Chapter 176 Natural Fund (5k)

"Huh~" After returning to his residence, Chen Yuanguang collapsed on the sofa and immediately complained: "This trip was more stressful than the college entrance examination."

Lin Jia had been waiting at the residence for a long time, and she asked quickly: "How is it?
Tell me more and I will analyze it for you."

So Chen Yuanguang told Lin Jia some key points of today's class, including the specific things they talked about during the subsequent meal.

"I don't really know how I answered, but in the end I was given the title of Special Committee Member of the National Natural Science Foundation. I can lead 20 billion natural science funds every year. I have the final say on who gets the money and who doesn't.

The evaluation is conducted every five years. If the project I selected is effective, the funding will increase. If it is not effective, the funding will remain the same.”

Lin Jia asked: "Is it the budget, or does it mean that it must be spent?"

Chen Yuanguang said: "Of course it is the budget. If it is not spent in the first year, it will be carried over to the next year.

What the bosses meant was that as one of China's top scientists in academia and industry, they wanted me to choose some truly valuable topics and use the National Natural Science Foundation to fund them.

I have the final say on all topics from selection to evaluation, and I feel a lot of pressure. Two billion yuan a year is not a small amount. "

The Natural Science Foundation has sponsored 1500 billion yuan in the past five years, spending an average of 300 billion yuan each year, which is equivalent to taking 300 billion yuan out of the 20 billion yuan to give to Chen Yuanguang. You have put forward the proposal, so you have to judge which technologies are key.

Lin Jia had a keen sense of smell and she quickly realized how much power was involved. With each term lasting five years, the power might continue to rise.

“Your judgment is correct. This is a test, and your test results will determine the level of support you will receive from the national level.

I don’t know what level of reward the big guys expect this result to be, but in my opinion, it is definitely a reward that can only be obtained with a score of 80 or above.

During ancient peasant uprisings, the victims would follow whoever could provide them with food.

Although the Natural Science Foundation is a national grant, it is up to you to decide how to distribute it to individuals. This is a huge power, which means that a large number of scholars will benefit from your favor.

In a sense, you will become the biggest academic tycoon."

Chen Yuanguang was not as excited as Lin Jia about the power he had acquired. He considered it a burden rather than power.

Chen Yuanguang was helpless: "I definitely can't spend such a large amount of money. My energy is limited, and I can only allocate a small part to this. How can I possibly look after so many projects?

You should know that the selection of natural science funds consists of multiple stages including preliminary review, expert review and conference review. I am not qualified to review all of them.

On the way back, I checked and found that last year we received 30 projects and funded 4 of them. Based on the total funding of 8 billion yuan last year, 300 billion yuan means 20 projects will be funded. This is a huge number that I cannot manage alone. "

Lin Jia said: "So this is the budget, you are not asked to spend it all."

Chen Yuanguang nodded: "You are right, but there is so much budget. I think if I am given 20 billion, I may only spend a few million every year. The gap is too big. Isn't it a bad thing?"

Lin Jia said: "I think this is a continuation of this exam. If you want to pursue a career in government, then do well. If you are not interested in a career in government, then it doesn't matter if you get a low score.

The reason why such an exaggerated amount is set is to test your ability to integrate knowledge and practice. When it comes to how to guide scholars to do key issues, your answers are just talk after all. They may want to see how you perform in the specific process.

They give you 20 billion every year and let you control the flow of the money. The resources are given to you, and you have your own ideas. They should hope that you will take bold attempts.

This is also a typical practice in China. A small piece of the Natural Science Foundation is cut out for you as an experimental field. The performance of the experimental field will determine how to carry out subsequent work around this area as a whole.

If you do it well, it won’t just be a simple increase of 20 billion. The methods you use in this process will become a case study and be promoted nationwide in the future.”

Chen Yuanguang was speechless after listening to this. What he meant was that if he did a good job, he would really be pushed to the position of the uncrowned king of the academic world?
"Lin Jia, I mean, if my method is to make the final decision, I will give it to whoever I think is capable, without any standard. It all depends on my subjective judgment.

