Huang He chose Cao County as the location for the northern server center, and there was a reason for that.
Cao County is situated in the heartland of the entire north, geographically speaking, not economically.
During the Shang Dynasty, Cao County was once the capital of Shang Tang, but a flood forced a relocation.
Later, the Zhou Dynasty also established its capital here, but later found Luoyang to be a better location, so they moved on.
However, the geographical superiority of Cao County is undeniable. If you measure distances on a map, you'll find that Cao County is exactly 600 kilometers away from Beijing, Xi'an, and Shanghai, three major Chinese cities.
This distance is also ideal for achieving the best network speed with a single network cable. Therefore, establishing a network center in Cao County would perfectly serve the entire north. [PS: Purely fictional, do not believe]
What if you ask about the Northeast and Northwest? That's not a problem either. At the very least, with the establishment of the Cao County network center, their network quality will definitely improve. Huang He will continue to expand in the future, forming a vast operational network covering all of China.
Moreover, to be honest, both regions are too poor at the moment to warrant Huang He investing a large amount of capital in networks. It is most sensible to fully cover the two most developed regions in China, Xinjiang.
No sooner said than done. Under Huang He's command, Jiangnan Group immediately contacted the Cao County government. Upon hearing that Jiangnan Group intended to establish a network center in Cao County, the local government wholeheartedly agreed and even began preparing to allocate land.
After all, in an era of nationwide investment attraction, Cao County's achievements were somewhat awkward. Now, with the establishment of a large-scale project, they were naturally eager for it.
So, soon, Huang He flew to Shandong and drove to Cao County. After about a week of discussions, the network center's layout plan was finalized.
This plan was quite ambitious, divided into three phases. The first phase was to acquire 100 mu of land to build a modern network center.
In the second phase, the land area would be expanded to 10,000 mu. In addition to upgrading the network, an integrated service area called "e-commerce" would be established. Although the people of Cao County didn't understand what e-commerce meant, it didn't dampen their enthusiasm.
The third phase was even more impressive. Huang He declared his intention to build Cao County into a comprehensive network research and development city, aiming to make Cao County another Shanghai.
The people of Cao County dismissed this as mere talk, as boasting is not illegal. Huang He just needed to invest enough money.
Mr. Huang was very generous with his money. Although the government sold the land to him at a very high price, the relocation costs for the land were to be borne by Mr. Huang.
Fortunately, the population in this area was not large, and the land in Cao County was not valuable. Mr. Huang spent about 5 million yuan to relocate all the residents. Simultaneously, the construction unit moved in. As soon as Cao County completed the policy procedures, the foundation for the network center had already been laid, and the construction of the entire factory building was about to begin.
This speed astonished everyone in Cao County. They couldn't help but exclaim that Huang He truly lived up to his reputation as a Wenzhou native, and that Wenzhou natives deserved their nationwide fame. Only with such swift action and execution could they achieve this rate of development.
However, the people of Cao County, who were only marveling, were unaware that their Mr. Huang was currently throwing a tantrum. This was because the people he had sent to order servers and networks from Compaq informed him that Compaq could not deliver the goods for six months.
"Why?" Huang He asked in confusion. "Haven't we always had a very pleasant cooperation with Compaq? Why are they refusing to sell servers?"
"Compaq was acquired by HP!" Leng Zhimeng, who was in charge of procurement, said helplessly. "And one of HP's major investors is Masayoshi Son!"
"Masayoshi Son? No way, he wouldn't go so far as to obstruct a company's normal operations!" Huang He said, perplexed. Based on his understanding of Masayoshi Son, although the man was quite terrible, he was a competent businessman and had never had a habit of interfering with the normal operations of companies in which he held stakes.
This was also why Huang He dared to offend Masayoshi Son. Based on Huang He's judgment, Masayoshi Son would never do something that would make Compaq refuse to sell servers to him, thereby missing out on profits.
"I'm not sure, but that's the reality. Compaq says their servers are booked until the second half of the year. Even if we order servers worth 200 million yuan at once, they cannot meet our needs!" Leng Zhimeng said.
"Could it be that the server business has truly become this good!" Huang He muttered. After all, the internet industry in China had developed at an astonishing pace after 2000. It was normal for server companies to sell out of stock. Compaq itself had been sold out by him before.
However, having to wait for half a year at once was too much. Even at this moment, Huang He still didn't believe that Masayoshi Son was secretly involved.
So, what was the truth?
