Technological Hegemony

When Luo Jia mentioned the Grasshopper Rocket, some people suddenly showed bitter smiles on their faces.

"Hey, don't mention it. Back then, I predicted that the grasshopper was a joke, but in the end I became a joke. I was slapped in the face and swollen."

"It's the same. Although Musk is arrogant, he really has a few brushes. From grasshoppers to Falcon 9, he has created miracles time and time again, and slapped the whole world in the face."

"As one of the people who were not optimistic about Musk at the beginning, the grasshopper was simply a black spot in my life."

Most of the people who said this were a little old, and they participated in the large-scale group ridicule activities against Musk and the grasshopper rocket in the scientific community.

That was in 2012. Musk made a small rocket named Grasshopper, claiming to change the world, but was ridiculed by scientists. No one was optimistic about him, thinking he must be crazy.

Until October 2013, when the Grasshopper rocket was successfully launched for the seventh time and flew to an altitude of 744 meters, the scientific community still ridiculed Musk.

However, time will eventually prove who is the real idiot. Only three years later, Musk’s Falcon 9 was successfully launched, which shocked the whole world. Two years later, on February 6, 2018, the great aviation history The landmark Falcon Heavy rocket was also successfully launched.

This time, the scientific community is no longer a matter of being slapped in the face, but has no face!

The cost of Falcon 9 is 60 million U.S. dollars, while the North American Hercules rocket and Delta rocket with the same thrust, and the European Ariana rocket, all cost about 200 million U.S. dollars, and the Falcon is only one-third of their cost.

What's more, the Falcon rocket can be recycled. On June 25, 2019, the Falcon Heavy rocket successfully recovered the fairing worth 6 million US dollars, coupled with the expensive first-stage rocket booster, which reduced the cost for commercial launches. Huge cost.

It is a pity that due to the difficulty of recycling, Musk gave up the second-stage rocket recycling plan, otherwise he could control the launch cost of the Falcon to a terrifying $10 million. You know, it was previously recognized as the cheapest rocket in the world. The launch vehicle, the China Long March series, costs close to 100 million U.S. dollars, but Musk is lucky, 20 million U.S. dollars will help you launch satellites, and he can still earn several million.

Just look at Huaxia’s development history. The low cost is really scary. Based on the calculation of carrying 100 satellites per launch, the cost of launching a single communication satellite is only 200,000 US dollars. Because of this confidence, Musk Only then did he dare to be the first in the world and propose the shocking Starlink project.

Luo Jia said with a smile: "Musk is of course very strong, but as the saying goes, a good man has three gangs,

The driving force behind him is NASA, known as the emperor of science and technology. NASA has given Musk great help in terms of manpower and funds. "

"Liu Cixin once said that weakness and ignorance are not obstacles to survival, but arrogance is."

"No matter how many scientific research directions we have achieved before, we are all newbies in the face of the large-scale space race. We must lower our profile and take every detail seriously."

Luo Jia made the brainstorming group understand the fact that North America is not a fool, they dare to start the space race, they have the confidence, behind it is the accumulation of countless scientific research spent decades and trillions of dollars.

When Apollo 11 successfully landed on the moon in July 1969, 90% of the brainstorming team hadn't been born yet. The gap is really too big.

As for some people who suspect that the moon landing plan is fake and that NASA has deceived the whole world, it can only be said that mentally handicapped children have a lot of fun, and some even believe that the earth is flat. There is no need to reason with those anti-intellectualists. The best way is Agree with them and let them continue to be stupid.

Members of the brainstorming group, at this moment, have a feeling that Musk seems to have dug a pit on purpose, a prehistoric pit, and then wants to bury Star Technology in it.

"Mr. Luo, Musk is not cheating on us!" Chao Anbang from the materials department said, "I simply calculated that if we want to catch up with NASA's technology accumulation over the past decades and participate in the space race, the entire company will They have to pounce on it, and it will take twenty years to do it."

"I also plan to conduct research on deep submersibles and create a marine ecology department after the development of semiconductors is completed. If the space race starts, my wish to build a villa under the Marianas may come to nothing."

