What the hell is a private enterprise?

Chapter 671 The Attack of SSE
Lu Ran was extremely doubtful whether he had misheard.

Modifying these oil tankers to reach speeds of 30 knots? That can't be a dream!
It's important to understand that due to the diminishing returns effect, once a ship's speed exceeds 20 knots, every subsequent increase in speed requires a huge investment.

大和号15万匹马力就能推到26节，可更小的衣阿华级为了突破30节就需要22万马力，动力需求增加了近50%。

油轮也是，10万吨级的阿芙拉油轮也不过需要2.2万匹就能推到15节，可要是30节……22万匹也不行。

Aside from marginal effects, the underwater hull design of oil tankers is not optimized for high-speed navigation at all. The resistance is enormous, and a top speed of 25 knots is already remarkable. Even with sufficient power, it is more likely to break apart before reaching 30 knots.

Meeting his shocked gaze, Tang Wen waved his hand:
"just kidding."

Lu Ran breathed a sigh of relief.

"Actually, it only progressed to section 24."

After saying this, Tang Wencai left, leaving Lu Ran even more bewildered.

……

Fast oil tankers were the emergency transport solution that Tang Wen ultimately came up with for the typhoon season.

If typhoons were truly blowing constantly, then there would be no solution, and service disruptions would be inevitable under severe weather conditions. However, the good news is that the bad weather is not continuous, and the core impact area is relatively limited.

Based on a summary of past disaster events, Tang Wen determined that even during typhoon season, the Nansha Islands would experience a few days of calm every ten to fifteen days, allowing for crude oil transportation and shipping operations to continue.

To be more precise, this timeframe is around 3 to 5 days, and virtually all relatively peaceful "stable periods" will last no less than this.

If they can leave within 3 to 5 days before the severe weather takes effect, the oil supply will not be interrupted.

The speed of 14 or 15 knots for a conventional oil tanker is definitely not enough. After analysis, Tang Yi believes that a reasonable speed should be no less than 23 knots, so that it can meet the requirements of completing round-trip transportation and loading operations within 72 hours under bad weather conditions.

Since there weren't any oil tankers that fast on the market, Geikin chose to build them himself. After all, there's plenty of bad weather at sea, so he maintained a fleet of fast ships specifically for emergency transport services in bad weather.

Further discussion revealed that the base speed for the fast fleet was set at 24 knots, a carefully designed figure.

The reason for not using brute force to increase power is that the cost-effectiveness is too low. The power requirement to propel a 100,000-ton oil tanker to 30 knots is at least twice that of a 100,000-ton battleship, which is neither necessary nor cost-effective.

若采用法系推进引擎，可以在必要时获得至少半个小时的8%速度加成，加上SM旗帜5%速度加成、以及传奇舰长10%速度加成，总共约25%的增幅刚好能把24节基础航速提升到30节。

If an emergency storm approaches, immediately stack up your buffs and speed across the sea to avoid danger.

而平常对外公开24节的航速就并不过分并且足够快，同样1000公里距离，14节需要39个小时，24节只需要23个小时。

The reason for choosing to buy a ship is to save time. Building a 50,000 or 100,000-ton oil tanker yourself would not be able to keep up with the typhoon season. Buying it directly and modifying the power system and ship type is the simplest solution.

The tanker purchased through the LV2 shipyard will have its forward hull fluid profile modified and its bulbous bow optimized, requiring 16 horsepower to meet speed requirements.

A 5-ton oil tanker using the same design would also require 10 horses.

这样答案就很轻松了，唐文直接选择统一套用2艘空想级的蒸汽轮机动力总成再略微提高压力超频，在标称16万轴马力、四轴驱动下10万吨级油轮就能满足24节，5万吨级油轮更是可以达到26节左右。

If the buff is fully stacked, the extreme speed of a 5-ton oil tanker can reach 32.4 knots.

Fuel consumption is certainly much higher than that of conventional tankers, but for Geigen, it has no impact on freight costs. Moreover, the shipyard does not require troublesome maintenance or worry about malfunctions, and can focus on use in harsh climates. It also has very good application prospects in Miangas and Natuna.

All seven modified oil tankers were able to complete their power upgrades by the end of May and be put into operation for emergency transport in June.

After arranging the tanker transaction, Tang Wen received another message from Nanmei; it was someone named "Avila" contacting him.

shield.

Tang Wen had lost interest in the "Brothers of Justice," and as for the "Divine Retribution" plan... he had no interest in that either.

The disclosure of this plan will indeed cause some trouble, and various environmental organizations will likely criticize it in turn. However, as long as Prism Building denies it, it can't do anything about it, and the Lost Empire has no foothold to get involved in.

