Traveling back to 1977

Chapter 906 Blatantly
Director Chen said that the staff at Jiangxi Film Studio were very helpful; they were able to complete the filming task smoothly with just a little pressure.

Before sunset, the entire crew successfully retreated to Zengjiabu, and Director Chen also returned to his home.

Chen Fan had already eaten dinner at the film studio's canteen. After arriving home, he first took a shower in the back bathroom, then made himself a cup of tea. Wearing a t-shirt, shorts, and slippers, he went into his study, put down the teacup, picked up the phone, and dialed a number.

A moment later, the call connected, and Zhou Yali's groggy voice came through the receiver, "Hello, who is it?"

Chen Fan took a sip of tea and said with a smile, "What time is it and you're still not up?"

"It's you."

Zhou Yali seemed to wake up a bit, turned to look at the alarm clock on the bedside table, and her face immediately darkened. "You either call in the middle of the night or in the early morning. It's only 5:30 now. Who gets up this early? Would it kill you to make calls during the day?"

Chen Fan said matter-of-factly, "How can I find you during the day when you're at school?"

Zhou Yali choked for a moment, then closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and said, "Speak."

Chen Fan took out a cigarette, put it in his mouth, and asked curiously, "I remember there were reports about mobile phones in American newspapers. Haven't you ever thought about buying one?"

"mobile phone?"

Zhou Yali opened her eyes, propped herself up on the mattress, and then tucked the pillow behind her back before leaning back against it, letting out a long, comfortable breath. She said, "Do you want me to carry this thing that weighs almost three pounds for weight training?"

She paused for a moment, then added, "I have a telephone at home and a car phone in my car, why would I carry this big thing around? Just to be laughed at?"

(Car telephones from the 1960s and 70s)
Car telephones have a long history. In the early 20th century, some cars were equipped with telephones. However, those were just telephones. To make a call, you had to park the car in a place with a telephone jack and connect the telephone line.

Well, that does avoid the driving risks of talking on the phone while driving.

It wasn't until 1946, when Bell Telephone Company built a wireless network, that in-vehicle mobile phones became a reality. However, at that time, Motorola's telephones weighed 36 kilograms, making them truly bulky machines that required a vehicle to move.

Later, as the size and weight of car phones gradually decreased, starting in the 50s, telephones quickly became standard equipment in high-end cars. This continued until the late 80s, when mobile phones entered the era of miniaturization and became a feature for high-end individuals, at which point they were phased out.

As for the mobile phone Chen Fan mentioned, it was even larger than the "Big Brother" that everyone knows today, and there was only a prototype at the moment. The first truly mature product, the Motorola DynaTAC8000X, would not be officially launched on the market until March 6, 1983.

But that doesn't mean that no one had used such a bulky phone before.

In fact, since the Motorola DynaTAC prototype was launched in 1973, Motorola has been promoting its products and building signal stations. Otherwise, without enough signal stations, who would buy their products?

Mobile phones, which can be carried around, have always been a hot topic of social concern, frequently making brief appearances in the media. Therefore, Zhou Yali wasn't surprised when Chen Fan mentioned mobile phones.

Faced with Zhou Yali's teasing, Chen Fan didn't say much, but changed the subject and laughed, "Since mobile phones are so bulky, you can use a pager."

"pager?"

Zhou Yali frowned slightly. "You mean Bellboy and Pocket Bell? Those names are quite fitting."

Compared to mobile phones, pagers have a much longer history of commercial use.

Starting in 1962, AT&T showcased the first commercial system for personal paging at the Seattle World's Fair, naming it Bellboy, which means "little servant with a bell," referring to the servants who delivered notes to their masters at European banquets. From then on, pagers began to be commercially popularized in the United States.

In the same year, Little Book Telephone Company also launched its own Pocket Bell, and these two products became the most important pager brands in the US market at that time.

Motorola developed its own pager quite early on, but it didn't dominate the market until the 80s when they invented the digital pager that could display numbers, which then became popular worldwide. Before that, pagers could only display a few characters and short numeric codes, requiring a call to the paging station to obtain detailed information.

Chen Fan only remembered this matter today when he was chatting with Ma Jiajia.

Wan Muchun's US R&D department is researching program-controlled telephone exchanges. That's fine; once the research and development is successful, they can make a fortune in the domestic market alone.

