Chapter 38: Help In One’s Hour Of Need
Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
Shenzhen, Shunfung Group Building, CEO’s office.
w.a.n.g Wei leaned back in his office chair and was scrolling through his phone.
It was after the lunch break. He would always take a half hour break after his lunch to look at what was trending on Weibo or today’s news. After all, his work was closely related to the Internet and so, it was important for him to keep up to date.
“An undergraduate from the University of Jin Ling published nine SCI theses… Are undergraduate students these days so smart?” asked w.a.n.g Wei as he smiled and shook his head.
He opened the article and saw that the author was by famous science writer Zhu Fangcai.
w.a.n.g Wei saw this name and twitched his eyebrows. His first impression of him was not good.
This Zhu Fangcai counted as a celebrity. He was famous for annoying people on Weibo. He had no talent and was named “Big Mouth”. w.a.n.g Wei was a practical workman and did not like this type of clever clowns. Especially since this person loved to criticize China’s education system and talk about it every day. He would even use w.a.n.g Wei’s high school education as an example to prove his points.
w.a.n.g Wei did not care about his education. Otherwise, he could just donate some money to a school and earn an honorary doctorate.
However, Zhu Fangcai would call him a “high school student”, which annoyed w.a.n.g Wei. After all, no one liked to be exposed over and over again.
w.a.n.g Wei saw his name and lost interest. He did not even read the article as it was just trying to make mischief with big words.
Using an undergraduate student’s nine theses to discuss Chinese academia?
Who the h.e.l.l are you?
At this moment, a knocking sound came from his office door.
“Come in.”
The person that came in was called Liang Shenghao. He was the technical director of the company’s drone logistics research and development center. Graduated from Caltech, he had a dual degree in logistics management and computer science and he was only thirty years old.
Due to the recent advancements in drone technology, the concept of drones was trending. Shunfeng was the leading enterprise in domestic private logistics, and naturally, it refused to fall behind in the field of drones. Therefore, it had established an unmanned aerial vehicle logistics project in cooperation with DJI and invested 500 million and built an R&D facility in Shenzhen.
Of course, due to hardware restrictions, it was very difficult to achieve drone distributions in the short term.
w.a.n.g Wei obviously knew this. Therefore, even though this R&D center was technically supposed to be a UAV logistics R&D center, there were not many researchers that engaged in UAV logistics R&D. The main R&D projects were concentrated in the direction of intelligent logistics.
What it meant was that it was using big data to predict warehouse location and merchant sales, as well as improving automatic sorting technology, etc.
Liang Shenghao walked to the office desk and placed a computer science magazine on the desk. He smiled and said, “CEO Wong, I found a genius for you.”
“What?” w.a.n.g Wei put down his phone and looked at the magazine. He smiled and said, “Modern Communication and Geographic Information Technology? Didn’t you tell me last time that there was a lot of substandard work in this journal? You finally ordered one?”
“I read all computer science journals, especially ones related to artificial intelligence. I don’t really read domestic journals though,” said Liang Shenghao. He pushed his gla.s.ses and continued, “Thank G.o.d I saw the article on trending, otherwise these theses would be in the trash.”
“You’re talking about?” w.a.n.g Wei’s expression was slightly weird.
“That’s right. That undergraduate student who submitted nine theses. I looked at them and the calculations mentioned in the theses were pretty interesting. It’s just that…”
Oh?
An undergraduate student is able to get your attention?
w.a.n.g Wei was interested. He sat up straight and said, “Just what?”
“It’s just that his research is a bit… Advanced,” said Liang Shenghao. He thought about the words that he should use and continued, “UAV logistics delivery is still a concept. Not a single company in the world can achieve the hardware standards for delivery drones. Therefore, s.h.i.+pping companies around the world are still tied up on the hardware side.”
w.a.n.g Wei nodded and asked, “I know this, what else?”
