Reborn in 2010, the AI ​​in my mind is too powerful.

Morris Chang was well aware that the afternoon vote might be more volatile, with the silent majority potentially exercising their right to vote. However, he was powerless to stop Chen Yiran if the vote were held directly in the morning.

Although he is the soul of this company, his shareholding is actually very small, less than 1%. The only people present in the morning who would definitely vote for him are the pseudo-government National Development Fund, as well as state-owned banks such as Mega International Commercial Bank, Taiwan Cooperative Bank, Bank of Taiwan, First Financial Holding, Hua Nan Bank, and Chang Hwa Bank, plus local life insurance companies and investment trusts such as Cathay Life Insurance, Fubon Bank, and Shin Kong Life Insurance.

Their combined total is only about 13%, so he had to suspend the morning's voting and call all the company's employees over.

In the early days, it was common for listed companies in Taiwan to distribute bonuses and stock options to their employees. TSMC's employee trust and bonus pool held a number of shares, highly dispersed among tens of thousands of employees. After accounting rule reforms in 2010, which changed employee bonuses to expenses, this pool shrank again. Including restricted stock held by senior executives, the total amount could reach about 4%.

Most of them were on production line shifts today and didn't come to the meeting. They rushed over in a company-provided emergency vehicle. This will at least give them more than 15% of Chen Yiran's share. The next step is to try and secure some peripheral shares.

Morris Chang knew that even if passive investors like Citigroup ADR, Vanguard, BlackRock, and State Street were to participate, they would most likely mechanically follow the advice of voting advisory firms. Therefore, all he needed to do was gain the trust of these firms.

Although the situation was urgent, he didn't immediately intervene. Instead, he first contacted Google and Nvidia. The three parties are now in a close alliance, and he needed sufficient support from Google and Nvidia.

It was already evening in the United States. Google and Nvidia were shocked when they received the news. They simply could not accept that TSMC had been hacked by Chen Yiran.

Nvidia immediately placed a huge order, signing a letter of intent with TSMC that would almost cover most of TSMC's production capacity for the next five years.

Google, being the company with the most cash among the three, provided financial backing for Nvidia's deal. Furthermore, it directly promised that Maze EDA would grant TSMC exclusivity, preventing it from supplying other foundries.

Morris Chang wasn't entirely satisfied with these conditions. The exclusivity of the labyrinth wasn't really that significant, since the market was already flooded with products from FlowEDA or Mentor. Fortunately, the guaranteed orders from Nvidia gave him something to say in his discussions with the other shareholders.

Morris Chang immediately contacted the two largest voting consulting firms present today.

One is ISS, an American institutional shareholder services firm. They provide advice to numerous institutions, with their biggest clients being Citigroup and BlackRock.

Another company is Glass Lewis, founded in 2003. Their core business is providing institutional investors with voting advice for listed company shareholder meetings, corporate governance analysis, and proxy voting management services.

Leveraging the geographical advantages of Silicon Valley, they have many institutional clients, with Vanguard and State Street being their largest clients.

The conversations with the two companies left Morris Chang with mixed feelings. Although both companies were very interested in the orders Nvidia had promised for the next five years, they still hadn't given him a definite answer, leaving him in a state of uncertainty.

Moreover, for some reason, Morris Chang felt that the two companies were unusually cautious, as if they were afraid of saying the wrong thing, which was very unlike the usual behavior of these companies.

Ultimately, he decided to personally confront the institutions that held shares in his company.

His first target was Citigroup ADRs, given their 21% stake. If he could convince them, his chances of winning would be much higher. He wanted to see if he could leverage TSMC's past stability to secure their direct support.

To his disappointment, the Citibank representative remained completely neutral, telling him very clearly: "As a depository institution, we do not wish to comment on this matter at this time. We will ultimately vote based on the advice of the voting advisory body."

After hitting a wall, he turned to BlackRock again. This time, their representative was David Huang, the Asia Pacific head, a high-ranking individual with discretionary power. Moreover, BlackRock itself is known for its rebellious nature, actively participating in governance and often ignoring the advice of the ISS.

