After the Divorce, I Could Hear the Voice of the Future

That night, Lu Liang stayed overnight at Zhang Tian'ai's place.

Entering the film set meant he couldn't leave for at least a few months.

Zhang Tian'ai was very attentive, and although Lu Liang wasn't in Tokyo, she made him feel very warm and allowed him to experience the ultimate bubble bath.

The next morning, Lu Liang went to Huaqing University, planning to meet the super academic achiever Li Jiahui.

When Zhao Jiaqun found out, he admired Lu Liang's well-connectedness and praised Li to the skies, "Mr. Lu, Li is our School of Computer Science's trump card. International corporations like Microsoft and Huawei have offered him annual salaries of over a million RMB."

"Why didn't he agree?"

As Lu Liang looked through the materials, Zhao Jiaqun might have been exaggerating, but Li Jiahui was indeed very capable.

At 24 years old and still a second-year graduate student, his resume was already more extensive than could fit on an A4 sheet of paper.

His hands were sore from collecting awards and rankings in all sorts of math competitions since childhood, and he scored 665 on the college entrance examination but was directly recruited by Huaqing University on special terms.

He barely wrote an essay, but received full marks in mathematics, physics, and chemistry. After entering Huaqing University, it was like he was on a roll; over the past six years, he had been involved in over a dozen projects, each receiving excellent evaluations and significant scholarships.

"Maybe the conditions Li proposed were a bit high," Zhao Jiaqun said with a strained expression, hesitantly revealing the truth.

Li Jiahui wanted to be solely responsible for a project and also wanted the special privilege to use the supercomputer at any time.

However, when it came to research outcomes, he wouldn't make any commitments or guarantees, so naturally, nobody was willing to engage him.

After all, no matter how talented, he was still just a second-year graduate student; even the fellows of the National Engineering Academy of the Chinese Academy of Sciences wouldn't dare to make such demands.

Lu Liang couldn't help but laugh, suddenly very interested, "Director Zhao, please invite him over then, I want to meet him."

"Mr. Lu, Li has a bit of a straightforward personality. If he unintentionally offends you later, I hope you won't hold it against him."

Zhao Jiaqun proceeded to give Lu Liang a heads-up.

Lu Liang laughed, "Genius always comes with its quirks."

"Mr. Lu is truly understanding," Zhao Jiaqun said with a forced laugh.

He hurried off to contact Li Jiahui.

Twenty minutes later, a boy with hair that looked like it had been slicked back with water and wearing glasses appeared at the doorway.

"Mr. Lu? You look much younger than what's circulated online."

Li Jiahui examined Lu Liang curiously, the ordinarily unflappable expression in his eyes finally revealing a hint of excitement.

Among the sixty thousand students at Huaqing, he might have been a legend in their eyes, but Lu Liang was a legend to billions of people.

"Many people say that," Lu Liang said with a smile, asking how the planning for the new energy project was going.

Li Jiahui glanced at Zhao Jiaqun and replied with a naive smile, "Actually, it's done; I was just worried that if I finished it too quickly, it wouldn't be taken seriously, so I haven't submitted it yet."

Lu Liang was startled, then asked with a smile, "How do you view Tesla's smart driving system then?"

Li Jiahui thought for a long time, "Tesla has taken a purely visual approach, relying on cameras to collect and process environmental information to achieve autonomous driving. However, Lidar technology can provide high precision and high-resolution environmental data in complex conditions."

"So do you think the future of smart driving will move towards Lidar?" Lu Liang asked again.

Li Jiahui shook his head, "It doesn't necessarily have to focus solely on one technology. Visual collection and Lidar are not in conflict."

As he spoke, he gradually became more animated, mentioning that domestically there was an unrivaled technological advantage in big data collection.

Gaode was already beginning to implement it, and could infer journey time through user information.

"Mr. Lu, I don't know if you've noticed, but Gaode's estimated journey times are very accurate; as long as there are no accidents en route, even if you suddenly speed up, the arrival time differs very little."

