Top Student at Their Peak-Chapter 831 - 284: A Terrifying Rehearsal

Across the ocean, at West University.

In fact, even before the pressure testing was completed in the laboratory, many high-tech companies, which hadn’t been doing particularly well lately, began to sense that something was amiss.

Truth be told, whether it’s companies like Microsoft and Google that started with software, or Intel and NVIDIA that began with hardware, or even IBM... they haven’t really wasted the past four years.

At least they didn’t do nothing in the face of persistently falling stock prices. You can see this from the frequency of senior management changes in recent years.

Almost all of the previous generation CEOs have been replaced.

Satya Nadella from Microsoft left first, then Sundar Pichai from Google, John Huen; Pat Gelsinger from Intel...

Even NVIDIA’s founder, Old Huang, has quietly stepped down.

You have to understand, these people didn’t leave willingly. Especially Old Huang, who was a dominant figure at NVIDIA in every sense.

But there’s nothing to be done; when capital gets ruthless, no matter how powerful an individual is, they can’t possibly compete with it.

Although from the current situation, replacing top executives doesn’t seem to have helped much. At least the downtrend in the stock market hasn’t been alleviated.

But how to say this, you still have to give the newly appointed executives some time. 𝑓𝓇𝘦ℯ𝘸𝘦𝑏𝓃𝑜𝘷ℯ𝑙.𝑐𝑜𝓂

For instance, Chris Malaki who replaced Old Huang, at least after he became chairman and CEO, took effective measures to lobby those in the White House to relax the sales restrictions on NVIDIA to the Huaxia market.

This indeed caused the entire tech market to warm up briefly.

After all, the world is materialistic; as long as you open your eyes and look at the world, you’ll find that Huaxia has long become the world’s largest single consumer market for electronic products.

After all, electronic product consumption not only requires a large population but also requires these people to have adequate purchasing power and use cases, and the society needs to provide a stable power supply.

It so happens that Huaxia possesses all these conditions, even surpassing traditional developed countries in many aspects.

For example, a stable power supply system.

No joke, many people living in cities can hardly remember the last time there was a power outage.

This is especially true for those students in middle and high school who need to attend evening classes. They haven’t enjoyed a sudden power outage to skip evening classes in six years.

If a power outage did happen one evening, they would probably be as happy as if it were a holiday.

Unfortunately, although favorable policies emerged, they were only a flash in the pan.

Because Huaxia has begun to lose interest in these products. The consumer-grade graphics cards that directly face consumers were hot for half a month and then vanished.

As for those suitable for large server setups, such as those for supercomputing centers and artificial intelligence, they were directly snubbed.

The blockade is gone, but it seems the market is too.

On one hand, these big companies have concerns. Across the ocean, those kinds of bans often change suddenly.

Today it’s allowed, tomorrow a ban suddenly comes. Subsequent updates and maintenance are troublesome. Moreover, big companies now have to consider cost-effectiveness.

NVIDIA’s products are not exactly cheap.

Moreover, those companies willing to invest heavily in computing power servers are either already members of the Quantum Simulation Computing Alliance or are figuring out ways to apply for membership.

Yes, although many people online in Huaxia are clamoring that the Quantum Simulation Computing Alliance is just a wasteful project.

But for those companies who can get in to slice the cake, their channels for obtaining information are much more effective than ordinary people.

Not to mention that the Quantum Simulation Alliance is composed of over forty companies, making it very difficult to completely keep development progress secret.

Even though the profitability of the first generation of quantum simulation computers is still unclear, some scientific research progress that’s leaked, especially those patents applied for by alliance member companies, can indicate future trends.

After all, everyone clearly knows that the Quantum Simulation Computing Alliance is different from those startup companies.

If they can produce something, the likelihood of failure does not exist. Having a complete product production line of their own is not merely an economic issue, or a technical issue.

It’s an issue concerning which of the world’s two largest economies will laugh last under the collision.

Under such circumstances, if you want to develop in Huaxia, and still extensively purchase products from the other side, you would most likely be severing your connection to the future.

There’s no choice; ever since the other side first broke the rules and started reversing globalization, the business operations involving such large companies have long ceased to be mere business issues.

If Huaxia truly hadn’t made any research breakthroughs, it would be one thing. But watching those foreign high-tech companies obediently sending their researchers to Huaxia, then still lowering themselves to get slaughtered...

For now, perhaps no one will say anything, but if quantum simulation technology really takes off in the future, they will most likely have nothing to do with this technology.

Under such circumstances, NVIDIA’s unrestricted products in Huaxia are getting applause but not sales.

Just looking at the online commentary, it seems you can feel NVIDIA’s sales in Huaxia after the restrictions were lifted. But NVIDIA is a listed company after all, and must release quarterly financial reports.