Anyone who reads a book or newspaper in Chinese is indebted to Wang Xuan, a pioneer in modern Chinese-language printing, just as one can thank Thomas Edison for inventing the electric light bulb.
　　Wang invented a computerized laser photocomposition system for Chinese character typesetting, helping China independently make the leap from letterpress printing to electronic publishing.
　　Wang died of an illness on February 13 in Beijing at the age of 69. Senior Chinese leaders, including President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao, joined people from all walks of life in paying their respect at his funeral.
　　Wang was born in February 1937 in the city of Wuxi, in east China’s Jiangsu Province. He was vice chairman of the 10th National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and a professor at the elite Peking University. Also an academician at both the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering, he was proficient in computer applications for processing words and photos.
　　“We knew each other for 20 years,” said Ni Guangnan, an academician with the Chinese Academy of Engineering. “Wang struck me as a person full of innovation. He was both a prominent scientist and a dedicated entrepreneur. His typesetting system is a paradigm of innovation.”
　　Wang’s work has been described as the “second invention of the printing system for Chinese characters” after Bi Sheng’s development of movable clay type in the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127), which ushered in a printing revolution.
　　
　　Using laser technology
　　
　　INDELIBLE MEMORY: Wang and his wife watching a typesetting film produced by his laser photocomposition system
　　In 1975, when Chinese printing companies were still setting type by hand, Wang led the development of an integrated microchip circuit to efficiently store compressed information in Chinese characters.
　　With the anticipation of the future application of laser technology, Wang invented an advanced laser typesetting system and produced a laser typesetting machine for Chinese characters.
　　“His invention has ushered Chinese printing into a new era of computers and lasers, out of the age of fire and lead,” former Vice Premier Fang Yi commented in 1980.
　　Wang patented the system in Europe in 1982.
　　In early 1985, Wang’s system was put into service at the official Xinhua News Agency. According to Kang Baoshan, head of the typesetting division of Xinhua’s subsidiary printing factory, before the system was installed, workers set the type by hand, which was very timeconsuming.
　　At that time, the factory only printed three newspapers and several magazines. The more than 100 workers in the typesetting division could only set 1 million words a day, but nowadays the factory is able to print more than 30 newspapers. It can complete one newspaper page in about 20 minutes, compared to the several hours the process used to take.
　　People’s Daily, China’s largest newspaper, began using Wang’s system in 1990. Zhang Suhua, a printing division employee, said Wang’s invention was significant because it had “helped liberate Chinese printing workers from strenuous physical work.”
　　Zhang said she used to run between 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
　　
　　PARADIGM OF INNOVATION: Wang gives a briefing on his laser photocomposition system at a high-profile meeting
　　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.

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