After the Divorce, I Could Hear the Voice of the Future
Chapter 626 - 618: Gou Liang, it truly wasn’t a mistake to call you

Chapter 626: Chapter 618: Gou Liang, it truly wasn’t a mistake to call you

Early the next morning, Lu Liang had an appointment with Wei Heng from Deep Blue Automobile at the Tianxing District.

"Mr. Wei, I’ve heard a lot about you."

Lu Liang clasped his hands, revealing a smile. In fact, he had known Wei Heng for quite some time.

But only by name and not in person, because they were both from the same hometown and born in 1985.

Although they didn’t attend the same high school, Wei Heng’s name was known to most students from that year.

Lu Liang had long forgotten the name of his high school homeroom teacher, but he remembered that year Wei Heng was specially recruited by Tongji University.

Back then, the homeroom teacher often said that if a student from his class were to be specially recruited by a 985 University, he would laugh himself awake even in his sleep.

The high school homeroom teacher was very snobby and constantly used good students as examples, hoping students would bring him honor.

Thinking back now, that guy never seemed to self-reflect, just wanting to reap rewards without effort.

After all, Wei Heng studied at the top high school; if the class had fifty students, no more than two would be admitted.

In contrast, in the high school where Lu Liang studied, scoring 300 out of 500 on seven subjects was enough for admission.

The idea of a phoenix flying out of a chicken coop was unrealistic, but the homeroom teacher would still talk about it daily, monthly, mentioning Wei Heng and the top students from that year.

As a result, Lu Liang found it hard to forget, but now it seems the homeroom teacher’s unrealistic wish has come true.

During the Spring Festival, Lu Liang visited his hometown, toured his primary, middle, and high schools, donating around eighty hundred thousand.

At some point, his picture was hung in the school’s prominent alumni section, and he received interviews from various media.

If Lu Liang hadn’t returned, it would be fine, but since he did, he had to leave something behind, at least making a gesture of deep teacher-student affection.

Thus, the homeroom teacher received recognition from the education bureau leaders, climbing from teaching for over ten years to become the director of instruction, eventually becoming the deputy principal.

The current principal was the same one during Lu Liang’s school days, now in his early sixties, likely to retire in the next few years.

"Mr. Lu, what are you saying? Your contribution to the new sports center in Yu City was praised by the locals and friends alike."

Wei Heng smiled brightly, standing at 1.75 meters tall, wearing gold-rimmed glasses and exuding charm and elegance.

He had known for a long time that they were fellow hometown acquaintances, but the emotional bond between locals takes effect only when it’s beneficial.

Partnering with Lu Liang was a reluctant move since Deep Blue wanted to break into the mid-range market, competing with BYD, Weima, and Xiao Peng, necessitating keeping up with the leading tier in smart cabins.

Developing now was too late, Chang’an wouldn’t fund meaningless smart cabin R&D, only at this time could the kinship sentiment be triggered passively.

Otherwise, no matter how distant the hometown connection, even with close brothers, accounts must be settled clearly.

"Just a small effort, not worth mentioning."

Lu Liang waved his hand and sighed, "It’s just that Yu City isn’t within the eight horizontal and vertical road networks, unreachable from the Yangtze River Delta, nor reaching the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau from below, with no coastline to the south, making development very difficult, just trying to do a little to enrich the citizens spiritually."

During the Spring Festival, he stayed in his hometown for five days, spending around seventy million.

Ten million to build a spectacle for the village to attract tourists, enabling the villagers to do business without needing to leave for work.

Another ten million was donated to his elementary, middle, and high school alma mater, as well as the village’s elderly and destitute elderly, finally, fifty million invested in the sports center in the urban area.

City leaders advised Lu Liang, saying teaching a man how to fish is better than giving him fish, best to invest in industries to boost the local economy.

But Lu Liang wasn’t foolish, realizing his hometown had changed six mayors in the past ten years, none of whom were clean.

Investing in industries was like stepping on chewing gum, not only dirty but sticky, potentially causing endless trouble later.

Better to spend some money, finalize the transaction wholly, with at least something left at the end.

If the quality was poor, Lu Liang wouldn’t take the blame.

He’d do his good deeds, they their sins.

"Mr. Lu, you’re just too modest."

Wei Heng suddenly looked towards the workshop direction, "Mr. Lu, isn’t that the Tianxing factory over there?"

Lu Liang nodded, smiling, "Mr. Wei, are you interested in a tour?"

"How could I be so bold?"

Wei Heng chuckled dryly, suddenly changing his tune, "Actually, I’m quite interested in the integrated casting production line."

"Then let’s go." Lu Liang anticipated Wei Heng’s words, directly instructing his cousin to turn the car towards the factory.

The sightseeing vehicle stopped at the factory entrance, Lu Liang took out several sets of protective clothing and helmets from the security room, casually donning them, leading Wei Heng into the workshop.

"Mr. Lu, shouldn’t we prepare first?"

Wei Heng was astounded, having held high positions within BorgWarner, Geely, and Chang’an Groups.

He had visited numerous workshops in various companies, but each required at least half a day or a day’s preparation.

Like Tianxing’s direct approach was unprecedented.

"A tour should reveal the most genuine local situation, good or bad, if prepared in advance, it’s like taking a test with answers known, does such a test have any reference significance?"

Lu Liang smiled faintly, seemingly sarcastic, though unclear whom he was targeting.

Suddenly spotting Zhuo Yifan inspecting materials in the warehouse, the once fair and clean young man now sporting a beard, looking older than Lu Liang.

Lu Liang couldn’t help but chuckle, waving Zhuo Yifan over for an introduction, "This is Mr. Wei from Deep Blue, and this is Zhuo Yifan, formerly my secretary, now the deputy director of the workshop."