"I haven't paid much attention to that," Lu Liang said thoughtfully, informing him that the NIO ES8 would be unveiled at a new product launch in December, but the vehicle's system had yet to be officially determined.

Li Bing was more cautious than Li Xiang and did not want to use someone else's system, nor did he want to train algorithms for others for free.

But he had to give Lu Liang face.

So they agreed that before the new car launch event, whichever company provided the better car OS performance, the ES8 would use that system.

Lu Liang wanted to know if they could have something presentable by December if he provided the necessary funds and personnel now.

"There's less than seven months left," Li Jiahui muttered.

Although he didn't know what the NIO's OS was like, except for Tesla, it was probably based on an Android framework.

Since it was an Android architecture, there was no need to write basic code; the timeline was tight, but it wasn't impossible.

And NIO's car OS technology can't be that advanced; it's probably just an improvement on the second generation.

Zhao Jiaqun hurriedly expressed his support, "Li, all members of our research institute can assist you with the project."

He wasn't sure about Li Jiahui's ability to lead, but he saw that Mr. Lu thought highly of Li Jiahui.

This was a good opportunity, no matter the consequences, they had to get the remaining 18 million US Dollars in sponsorship first.

Li Jiahui pretended not to hear, his face serious as he looked at Mr. Lu, "Mr. Lu, I want to try, but I can't make any guarantees."

Mr. Lu smiled and said, "As long as you're willing to try, even if there are no results, you can learn from the process. Money is a minor issue."

A talent coveted by giants like Microsoft and Huawei, even if it takes twenty million US Dollars to play along with him, it's a pretty good deal.

Technology is the primary productive force. If Douyin had technology on par with Byte, he wouldn't have to give Douyin back to Byte.

Li Jiahui nodded solemnly, "Mr. Lu, I will give it my all."

"From now on, whether it's life or work, if you need anything, talk to Director Zhao."

Mr. Lu smiled, turned to Zhao Jiaqun, and informed him that he would send someone with the 18 million US Dollars in a few days.

His preferred choice was actually Hu Weiwei, but Hu Weiwei was still processing her resignation at Mobike. It was estimated it would take a few months before she could take over the work here.

Zhao Jiaqun was overjoyed, patting his chest in a hurry, "Li, just let us know whatever you need."

In total, twenty million US Dollars, converted to 130 million RMB, the position of vice chancellor seemed within easy reach.

"If there's anything you can't handle, you can also call me."

Mr. Lu left his private number, had lunch in the school cafeteria, and then left.

He rested in the hotel for two hours.

In the afternoon, he went to the headquarters of Li Xiang.

The Li Xiang ONE was about to be launched, and Li Xiang was preparing to feature the new range-extended electric technology.

Range extension is a type of hybrid technology; it's considered high-tech, but simply put, it's using oil to charge, not requiring particularly advanced internal combustion engine technology.

From another perspective, range-extended vehicles also addressed Li Bing's concerns; there's no need to worry about matching a high-cost vehicle with a cheap internal combustion engine.

Li Xiang and Li Bing both had the same concern, it's just that the two companies chose different solutions.

If the internal combustion engine technology wasn't up to par, it was replaced with a generator.

If there were no widespread charging stations, they would adopt a battery-swapping strategy.

Li Xiang took Mr. Lu to the lab, where the prototype vehicle had already come out, but it hadn't passed all the tests yet.

"Mr. Lu, what do you think?"

Li Xiang asked with pride, inviting Mr. Lu into the car.

"It really is like a moving home," Mr. Lu admired.

Panoramic sunroof, leather sofas, massage chairs, mini fridge, large color TV, they installed whatever equipment they could. Ignoring the vehicle's performance, it was indeed pretty good.

Li Xiang smiled and said, "With such expensive housing prices everywhere, buying a car becomes both a mode of transport and a home."