There was indeed no involvement from Masayoshi Son. Just as Huang He suspected, Masayoshi Son was very wise in business and had not done anything like this from beginning to end.
But it so happened that some of the people under Masayoshi Son were too clever for their own good. Last September, HP completed the acquisition of Compaq, and the biggest contributor was Masayoshi Son, as he had invested in both HP and Compaq.
When HP was planning to acquire Compaq, they approached Masayoshi Son and asked him to act as an intermediary. As expected, the plan went very smoothly, and the two companies finally completed the acquisition and merger.
This made everyone at HP very grateful to Masayoshi Son, and he also became one of HP's major shareholders. Later, they learned about Huang He's situation from Masayoshi Son's secretary. Therefore, they decided to delay Huang He for six months through their Greater China region company, so that Huang He would know the consequences of offending Mr. Son.
This was truly a loyal servant who acted without his master's explicit command.
"Chairman, since Compaq isn't selling, let's buy from others. I'm already in contact with IBM China, Oracle, and Microsoft China, among other international brands. We can still buy servers!" Leng Zhimeng said, waving her fist.
"What about their prices?" Huang He asked, frowning.
"The prices..." Leng Zhimeng gave a wry smile. "The prices are naturally much more expensive than Compaq's. Otherwise, why would Compaq sell so well domestically? It's because they are the cheapest!"
"Yes, but even Compaq's prices are still very expensive, and the maintenance costs are staggering, amounting to millions of yuan every month, right?" Huang He said.
"But isn't that natural? Everyone is like this!" Leng Zhimeng replied instinctively.
"No, it absolutely shouldn't be like this. The price of servers should not be so exaggerated. Zhimeng, you know, the money I painstakingly earned from blind boxes has been poured into your network, which is a bottomless pit. We can actually take advantage of the opportunity to build the new northern center to reduce server costs!" Huang He said.
"How can we reduce them?" Leng Zhimeng asked, puzzled.
"We buy domestic servers!" Huang He exclaimed, slapping his thigh. "Domestic ones are definitely cheaper and easier to maintain!"
"No, brother-in-law, please don't go crazy. We can't buy domestic ones!" Hearing Huang He's words, Leng Zhimeng became anxious and quickly tried to dissuade him.
"Why? I remember that domestic servers also have good sales, like Inspur servers, which rank third nationwide!" Huang He said.
"Brother-in-law, small websites can indeed buy domestic servers because their scale is small and data access volume is low. Domestic cheaper servers can support them.
But we are different. We at 00 now have the largest and most extensive server demand in the country. Not to mention whether these large servers can be produced by domestic server manufacturers, the key is that their quality is too poor. A server will have problems after only a few days of use and will require maintenance!
Those small websites that crash all the time are the best examples. But those small websites can afford to crash because they don't have many users, and it doesn't matter if they crash. Once our website and products crash, it's a major event that affects the entire country. If we crash a few times in a row, all the users we've painstakingly attracted will flock to QQ.
Don't you always teach me that user numbers are paramount? Compared to user numbers, it's better to buy more expensive and stable foreign servers!" Leng Zhimeng said.
Although Leng Zhimeng's words seemed to favor foreign products and disfavor domestic ones, the situation in the industry at the time was indeed like this. It wasn't that domestic servers didn't exist, but their quality and issues were too numerous. Large internet companies didn't dare to use domestic servers, as they could crash at any moment, driving you mad.
"Is that so!" Huang He nodded and pondered for a moment. "Zhimeng, why do you think our domestic servers have these problems?"
"Ah... how would I know that?" Leng Zhimeng said.
"No, we must figure this problem out!" Huang He slapped his thigh. "Go and find Chen Shoufu and see if he knows!"
More than ten minutes later, Chen Shoufu came running over. Huang He asked him his question, and Chen Shoufu replied, "If it's a matter of technology and production."
"It's definitely that the technical design is not comprehensive enough, and there are also problems with production quality control, where many parts are crudely made and unqualified products are used. These are common problems with our domestic products!" Chen Shoufu said frankly.
"Yes, production problems can be improved and overcome. However, technology is troublesome. Teacher Chen, do you know who is the most knowledgeable person about servers in China, and how can we find him?"
"Ah... Chairman... Why are you asking about this? Are you planning to build servers yourself?" Chen Shoufu asked instinctively.
"Yes!" Huang He slapped his thigh. "Since we can't buy them, let's build them ourselves!"