20 billion may not be spent in full, I spent several hundred million, and the results achieved for the nodes in the last five years were very good, so what would your country do?"

Lin Jia said: "That should be to maintain the status quo, and then your opinions will become very important on major scientific research-related issues."

Chen Yuanguang then asked: "Actually, I'm thinking of one point, that is, the 20 billion yuan annual support fund can be raised by myself without government funding. If you think in this way, the value of this matter is not that great."

"No, Yuan Guang, power comes from the ability to allocate resources. You have a very strong ability to allocate resources. If you really want to do this, you don't even need to pay for it yourself. There will be many companies in the country willing to donate.

Leading companies like Xiaomi, Huawei and even Tencent won’t mind donating money to you to do this.

However, organizations are power amplifiers. Even a small social platform or an organization with weak connections like fans and bloggers can infinitely amplify the power of bloggers, not to mention the largest organizations in the country.

The 20 billion RMB he provides you will have a better effect than if we paid billion ourselves.

What's more, the fixed cash expenditure of 20 billion per year is not a small amount for us." Lin Jia shook her head, and she obviously disagreed with Chen Yuanguang's point of view.

Chen Yuanguang had not yet figured out how to manage the 20 billion yuan of natural fund. After the academician conference ended, scholars across the country received new news from the natural fund. Projects that had not been applied for before could try a special channel in the natural fund.

Even if you have applied for the Natural Science Foundation, you can also apply for the special channel there. The two are not duplicated.

It is already the middle of the year and the annual application for the Natural Science Foundation has long been closed. Some scholars with new ideas can only apply for funding support from schools, colleges or external sources, so the Natural Science Foundation provides a new option.

For a moment, everyone was asking what was going on.

Everyone was well-informed, and soon the natural fund project with an annual investment of 20 billion yuan, which was fully led by Chen Yuanguang, shocked everyone who knew the news.

Various media outlets rushed to report on this because this was indeed unprecedented power, as Lin Jia had said.

“It is reported that the Natural Science Foundation under the Natural Science Foundation Committee has added a special channel”

"After Dr. Chen Yuanguang, nicknamed the God of Light, was elected as an academician of the two academies, he quickly gained the trust of the national level and led a natural science fund worth tens of billions of yuan."

According to the media, 20 billion per year means billion in five years.

The numbers must be exaggerated to attract readers.

"Isn't this a bit too important at the national level? The God of Light has the final say? Even the director of the National Natural Science Foundation Committee doesn't have this power, right?"

“Obviously not. The National Natural Science Foundation has to go through rounds of review, which requires collective decision-making, with at least three experts involved. It is not uncommon for more than 10 experts to review the project.

This is the first time I've heard of something like this being decided by one person. The country has placed too much trust in this."

"As a poor young professor, I am grateful that I can apply for 8 yuan of provincial funding. The God of Light actually directly gave me 20 billion yuan. Although it is not him who spends it, it is too enviable and jealous."

"The gap between people is too big. Two billion, isn't that a bit too exaggerated?"

At first, everyone focused on the matter itself, thinking that it was a bit exaggerated and to some extent broke the original operating mechanism.

Later it slowly turned into complaining and emotional venting.

"I admit that the God of Light is amazing, and his achievements are beyond my reach in my lifetime, but isn't this too unreasonable? No matter how amazing he is, he is only good in his field. How can he judge all scientific research projects with his own ability?"

"It is totally unrealistic for one person to make the decision. Which leader made the decision on a whim?
This will only lead to two possibilities. One is that Boss Chen will decide everyone's life and death at will. I believe that Boss Chen does not value the 20 billion yuan and will not make any under-the-table deals, but it is also fatal for him to decide everyone's life and death on a whim. The second is that the fields he is good at will receive unprecedented support, and the fields he understands, such as materials, biology, and chemistry, will receive support, and he will not even look at the application materials for the fields he does not understand.

The latter will make it easier to apply for projects in these fields, which is also unfair to other fields.”

