Chronicles of Semiconductor Pioneers Chapter 6

If Alex Zhou just wanted to copy the paper, he would only need to spend a morning.

The biggest difficulty was that he needed to use the content that could be found in the Yanda Library and the journals subscribed to by the Microelectronics Department as the theoretical support for this email.

Rather than citing unpublished results.

The next morning, at 9:00 Yenching time, which was 5:00 p.m. in Los Angeles, Alex Zhou received the email from Victor Hu on time at Yenching University's computing center.

The night before, they did not communicate about the email itself, but instead asked more about Alex Zhou's personal situation and examined his oral expression.

In every aspect, Alex Zhou met Victor Hu's psychological expectations.

Oral expression is the first hurdle that international students of this generation face after going abroad. Many students need about half a year to adapt.

According to Alex Zhou's spoken expression, one can skip this stage directly and start doctoral work seamlessly.

Yes, the PhD stage is more about work than study.

Research-oriented work.

The department where Victor Hu is located is abbreviated as EECS in English. This department is divided into three major parts: electrical engineering, computer science and other interdisciplinary subjects, and pure computer science.

Integrated circuits are a sub-item of the larger field of electrical engineering.

When Alex Zhou entered school, the field of electrical engineering already had seven sub-fields:

Information, Data, Network and Communication Sciences

Computer vision and artificial intelligence, control systems and robotics, integrated circuits, micro/nano-electromechanical systems, physical electronics, signal processing.

In 1998, electrical engineering was not divided into such detailed categories.

"These questions are actually mainly about the breadth of your knowledge and whether you have a deep enough grasp of the basic knowledge in the field of integrated circuits.

Not a lot of bells and whistles."

(I haven’t done the test and I can’t even understand it, but I heard from experts who have done it that it’s not difficult.)

Most of the time is spent typing, but not much time is spent thinking.

After Alex Zhou sent the email, Victor Hu replied almost immediately.

Alex Zhou looked at the time in the lower right corner of the WIN98 system, and then estimated the time in Los Angeles in his mind. It was now nine o'clock in the evening in Los Angeles. "I guess the teacher set a reminder tone and has been waiting for my reply.

It seems there is a shortage of labor recently."

For professors, doctoral students are their free labor. They exchange their labor for degrees and, by the way, inherit the professors' personal connections in industry and academia.

As for how much you can inherit, it depends on the character of your mentor and whether he appreciates you.

Perhaps Alex Zhou was the last PhD student personally supervised by Victor Hu, so Victor Hu spared no effort in introducing connections to Alex Zhou.

But this does not mean that Victor Hu's requirements for Alex Zhou are not high. On the contrary, Victor Hu's requirements for Alex Zhou can be described as strict.

Even under such stringent requirements, Alex Zhou still took four years to obtain his doctorate degree.

This shows how talented he is.

According to Berkeley regulations, it takes 5 to 6 years to study for a doctorate at Berkeley after starting with a bachelor's degree.

Even at Berkeley, there are very few people who can graduate with a bachelor's degree in six years, especially in engineering fields such as integrated circuits.

But during this period, Victor Hu's need for a PhD was more about talent and immediate combat capability.

Because he started his own business, he founded a company called Sirius Electronics in 1996. He worked in Berkeley while running his own business privately.

If it had continued on its original trajectory, the company would have performed mediocrely and eventually been acquired by Cadence.

Even with Victor Hu as the founder, no company that does EDA has been able to surpass Cadence.

Cadence is the world's largest integrated circuit design software manufacturer. HuaDa JiuTian,   which is listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange, does the same thing. The difference is that HuaDa JiuTian mainly focuses on the domestic market, while Cadence's products are distributed all over the world.

Therefore, Victor Hu was in need of people to work for him at this time.

For a gifted person like Alex Zhou, if he has a solid foundation, he can start working right away.

It couldn't be more perfect.

At this time, Americans had already begun to pay attention to work-life balance.

Almost all the Chinese students Victor Hu met were very hardworking and dedicated.

Alex Zhou knew all this because Simon Liang revealed it to him when he was chatting with him when he started his business.

The general meaning of Simon Liang's ridicule is: Fortunately, you studied for your teacher's doctorate after 2010. If you studied for his doctorate during the time when he started his business, it would have been a huge workload.

Of course, even if you know it's a trap, you still have to jump into it.

Because timing is so important.

It was 1998 and the bubble of Internet companies was about to burst.

On the night that Alex Zhou finished the Berkeley doctoral entrance examination in integrated circuit specialization, Victor Hu called him again.

I asked a few professional questions and Alex Zhou answered them fluently.

Victor Hu also did not beat around the bush: "I will arrange for someone to help you with the transfer.

You are a sophomore now, right? After you came to Berkeley, you started directly from your senior year.

I will slowly make up for TOEFL and GRE after coming to California.

Since you have just finished the first semester of your sophomore year, you only need to study for one semester as a senior and then go directly to my doctoral program.

You will need to take some exams for courses you have not taken.

But with your abilities, these exams are easy.

I will also help you arrange a scholarship and ensure that you have no problem with your basic living in Los Angeles.

Also, let me tell you in advance that you may need to work part-time in my company after you come here.

This part-time job will also receive salary.

It's just going to be a bit hard, so you might need to be mentally prepared."

Alex Zhou agreed just as straightforwardly: "Okay."

At this time, just moisturize first.

As for work, it is not certain who will be in charge of whom at that time.

Berkeley has dedicated staff to handle transfer matters, and Alex Zhou only needs to go to the Yanda Academic Affairs Office to go through the process.

In fact, the most difficult step is to apply for a visa.

Before China joined the WTO, there was a high risk of rejection of a visa to stay in the United States.

Fortunately, Berkeley’s brand is well-known enough, so all this was done smoothly.

"That's amazing, I went straight to Berkeley. I was gloating about going to Santa Barbara.

As a result, Alex Zhou went directly to Berkeley.

I went to Santa Barbara on exchange, but you transferred directly.

I finally understand what it means that there is always someone better than you. "

There is a lag in the delivery of messages.

Alex Zhou had already started the transfer process a few days ago, and Ryan Cao only learned the news.

Kevin Wang and Tyler Li, who were half lying on the bed, sat up straight all of a sudden:

"What!

Alex Zhou, have you applied for it?"