Reborn in America

Chapter 48: Carpenter Radio

In September 1951, the world's first transistor radio went on the market. It was launched three years earlier than the original transistor radio in history, and it is low in production cost, compact and easy to carry. The shell of this radio is made of plastic and comes in red, black, blue and white. It looks like a futuristic technology.

This radio, the size of a soap box, sells for $65.5, which is equivalent to a week's income of a blue-collar worker. It is more expensive than starting a tube radio, but its performance, appearance and various data are much better. Its cost is $10, and Carpenter Electronics can make about $55 for every one sold.

When every revolutionary product goes on the market, it is a time to make huge profits. The same is true for this transistor radio, which is very profitable.

Karls is a businessman, he is forty-three years old this year, his body is already slightly blessed.

He was walking home, thinking about what gift he would buy for his wife. Tomorrow is their 20th wedding anniversary.

"What gift should I give? Ring? Well, I have already given it last year. Or a gold necklace?" Karls thought while looking at the jewelry stores around him.

As I walked, I suddenly heard a sound of music. He took a closer look at a black man approaching, and the voice came from him.

"Strange!" He thought to himself, so he fixed his eyes and saw that the black man was holding a black box in his hand. He wanted to ask, but for some reason, he couldn't ask.

Karls shook his head and stepped in with the black man. After a few steps, he turned his head and listened.

He confirmed that it was music played on a radio station.

"Could it be that it is a radio?" Karls reacted immediately, he had never seen such a small radio. In his impression, the radio is the same size and heavy as a wooden box.

The thought that this was a radio made his heart tickled, and he almost caught up with the black man and asked him. Fortunately, he did not catch up because he heard another piece of music. No, more than a paragraph, it seems that there is music moving everywhere in the street. The usual quiet streets are filled with these music.

This time, he saw a few white youths, men and women, talking and laughing, all holding a small black radio in their hands.

Karls immediately went up to stop them and asked eagerly, "Is this a radio in your hands?"

"Yeah! This is a newly launched transistor radio. It's lighter. It can be held in your hand and can be put in your pocket." A young man of about 20 showed it to him and put the radio in his pocket. The music still didn't stop, still so clear and loud.

"Where did you buy this radio? How much?" Karls hurriedly asked, he wanted to buy one for his wife.

When the young people heard it, they all laughed. This makes Karls not knowing why. He doesn't know why those people are laughing. Is this a coke?

Another young man explained to him: "It's gone. These radios are not expensive, only $65.5 each. We bought them in the shop in front. Many people were robbing them just now, but none of them got them."

A young man said: "Several people have asked us this way. They want to buy like you, but they are a step late."

Karls was taken aback. He didn't expect this kind of radio to sell so well, and he was robbed of it all at once.

The young people were about to leave, and Karls hurriedly held them back: "Can you sell one to me? I'm willing to double the price."

One of the young people looked at the money Karls had taken out, and thought for a while and said, "Well, I will sell you this one."

Carls got his wish and walked away happily with the radio. He turned on the radio all the way, turned the sound to the maximum, and walked arrogantly on the road. People passing by all looked at him with surprise eyes, and Karls felt unspeakably comfortable.

Karls twisted left and right, changing the radio channel, he saw the trademark on the radio, and whispered: "Carpenter! Well, it was called Carpenter radio."

When he got home, before he entered the house, he heard the music from the radio station. Karls was a little weird, and also had a somewhat ominous premonition. He opened the door and saw his wife standing in the doorway with a Carpenter radio in her hand.

"Why do you..."

"Hey, I saw this radio is good on the road, so I bought one. I didn't expect..."

The two looked at the radio in each other's hands, and suddenly felt dumbfounded.

"Tomorrow I will return it!" Karls said.

But I didn't expect that his radio was not returned in the end, and was eventually bought at a high price.

At the same time, in the marketing department of Carpenter Electronics, phone calls came one after another, and people kept coming in. The employees are very busy. Their job is to appease the anxious sellers and make them wait patiently for the workers on the production line to produce the radio.

The employee picked up the phone and said repeatedly, "Sorry, our company's radio is out of stock for the time being, please wait a few days."

As soon as I put the phone down, the bell rang again.

The employee explained to the customer on the phone, and almost kept his saliva dry.

Seeing this situation, Lao Qiao quickly found Bart and asked him to find a way to solve the problem of production capacity.

