20 years of restarting life

Chapter 3683 ASML
The next morning, an ASML minibus came to the hotel to pick up Zhao Chang'an and his party, and they headed straight for Eindhoven.

Unlike in China, when the minibus entered ASML headquarters, there were no banners or any welcoming flowers.

Only a few senior company executives, including President Doug Dunn, greeted them in the lobby. Both sides communicated in English, and there was no need for a translator or a site manager to liven up the atmosphere.

However, ASML did produce a blonde beauty, Hada Liroy, Doug's secretary, who was a bright spot among the group of men at ASML.

Although ASML knew Zhao Chang'an was very young, the visual impact of actually seeing this excessively young man, even a few years younger than their sons and daughters, still left Doug and his team momentarily stunned.

Last year, ASML's sales were $7.95 million, net profit was $1.05 million, and net profit margin was 13.3%.

In other words, the profit attributable to all shareholders is 1.05 million, and this young man has earned the equivalent of ASML's net profit of thirty or forty years in just a few months of high-stakes gambling.

Although ASML is the world's second-largest lithography machine company and a leader in the industry, this young man completely surpasses everyone else in terms of wealth and the ability to create wealth.

While accompanying Zhao Chang'an and others on a tour of the company, Doug Dunn suddenly recalled his words from the meeting the previous night: 'Once the prototype is developed, that's when we'll truly discuss joint ventures and equity stakes with these companies. A four- or five-billion-dollar investment—how much each company will invest and what their shareholding will be—that'll be another round of negotiations.'

The intense visual impact at that moment, even now when he thinks about it, makes him blush slightly.

They were a bunch of old foxes on their side, but the young man in front of them listened to the introduction with a smile the whole time, his eyes calm, wise, gentle and so friendly.

If he were truly a weakling, he would have been devoured long ago; how could he have gotten this far?
At this moment, Doug Dunn finally began to seriously consider this collaboration, instead of just thinking about the money from North America and the possibility of being abandoned at any time in the future.

On the way here, Qi Xuan'er was still a little unconvinced. However, as she visited the manufacturing lines of PAS5500 and TWINSCAN AT:750T, she was amazed by the world's most cutting-edge high-tech equipment, which was the size of shipping containers and full of the beauty of metal and machinery. She listened to the blonde woman explain the technology used in these instruments and the technological innovations and efforts made by ASML's upstream suppliers to meet these technical requirements.

Qi Xuan'er suddenly realized why Zhao Chang'an had never paid any attention to the smartphone operating system that she and Fan Chufei had been working on for over a year.

Faced with absolute strength, the meager achievements of his team over the past year were like a kindergarten textbook—not entirely useless, but practically useless.

Once the thought surfaced, it was impossible to suppress it. Qi Xuan'er looked at Zhao Chang'an, who was walking ahead with a smile on his face, listening to the blonde woman's introduction. Suddenly, she remembered that it was this bastard who almost took her that night. Looking at his back and the dog-man's serious expression, she was so angry that she wanted to kick his butt hard and make him fall face-first into the mud.

Thinking to herself that if she kicked Zhao Chang'an right now, making him fall face-first into the mud, his uncontrolled flailing and screaming would be hilarious, Qi Xuan'er couldn't help but smile. It seemed that her original fierce determination to come from afar to demand an explanation wasn't so strong at this moment.

Because the tour only included a portion of the visually and intellectually impactful units that did not require confidentiality, the entire tour was short, lasting just over an hour. By the time the tour was over, it was lunchtime.

Although ASML has had an office in Taiwan for several years, it has not sold a single lithography machine to date. This is similar to how TSMC allocates some of its orders to ASML due to its shareholding relationship with Philips.

Domestic chip manufacturers generally have some business relationship with Japan, and due to the relatively low transportation costs, they mostly purchase Japanese lithography machines.

So the hospitality here is very European; they don't understand Chinese etiquette at all. They just booked a table at a hotel next to the company, and everyone had a simple meal. Of course, no alcohol was consumed.

Zhao Chang'an and his group rested in their hotel rooms, and in the afternoon they held a special discussion on the feasibility of a 193nm light source.

According to Doug Dunn and others, to get someone to spend money, you first have to promise them something lucrative; this has always been the case, both domestically and internationally. You have to show that the product will be very profitable in the future before the investor will be willing to spend money.

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After lunch, Doug Dunn and the other ASML executives did not rest, but went to the conference room.

"He's so young. Although I knew he was only in his early twenties, I still find it unbelievable when I see him in person."

Martin, who had been holding it in all the way, began to sigh as soon as he entered the conference room: "When I was his age, I had just joined ASML, and what did I do every day? Oh right, I made coffee for you guys!"

"What's wrong with you making coffee? I help carry things and do manual labor every day. Back then, the house would leak whenever it rained, and it was always us strong people who went up to fix it."

Charlie also sighed, "His team members are all very young, just like we were back then. Although I don't know how to appreciate Eastern women, human aesthetics can sometimes be universal, and those women are really beautiful."

"Like how you always used the excuse of inspection to touch Millie back then?"

Martin's words made everyone laugh. Among the five people, Doug Dunn was the oldest, at 45 years old this year. The other four were all around 40 years old. They were all recruited before the company and research institute were separated, and they were also among the 47 veterans who joined ASML.

So everyone is familiar with him and knows that Charlie fell in love with his current wife, Millie, and would go over to touch her every now and then, ostensibly to search her body.

At first, Millie disliked him quite a bit, but later he developed feelings for him as he touched him more and more.

This stable relationship among the 47 people is also the secret to ASML's survival through more than 20 years of ups and downs. During difficult times, it was common for them to go months without receiving salaries. Car loans, mortgages, children's education, and other expenses forced them to rob Peter to pay Paul for investments and credit cards.

Therefore, they are very satisfied with today's hard-won achievements, but they are also anxious and vigilant, afraid of returning to the hard times of the past.

"What are your opinions on this General Manager Zhao, aside from his excessive youthful behavior?"

Doug Dunn asked with a smile.

“I really like his personality. He listens quietly and asks questions humbly, unlike Coburn, who is arrogant and bossy.”

Martin was referring to Intel's negotiator. Initially, he had a good impression of the guy, but his impression changed when Intel offered only 200 million yuan upfront.

Later, the two hundred million dollars were repeatedly delayed, and Martin's impression of him changed from bad to annoyed.

"This person is really annoying. He acts like he owns Intel's territory in the company, going everywhere. If he had a camera in his hand, I would suspect he was a corporate spy."

It's obvious that Charlie also dislikes Coburn.