"I recognize the contributions made by Guangshen. Perovskite batteries, topological semimetals, not to mention room-temperature superconductors, have all made outstanding contributions to the country and won us unprecedented strategic space. I also believe that what Guangshen said in the interview about bringing everyone a golden age is his true idea.

From conversations I have had with my high school, college, and graduate school classmates, the treatment in the photovoltaic industry has improved significantly in recent years. Even the wages of grassroots employees have increased by at least 30%. This is definitely the credit of the God of Light. The excess profits brought by perovskite batteries have also been enjoyed by grassroots employees.

But I still have to say that it is very unreasonable to directly give 20 billion to Guangshen. Even if the country pays 20 billion to Guangshen as salary every year, I will not say anything. After all, Xiaomi gave Mr. Lei billion RMB in option incentives, and Guangshen's contribution to the country far exceeds Xiaomi.

But asking him to lead the investment of 20 billion yuan in the Nature Fund, like other young people, is unreasonable, unfair to everyone and unfair to the God of Light. "After everyone started to think carefully, a lot of negative voices broke out, generally focusing on whether this was too hasty.

However, everyone's opposition was still focused on the incident itself, rather than directed at Chen Yuanguang.

The greatest malicious intent is to call him Boss Chen, implying that his underlying nature is a capitalist, not a scientist or anything else.

Of course, there are also many supporters of Chen Yuanguang who stand up and speak for him online:

"If the God of Light is not qualified, who is? As a top scientist in the fields of biology, chemistry, and materials, isn't he more qualified than anyone else to judge?

Moreover, this is a budget and there will be an audit. Opponents simply feel that their interests may be harmed and find some high-sounding reasons to oppose it.

I think Guangshen has absolute say in the areas related to him and his extensions. He can do a good job in this work, and I don’t think Guangshen will spend this part of the money arbitrarily on areas he is not familiar with. ”

Seeing the public opinion rising up on the Internet and everyone arguing fiercely, Chen Yuanguang decided to stand up and say something.

He had previously felt that when the relevant parties made decisions, the people below had no idea how they made the decisions, and the lack of transparency in information led to a lack of unity between the top and the bottom.

He does not think that he and the young scholars who apply for the project have a superior-subordinate relationship, but he still hopes that the information will be as open and transparent as possible so that everyone knows why this is happening.

So that night after the incident fermented, he posted a Weibo:

"Hello everyone, I would like to talk to you through live broadcast about the fact that I will be leading the flow of part of the natural fund. I will broadcast live on Weibo at 8 o'clock tomorrow night. You are welcome to ask questions, and I will try my best to answer your questions."

After the Weibo post was sent out, the Weibo backend reacted the fastest and urgently prepared to add bandwidth, fearing that the application would crash during the live broadcast tomorrow night. Wouldn’t they be scolded to death then?

As for Chen Yuanguang’s first live broadcast, which brought a lot of traffic, everyone obviously didn’t want Weibo to eat it all.

Tik Tok, Bilibili and other major video software have used various channels to hope that Chen Yuanguang can live broadcast on their platforms, or at least share a live stream.

Unfortunately, there was only one day, which was not enough time to finish the work, and Chen Yuanguang didn't want to bother either.

Therefore, Weibo can enjoy this huge traffic exclusively.

Chen Yuanguang’s Weibo calmed the situation down and everyone was waiting for his live broadcast.

But this still cannot suppress the discussion among the people.

Especially in colleges and universities, young professors who lack funding are discussing this issue privately.

"Will you apply for the Light God's Natural Fund?"

Even though people criticize Chen Yuanguang online, they still respect him in real life. After all, his achievements are real.

"Of course, I'm preparing to write the materials, but I don't know if it will be easy to apply."

“It’s definitely not easy to apply. You can imagine how fierce the controversy is online now. The God of Light is obviously someone who values ​​his reputation. He will definitely be very strict. Otherwise, what if he lets some watered-down or fake projects through, damaging his reputation?
I think this will be even harder to apply for than previous natural science grants.”

"That's right, but I still want to give it a try. I'm still a small fry and I don't have the right to be picky. I have to grab every opportunity."

