Stanford University was founded in 1891 by railroad tycoon Leland Stanford, then governor and senator of California, and his wife Jane Lathrop Stanford.
The university is named in memory of their son Leland Stanford Jr., who died of typhoid fever at the age of sixteen. Leland Stanford once told his wife: "All the children in California will be our children."
Private universities are very popular in the United States. World-renowned universities such as Stanford and MIT are private universities. The United States will not provide funding to these schools, but their funds are very abundant, and their talent pool is so strong that it is suffocating.
In his previous life, Liu Lang often lamented that the United States has too many talents. Half of the people who won Nobel Prizes and world-class awards are Americans. They use technology and knowledge to change the entire world.
Any strong country must have its strengths. Talent is one aspect, but the most important thing is to have an atmosphere to cultivate these talents.
People in the island country are all "boring gourds". They may seem boring, but they have a kind of ruthlessness. No matter how small their business is, they will devote their whole life to it. This is the sentiment of a craftsman.
The Americans are somewhat different. They "proclaim themselves" to be God's beloved children, and any country that does not comply with "God's" instructions will be punished. This kind of hegemony was most vividly demonstrated after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Those countries that "go against" the wishes of the United States
His nose was bruised and his face was swollen after being beaten.
"I am the boss of the world, you all must listen to me!"
This is the sentiment of Americans. For the country, this sentiment often leads to wars, but for individuals, it is full of goodwill. It shows that they are not so obsessed with money and understand the true role of money better.
In the United States, many wealthy people donate large amounts of money. Many of the funds raised by private schools come from graduating alumni. You must know that operating a university costs a lot of money. The cost of building a laboratory may be as high as hundreds of millions of dollars.
, these are not small amounts of money, no
There is a feeling that you will never pay for it out of your own pocket. In addition, there are many important projects involving natural sciences, and the funds often come from private donations. For example, the one that impressed Liu Lang the most was a project to explore Mars, with funds of more than one billion.
, all this money comes from those rich people.
This kind of thing is not common even in China more than thirty years later. Those rich people have left their property to their children, thus creating a large number of "rich second generations".
Of course, the money is his own and no one else has the right to say how it should be distributed, but this also shows the difference between the two countries. To put it bluntly, it is a gap in vision.
The establishment of Stanford University is the embodiment of this American sentiment. The founder donated all his life savings, even to the extent of borrowing money to run the school. However, the rewards given by this school are immeasurable and have even affected the entire world.
Development is the place with the highest technology in the United States and the establishment of Silicon Valley, the source of world technological development.
More than thirty years ago, Stanford was not very famous. At this time, the university's Board of Trustees made a decision to rent large tracts of land to recent graduates of Stanford at low prices to support their entrepreneurship. This decision caused a short-term impact around the school.
A large number of companies gathered within a short period of time, especially at that time when the electronics industry was developing rapidly. Most companies were built around the electronics industry, and the fundamental material of the electronics industry was semiconductors. Over time, the name "Silicon Valley" came into being.
name.
It can be said that Stanford University has laid a solid foundation for the formation and rise of Silicon Valley and has trained leaders of too many high-tech companies, including HP, Google, Yahoo, Nike, Electronic Arts, Sun Microsystems, NVIDIA, Cisco and other companies.
, it is no exaggeration to say that the products manufactured by these companies have changed the world.
As a graduate of Stanford University, Knight led everyone to experience the atmosphere of the university again on the Stanford campus. The students coming and going made everyone feel the vitality.
"Liu Lang, this is Stanford Business School. I studied for my master's degree here twenty years ago. Twenty years have passed in the blink of an eye... Look at this big pine tree. Our drama club often rehearsed plays under it. I
Always play Hamlet!”
Knight sighed.
"Phil, Stanford is an engineering university, so it's not suitable for you to major in business administration!"
Liu Lang joked.
"Haha, there was no such thing as Silicon Valley twenty years ago. Of course, there were some companies at that time, but they were too small. They were scattered small businesses with no scale. There were large tracts of open space there. Later, it became more and more popular.
The more people gathered together, the name Silicon Valley was finally spread and it became the most important place in the electronics industry in the United States. This is all thanks to the directors of Stanford University, who are always so generous and far-sighted!"
Knight is filled with gratitude for Stanford.
"Yes! Nike is the beneficiary. Without Stanford University, Phil, you might not be able to establish Nike!"
Liu Lang said.
Knight founded Nike in 1971, with its headquarters in Silicon Valley. At that time, Knight and his partner Powell only had more than $10,000 in hand, which was all their savings.
Stanford University provides great support to companies like theirs. The first year's rent is basically a symbolic fee. But even so, Nike's start-up has not been smooth sailing. They have no money to hire workers and can only find help from factories.
Production, but you also have to persuade the factory to collect money afterwards.
In addition to requiring factory OEM work, we could not afford professional design experts. Fortunately, Powell was a college physical education teacher, so he designed it himself according to his own aesthetic concepts. Later, Knight also joined the ranks of designers.
It can be said that Nike started with 10,000 US dollars and developed into a company with annual sales of over 10 million US dollars in ten years. This sounds like a lot, but there are countless companies of this size in the United States. The leaders in the same industry, Adidas and
Puma's annual sales start at one billion US dollars.
In the past ten years, Nike has only been a "small business" and has little reputation in the United States. However, in the past year, Nike has become extremely prosperous. Its market value has soared from 50 million U.S. dollars to 200 million U.S. dollars, a four-fold increase.
It has become a billion-dollar company, and Knight, as the largest shareholder, has also become a worthy company based on market value.
In fact, he became a billionaire, an upstart on Wall Street, and a legend in Silicon Valley. Many media reported on the miraculous rise of Nike, which inadvertently made Stanford University more famous, and Liu Lang saw around him
There were many students coming and going, many of them wearing Nike sneakers.