"This can't go on, we have to increase the production line! All the equipment and workers are used to produce the radio." Old Qiao said like this, he knew that the longer the delay, the higher the customer dissatisfaction.

Bart thought for a while and agreed to Old Qiao's method. He himself was not very good at management, so he had to leave it to others to take care of. Bart’s current focus is on research and development of new products, and he focuses on the progress of the research and development department. At Alex's reminder, he is now busy using transistors and integrated circuit boards in other home appliances.

Old Qiao is an old friend of Bart. When he and Bart were in the factory, they belonged to the middle and lower managers. Since Old Qiao is black, no matter how high his ability is, he can't go any further. When Bart asked Old Joe to work with him, Old Joe immediately agreed.

With Bart backing his back, Old Joe was in the Carpenter Electronics Company, and he was almost in the lead. Only major issues will be discussed with Bart, usually just to talk about it, Bart will not interfere too much with Old Joe's decision.

At first, some veterans in the company were still unconvinced with Old Joe. One or two of the white executives discriminated against black people and deliberately found fault for Old Joe. Old Qiao remained calm, and after getting acquainted with the situation, he found out the faults of these people, and let them go. While everyone was silent, he promoted a few people on his side to replace those who were killed.

It was only when those people found out that Bart listened completely to Old Joe's opinions, and they realized that they were either going to f**k off or cooperating with Old Joe's work honestly. At this time, Old Qiao offered another trick to calm people's hearts. But within a month, the people in this company were under the control of old Joe.

Carpenter Electronics Co., Ltd., under the management of Lao Qiao, is in order, the production efficiency has been continuously improved, and the cost of the products has also been reduced. Their company's radios are so popular. At first, people in one state were rushing to buy them, followed by people all over the country rushing to buy them, and finally the whole world needed them.

Their production capacity has been unable to keep up, and at the same time other radio manufacturers have been putting pressure on Carpenter to release their patents and at least authorize them to produce. There is no way, Bart can only authorize other companies to also produce "Carpenter" radios.

At this time, they have not yet authorized the patent for the integrated circuit board, and other manufacturers also think they can circumvent this patent. However, Bart and others did not expect that just this one patent would be able to stop everyone. It can be said that without the invention of the integrated circuit board, there would be no later computer age, let alone a large number of cheap electronic products.

The integrated circuit board was originally developed by Kilby in 1958. It only placed electronic components such as resistors, capacitors, and transistors on a single semiconductor chip, but it could greatly reduce the volume of the entire circuit. Greatly reduce the cost of electronic products.

The invention of integrated circuits paved the way for the development of various functions of electronic products and opened a new era in the history of electronic technology. This is an invention that can change the world. Kilby only relied on this one invention to win the Nobel Prize.

Alex knows that the integrated circuit board he produced is a very crude thing, and it has great potential for development. So he asked Bart to concentrate manpower and material resources to explore the possibilities of integrated circuits, and pointed out several key points.

For example, the diffusion technology of silicon dioxide and the isolation technology of pn junction are used to fabricate aluminum wires on the oxide film. The components and wires are integrated, so that integrated circuit boards can be produced in large quantities for the industry.

Originally, Alex could make these by himself. When he was in college, he used to make circuit boards by himself. He only used the simplest knife-engraving method, but he also studied other plate-making methods. , Such as paint plate making method, mimeograph plate making method and so on.

However, he felt that if he did everything himself, what would he do to earn so much money? Isn't earning money just for enjoyment? If you have money, you can hire people to do things. He simply wrote these things down, handed them to Bart, and asked Bart to find someone to study.

"Money is a good thing!" Alex couldn't help thinking when he watched a group of staff who were instructed by him to turn around. And if the things you make are liked by the world, the glory can be attributed to yourself."

Alex has always believed that Jobs is not a technician, but a businessman with rich ideas. The leader of Qiao’s g**g is just throwing out his own ideas with money, and then selling the thrown things out to other people, and he relies on other talented people. In other words, Jobs spent money to buy the time of talented employees and let them help them realize their dreams.

This is what Alex is doing now, and fools will do it by himself. He is not idle and doing nothing. Alex is now busy writing books, studying, and recording. Don't bother him with these little things.

But what I didn't expect was that Angel also thought that now that he was rich, Alex shouldn't be allowed to make money so desperately. She wanted her sons to go to school. Go to elementary school, go to middle school, go to college!