workrooms to assemble and reassemble varied sizes and typefaces of metal Chinese characters before the new system was applied. “It always took more than 30 people eight hours a day to set only one page of news stories,” she said, but with the introduction of the new system, “from that year, the staff in our workshop was reduced by more than half.”

By 1994, almost all the domestic newspapers and printing houses had adopted Wang’s system.

Marketing an invention

Envisioning a large market for his invention, Wang dedicated himself to merchandising his laser typesetting system with the Founder Group, which had links to Peking University, in the late 1980s. He was a former board chairman of the company, which is now a stock market-listed software leader.

While Wang was an expert in computer applications, what is perhaps even more significant is that he was successful in marketing his invention and promoting the establishment of an industry. Based on his ideas, the Founder Group has become a large company with annual sales of 24.5 billion yuan.

Experts say the core competitive edge of the Founder Group comes from production of Wang’s typesetting system, which now makes up over 90 percent of the news printing market in Chinese characters.

Founder’s laser photocomposition technology is used by 99 percent of the domestic newspaper industry and 90 percent of the book and periodicals publishing market, as well as 80 percent of the overseas market in Chinese-character newspapers. In addition, Founder’s Japanese photocomposition technology has also accounted for one third of Japan’s press market.

Wang received many domestic and international awards, including a gold medal at the 14th International Inventions Show in Geneva in 1986, and the 1995 prize for the advancement of science and technology from the HoLeung Ho Lee Foundation. In 2001, he received the State Scientific and Technological Award, the nation’s highest honor in the field of science.

Wang had a unique understanding of how China should develop its technology products, a view that continues to exert an impact on the information technology sector. Such independently developed products must be world-class to make inroads into the markets of developed countries, he said.

“One must be patient and persistent in scientific research,” Wang said. “And only through competition with world-class technology will China’s research institutes and enterprises improve their innovative power.”

Wang had an unassuming and amiable personality, and was always helpful to young people. “The younger generation should surpass [me] and take a big step forward,” he said.

In 2002, he used his 9 million yuan bonus to create the Wang Xuan Scientific Research Fund to support the research of the Computer Institute of Peking University.

“Though we never saw Professor Wang Xuan with our own eyes before, we came here not only because of his invention and contribution but because of our admiration for his personality,” said a young teacher from Peking University who attended his funeral.