Chapter 195: Useless Products
Xu Qiang waited for two days but still didn't get a reply from Liu Biao.

It was obvious that the amount of investment that Xu Qiang needed from the factory had already put Liu Biao in a dilemma.

Generally speaking, Liu Biao is a man who makes decisions quickly, but this decisiveness is based on his rich experience and work experience. However, the new product that Xu Qiang applied to develop is obviously within his blind spot, and the funds and manpower required for continuous investment are so huge. As the head of the family, Liu Biao naturally needs to be cautious.

Besides, in Liu Biao's opinion, bulletproof vests are somewhat useless, or even inferior.

At present, the domestic troops are not equipped with bulletproof vests at all, except for special military and police forces. Since liberation, the troops have never been equipped with them on a large scale.

This is also related to China's national conditions. On the one hand, domestic bulletproof vests are somewhat bulky. Since they are built with two alloy steel plates, they are not only heavy but also very inflexible, which affects the soldiers' tactical movements and will weaken their combat effectiveness to a certain extent under extreme wartime conditions.

On the other hand, bulletproof vests are not really invulnerable. They can block fragments of pistols and artillery shells at a certain distance, but their protection against rifles is somewhat disappointing. They may reduce the death rate of soldiers, but they lead to many seriously injured people. Sometimes it is better not to wear them.

"Director Liu, are you looking for me?" At this time Li Cunzhu came to the office of Director Liu Biao.

"Thank you for your hard work recently, working overtime every day. I see that you have lost some weight. Please sit down." Liu Biao said with a smile.

"this is necessary."

"How is the project you are responsible for going?" Liu Biao asked.

"The progress is very smooth. Our project team has made five consecutive technical plans for this new product. The next step is to contact each workshop and ask them to make samples according to the drawings. It is estimated that all samples can be made before the end of the month." Li Cunzhu said.

"The research and development speed this time is very fast!" Liu Biao's eyes suddenly lit up when he heard this.

In Liu Biao's impression, the technical research and development in the factory has always been a time-consuming and labor-intensive task. Even for an ordinary technological innovation, from project establishment to successful research and development, it is necessary to repeatedly copy samples and test them, and push the drawings back again and again, which takes a short period of several months to half a year, and a long period of two to three years. Many times, when the project is halfway through, difficult problems will arise, such as insufficient machine tool processing accuracy and lack of key components, and ultimately the project will end in failure.

In fact, this is also a very normal thing. After all, in the past, the domestic industry was large but not strong, and many equipments were old and backward. At the same time, developed countries have been imposing technological blockades on China. Therefore, it was indeed quite difficult to develop an advanced military product at that time. This kind of thing is not something that any military industrial enterprise can solve.

But now, Li Cunzhu's project team has entered the sample testing phase in just over ten days, which is an unprecedented efficiency. This shows that Li Cunzhu is really putting all his efforts into this project this time.

"This is the result of our team's cooperation. I just proposed the technical ideas. The real credit belongs to them." Li Cunzhu said lightly.

"Old Li, you are still so modest." Liu Biao nodded approvingly after hearing this, and then said, "I asked you to come here today because I want to consult you about something."

"whats the matter?"

"It's like this. The day before yesterday, Comrade Xu Qiang handed me his new product development application..."

"Uh." Li Cunzhu's expression brightened when he heard this, and then he asked repeatedly: "What product did he apply to develop?"

If it were when Xu Qiang first joined the factory, Li Cunzhu would not have had any interest in Xu Qiang at all. When Xu Qiang wanted to develop military batteries, he was also dismissive in his heart. He even thought that it was a fantasy for a farmer like him with only a junior high school education to engage in technological research and development.

But it is different now. Including the technological transformation of the chemical workshop, Xu Qiang has completed the technological innovation of three major projects. Moreover, the samples have not only been highly recognized by provincial experts, but will also be sent to the Fifth Ministry of Machine Building for this year's major military technology evaluation. All of this was completed in less than two months. Such high technological innovation ability and efficiency make Li Cunzhu feel inferior.

It was also because of this that when he learned from Liu Biao that Xu Qiang had applied for a new R&D project, it naturally attracted his great attention.

"Xu Qiang said he wanted to develop bulletproof vests..."

"Bulletproof vest?" Li Cunzhu was stunned when he heard this. He obviously did not expect Xu Qiang to propose developing such a product.

"Yes, it's a bulletproof vest." Liu Biao pondered for a moment and said, "And the research and development funds Xu Qiang applied for this time are at least 100,000, and there is a possibility that there will be an overspending..."