However, it doesn't preclude us from also taking mobile communication into account.

Zhou Yali rubbed her hair, and not hearing Chen Fan's voice, she continued, "You keep switching between your mobile phone and pager. Tell me, what's the matter?"

She yawned as she spoke, "If I finish this sooner, I can catch up on some sleep."

Chen Fan chuckled and said, "I already told you, it's a pager."

Zhou Yali blinked. "What do you mean? You want me to buy a pager? So you can call me all the time, and it'll keep beeping all day long?"
"Let me tell you, don't even think about it! My dad doesn't even carry that kind of thing. Maybe Uncle Fang or Uncle Liu will carry one; they're my dad's drivers, and we only call them in case of an emergency."

Chen Fan clicked his tongue and said, "I have to say, you really are a bit slow."

Zhou Yali's face fell, and she said with a dark expression, "What do you mean? You're resorting to personal attacks just because I don't listen to you? That's not fair! I'm going to complain to Lili."

Chen Fan's lips twitched slightly. "What I mean is, mobile communications is a huge market. After you get up, go to the company first, find Dr. Engelbart, and set up the pager and mobile phone projects as well."

Patents for this technology are not hard to find, nor are they unique. American Telecom, Bell, Motorola, Ericsson, and I've also heard that Nokia, the Swedish defense contractor, is collaborating with Salora to develop wireless telephone technology.

"Buy what we can, and license what we can't buy. The key is to develop our own mobile communication products as quickly as possible."

He paused for a moment, then added, "Also, core competitiveness is something I've always emphasized, and that includes Chinese character input and display technology. You should discuss this with Dr. Engelbart; ideally, you could develop a pager that can display Chinese characters and see if that's even possible."

After saying a lot, Chen Fan picked up his teacup and took a sip, bracing himself for someone's tirade, but there was silence on the other end of the line.

He couldn't help but feel a little strange. He took the receiver away to look at it, then put it to his ear again. "Hey, are you asleep?" Zhou Yali took a deep breath and said quietly, "I can accept anything else, but a pager that can display text? Are you trying to make things difficult for me, bro? Do you even know what a pager can do these days?"

Chen Fan coughed twice and chuckled, "It can transmit information, of course. Since it can transmit character and number codes, it can also transmit phone numbers and text. Microelectronics and large-scale integrated circuit technology have advanced rapidly in recent years, as evidenced by the fact that microcomputers have begun to enter homes and be used in practical applications. Perhaps Dr. Engelbart could look for ideas in this direction."

If we don't have enough manpower, we'll poach talent; if we lack the technology, we'll buy patents. Let's set a goal first: to be able to directly transmit phone numbers, then transmit English letters, and finally display Chinese characters. Let's take it one step at a time.

Zhou Yali took a breath and sighed, "A single word from the general is enough to make a soldier run himself ragged. Alright, I understand. Is there anything else?"

Chen Fan thought for a moment, "Let's leave it at that for now. Well, if the R&D progress is too slow, we'll just get the agency rights directly. Anyway, almost all multinational giants don't care about the mainland market right now, so you can go and negotiate with them, Bell or Motorola, package Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau together, create a Greater China region, and get the agency rights first."

Upon hearing this, Zhou Yali couldn't help but feel curious. "Brother, these two things have been on the market in the US for quite some time now. Let's not even talk about pagers; at least quite a few people still use them. But take mobile phones, for example. Motorola started commercializing them in 73, and it's been seven or eight years now, yet very few people still use them. My dad doesn't even bother with that clunky thing. We have phones everywhere—at home, at work, in our cars."
Why do you seem so bullish on these two things, as if being a step behind would mean huge losses?

Chen Fan pondered for two seconds and said, "With your intelligence, it might be difficult for me to explain it clearly to you."

Zhou Yali rolled her eyes and said, "I think you're itching for a beating and need Lili to loosen your bones."

Chen Fan gave a cold laugh, "You went to her to complain? Did you think about the consequences?"

Hearing this, Zhou Yali immediately deflated, "I don't know how you raised her. She's completely obedient to you, even more so than my dad is to my mom. I just can't understand it."

Chen Fan snorted twice, "Is it because I taught her well? It's because Lili has high moral character, unlike some people who always want to use violence without even considering their own abilities and whether they can win a fight."