After hearing Morris Chang mention Nvidia's order, David Huang pondered for a moment and said, "To be honest, the reason I came here in person is because I have some ideas about TSMC's future strategy. Originally, we hoped that you could get more support from Nvidia and Google."

Although you've obtained it, it was under duress from the Aurora Group. That speaks volumes; without a doubt, the Aurora Group is far too attractive.

Morris Chang had no choice but to look at it from another angle: "I admit that Aurora Group does look like a behemoth now, but that also means that their internal affairs are complicated and that things will be more chaotic in all aspects. In the future, there may be conflicts of interest that lead to their disintegration."

However, our alliance with TSMC, Google, and Nvidia will unite even more closely under pressure. I admit that we cannot guarantee a win, but as long as we don't lose, it will be enough to bring sufficient benefits to our shareholders.

Because besides us, no one else can operate in the high-end market. We don't need to completely defeat Aurora Group; we just need to get a share of the high-end market, since not all users are willing to choose Aurora.

"I know you're right. To be honest, I don't think bringing Chen Yiran in is necessarily a good choice. I believe many shareholders know that Chen Yiran is indeed a bit too assertive right now."

In my opinion, their situation is actually quite awkward. They haven't reached the point of being too big to fail, but they have already formed a semi-monopoly.

So you'll support us?

David Huang shook his head decisively: "Even so, I will still support Aurora, because their advantages all come from their technology, so it's not easy to find fault with them, and the risks are controllable. And you know, Chen Yiran is now recognized as the most rebellious person in Silicon Valley."

We can't afford to fall out with him over such a trivial matter.

Morris Chang frowned. He knew that Chen Yiran was currently riding high and would almost certainly become the world's richest person next year. A world's richest person under 25 years old—this was a plot that many novels dared not write. But he still didn't understand why these investment institutions were afraid of Chen Yiran.

It's important to understand that BlackRock manages over $4 trillion, making it a true behemoth.

David Huang noticed Morris Chang's doubts, and perhaps out of respect for the octogenarian, he didn't hide anything: "His technology also has a great role to play in finance. Several companies on Wall Street are already using Deepflow to build the latest models."

Using his framework, his chips, and his AI may become the norm on Wall Street in the future. If, because of this small matter, he were to say in the future that all products under his framework would not be open to us, we would be in a very passive position.

To be honest, I can't predict the future anymore. Ten years ago, while computers were starting to influence us, ultimately it still depended on people. Now, everything seems to have changed. Forget the economy; AI is even venturing into complex mathematical problems.

Morris Chang's eyes dimmed slightly, but he still maintained his smile and said, "Thank you for your honesty. I still hope you will consider this carefully."

He then silently walked back to the makeshift operations room, where representatives from the National Development Fund were working with the others, hoping that no one would defect at the last minute.

Seeing Morris Chang enter, he asked hopefully, "How did it go?"

Morris Chang sighed: "Let's do our best and leave the rest to fate. We still need to hold more shares. It all depends on how the external funds ultimately decide."

A representative from the National Development Fund turned to someone standing by the wall and said, "It seems like that's not going to work. Is it possible to use some administrative power?"

The person by the wall was a government official who had rushed over in the afternoon. He said mockingly, "If you want to court death, try it yourself. Who are these people on the other side? Are you trying to pull some underhanded tricks?"

Just considering four firms—Citibank, Vanguard, BlackRock, and State Street—it's not impossible for them to directly contact the US military and launch an attack on you. If you can withstand them, I'll help you use administrative power.

"But it's the sacred mountain that protects the nation."

The person by the wall glanced at Morris Chang and said, "Let's keep a unified story. If we ultimately succeed in preventing Chen Yiran from getting in, then we've protected the sacred mountain that protects the nation."

If this fails, it means that Chen Yiran, along with American capital, is very optimistic about TSMC's development. Their investment in TSMC and entry into the board of directors are aimed at deeper management involvement, attempting to give TSMC a more advantageous position in the future chip industry.

At 3 p.m., the shareholders' meeting continued, starting with the proposal to have Chen Yiran of Aurora Group join the board of directors.

The final vote count completely surprised everyone present.

Morris Chang looked at the final vote count in surprise, and finally felt relieved. He felt it was time for him to retire.