Building a Sci-Fi Empire: Starting with Cold Nuclear Fusion

A new project team has been formed.

A group of people were called into a large conference room by Zhao Peng and Wang Kai.

Zhu Yun, the person in charge of this project, was about forty years old. He was short and fat, but had a kind face and looked like a good-natured person. He was sitting to Zhao Peng's left.

Next came Qin, who was working with Zhu Yun, as well as Chen Yuan, Xiao Yun, Ding Yang, and other R&D personnel, engineers, and support staff.

On the other side of the conference table sat a very capable man in his late thirties.

Below him was a man in his fifties wearing a Zhongshan suit, and several entourage members dressed in suits.

Zhao Peng introduced the people on the right to everyone.

They were representatives sent by Liyao Company, a state-owned medical equipment manufacturer from the neighboring city of Xi'an, to discuss cooperation.

The capable-looking man in his late thirties was the vice president of Liyao Company, named Wang Mingxian, who was in charge of business cooperation.

As for the middle-aged man in his fifties, he was a nuclear energy expert brought in from Beijing by Liyao Company, named Zhang Shulin.

He is said to be very famous in nuclear energy research and now works for the state-owned China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) in a high-ranking position.

If Ruoli Pharmaceutical were not a state-owned enterprise, it's possible that no matter how much money they spent, they wouldn't be able to persuade Zhang Shulin to take the helm.

The remaining few people were those who had come with Wang Ming to discuss cooperation; they were considered Liyao's negotiators.

Chen Yuan sat there listening to Zhao Peng and Wang Mingxian discuss the details.

Wang Mingxian said unhurriedly, "Our company is developing a new type of pacemaker, which we call a symbiotic pacemaker. If it can be successfully developed, this technology is expected to solve the problem of patients needing to have their pacemakers replaced again due to battery depletion. The slogan of our project is 'one-time implantation, lifelong use.' To achieve this, the battery requirements are very high. Ordinary batteries certainly cannot meet the power supply needs. Therefore, after internal discussions, we finally decided to try to incorporate nuclear batteries into this new pacemaker. We have heard that your company is very professional in the field of new energy storage, so we thought of cooperating with you."

Zhao Peng nodded slightly and said, "I've already heard the general requirements from my colleagues at the Ministry of Commerce. The goal is very clear, so there's no doubt about that. I'd like to know what your requirements are for the nuclear battery, and how much time you've given us?"

Wang Mingxian stated bluntly, "The requirement is that the nuclear battery should be as small as possible. Our previous discussion concluded that the ideal size for a micro nuclear battery is 15 millimeters by 15 millimeters by 5 millimeters, with a stable voltage of 3 volts and a power output of 100 microwatts. As for the timeframe, we can only give you three months. Can you meet that requirement?"

Three months?

Too little time!

As anyone who studies applied physics knows, although nuclear batteries have been developed for a long time, the kind of nuclear battery that Liyao Company requires is very difficult to develop. It is not impossible for a typical company to spend several years developing it, and it is almost impossible to complete the task in three months.

As expected, he saw Zhu Yun, Lao Qin, Ding Yang and others frown immediately, clearly sensing the difficulty as well.

Zhao Peng didn't give an immediate answer, but instead asked, "What if it can't be completed within three months?"

Wang Ming thought for a moment and said, "Our company is aware of the high level of difficulty, so we're not just discussing cooperation with your company. We've also approached four other new energy development companies, including large companies like CATL and Haichen. In short, including your Xinghe Company, we have a total of five partners. However, we will only pay one payment. We'll pay whoever produces the finished product first. This is stipulated in the contract. If we have a micro nuclear battery supply, other companies that are still in the research and development phase will have to terminate their projects and will not receive any payment. Your company's board of directors agreed to this after discussion, which is why I'm sitting here today."

what?

If others get there first, will we have to pay for research and development ourselves?

Chen Yuan genuinely didn't understand why the board of directors would agree to such a demanding request.

Little did he know that the new pacemaker launched by Liyao Company this time was making a huge splash. If any new energy development company could provide it with a miniature nuclear battery and become its supplier, it would definitely rise to fame and become the preferred supplier for many medical device companies that aspire to develop new pacemakers in the future.

At that time, not only domestic medical device companies will come knocking, but also some well-known foreign medical device companies.

This kind of thing may seem like a thankless task on the surface, but once it's done, the rewards will be enormous.

Therefore, the board of directors of Xinghe Company was willing to accept this cooperation even if it meant losing money.

No, losing some R&D expenses won't cause any major damage.

Once it's successful, the benefits will be enormous, and it will also boost brand awareness both domestically and internationally.

Who wouldn't gamble on something like this?

Zhao Peng said, "Okay, since the board of directors has agreed, we who are in the R&D field can only try to overcome all difficulties and strive to achieve results within three months."

Afterwards, the two groups discussed other details of their cooperation.