Zhou Yali took a deep breath. "Do you believe I'm not going to get involved in this?"

Chen Fan was not threatened at all. "Hmph, believe it or not, if you don't listen to me, you'll regret it so much that your heart, liver, spleen, lungs, and kidneys will ache."

Zhou Yali stubbornly refused to admit defeat, her tone showing no sign of backing down, "Then let's wait and see."

After that, hang up the phone.

Chen Fan took the receiver away and looked at it, then chuckled, "You've gotten quite temperamental."

After saying that, he hung up the phone.

Then, without turning around, he said, "Come in. Standing at the door for so long, trying to make a phone call?"

Ma Jiajia walked in with a smile, nodded and said, "Yes, I'd like to contact the master."

Chen Fan got up and sat down next to her, looking at her with a smile, "Is this what we talked about during the day? Just tell him that it was me who said that if you want to get in, do it as soon as possible, don't dawdle, it won't look good and you'll lose a lot of money."

Ma Jiajia smiled, pulled out a chair, sat down, picked up the receiver, and dialed a number.

The call connected shortly after, and upon hearing the voice on the other end, she immediately said, "Sister Lan, is Master in? What? Master has come to the country? I've never heard him mention it."

"Oh, you're attending the Canton Fair, right? Do you have his contact number? Okay, tell me, I'll write it down."

As she spoke, she pulled a fountain pen from the pen holder, held the receiver between her neck and the earpiece, and unscrewed the pen cap. "Okay, I've got it."

"Well, Sister Lan, are Madam and Young Master doing well? If they are, that's good. I'm doing well too. Young Master is very polite and doesn't make things difficult for anyone. He's also incredibly handsome, even more so than Master was in his youth..."

Listening from the side, Chen Fan couldn't help but nod with a smile. Sure enough, his strengths were like fireflies in the dark, impossible to hide.

When he heard the next sentence, he immediately stopped laughing.

Ma Jiajia made no attempt to hide anything from him, saying directly, "Young Master has come up with a new project. Yes, he's already told Miss, and I reckon she'll be working on it as soon as you wake up. Yes, it sounds great. Young Master even said that if Miss doesn't do it, she'll regret it so much her heart, liver, spleen, lungs, and kidneys will ache."

Yes, I know. I went to see the master about this. This time, we can't let them do things alone anymore. They never involve the young master in any good things. In the future, the young master will have to beg the young lady for help. I definitely can't stand by and watch that happen.

"Don't worry, I'll call the master right away. It's only just gotten dark here; he's probably still awake. Okay, you can hang up now, we'll talk later."

Chen Fan sat to the side, forgetting to smoke the cigarette dangling from his mouth, staring blankly at Ma Jiajia, "What are you going to do?"

Ma Jiajia turned to look at him and smiled, "Young Master, the domestic market is so big, you and Miss alone can't handle it. Look, just by adding a film and television city, you're already too busy and have to borrow people from the Master."

But we can't keep borrowing, so I'm here to find you the most suitable partner, and that's our boss.

You have the technology and vision, and the boss has the funds and connections. In particular, we have a pool of talent from several companies. No matter what project you want to do, we can send the corresponding management personnel over.

Besides, we're all family, so you don't need to worry about us setting traps for you. With us managing and supervising the company, and even people recruited from outside being kept an eye on, it's a win-win situation.

After she finished speaking, seeing that Chen Fan was still dumbfounded and didn't seem inclined to say anything, she stopped talking, pressed the hang-up button on the phone to disconnect the signal and restart it, and then dialed another number.

The call connected quickly, and Ma Jiajia immediately perked up, saying seriously, "Master, is this Xiaojia? You told me to call you immediately if the young master makes any new moves. Today, the young master has made some moves. Let me tell you, it's like this..."

Chen Fan sat to the side, his expression somewhat indescribable.

No, I'm a grown man sitting right here, and you're so blatantly "colluding with each other" without even trying to hide it. Isn't that a bit inappropriate?
what?
They are the family, and I am the outsider?
Chen Fan wiped his face, thinking that he still couldn't do without his own trusted confidants.

So he secretly made up his mind that he must cultivate his own talent, and as soon as possible!
(End of this chapter)