Video Game Empire

Chapter 146: Good news for Apple going public

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While Dongfang Electronics is cultivating its internal skills in Hong Kong, its overseas layout has never stopped. ⊙Dingping novels, after nearly half a year of continuous market promotion, the sales volume of Aikang's ab computer has been rising. In the last month of 1980, monthly shipments of the basic ab-1 computer in the North American market reached 12,500 units, while monthly sales of the enhanced ab-2 reached 8,000 units.

It's a pity that Li Xuanyuan's plan to block Apple's plan was not fully realized. The monthly sales of Apple's app2 computers in the US market increased from 10,000 units at the beginning of the year to 20,000 units at the end of the year. In the past year of 1980, the total sales volume of Apple's app2 computer was as high as 300,000 units worldwide.

It can only be said that the personal computer market in 1980 was in the most savage growth period. Although the competition among various companies was fierce, good products could still obtain a steady stream of huge profits from the rapidly expanding market. What Li Xuan didn't know was that if he didn't show up, the global sales of app2 would have been at least 100,000 more units.

Of course, Li Xuan's targeting action was not without effect. The app3 computer, which was highly expected by Jobs and Apple, suffered a tragic defeat after it was launched.

Although the ab-2 computer released by Aikang Computer more than a month in advance, with a lower price and excellent supporting business office software, it has seized a large number of enterprise users who were waiting for the app3 computer to be launched.

But Aikang Computer is only a fledgling new company after all, and Apple relies on the illustrious reputation accumulated by the previous app2. Let app3 still be sought after by the market as soon as it is listed. When a customer buys a new computer soon after using it, a lot of troublesome problems arise.

Among all the bugs in the app3 computer. The most serious problem is that when the computer is constantly running, it freezes inexplicably. And the reason for this problem. It is caused by the sudden failure of the real-time clock chip on the computer motherboard after a long period of use.

The clock chips of the app3 computer are all purchased from National Semiconductor Corporation, and Apple Computer has found a pig teammate this time. National Semiconductor has a notorious reputation in the industry for intentionally selling defective products, and their contracts with distributors include a 30-day return clause for defective parts. So many dealers who value their own reputation will test it before selling National Semiconductor's products.

The success of app2 made Apple's executives full of joy and confidence in the newly launched app3 computer. Hastily marketed without rigorous testing at all. In addition to the clock chip problem, the heat dissipation design of the app3 computer is also seriously flawed. New computers often have a series of problems, such as chips detaching from the circuit board due to overheating, the screen displaying a blurry image, or the disk being "baked and melted" when it is removed from the machine.

In addition, the new app3 computer is not perfectly compatible with the software originally running on the app2 computer. And Apple's previous propaganda claim that the new computer will release a series of excellent office software at the same time is also considered to be empty talk.

The form software "Visual Computing", which used to be an important boost for promoting the sales of app computers, has already been bought out by Li Xuan and put in a drawer to become moldy. The new software launched by Apple itself is very bad, and it is not comparable to the as-or, as-ab, as-bas and other software on ab computers, which makes the consumers who have been waiting for it, the greater the expectations, the greater the disappointment and the greater.

As a result, less than three months after the app3 computer was on the market, Apple received a large number of returns from agents. It was only then that Jobs and other executives came to their senses. Immediately set out to result in a series of problems with the new computer.

However, the market reputation of app3 has been seriously damaged. In addition, Li Xuan took the opportunity to let Aikang Computer increase its promotion of ab-2, which caused the sales of app3 to plummet. Apple finally decided to temporarily suspend production of the new computer.

The delisting of app3 has made Aikang's ab-2 computers more persuasive to consumers. The sales volume, which had been growing all the time, further increased rapidly. January 1981, according to analysis by the company's marketing department. The monthly sales of the ab-2 in the US market can exceed at least 10,000 units.

Apple hastily discontinued app3 in order to make it seem like a failure. Do not continue to damage the overall image of Apple. Because it was the most critical moment for Apple to go public.

"When we created the personal computer. That was the same as creating the bicycle of the 21st century!" is the slogan that Apple paid for a full-page ad in the Wall Street Journal.

Relying on the success of the app2 computer, Apple successfully listed on the Nasdaq on December 12, 1980, and publicly issued 4.6 million shares at a price of $22. The result was enthusiastically sought after by the market, and the listing took less than an hour It's all sold out.

When the New Year's bell rang in 1981, the total market value of Apple's stock had reached 1.8 billion US dollars, and 4 billionaires and 40 millionaires were born within the company. The one who is in the limelight of all is naturally Chairman Steve Jobs, who ranks first among all the richest people in Apple with a fortune of $256 million.

