166: Mi Chonggao's first year

When he returned to the office, Lin Bing was already waiting for Lei Jun.

"Lin Bing, is Nvidia still trying to negotiate with us?"

"Mr. Lei, yes. Since Nvidia's asking price was too high previously and I rejected it, per your instructions to keep them on the back burner, I've been keeping Old Huang hanging in limbo until now."

A few months ago, after failing to reach an agreement with Red Star, Old Huang sent a vice president to fly to China specifically to negotiate the details with Xiaomi.

Lei Jun felt that Old Huang's asking price of 250 million us dollars was still too high, so after negotiating for a while, he decisively suspended the talks.

For the past few months, both sides have been dragging things out, discussing details endlessly, but there has been absolutely no substantive progress.

Although Old Huang was so anxious he was practically foaming at the mouth, he had no choice; currently, Xiaomi was the only company willing to negotiate with Nvidia.

If he couldn't sell it, he would really be stuck with this business on his hands.

Moreover, this year Qualcomm released both the snapdragon 801 and 810 chips in one go, which made Old Huang even more anxious.

There were also rumors that Xiaomi and Qualcomm were going to engage in deep cooperation.

The kind involving cross-shareholding.

"Restart the negotiation plan. After leaving Old Huang hanging for a few months, I'm afraid he's truly getting anxious now," Lei Jun said with a calm expression.

In the business world, there is no such thing as sentiment, especially since Old Huang had screwed him over quite badly before.

"No problem, I can contact Old Huang later."

"What about our terms this time?"

Lin Bing knew that if they kept Old Huang waiting any longer, there might be unexpected complications. Furthermore, for a mobile phone manufacturer to make high-end devices, it must possess its own chip design capabilities. Acquiring Nvidia was just the first step; if they waited any longer, the technology in their hands would truly become obsolete.

"Negotiate at 150 million us dollars. Regarding the Engineer team, follow their wishes: Nvidia must not hinder those willing to come to China, and for those unwilling to come to China, Nvidia is responsible for the compensation; Xiaomi will not be responsible."

Afterward, Lin Bing contacted the person in charge at Nvidia. The other party was also puzzled, as there had been no substantive progress for months, and every time they contacted Lin Bing, he had brushed them off with excuses.

However, Nvidia didn't overthink it; as long as Xiaomi was willing to restart negotiations, that was all that mattered. Getting this rotten project off their hands as quickly as possible was the real priority.

This time, with Lei Jun's approval, the progress was very rapid, and by the end of June, both parties signed the contract.

Dami Company invested 160 million us dollars to acquire Nvidia's mobile processor design department and other businesses. The Engineers from the design department were taken on by Dami Company, with compensation packages no lower than what they received at Nvidia.

For those Engineers who were unwilling to leave the USA, Nvidia was responsible for their compensation, and Xiaomi would not be involved.

Subsequently, Xiaomi released an official announcement domestically, stating that Dami Company had completed the acquisition contract with Nvidia.

Simultaneously, they released a poster. In the shadows, one could see the golden mi logo and the frame, and below it was a slogan: "Giving life to glass; craftsmanship and tactile feel, taken a step further. See you in August."

This news quickly exploded across the entire internet.

Previously, there had been rumors that Xiaomi was going to acquire Nvidia's mobile chip technology.

But these reports were a mix of truth and lies, dragging on for nearly half a year without any confirmation.

Every time, they would say that negotiations between Nvidia and Xiaomi had made breakthrough progress, only for the news to vanish, which made Chinese netizens somewhat immune to this "tea," and they didn't really want to follow it anymore.

But this time, the news was released officially by Xiaomi through their official Social Media Platform account.

Lei Jun's personal Social Media Platform account also reposted the news.

So, was it actually acquired this time?

"Lei Juns nickname is truly Lei Juns nickname; he really acquired Nvidia."

