Reveal The Chip Screen Printing: The Same Chip Was Sold at Different Prices

A few years ago, there was a famous domestic master control factory, let's call it "big core company". The company has a young engineer named Tiger, he is smart, insight, always can find the company's hidden secrets.


* 1

The secret of screen printing


One day, Little Tiger was drinking coffee in his office while mulling over the latest batch of chips. He found that the same chip was stamped with a different silk-screen logo, transformed into a different model of product. Some of these chips are called A8X for tablets, some are called R5X for smart hardware, and some are called T8X for in-car devices.

The tiger scratched his head in confusion: "The same chip, a different shell can sell different prices?" This is amazing!"

So he decided to investigate further. He visited various departments of the company and finally found Lao Zhang, who was responsible for product naming. Lao Zhang is an experienced old engineer, he smiled to Little Tiger and said, "Little Tiger, you don't know, this is our business strategy." The same chip will be printed with different silk screens according to different application scenarios and packaged into different models, so that it can be sold at different prices."

Tiger suddenly realized: "So, no wonder the tablet A8X sold the cheapest, the car T8X most expensive."


* 2

Software traps



However, Tiger was not satisfied with this, and he continued to dig deep to find out what the difference was between these different silk screen printing chips. After a review of the data, he found that although the hardware of these chips is identical, but the software is very big. The company has developed three different software solutions, known in the industry as SDKS or baselines, for tablets, smart hardware and on-board devices.

"So it is," Tiger said to himself, "that the chip manufacturers have imposed restrictions on various open source or closed source code logic to prevent customers from using the cheapest A8X in on-board devices."

Tiger decided to challenge the limits of the system. He brought together a few like-minded engineers to figure out how to get around these software restrictions. They worked day and night and finally made a breakthrough a month later. They successfully converted an A8X chip into an in-car T8X and made it run smoothly on in-car devices.



* 3

The emotion of the inner volume


The joy of success has not completely dissipated, but the little tiger has fallen into a new thinking. He knew that while they had broken software limits, it was only a technical victory. If customers do adopt this approach on a large scale, the company is bound to take stricter measures to limit it, and ultimately those customers who want to save costs will be affected.

One day, Xiao Hu met the CEO Lao Liu in the coffee shop of the company. Lao Liu was very satisfied with the tiger's performance, but also worried about his breakthrough. He patted Tiger on the shoulder and said, "Tiger, you are the future of our company, but you must also understand that business strategy is an important part of the company's survival." We should not neglect long-term development for the sake of immediate interests."

Little tiger nodded, well aware of the truth. He decided to report the problems he found to the company, hoping to find a balance that would ensure the interests of customers and maintain the development of the company.

Behind this story, we see the microcosm of the chip industry. In order to survive and develop, companies are racking their brains to develop a variety of strategies, but the ultimate purpose is to be able to stand firm in the fierce market competition.

This story is fiction and any similarities are purely coincidental