Next stop, Shanghai.

……

Devil
Tang Wen headed straight to the Shanghai Semiconductor Industry Center, where he encountered an unexpected person:

"Old Zhao, what a coincidence?"

"Unfortunately, I was waiting for you."

Zhao Hande did not come alone, but with a group of more than a dozen people... They looked a bit like bank staff.

Upon seeing Tang Wen, his first words immediately invigorated the latter, but due to the large number of people, he spoke in a voice only the two of them could hear:
"Isn't it wrong for Gaijin to sell military equipment worth 200 billion yuan to foreign entities?"

"Would you believe me if I said those were custom-made props for a tourist attraction?"

"Come with me tonight, this is a complicated matter."

"Peace Hotel, my treat?"

"……Row."

After quickly reaching a consensus, the two returned to normal, pretending nothing had happened amidst the puzzled looks of others. Then, Tang Wencai learned from Ni Zhenhai that today was the day "Silver Shield" was to be delivered.

In fact, starting from the beginning of April, Shanghai Semiconductor began to deliver trial versions of Silver Shield in units of dozens of wafers, and the results were positive for all users.

As the first step in penetrating the official office system, Silver Shield was also supervised by Tang Wen. Although he did not understand banking, he understood software interaction. After understanding the general functions, he tried his best to make it beautiful, simple and easy to use from a modern perspective, and he first proposed the concept of "foolproof".

What is "foolproof"? It means that even a layperson can guess the meaning of a software based solely on its prompts, function names, and graphical indicators.

Not only is it user-friendly, but the installation process is also designed to be user-friendly:
Open the case, insert the card, power on, and it will automatically install, automatically connect and activate. After entering the operating unit key, you can use it directly. If there are any steps that cannot be resolved, upload them to the server for processing.

Don't underestimate this point. Ni Zhenhai made special optimizations in this area to meet the needs of the big boss, so that even laymen can get started quickly.

SilverShield, as a micro-independent system, is certainly much simpler to optimize than Windows. However, there are no software development companies that are as sophisticated as SilverShield at present. As a result, SilverShield's user experience is relatively comfortable. In terms of core underlying functions, it may not necessarily be the best.

The advantage of doing this was that the bank's top leaders unexpectedly discovered that the Silver Shield system was very easy to use, with clear interaction logic that they could learn by guessing and even complete the installation process with ease. It was much better than the annoying and complicated Windows and DOS, and they immediately developed a good impression of "domestic products surpassing foreign ones".

Therefore, the promotion of Silver Shield went quite smoothly. Even ordinary office workers at the lower levels found it simple and easy to understand, and gave it high praise. As a result, Shanghai Semiconductor began producing 1000 sets of the official 1.0 version, which were officially delivered today, and the media were invited to witness the event. The ceremony has already concluded, but in addition to Silver Shield, Ni Zhenhai has prepared many other things.

"This is our secure printer/copier. The key chips are all manufactured by our company, so we are not afraid of leaks."
This is our secure fax machine, which is also entirely self-developed and not afraid of leaks.
This is our secure paper shredder; it automatically monitors and is immune to leaks.
This is……"

Ni Zhenhai introduced the exhibits one by one; they were all commonly used and essential office supplies, seemingly intended to dominate the entire official unit.

Tang Wen quickly grabbed him:
When were these things made?

"Oh, sometimes I suddenly realize that the things my old workplace bought were quite expensive and could easily lead to leaks, so I took some time to make one."

"Did you encounter any difficulties?"

What difficulties could there be with such a small thing?

Ni Zhenhai, puzzled, explained further:

"SSE only makes some small chips. Many components are purchased directly, and the requirements are just raised."

Shanghai Semiconductor is a leading and unique chip manufacturing and R&D company in China. Because the MDA project can also require the cooperation of the top supply chain, doing this is just a small matter.

Furthermore, I believe that all these things can be integrated into one system, which would also benefit the future promotion of our computers.

Tang Wen then realized that this was a true blue ocean era, where everything was a blue ocean and the competition between different tracks was not as fierce or as wide.

Shanghai Semiconductor is now a true behemoth, not to mention that Ni Zhenhai almost emptied his former employer's talent pool after expanding his business, and then recruited a group of people from Tsinghua and Peking Universities, possessing R&D capabilities that were difficult to match in the original timeline.

The University of Tokyo has never lacked talent; it's just a pity that it couldn't gather them at the right time.

After explaining to Tang Wen, Ni Zhenhai led the visitors to a unique booth. There was a table and three monitors and keyboards side by side, but they were not connected to a computer case; instead, they were all connected to a large, tall black box behind the booth.
"This is my personal vision for the future: cloud processing and cloud computing."

