I am Hollywood

Chapter 809: Chapter 810: ARM

[Chapter 810: ARM]

British labor protection laws were much stricter than those in North America. Any slight violation of the work schedule could lead to an investigation by the union. At noon, the crew stopped promptly for lunch.

Eric instructed Peter Rich to prepare two lunch boxes and then headed toward the office exclusive to the 007 crew with Caroline.

Carrying a small case for Caroline, Eric looked at the girl walking beside him and asked, "I saw you come in so early this morning. You don't live around here, do you?"

Caroline felt a bit awkward following Eric with empty hands, but she was too shy to ask for the case back. She occasionally glanced at Eric and nodded in response, "Yeah, I live by the River Thames."

Caroline was clearly used to describing her home location this way, while Eric had no idea where the River Thames was but assumed it was nearby. He decided not to pry further and asked, "How are your parents doing?"

"They're good, but Dad is as busy as ever, just like... just like you. My brothers are also busy, so Mom is often home alone."

Eric smiled and said, "Well, you can take this time to spend some more time with your mom."

Caroline nodded obediently. "I will."

...

They soon arrived at the temporary office, where Caroline opened the case with a password. Inside were three neatly arranged rectangular boxes.

Eric opened the box and revealed an MP3 player slightly larger than an old-fashioned lighter, featuring a beautiful sky-blue lacquer finish, a circular dial for operation, and a pure white display. The box also contained headphones, a charger, and a data cable.

Seeing Eric skillfully turn it on and casually open the computer on the desk, Caroline quietly introduced, "This is the latest product from the R&D center, using a 512MB micro hard drive and a rechargeable lithium battery. The display screen is made from the latest generation TFT technology, allowing for eight hours of playback on a single charge, and data transfer uses a USB cable."

Eric tried operating it for a moment. The player had preloaded a few songs, and he put on the headphones, enjoying the pleasant music coming from them.

He took another box out of the case and handed it to Caroline. "You should try it out."

"Me? Is it okay?" Caroline asked uncertainly. Seeing Eric pushing it toward her, she accepted and opened it carefully. Even though she carried these samples from Los Angeles, good manners prevented her from opening them beforehand, despite her curiosity.

This one happened to be pink, and Caroline knew the final model would be pure white. The finalized MP3 player from the R&D center would come in three colors: sky blue, pure white, and pink.

Caroline followed the developments at Firefly Electronics but was using an MP3 player for the first time. Not as familiar as Eric, she needed to read the manual to operate it properly.

Seeing Caroline struggling with the MP3 player, Eric chuckled. Noticing the computer was already on, he connected to the internet.

Yahoo had started to expand internationally over the past two years and established branches in major English-speaking countries, as well as in Japan, Germany, and France. They began to operate portal services, Yahoo Mail, instant messaging, and other business avenues.

Eric opened the American version of the Yahoo Music Store, which would launch simultaneously with the MP3 release, currently still in the internal testing phase.

After logging onto the website, Eric reached for the USB data cable on the desk, but when he looked down to connect it to the computer, he realized that the computer didn't have a USB port. He remembered that USB data transfer was a technology standard only recently promoted by IT giants like Intel, IBM, and Microsoft, meaning only the latest personal computers had USB ports.

The two mainstream data transfer standards available were Apple's FireWire and the USB. However, since last year, Apple's market share had been rapidly declining, projected to account for only 5% of North American personal computer sales this year. Even if Steve Jobs returned to Apple later on, Apple Computer wouldn't be a mainstream personal computer anymore. Eric, therefore, didn't pursue any technology investment in that direction.

With this computer unable to facilitate data transfer, Eric decided to postpone testing until he was back home that evening when his laptop had a USB port.

At that moment, Peter Rich entered, carrying two lunch bags, placing them on the coffee table in the lounge area. Noticing Eric had no further instructions, he nodded to Caroline and left.

Caroline had just figured out how to play songs when she saw Peter Rich bring in lunch, quickly taking off her headphones.

Eric and Caroline sat down on the couch. "Time is tight, so we can only grab a quick lunch here. Is that all right?"

"It's fine," Caroline shook her head and took out the lunch from the bags.

The lunch was simple -- sandwiches, roast beef, small cakes, and vegetable salad. It looked decent, but anyone who tasted it would know the truth.

Eric had grown weary of commenting on British cuisine. He just wanted to fill his stomach. With the crew's one-hour lunch break, he didn't bother cooking something special. Watching Caroline's accustomed demeanor, it was clear that she usually ate this kind of food.

How pitiful.

Caroline pulled out two cups of apple juice, handing one to Eric. Noticing Eric's expression, she curiously asked, "Eric, what's wrong?"

"Nothing," Eric shook his head, calmly taking a bite of his cheese sandwich.

Caroline blinked her big eyes and giggled softly, "Eric, do you think British food is bad?"

Seeing that Caroline didn't seem to mind, Eric nodded seriously.

"Hehe," Caroline chuckled, not offended, but still slightly countered, "We just pursue simplicity!"

From the moment he met Caroline, Eric could sense a subtle pride in her as a British girl. He decided not to pursue that topic further and switched subjects, "The MP3 player is done. How's the progress on the e-reader?"