"Director Zhuo is indeed impressive."

Wei Heng stood with respect, putting aside any contempt.

The secretary is often the closest person in work to Lu Liang, being in the grassroots signifies soon being entrusted with important responsibilities.

It’s hard to say when Zhuo Yifan will gain the status to have an equal dialogue with him. By then, showing respect will be too late.

"Mr. Wei, you must be joking."

The group chatted as they walked, starting from the warehouse at the production line’s origin, passing through dozens of workshop departments, witnessing firsthand how a pile of components finally turned into a complete vehicle.

The number of frontline employees at Tianxing Factory is considerable, but still too few compared to traditional car manufacturers.

This is mainly thanks to integrated die-casting technology. After high-temperature forging and cooling, the basic contour is formed.

Compared to traditional automotive manufacturing production lines, there are fewer welding points and many unnecessary processes are eliminated.

Wei Heng curiously asked, "Director Zhuo, how many cars can roll off a production line in one day?"

Zhuo Yifan glanced at Lu Liang and, after receiving a nod, said, "Currently, an average of 68 cars."

"So few?" Wei Heng frowned, feeling a severe deviation from his predicted capacity.

"Mr. Wei, we’re currently touring Line 5, which has just been put into use, so its capacity hasn’t ramped up yet."

Zhuo Yifan explained with a smile, mentioning that the average he referred to is of the six production lines. If considering only the first three lines initially put into operation, the daily capacity is 165 cars.

Wei Heng suddenly understood and congratulated Lu Liang with cupped hands, "Congratulations, Mr. Lu, for Tianxing Automobile’s June delivery exceeding ten thousand cars."

With six production lines, each averaging 68 cars a day, that’s over 12,000 cars a month.

Tianxing Automobile’s locked order volume conservatively estimated at 140,000, meaning basically how many are produced is how many can be delivered.

Last month was more than five thousand cars; this month is just over ten thousand.

Tsk tsk, what a terrifying sales curve.

"Sigh, what’s there to celebrate about that."

Lu Liang sighed, showing a troubled face: "After completing deliveries this month, there are still tens of thousands of orders. My biggest wish now is to clear these orders this year, so our supporting customers don’t wait too long."

Zhuo Yifan thought Lu Liang was warning him: "Mr. Lu, we’ll certainly ramp up capacity as soon as possible."

"..." Wei Heng remained silent,

suddenly feeling a bit dry-mouthed and itchy-throated.

Selling over ten thousand units in the second-month post-launch isn’t worth celebrating?

There’s still damn tens of thousands of orders, is this even human speech?

The key is that it’s true, damn infuriating.

"Mr. Lu, shall we go back and discuss cooperation."

Wei Heng no longer wanted to tour; he didn’t see important departments, only saw Lu Liang showing off.

"Mr. Wei, won’t you stroll around a bit more?"

Lu Liang smiled, insisting on keeping him there.

He was more than happy to guide people around the factory, as it felt like introducing them to the empire he built.

"Mr. Lu, let’s discuss cooperation first. After all, I have something to do in Beijing tomorrow." Wei Heng quickly waved his hand.

"Alright then."

Lu Liang was slightly unsatisfied as they left the factory and headed to the office building next door. After several hours of negotiations, they finally confirmed the component supply model.

Tianxing Technology would provide customized auto parts like LiDAR, millimeter-wave radar, and cameras to Deep Blue Automobile, forming a package and offering a technical team for free installation guidance.

For each package, Deep Blue is required to pay the original price of 15,000 RMB, with a current discounted price of 10,500 RMB.

The cooperation model was suggested by Hu Weiwei, referencing Neon’s machine tools as a template, to which Tianxing Technology adapted its scheme.

Japanese technology is closely guarded, even if you buy their machine tools, you only get usage rights.

If any equipment malfunctions, you need to hire Neon’s technical team to China for repairs at a high salary, and outsiders aren’t allowed to watch during repairs.

Tianxing Technology hasn’t reached such a monopolistic position like Neon’s machine tools, so in this regard, the cooperation terms can be slightly relaxed.

Put simply, they include after-sales service.

First, create a dependency among the collaborating car companies, leading them to completely abandon the development of intelligent driving systems. In the future, if they happen to achieve a monopolistic position, changing conditions would be a matter of saying a word.

Soon, the news of Deep Blue and Tianxing’s cooperation to develop the intelligent cockpit for Deep Blue’s SL03, set to release this autumn, spread widely.

Wei Heng received a call from Li Xiang questioning him just after having drinks with Lu Liang and resting back at the hotel: "Mr. Wei, what’s going on?"

Upon learning the situation, Wei Heng’s face turned bitter.

He was certain, absolutely sure, that this news was definitely spread by someone at Lu Liang’s behest.

Wei Heng rubbed his temples and sighed helplessly, "Mr. Li, I’m really sorry, the senior management at Chang’an pushed too hard, and we had no choice."

"Understood."

Li Xiang paused in silence, did not probe further, only saying: "Sorry for disturbing your rest this late."

"No disturbance at all."

After exchanging a few pleasantries, the call ended with a busy tone, leaving Wei Heng with a look of grievance: "Gou Liang, truly a fitting name."

He wasn’t afraid of being labeled a traitor, but feared carrying the label without reaping any benefits.

Due to Deep Blue’s voluntary surrender, the alliance initially formed to resist Tianxing Car Machine’s monopoly now had a breach.

Not unexpectedly, many car companies would follow by abandoning resistance and choosing to cooperate with Tianxing.

After all, autumn was approaching, and no one wanted to fall behind.