination, kindness and scientific and technological ideals.
Looking back on the forty years of Wang Xuehong’s business ups and downs, we can see the rapid economic development brought about by China’s reform and opening up, as well as the ups and downs of Taiwan’s treasure island in the global consumer electronics field. Looking at Wang Xuehong and her startup company from the perspective of ten years, we can see the forward-looking, decision-making and technological dreams of this most powerful woman in the global IT industry during the industrial transformation. In the midst of the tide, Wang Xuehong, without exception, chose to stand at the forefront and do the most difficult things that lead the industry.