"It mainly depends on the processor chip. ARM has focused on developing mobile phone chips with Texas Instruments over the past two years and isn't able to provide us with much technical support. So, the R&D center had to use the technology provided by ARM to design it by themselves. Although it's not as complicated as mobile phone chips, developing the control chip for the e-reader is still much more challenging than the audio decoding chip for the MP3 player..."

As Caroline spoke, Eric suddenly looked up and interrupted, "ARM?"

"ARM is a company based in Cambridge that focuses mainly on licensing the core design technology for microprocessor chips," Caroline explained. Noticing Eric deep in thought, she asked, "Eric, is there a problem?"

There certainly was a big problem.

Eric lamented inwardly that Microsoft and Intel's dominance in the personal computer market was irreversible. Besides their lead in the internet through Yahoo, AOL, and Cisco, he had also been considering and implementing strategies for the future of smartphones and the mobile internet age.

Qualcomm, Nokia, Yahoo, and investments in the mobile communications company Sprint were all significant pieces in Eric's plan for the next decade. However, considering the Wintel alliance, it was clear that to secure dominance in the mobile era, it was essential to focus on mobile operating systems as well as mobile processor chips.

In the previous timeline, ARM chips controlled over ninety-five percent of the mobile smart devices market, with virtually all electronic manufacturers, including Apple, Qualcomm, and Samsung, using ARM chip technology. However, more than a decade later, due to the widespread and sometimes excessive licensing of ARM technology and mainstream manufacturers like Apple and Samsung developing their own chip solutions once they matured technologically, while ARM controlled a massive number of core patents, achieving a monopoly akin to Intel's in the PC processor industry was now entirely out of reach.

But as of now, everything was just beginning.

If they could secure ARM early on, even if new mobile chip technology standards emerged later, the proven superiority of ARM's technological solutions, combined with support from industry giants like Qualcomm, Nokia, and Sprint in terms of channels and markets, could lead to ARM once again unifying the mobile chip landscape. Achieving a status akin to Intel in the PC chip market was not impossible.

Realizing this, Eric looked up to find Peter Rich but instead encountered Caroline's puzzled gaze.

Taking a moment to calm down, Eric remembered that Peter Rich would certainly be nearby to help with his daily affairs. Since there was someone right in front of him, he asked, "Caroline, how long is your vacation?"

Caroline, unsure of why Eric was asking, replied, "Half a month."

"Let's extend your vacation. How does a month sound?"

"Hmm?" Caroline was even more confused.

Eric continued, "It so happens that I suddenly thought of something. Since you're already here, there's no need to bring someone over from Los Angeles. During this time, I want you to help me gather information on ARM. Since you have prior experience collecting data for Qualcomm, you should be quite familiar with it. I need everything about ARM, including management information, shareholders, business status, partners, etc."

Remembering Qualcomm, Caroline began to understand Eric's intentions. "Eric, are you planning to acquire this company?"

Eric nodded. "You might need to make a trip to Cambridge. I'll arrange for a driver for you."

"No, no need," Caroline quickly shook her head. "I can drive myself. I also know many people in Cambridge."

"Then never mind. If you need any help, you can contact Peter or call me directly," Eric said, noticing that Caroline's expression had changed and no longer appeared as relaxed as before. He realized, "Is this disrupting your vacation? If you don't want to do it, I can call Kelly to send someone over."

"No, no! I want to!" Caroline quickly shook her head.

The truth was, she was just thinking that if she could spend a month in the UK and have a specific job to do, it would mean finding excuses to see Eric more often.

Thinking of this made Caroline feel a little flushed.

The two enjoyed their lunch while discussing some details. Before leaving, Eric gifted Caroline the pink MP3 player.

Although Caroline was excited about the player, she protested, "This is a sample! How can I take it?"

"Samples are meant for trial use," Eric laughed as he stuffed the box into her hands. "I'll have someone send you a Yahoo Music Store account tonight, but you might need a newer computer with a USB port to download music. I can't help with that. When you finish using it, feel free to write a user report."

"Well, okay," Caroline finally accepted the player.

An hour was actually quite brief. Caroline glanced at the clock, realizing it was already 12:55 PM, and bid farewell.

Eric instructed Peter Rich to send the remaining two MP3 players to his place and briefed him on assisting Caroline in gathering ARM data before starting his afternoon work.

...

Since Kate joined the cast, she had always been quite cautious as a newcomer, especially as an outsider from Australia. However, after Eric accepted her suggestions that morning, she gradually became more open and began expressing her ideas more boldly.

After Kate joined the cast in Italy, Pierce Brosnan had been feeling a bit frustrated because he kept having trouble keeping up with her pace. But with Eric's support from behind, plus the fact that no matter how outstanding Kate performed, she was still just a Bond girl, which didn't impact his standing in the crew too much. Thus, Pierce Brosnan had managed to maintain a relatively positive demeanor, except for occasionally showing a bit of tension during scenes with Kate, while the rest of the filming went smoothly.

The underwater photography portion wrapped up successfully in the afternoon, and most of Kate and Pierce Brosnan's scenes were completed. The remaining shots for Kate would be with Christina Aguilera, who played her sister. This storyline was entirely separate from the original version and naturally had little screen time since this was a James Bond film, where James Bond was always the core focus. Although Eric obtained absolute control of the Bond series, he wouldn't make drastic changes to the overarching style of the James Bond franchise.

*****

/Sayonara816.