About half an hour later, the negotiations were almost complete.

The people from Liyao Company got up to leave, leaving only nuclear energy expert Zhang Shulin behind.

……

Because of the tight schedule, as soon as the meeting ended, Chen Yuan, Zhu Yun, Lao Qin and other members of the project team immediately went to Laboratory No. 1.

This time, since it involves nuclear energy, their project team may occupy two laboratories.

One is naturally Laboratory One, and the other is Laboratory Six.

Unexpectedly, as soon as Chen Yuan and the others entered Laboratory No. 1, they saw Zhen Yuhan standing there.

Ok?

He wasn't called out by name, so why is he here?

Chen Yuan looked suspicious.

Not to mention him, Zhu Yun, the person in charge of this project and Zhen Yuhan's mentor, also seemed to have not expected this situation, his eyes filled with doubt.

Zhen Yuhan gave Chen Yuan a cold look, then quickly shifted her gaze to Zhu Yun's face.

He smiled brightly and said, "Master, the company leaders learned that your newly established project team is short-handed and worried that they might not be able to handle the workload, so they specially asked me to come and help you with odd jobs. For this, the leaders even specially issued me a laboratory access permit."

As he spoke, he pointed to the access pass hanging around his neck, it was unclear whether he was telling everyone that he had entered the laboratory legally, or showing off to Chen Yuan that he also had an access pass.

Zhu Yuntai was a kind-hearted man, and seeing this, he didn't say much. He just instructed, "Alright, since the leader sent you here, then you just follow behind me. Do what I tell you to do, and don't do anything on your own."

He seemed to understand that Zhen Yuhan might not be of much help to the project and might even do more harm than good, so he gave her a heads-up in advance.

When Zhen Yuhan saw that Zhu Yun had agreed, she was overjoyed.

He wasn't specially sent by his boss, of course. He learned that this project was very important to the company, so he went to ask his vice president uncle to come and "gain experience" in the project team so that he could be promoted more quickly and have something to show for his achievements when he gets promoted in the future.

In addition, Zhen Yuhan had another little thought: she couldn't let Chen Yuan outshine her no matter what.

The other person got into the new project team; if he doesn't join, he'll definitely be outshone.

Therefore, he was determined to join the project team and strive to be on equal footing with Chen Yuan.

In Zhen Yuhan's view, Chen Yuan's contribution to the 1175Ah battery cell project last time was definitely due to good luck, rather than any real ability.

Therefore, he does not believe that Chen Yuan will be able to achieve results in the new project team this time.

Since Chen Yuan can't produce results, and neither can Zhen Yuhan, why don't we all benefit from the success of the project team's bigwigs?

Zhen Yuhan has a vice president uncle. As long as she can get in touch with the project team, she will have no problem getting a permanent position or even a promotion and raise. As for Chen Yuan, he will definitely be ranked after her!

That's right, this is the truest reflection of Zhen Yuhan's inner thoughts; he simply can't stand to see Chen Yuan do well in the slightest.

After a brief incident, Zhu Yun, Lao Qin, and other researchers gathered around Zhang Shulin, a nuclear energy expert sitting there, to discuss the development of micro nuclear batteries.

Zhang Shulin briefly introduced the history of nuclear batteries, then took out a paper nuclear battery design drawing from his briefcase and said, "A nuclear battery, also known as a radioisotope battery or radioisotope thermoelectric generator, is a device that uses the heat energy released when a radioisotope decays and converts it into electrical energy through a thermoelectric conversion device, such as a thermocouple. The world's first radioisotope battery was successfully manufactured in Laochou on January 16, 1959. It weighed 1,800 grams and could generate 11.6 kilowatt-hours of electricity in 280 days. Of course, with the development of technology, nuclear battery technology has also made great breakthroughs. The nuclear battery design drawing I have here is a relatively advanced small nuclear battery design drawing on the market. Its size is only 25 millimeters by 25 millimeters by 8 millimeters. Although it is already very small, it is still somewhat different from the requirements of Liyao Group. What we need to do now is to carry out a series of upgrades based on this design drawing to make it meet the requirements of Liyao Company."

Oh, it's not simply developing from scratch, but upgrading based on existing benchmarks.

As Zhu Yun, Lao Qin, Ding Yang, and the others suddenly realized what was happening, they all felt a little more relaxed.

Developing something from scratch is much more difficult.

Now that they have a reference point, the difficulty of their research and development will be reduced by at least two levels.

Zhen Yuhan didn't care. He was just there to gain experience and never intended to actually participate in the project. He only wanted to do odd jobs and earn some experience. He had no other requirements, as long as Chen Yuan was just as useless as him.

Little did Zhen Yuhan know that while she was pondering this, Chen Yuan had already connected to the quantum spiritual realm and started quantum computing to simulate the upgrade of the design blueprint he had just seen!