"After all, it is aerospace. Thousands of sub-projects are larger than the research and development scale of semiconductors. In addition to aerospace engines, we must also launch aero engines. The electrical department can start pre-research on electric aero engines, and strive to complete them within two years. Aerospace engines Well, we need the Mechanical and Chemical Department to be the main force."

"If this is the case, will the quantum department still be established? Judging from the current known conditions, the quantum direction is also a huge pit, and the scale is by no means smaller than that of life sciences."

Ordinary people often have a misunderstanding, thinking that scientific research is a flash of inspiration for one or two people, but they don't know that, in fact, the field of scientific research also requires a lot of manpower.

Taking the semiconductor industry as an example, although Xingchen Technology has created a complete semiconductor industry chain from upstream to downstream, so far, Huaxia Semiconductor has not completely replaced the dominant position in North America. The main reason is not that the technology is not in place, but because of manpower lack of resources.

It's funny to say that Huaxia, which has always been known for its large number of people, can't find enough engineers to support the semiconductor industry.

However, this is the fact that there is a talent gap of at least 400,000 semiconductor engineers, which has already caused Chinese companies to think of their neighbors. They offer high salaries and go to Japan and South Korea to poach people. Even Xingchen Technology, which is a benchmark in the Chinese technology field, also poached some of them .

Talent is actually a kind of hegemony. According to the data in 2018, more than 60,000 doctoral students graduated in North America that year, and 80% of them were foreign students.

Knowledge is the primary productive force. It is no exaggeration to say that the most intelligent brains in the world have gathered on the land of North America.

What is even more frightening is that these more than 60,000 PhDs did not return to their hometowns after graduation, and 80% of them stayed in North America.

Judging from the current situation, if Xingchen Technology accepts Musk's challenge, the company will stop thinking about developing agriculture and quantum development in the next 20 years or even further. Unable to start.

Because they don't have enough people.

...

North America, Washington, White House.

"Twenty years!" Musk said to the president with a smile on his face: "If Xingchen Technology accepts my challenge, it will bring twenty years of respite to the entire North American scientific research community."

"They will be overwhelmed by the huge and complicated space program, but we, who have a chance to breathe, can quickly close the gap with them in the electrical, optical, chemical, and semiconductor fields."

"The best way to deal with opponents at the level of Xingchen Technology is not to defeat them, but to find a way to entangle them and not let them go too fast."

After listening to Musk's explanation, the president smiled exaggeratedly, and the fat on his body trembled.

"As expected of a famous super genius, I knew that you must have a way to deal with the damn Star Technology!" The president grabbed Musk's shoulder affectionately and said very excitedly: "God bless America! Your plan is really great, if you Star Technology is caught in this endless scientific research competition, and we can take the opportunity to overtake it!"

"The only question is, can we delay Xingchen Technology for so long only by relying on the technology in NASA's reserve? I heard that those Chinese people are very hardworking. Two years without a holiday."

"It's really unimaginable what kind of scene it would be like for 220,000 engineers and scientists to work 12 hours a day without any holidays, day and night. The terrible Chinese people are like a group of machines. "

After hearing this, Musk shook his head with a smile, "Mr. President, please forgive me for having to refute your point of view. What is terrible is not the Chinese people, but a belief called ideals. To begin with, almost every one of them is an idealist."

"As for our technical reserves in the space field, you can rest assured that putting the whole country into space research and development is completely different from a company's research on space technology."

"It's like a long marathon. We have already run halfway, but Xingchen Technology has just started. In this case, even if we walk slowly, it is enough to maintain the lead all the way to the finish line."

The Prisoner’s Dilemma of Tech Chasers, Luo Jia once specifically talked about this problem, when the route is the same, other marathon runners start first, and it will be difficult for you to catch up with them later, because they are also exerting strength while you are running run wildly.

Star Technology needs to mobilize hundreds of thousands of engineers and scientists to pursue vigorously, but only a small team of a few thousand people in North America is enough to maintain its leading edge.

Not fair, but that's the reality.