“But the content of his theses was based on the theoretical feasibility of drone delivery. For example, in his paper, he proposed to construct the concept of logistics ‘honeycombs’ in the city, docking with the sorting center, introducing the drone into the GIS system, automatically finding the way in the case of unmanned operations. It could identify the address through the camera, confirm the person receiving the object based on the face recognition technology, confirming the receipt by a gesture, and automatically uploading the alarm data when the drone is interfered with…”
Liang Shenghao spoke until here and stopped.
w.a.n.g Wei’s fingers tapped lightly on the desk. He paused for a long time then said, “Okay, so he made a suggestion?”
If Lu Zhou had just made a suggestion, it would not have been anything special. Anyone could make a powerpoint on artificial intelligence and make some statements. Being able to mention those ideas just meant that he had some understanding of the topic.
However, if Lu Zhou’s level was actually that low, he would not even get past the HR department.
“Not just a suggestion,” said Liang Shenghao. He shooked his head, “It also mentioned a calculation method, mainly regarding facial recognition and GIS system. This is why I think this kid has skills. Especially the algorithms he wrote for facial recognition. Although I can spot some flaws in them, they could still be groundbreaking. Our research facility can even do additional research on his work.”
It was not just an idea. Lu Zhou also realized his idea, which was a completely different story.
It was like a person saying, “I want to build an apartment”, then finding two people and placing down two bricks. The value that those people built was different than the value of an idea.
Even though this undergraduate student had only realized a tiny percentage of his research, w.a.n.g Wei did not care. Any research required a long process. The higher the value of the research project, the more money and time it would take.
w.a.n.g Wei did not say anything. Instead, he picked up the computer science magazine and flipped to Lu Zhou’s page.
[UAV logistics research and development prospects and framework discussion]
[A pixel a.n.a.lysis algorithm based on artificial intelligence]
[Optimization Algorithm for Dynamic Image Recognition Based on Artificial Intelligence]
[Automatic measurement method of human body size based on artificial intelligence algorithm]
[…..]
Even though the individual theses might be substandard, the total sum value of the theses was still substantial.
Liang Shenghao saw that his CEO did not speak, so he continued, “Publis.h.i.+ng an algorithm like this on a journal is too wasteful, I recommend sending him a job offer and directly hiring him into our company. He can help us with research.”
“Not so fast,” said w.a.n.g Wei as he waved his hand.
Liang Shenghao frowned as he said, “Are you doubting his education? From his performance, even a graduate student in applied artificial intelligence wouldn’t be as valuable as him. Also, even though we won’t use UAV logistics in the short term, we will eventually have to enter this field! We should start preparing now. It’s better now than later.”
Computer science was a new subject. It was different than in other fields. Even though education was still important, it was not crucial for many successful tech entrepreneurs.
After all, those people with special talents would not be at job fairs. They would be on the list of famous companies’ recruitment list.
“Haha, you don’t have to teach me this. I only look at skills, you know that,” said w.a.n.g Wei. He smiled and threw the magazine on the table, “Don’t send the offer just yet, let’s wait for a while. After all, we are the only Chinese company doing UAV delivery logistics so no one will steal him from us.”
Liang Shenghao paused. He was about to say something but when realized the underlying meaning from the CEO, his eyes lit up.
I see…
My CEO is so smart!
An energetic young person being criticized like this, getting his research called worthless, must have built up a grievance in his heart.
Let that Zhu Fangcai clown attack him a bit more and wait till Lu Zhou can’t handle the pressure anymore. Then Shunfung group will come out and offer a 500 thousand per year job to him, affirming his research value…
Then he would be loyal to Shunfeng forever!
A person with a high salary could always get a better position at another company. Therefore, many companies use employee benefits and stocks to retain their employees. The first key to employee retainment was convincing that the company’s future was bright. The other was placing the company in the employee’s heart, making the company special to them.
In some sense, the latter was more important than the former.
w.a.n.g Wei leaned against his office chair, smiled, and said, “Put this magazine here, I’ll remember this. Go and do your own stuff.”
“Okay,” nodded Liang Shenghao before he left the office.