Actually, there was no question of who won or lost. Lu Zhou's proposal was definitely a win-win situation for Umicore.
Otherwise, Grynberg wouldn't have nodded so easily.
However, this was a US $400 million deal.
Even for an international chemical giant like Umicore, this was not a small amount of money. Especially when Lu Zhou asked for a "lump-sum payment before the end of the year" condition.
After signing the letter of intent, in order to convince the board of directors, Grynberg didn't even have time to eat dinner. He only had time to open a bottle of champagne and toast Lu Zhou. He then quickly left the hotel while talking on the phone.
Based on his promise to Lu Zhou, he would fly back to the headquarters in Brussels tonight and convince the board of directors to agree to this patent cooperation agreement. He would try to sign the contract before the end of the year.
As for whether or not he could do it, Grynberg could only say that he would try his best.
After all, for a listed company, a deal involving hundreds of millions of US dollars couldn't be casually made.
Regardless of whether or not the contract was successfully negotiated, the moment the letter of intent was signed, the relevant information had to be disclosed in the stock market in advance.
Grynberg's phone call was to the secretary of the board of directors.
Lu Zhou quietly enjoyed the rest of his dinner. He got up and left the hotel lobby. He got on the elevator and went straight back to his room.
Along the way, his footsteps were very light, just like his mood.
It wasn't until the door behind him closed that Lu Zhou came back to his senses. He realized what he had just done.
"US $400 million …"
Sitting on the edge of the bed, Lu Zhou looked at the letter of intent in his hand. His heart raced and he couldn't calm down for a long time.
He didn't expect that in one night, he would go from middle-class to financially independent.
When he was a child, he had daydreams of winning the five million lottery. As for tens of millions or even hundreds of millions … To be honest, he didn't even dream about it.
What should I buy?
Hire a teaching assistant?
Buy a supercomputer for Xiao Ai?
Ask my dad to buy two sets for me in Beijing?
Or …
Post it on Weibo?
Fortunately, rationality prevailed.
Lu Zhou, who had just taken out his phone, resisted the urge to "share the joy" with his fans and stuffed his phone back into his pocket.
When it came to money, it was better to keep a low profile.
Taking a deep breath, Lu Zhou chanted a few times to calm himself down. He got up and went to the bathroom to take a shower to calm down his boiling brain.
As for the question of what to buy with so much money, he planned to think about it after he signed the contract …
After washing up, he laid down on the bed.
He thought that he would be able to fall asleep soon after a busy day, but after tossing and turning for the second half of the night, Lu Zhou did not feel sleepy at all.
He didn't know when it started, but it was already dusk outside the window.
It wasn't until his phone's alarm rang that he realized he hadn't slept all night.
In fact, what Lu Zhou didn't know was that he wasn't the only one who couldn't sleep.
That night, many people stayed up all night with him.
As for the reason, it had to be traced back to a few hours ago.
At midnight in Washington, the head office of Umicore, located in Brussels, Belgium, suddenly disclosed a US $400 million patent cooperation plan on its official website.
It was this news that disturbed a lot of investors' dreams.
Although the media had reported more than once that lithium anode materials had "major research results", no chemical company had actually begun to industrialize lithium anode materials.
But this time, Umicore suddenly invested a huge sum of money to obtain the patent authorization for lithium anode materials.
The sensitive capital market finally smelled a hint of movement.
It seemed like this day had finally arrived.
…
The next day, the MRS conference was still going on. Other than Lu Zhou, who had stayed up all night and was still sleeping, everything seemed to be the same as yesterday.
However, on Wall Street, which was less than a hundred kilometers away from Boston, the lithium battery-related sector was boiling like a carnival.
Almost all companies involved in the lithium battery industry, within half an hour of the market opening, showed varying degrees of increase in stock prices.
This did not only stop at the lithium battery-related industry, but it even fed back to the lithium materials futures market.
Lu Zhou underestimated the market's enthusiasm for lithium batteries and the influence of his partners.
When it came to market value and reputation, companies like Umicore were not comparable to Samsung, Sony, Panasonic, and BYD battery manufacturers. They could not even compare to the "customers of their customers" — the hundreds of billions of USD worth of mobile phones, electric vehicles, and other technology companies.
But when it came to industry influence, these chemical giants with hundreds of years of history were not inferior to them.
The reason was simple.
Five years could create a Tesla, ten years could create an Apple or Microsoft. However, if the speed of technological progress could not keep up with the pace of the times, they might be replaced by new high-tech companies in less than ten years.
However, for those companies in the upper reaches of the industry chain, although their prospects were unimaginable, the risks that were evenly distributed to them were relatively small.
After all, no matter what kind of products were popular in the market, there would always be a demand for chemical raw materials.
However, no matter how the capital market reacted, these things had nothing to do with Lu Zhou for the time being.
At least for now, he did not have the energy to pay attention to these things.
Lu Zhou slept until the afternoon. He stretched his back and looked at the time on his phone. Instead of looking at the time, he saw that his screen was full of missed calls.
Among them were calls from Professor Chirik, calls from China, and some missed calls.
Just as he was having a headache thinking about which phone to call, another call came in.
Lu Zhou picked up the phone and put it next to his ear.
"Hello?"
"It's me."
When Lu Zhou heard the familiar voice, he paused for a second and spoke in an uncertain tone.
"Professor Lee?"
Hearty laughter came from the other end of the phone.
"Haha, looks like you haven't forgotten about me."
Lu Zhou smiled and said embarrassedly, "How could I forget? Speaking of which, did you change your number? "
Lu Zhou obviously would not forget about Professor Lee. If it wasn't for Professor Lee's help, he might not have been able to complete the system mission. However, it was an unknown number, so he didn't know what was going on.
Professor Lee smiled and said, "I didn't change my number, I'm on a business trip, so I'm using a temporary number."
"Business trip?" Lu Zhou had a strange look on his face as he asked, "You're not in Boston, are you?"
"I'm not just in Boston, I also listened to your report yesterday. It was amazing," said Professor Lee. He then teased Lu Zhou, "How was it, did you have fun last night? Did you rest well today?"
Lu Zhou coughed and said, "What do you mean? I fell asleep as soon as I went back … I just couldn't sleep. Oh yeah, where are you right now? "
Professor Lee smiled and said, "I'm downstairs, sitting in the lobby of the hotel. It's almost dinner time. If you have time, let's have dinner together. If you haven't slept enough, let's get together another day. "
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