"It's going to cost 100,000 yuan!?" Li Cunzhu was also surprised when he heard this. After a moment, he said, "The research and development funds for my signal shielding box are only more than 10,000 yuan. How could Xu Qiang spend so much money to make a bulletproof vest?"

"Old Li, do you know anything about bulletproof vests?"

"I don't know much either. After all, this thing has nothing to do with our factory's military products. It belongs to protective equipment." Li Cunzhu thought for a moment and said, "I have read some information on this before. How come the country has already developed a bulletproof vest in the 1950s, which is made of fiberglass and can protect against grenade fragments and pistol bullets? Later, in the early 1970s, a new type of bulletproof vest was developed. It is made of a composite structure of aluminum alloy and boron carbide. It is mainly used by special military and police forces and front-line assault troops."

"Is boron carbide expensive?" "It's very cheap. In fact, as far as I know, a domestic bulletproof vest costs less than 100 yuan. However, compared with similar foreign products, the performance is still quite different."

"Is that so?" Liu Biao nodded and said, "It seems that even if Xu Qiang's bulletproof vest is successfully developed, with a profit of 10%, we have to sell 10,000 pieces to make back the cost?"

"Our country has never paid much attention to this kind of protective equipment. We mainly focus on developing offensive weapons." Li Cunzhu shook his head and said, "Moreover, foreign bulletproof vests are much better than ours. They are as soft as ordinary clothes when worn on the body. They don't like our products at all unless the price is very low. But this thing is not a consumable. For example, in a battle, both sides may consume tens of thousands of artillery shells, but bulletproof vests will only lose a few hundred or a thousand pieces at most. This is already the best..."

"Uh." After hearing this, Liu Biao seemed to have figured it out.

"Besides, the countries that buy our weapons are all third world countries. The size of their armies is much smaller than ours. Even if each soldier gets one, the demand is only tens of thousands. Moreover, they are poor, and human life is the least valuable." Li Cunzhu paused and continued, "And if we can't open up the international market for bulletproof vests, we can forget about it domestically. Unlike other military products, no one buys them abroad. At least the domestic production capacity can be absorbed..."

"I understand." Liu Biao nodded and said, "Chief Engineer Li knows more. In that case, I will not approve this project."

"Comrade Xu Qiang is indeed very capable in technical innovation, but he does not understand the domestic and international military product markets, and inevitably takes some things for granted. Ultimately, he is too young and has a lot to learn," Li Cunzhu said calmly.

"Okay, that's it, you go and get busy." Liu Biao said.

"Then I'll leave." After saying that, Li Cunzhu stood up and left Liu Biao's office.

Seeing Li Cunzhu leave, Liu Biao picked up the teacup, took a sip, and then shouted to the outside of the door.

The next moment, Secretary Wang Bo appeared at the door.

"Xiao Wang, go to the waste storage of the chemical workshop and call Xu Qiang over to me."

"Okay." Upon hearing this, Wang Bo immediately turned around and left.

Liu Biao stood up at this time, lit a cigarette, and slowly walked to the window.

At this time, Liu Biao seemed to have made up his mind.

He absolutely could not allow the product that the factory had spent a lot of manpower and money to develop to end up losing all the money.

"Jingle Bell!"

At this moment, the phone on Liu Biao's desk suddenly rang.

"Hello? Who is it?"

"There's a call from Nanchang." A woman's voice came from the other end of the phone, followed by a beeping sound.

In those days, making long-distance calls was a very painful thing. You had to wait in line for a long time at the post office, and the charges were quite high. Therefore, the most common way of long-distance communication at that time was to write letters or send telegrams.

But you can make long-distance calls directly from Shengli Machinery Factory. You have to dial 113 first, which is the long-distance station, report the unit's registered phone number, then the unit's account number, and then the number you want to call. The other party will answer: hang up and wait.

So you can hold the phone and wait, the person cannot leave and you can't tell when he will come.

Shengli Machinery Factory has its own telephone room, with five telephones capable of making long-distance calls distributed to each department, namely the factory director's office, the deputy factory director's office, the secretary's office, the supply and marketing department, and the security department.

However, even though the factory can make long-distance calls, they are rarely used. Only when there is something very important will they make a long-distance call. This is true for all units.

When the call came from Nanchang, the first thing Liu Biao thought of was the National Defense Science and Technology Office, because it was the superior unit of Shengli Machinery Factory and the only unit in Nanchang that had connection with Shengli Machinery Factory.

"Hello, is this Director Liu? I'm Gao Zhiguo!"

After a moment, a familiar voice came from the other end of the phone.

(End of this chapter)