"To the person above, please be precise. It's the acquisition of Nvidia's mobile chip department, not the acquisition of Nvidia. It's not that I look down on Lei Jun, but he wants to play with chips?"

"As a mi fans, I really hope to see Xiaomi absorb all of Nvidia's technology and design a mobile processor chip that belongs to Xiaomi as soon as possible."

"I heard that Nvidia was designing a processor with an integrated 4G baseband last year. Mr. Lei only spent 160 million us dollars; that's practically a steal!"

"Haha, in the future, our China will have Huawei, Red Star, and Xiaomi—three manufacturers capable of independently designing chips. This is a small step for Xiaomi, but a giant leap for China. Go Xiaomi!"

"Give it a rest, you guys upstairs. Don't you know how expensive it is to support a chip team? Whether Xiaomi can absorb Nvidia's technology is another matter entirely; as for designing their own chip, you can just wait forever."

"As long as Mr. Lei isn't making this acquisition just for fun and is willing to continue down this path, this spirit is worth encouraging, even though I'm not very optimistic about Xiaomi making chips."

"What good technology does Nvidia have? Even dogs wouldn't use the chips they design themselves. Look at the previous tegra4; Lei Juns nickname clearly threw this 160 million us dollars down the drain. How many Hongmi phones will he have to sell to make that back?"

mi 3 mobile version user: I feel offended.

"You're all just discussing the acquisition, but didn't you notice the poster Xiaomi released? Is this an early teaser for the mi 4? I feel like this mi 4 is going to be lit; they're even using glass materials."

"It's only June and they're already teasing the mi 4? Looks like Mr. Lei has cleared out most of the mi 3 inventory and needs to release a new phone quickly."

"I saw the golden mi logo. Xiaomi just drew an SSR card. Wow, golden legend!"

"Glass back cover? Interesting. The mi 4 is definitely worth looking forward to."

There were all kinds of comments online. Netizens were discussing Xiaomi's acquisition of Nvidia, and along the way, even the teaser poster was pushed to the number one trending spot.

This was the result Lei Jun wanted to see. Regardless of whether Xiaomi can actually develop the chip in the future, as long as they release any news about chips, it will be a trending topic!

Over at Red Star, Chen Chen saw the Social Media Platform post Lei Jun made and couldn't help but admire Lei Jun's bargaining skills.

Old Huang had quoted Red Star 400 million us dollars, and with one cut, he slashed it down to 100 million us dollars, leaving Old Huang speechless.

Although Lei Jun spent 160 million us dollars, this price was not a loss at all. After all, Nvidia's technology was worth 130 million to 150 million us dollars, and Xiaomi also absorbed some of Nvidia's semiconductor design Engineers. If used well, these people are where the true value of this acquisition lies.

However, Chen Chen still wanted to say one thing to Lei Jun: "Lei Zi, the water in the chip industry is too deep; you can't handle it."

In his previous life, it wasn't that Xiaomi didn't have the heart to make chips, but mainly that the investors behind them and Lei Jun were scared off by the repeated costs of tape-out. You have to know that as chip manufacturing processes become more advanced, the cost of each tape-out becomes higher and higher.

Xiaomi's Pinecone S2 chip failed five times in tape-out, throwing over a billion down the drain without even hearing a sound.

This rate of burning money directly discouraged Lei Jun and Dami Company; no one could really afford to burn money like that.

Just like this time, with the processor built on the 20-nanometer process, even though the tape-out was successful on the first try, it still cost nearly 90 million rmb in total.

Looking at Xiaomi's promotional poster, Chen Chen could tell at a glance that the device was the first-generation cannon fodder for Xiaomi's high-end push—the xiaomi note1.

Originally, this device wasn't supposed to be released until next year. It seems that this butterfly effect of his has changed everything, and he probably can no longer view this world through the lens of how things developed in his original timeline.

"Song, notify Yang Tuo to start the pre-heating for our k series."

As for the Full-Screen Display, that would definitely have to be hidden away as a "surprise."