"Who isn't? The God of Light is an unattainable genius, and we are young scholars at the bottom of the ecological chain. Of course, we can only try our best."

Everyone has the same idea about this: it is always good to have one more application channel.

The next evening, the number of viewers in the Weibo live broadcast room exceeded 10,000 within one minute of the start of the broadcast.

"Hello everyone, because this topic has attracted everyone's attention, and I don't have any live broadcast experience, so I specially invited Brother Lei to be my live broadcast controller and help me choose the questions from everyone's comments."

Xiaomi’s headquarters is in Yanjing, and they have many live broadcast rooms. After a security check, Chen Yuanguang chose Xiaomi’s live broadcast room for this broadcast.

"That's right. After my junior found me, I said it was no problem. I am not as good as my junior in other aspects, but I am far ahead in one aspect, which is my experience as an internet celebrity." Lei Jun was wearing a blue suit.

There are two chairs in the entire live broadcast room, and they are facing the camera at a 45-degree angle.

The Weibo backstage staff was confused. “Boss, the number of viewers has exceeded 500,000. We need to ask the telecommunications company to urgently increase the bandwidth, otherwise the network will definitely collapse.”

"Add!" After saying this, the person in charge of their network looked helpless: "The God of Light actually invited the Lord of Thunder. The network can't support whoever replaces the two top stars."

The subordinate next to him whispered to himself: "TikTok can hold up."

In the live broadcast room, Lei Jun continued: "I did my homework before coming here and collected the most common questions from people online.

Therefore, I plan to divide it into two parts. First, I will ask these common questions, and then answer netizens’ comments. "

Chen Yuanguang nodded: "Okay."

Lei Jun asked: "Junior brother, the first question is that I need you to give us a general introduction to the 20 billion natural fund."

Chen Yuanguang replied: “To put it simply, I mentioned a phenomenon, that is, many scholars work on issues that do not have much practical significance other than publishing articles.

It can neither create value for the industry nor promote scientific progress. Apart from becoming a cold number to measure the publication status of articles, it has no other use.

Some scholars who choose very difficult topics cannot publish papers in the early stages, and because they do not have papers, they cannot obtain sufficient resource support in the current evaluation system. As a result, even if they have the interest, confidence and belief to solve the problems, they find it difficult to continue due to practical reasons.

After I mentioned this phenomenon, the government thought what I said was very good and wanted to give me some resource support so that I could support this type of scholars and projects.

I originally wanted to decline, saying that the task was too big and I couldn't afford it, but then my leader said, "Don't be so modest, it's you."

Therefore, this task fell on my head. I also surfed the Internet and saw some doubts from everyone. I would say that this is a responsibility for me rather than a benefit.

If I cared about these things, I would not have given the patent of perovskite battery to Guangjia Aerospace. You should know that the patent of perovskite battery brought Guangjia Aerospace more than 30 billion RMB in revenue last year, and it is estimated to exceed billion this year.

I can definitely set up another company and put the patent in a company in which I personally own 100%.

Sorry, that's a bit off topic." Chen Yuanguang clasped his hands together.

Lei Jun took over the conversation: “It’s normal to go off topic during the first live broadcast.

Let me add that, in my understanding, I don’t know whether my junior brother loves fame or not, but he definitely doesn’t love money.

Before, Guangjia Technology invested in Xiaomi Auto. I proposed a price, and he took the initiative to raise the price. I was wondering at the time, how could anyone complain that the price he offered was too little?

Junior brother, please continue."

After Lei Jun finished speaking, he raised his hand to signal Chen Yuanguang to continue.

"Then the natural fund I was given a budget of 20 billion RMB per year. I can invest it all or not invest a penny. It has to be audited every year.

It is true that I am the leader. To be frank, I have the final say.

I had also thought about whether to set up a company to operate it, or to do the same as the previous natural fund, with preliminary review, expert cross-review, and meeting review, and finally I would make the final decision.

Later I decided that it would be less troublesome, so I just decided directly. "

(End of this chapter)