Rebirth: Starting from Lighting Up the Tech Tree

Chapter 243 The American Market

The Americas are divided into two markets. To the north is ice, to the south is fire. The ice in the north is the political and business barriers built by Microsoft and Google over thirty years. The fire in the south is the willingness to cooperate actively ignited by the governments of Brazil, Argentina, Chile, and Peru.

Zuo Cheng's strategy was simple: first, direct the fire northward.

The rollout in South America has exceeded everyone's expectations. Brazil's Ministry of Agriculture signed the second phase of its smart agriculture cooperation agreement, expanding the coverage area from 80 million mu to 200 million mu. This figure exceeds a quarter of Brazil's total arable land, meaning that one in every four fields in Brazil is running on the 402 system. A statement made by the Brazilian Minister of Agriculture at the signing ceremony was widely reported by local media: "We used to say that Brazil was the world's breadbasket; now we want to say that Brazil is the world's smart breadbasket. The word 'smart' was given by the Chinese."

Argentina's entry point was communications. The Pampas grasslands are among the world's most fertile pastures, but their vast size and sparse population made traditional communication base station coverage too costly. The Argentine government used Sky Dome to cover the entire Pampas's communication dead zones, allowing remote pastures to access high-speed internet for the first time. A herder grazing his livestock on the Patagonian plateau posted a video on social media showing him conducting a video consultation with a veterinarian 800 kilometers away. This video has been viewed over 20 million times in Argentina. In an interview, the Argentine Minister of Communications repeatedly used the phrase "digital equality." The fact that herders on remote pastures and citizens of Buenos Aires can now use the same internet speeds and access the same information world was previously unimaginable.

Chile's cooperation follows a different path. Chile's state-owned copper company, Cadillac, is the world's largest copper producer, with an annual output exceeding 1.5 million tons. Copper smelting is a major energy consumer; a medium-sized smelter's annual electricity costs exceed $500 million. After signing an agreement to connect to the quantum manufacturing optimization engine, Cadillac's copper smelting energy consumption decreased by 14%. This 14% reduction translates to nearly $70 million in savings annually.

Peru followed suit, incorporating 402's smart agriculture solution into its highland crop cultivation program in the Andes Mountains. Quinoa and potato cultivation in the Andes has a long history, but has long been hampered by the extreme climate and poor communication at high altitudes. With the Tianqiong constellation coverage, farmers in the mountains can now access real-time weather data and market price information for the first time.

From north to south across South America, 402's products reach over 200 million people.

When Han Lu placed the summary table of contracts from the four South American countries on Zuo Cheng's desk, her tone carried a rare hint of excitement. The four contracts totaled over three billion US dollars, but for Zuo Cheng, this figure was far less important than another set of numbers: a population of two hundred million, an area covering over two hundred thousand square kilometers, and a comprehensive terrain verification project spanning from tropical rainforests to the Andes Mountains.

The strategic value of this data lies in the fact that the 402 has proven its technical capabilities in South America under various terrain and climate conditions. Whichever market follows suit will have readily available case studies to refer to.

But Zuo Cheng was looking at a different document.

British Columbia, Canada, bypassed the federal government and signed a Sky Dome coverage agreement unilaterally with 402. The provincial government's announcement was restrained, stating only that it was a pilot project to improve communications quality in remote areas. But everyone knows what this means. The provincial government is using 402's technology, while the federal government has yet to comment. This is a rift.

Mexico's cracks are appearing in the energy sector. The Mexican Federal Electricity Commission signed a contract for space-based solar power, becoming the first official agency in North America to use 402 space-based energy. The contract is small in value and pilot in nature, but its signal is extremely significant. Mexico is North America's energy gateway, and any energy technology implemented there has the potential to penetrate northwards.

Two cracks weren't enough. The third one came from Silicon Valley.

Tesla officially released a technical evaluation report on its autonomous driving cloud-based scheduling system, concluding that the 402 solution is at least two years ahead of Tesla's self-developed solution in terms of globally optimal path planning. Elon Musk made three statements during the earnings call that have been repeatedly quoted by global media.

"I don't like to admit this, but the data doesn't lie. If we want to catch up with 402's level of autonomous driving, the most rational choice is to adopt their quantum scheduling system. Of course, I won't do that."

Wall Street's reaction was more direct than Musk's words. Seven investment banks simultaneously lowered their target stock prices for Tesla's Autopilot system. Analysts collectively concluded that if Tesla insists on developing its own cloud-based dispatching system instead of integrating with 402, the gap in Autopilot experience will only widen.

Zuo Cheng placed three documents on the table: a low-key contract from the Canadian provincial government, a pilot agreement from Mexico, and Tesla's evaluation report. Three cracks had appeared in the North American ice sheet. He picked up a pen and wrote a line on the paper.

Canadian provinces, Mexico, and Tesla. These three things have one thing in common: none of them were initiated by 402 (presumably a typo, should be 402). They were decisions made by the other party themselves.

He told Han Lu, "Microsoft and Google can hold onto the federal government, but they can't hold onto the market. When Mexico uses 402 energy, Canada uses 402 communications, and Tesla's customers are asking why they don't use 402 dispatch, the federal government isn't making choices for the market; it's sacrificing for the market."

Han Lu compiled the data from the three cracks into a table. The coverage agreement for British Columbia, Canada, has officially taken effect, and construction has begun on the first five Sky Dome ground stations. Although Mexico's space photovoltaic pilot contract is only $80 million, the Mexican Federal Electricity Commission has already internally initiated a feasibility study to expand it to three states. While Tesla verbally states it won't connect, pressure from Wall Street is increasing week by week, and some shareholders have formally proposed a motion demanding that Tesla abandon its self-developed cloud dispatching system.

All three cracks will widen. It's only a matter of time.

In the same week that the three cracks appeared, two pieces of news arrived in Hangzhou almost simultaneously.

First: The CEO of Microsoft made a phone call to the CEO of Google. The call lasted nearly two hours. Silicon Valley tech media later learned from sources that the call had only one topic: the three cracks that 402 had created on the North American border. Both agreed that if no substantial countermeasures were taken, the ice over the North American market would completely shatter within two years.

Article 2: The next day, the two companies simultaneously announced that they would merge their respective quantum computing laboratories to form a joint quantum research center with a total investment of over $50 billion.

The spearhead points in only one direction.