It took Apple less than four years to expand into a large company with a market value of nearly 2 billion US dollars. Its success has once again made the American business media boil, and Silicon Valley has created another "car garage" myth! (The most famous garage startup before was Hewlett Packard Enterprise)

Li Xuan was a little upset that he couldn't stop Apple's rise, but Apple's success really wasn't bad news for him. Dongfang Electronics started planning the listing schedule of Aikon Computer as early as six months ago, and not long ago selected Credit Suisse and Barclays Bank as the lead underwriters for the listing.

However, after the two investment banks got the detailed information of Aikang, they were not enthusiastic about the listing operation. Because in their view, Aikang's listing plan is a little hasty. There are still some gaps in many aspects and the listing requirements of the London Stock Exchange.

For example, it has only been two and a half years since the establishment of Aikang Company. Usually listed companies are required to have a three-year operating record. In addition, Aikang has just been acquired by Dongfang Electronics, and the ownership has been transferred. Li Xuan also recruited Mr. Kertrick Tang from British General Motors as the new o of Aikang Computer.

When reviewing the qualifications of listed companies, the British Listing Committee and the London Stock Exchange are very interested in operating stability. And these just-completed ownership and management changes will undoubtedly make the audit agency believe that Aikang will have a huge risk of operating uncertainty in the future, which has greatly increased the difficulty of the company's listing.

Therefore, both investment banks suggested that Aikang should postpone its listing plan. After half a year, as long as Aikang is still operating stably, the auditing agency can eliminate the concerns of a business crisis caused by changes in equity and management changes.

But after Apple's huge success on the US Nasdaq exchange. The enthusiasm of Barclays and Credit Suisse suddenly changed. In the U.S. market, although the sales of icon's ab-1 still lag behind Apple's app2 computer, the momentum of catching up is very obvious. In overseas markets such as the UK and Australia, the sales volume of ab-1 has already surpassed by relying on stronger publicity and a perfect supply and marketing system established quickly.

In addition, Apple's new product, the app3 computer, has just suffered a shameful failure, while the ab-2 computer, which is positioned in the same market, has seen shipments climb steadily since its launch in August. It's a good contrast gimmick. Just a little hype can convince the market that Ikon is an emerging computer company with more potential than Apple.

And Apple's market value on the Nasdaq is as high as $2 billion, and it is Ikon's next move. The best reference to convince investors. A company that is slightly underperforming but is catching up, and has even greater potential, should be worth about the same as Apple in the United States.

As for the previously mentioned issues that are not conducive to listing. The two investment banks also changed their minds. In the elaboration of the listing conditions of the London Stock Exchange, there are also special provisions for particularly outstanding companies to reduce the hard conditions. And with Aikang's sales performance rising all the way over the past six months. The two investment banks said they were confident enough to convince the UK Listing Committee and the London Stock Exchange that Ikon was a particularly good company under the special terms.

Just as Ikon's listing action resumed. Li Xuan set foot on the flight to the United States again. The first tapeout of the previous r-1 was a success. The first batch of samples obtained basically met the design requirements after testing, and there were no major flaws.

In fact, the total number of transistors integrated by r-1 is less than 30,000, and the design structure is not complicated, so the probability of error is much smaller. This is also the reason why Li Xuan considered the plagiarism target at that time and chose the ar architecture instead of the better rs architecture (reduced instruction set) such as ps.

Early ar-1 and ar-2 architectures, UU reading www. uukanshu.com is definitely the simplest, or the most rudimentary rs architecture. The first PS-based processor being designed by Professor Stanford Hennessy, after Li Xuan opened his golden finger, the progress has been much faster, but the total number of transistors integrated in the design is at least 50,000.

The success of the tape-out of the r-1 made the fab plan of Dongfang Electronics have to be put on the agenda. The 6502 processors used by Dongfang Electronics were all OEM production by the fabs of Japan's Seiko Epson Corporation.

The 6502 chip is one of the mainstream chips on the market now, and os technology has extensively licensed its technology. Even if there is an accident in Epson's fab, Dongfang Electronics can always find alternative suppliers. But Li Xuan is not going to hand over the newly developed r chip to Japanese companies for OEM, which is equivalent to handing over his life to the other party. (My "Rebirth of the Electronic Empire" will have more fresh content on the official WeChat platform, and at the same time there is a 100% lucky draw gift for everyone! Open WeChat now, click the "+" sign on the upper right to "Add a friend", Search the public account "qra" and follow, hurry up!) (To be continued..)

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