"At some point in the future, we can eliminate PCs and instead centralize computing power to be distributed by a unified national data center. Each unit will only need an inexpensive monitor and a keyboard and mouse..."

Tang Wen immediately knew that the timeline was closed. In the original timeline, Ni Zhenhai tried to find another way to break the PC monopoly of the Wintel alliance by replacing it with cloud computers.

However, this proposal is too outdated and is unlikely to be accepted.

As expected, the visitors were interested, but they didn't seem excited at all, until...

"I have another major innovation for cloud computing: its integration with MDA!"

Ni Zhenhai's words once again drew everyone's attention, including Tang Wen's:
"MDA can also be used as an input/display terminal, and can be fully connected to a central server. By assigning computing power and functions, it can achieve the purpose of working on the go, which is even equivalent to carrying a supercomputer with you..."

Things started to get increasingly outrageous. Tang Wen never imagined that MDA would have such a wonderful aspect. As a result, Zhao Hande and other listeners reacted strongly, clearly attracted by this huge prospect.

After all, the weakness of MDA is that its performance is completely incomparable to that of a PC, and cloud computers solve this problem, don't they?

Although we don't know what it will be used for yet, carrying a supercomputer with you sounds really great!
After hearing that it was related to MDA, everyone kept asking Ni Zhenhai for a long time. Tang Wen tried to stop him but failed. He could only secretly decide to stop this unreliable idea.

After Zhao Hande and everyone else had left, Tang Wencai pulled Ni Zhenhai aside with a dark expression:
"With the current network bandwidth, playing cloud computing? The cost of fiber optic cables and switches is terrifying."

Ni Zhenhai: "This is just one approach, and bandwidth will definitely expand in the next few years. I've calculated that 10Mbps is more than enough."

Tang Wen rolled his eyes. 10Mbps is 1.25MB per second. Even watching 720P videos will buffer from time to time. Can this speed replace a PC?

“Master Ni, bandwidth will improve, but the size of the operating system will also expand in the future.”

Ni Zhenhai disagreed, confidently stating:
"What good would it do to expand it further? Individual users can't even use up 100GB of space."

"..."

Tang Wen really wanted to put this sentence under the signboard of the Shanghai semiconductor company:

No one can use up 100GB of space.

Leaving aside cloud computers for the moment, Tang Wen shifted the topic to the M550 chip and GS1.

Ni Zhenhai led him to the chip lab, and Su Huisheng immediately started shaking a... CPU after seeing his boss.

The exterior was no different from the one Tang Wen had seen four months ago, but the interior had been completely transformed.

Su Huisheng: "The M550 has now officially entered the deep development stage. The stability of this chip is still unknown, but it already has all the functions designed for it."

Next, we will conduct intensive testing, optimize stability, find bugs, reduce power consumption... and then we can officially launch it.

"how long?"

"Design verification... I still assure you that it will be completed in 1998, and the launch date of January 1999 remains unchanged."

Chip development generally involves four stages:
Engineering Validation (EVT) – Design Validation (DVT) – Production Validation (PVT) – Mass Production (MPW).

Once the EVT stage is completed, it means that the chip's basic structure is established without major errors. The DVT stage is then used to address performance, power consumption, and compatibility issues. After that, the PVT production process can be tested to control the yield rate. Completing the first two stages means the chip is successful. The third stage is to stabilize the chip quality.

Tang Wen counted on his fingers and found that it had been exactly 13 months since SSE was established and started recruiting people to reverse engineer Pentium and the Dongjiang 550 chip, the predecessor of the M550. Adding the next 6 months of the DVT and PVT phases, the total development cycle was as long as 19 months.

soon.

It's worth noting that in order to speed things up, Tang Wen also copied Lao Ma's rapid iteration method: rapid tape-out.

The biggest reason why future chip development is difficult is the high cost of tape-out. After all, starting an entire chip production line just to produce a few hundred prototypes is incredibly expensive.

In the future, a single tape-out can cost tens or hundreds of millions of dollars, which would be enough to make top-tier companies feel the pinch. Therefore, they will carefully check each tape-out before it is completed to avoid waste.

The current cost of tape-out is relatively low, but it still starts at two to three million. Tang Wen's requirements are rapid changes, rapid optimization, and rapid tape-out. In just seven months, the M550 has been tape-out 12 times, and in the last three months alone, it has been tape-out 8 times. Through practice, process problems are identified and resolved.

The burning of money not only led to the rapid improvement of chips, but also enabled the chip production lines to mature quickly.

Great! We'll be able to use the domestically produced Besturn II by the end of this year.

Tang Wen couldn't help but cheer in his heart and made a last-minute decision to give a bonus to the M550 chip development department.

(End of this chapter)