The venture capital due diligence process was more invasive than Chen Wei had anticipated.
Over the two weeks following the March 28th pitch, the investment partners had embedded a technical team at Qiming's Zhongguancun office. They verified experimental data, re-ran critical synthesis batches, interviewed Zhang Mingwei about experimental protocol, and consulted with independent materials scientists about the technical claims.
None of this was hostile or adversarial. It was just rigorous. Venture capitalists investing ¥25 million in an unproven startup had legitimate reasons to verify that the technology actually worked and that the founders understood what they were claiming.
Chen Wei found it simultaneously validating and slightly violating—having his research methodology interrogated by sceptical technical experts who were looking for weaknesses rather than strengths.
By April 10th, the due diligence team delivered their preliminary assessment: "The technology is sound. The manufacturing scalability approach is novel and appears workable. Team capability is solid. We recommend proceeding with ¥25 million Series A funding."
On April 12th, Qiming received the official term sheet.
The document was sixty-three pages long, which somehow seemed worse than the seventeen-page employment contract. There were sections on governance, board composition, liquidation preferences, anti-dilution provisions, and a dozen other legal constructs that Mr Wang had to explain in layperson's terms.
But the core terms were clear: ¥25 million investment in exchange for 25% equity dilution. Qiming's post-money valuation: ¥100 million. Chen Wei's 2% stake was now worth ¥2 million on paper—theoretical wealth that would only materialise if the company succeeded and eventually had an exit event.
"Signing the term sheet is not closing the deal," the venture attorney explained. "Due diligence and legal documentation will take another 4-6 weeks. But once we sign, the commitment is essentially binding. Either we close, or there are expensive breakup clauses."
The term sheet was signed on April 15th, 2026. Funding was projected to close by the end of May.
With incoming capital visibility, Qiming's operational velocity increased dramatically.
Mr Wang began hiring: a business development manager, a supply chain specialist, and a senior synthesis chemist who had previously worked at Samsung's battery division. The office expanded to include a dedicated lab space with proper synthesis equipment rather than borrowed Tsinghua apparatus.
The scaled synthesis optimisation experiments were completed by mid-April, with the final batch of results showing the expected performance trajectory. By adjusting polymer cross-linking density and lithium salt concentration, Chen Wei's team had achieved a formulation that maintained 0.92 mS/cm ionic conductivity across thermal windows up to 50°C deviation. It was robust enough for manufacturing.
The manufacturing protocol was documented, analysed, and packaged into a technical report that became part of Qiming's investor materials. The paper was actually publishable—rigorous methodology, clear data, novel insights about distributed grain-boundary conduction in ceramic-polymer composites.
But publishing it created a problem.
The problem emerged in a conversation with Li Na on April 20th, during what was supposed to be a routine team meeting.
"Our battery materials publication is ready for submission," Li Na said, displaying the draft manuscript on her laptop. She, Chen Wei, and Professor Liu had spent weeks compiling the experimental data, characterising the composite architecture, and contextualising the work within the solid-state battery literature.
It was good science. It was publishable in a top journal. It was also a description of Qiming's core technology.
"We need to file the full patent applications before publication," Chen Wei said immediately. "If we publish first, we lose patent rights."
"That's what I wanted to discuss," Li Na said carefully. "The patent attorney says we need another ¥150,000-200,000 to file full specifications. We have to do it before publication. But there's a complication."
"What complication?" Chen Wei asked, though he was already beginning to understand.
"The patent prosecution timeline. Full applications filed now won't be examined for 18-24 months. During that time, the technology will be described in peer-reviewed literature. Competitors will see the published paper and understand our approach. They could potentially develop around our patents or file their own patents on improvements."
"So we're trading publication secrecy for patent protection," Chen Wei said. "Publish first, lose patents. Patent first, then publish, but accept that competitors see the technology while patents are pending."
"Yes," Li Na confirmed. "The venture capitalists are pushing hard for publication. Good academic credentials help the company's profile. Investors like seeing that their portfolio companies are led by researchers who publish. But the patent attorney is saying we should delay publication until at least 12 months after full patent filing to maintain maximum secrecy."
It was a classic tension between academic values and commercial interests.
In pure academia, you publish as quickly as possible. Priority in publication established intellectual priority. Your name was on record as having done the work first. Peer review validated the science.
In a commercial context, publication was a strategic risk. Every paper you published was information your competitors could access. They could study your methodology, identify weaknesses, and design competing approaches.
The venture capitalists wanted the academic credibility of a publication. The patent attorneys wanted the commercial protection of secrecy.
Chen Wei and Li Na had to choose.
"What does Professor Zhang recommend?" Chen Wei asked.
"I haven't asked him yet," Li Na said. "I wanted to discuss with you first."
They met with Professor Zhang the following day in his office. The professor listened carefully, asked clarifying questions about the patent timeline and publication urgency, then offered his perspective:
"This tension will follow you throughout your career," Professor Zhang said. "How do you balance contributing to the field's collective knowledge with protecting your commercial advantage? There's no single correct answer."
He paused, considering.
"But here's what I would suggest: publish the work, but delay publication by requesting a journal embargo until patent filing is complete. Most major journals will accept 3-6 month publication delays if you explain that you're protecting intellectual property for commercialisation. File full patents in June, request embargo until September, publish in October. That gives you 4 months of patent secrecy while maintaining your academic publication timeline."
It was a pragmatic middle path. Not perfect—competitors could still study the published paper and work around the patents. But it provided a protection window while preserving the academic contribution.
"The venture capitalists won't like the delay," Mr Wang would certainly complain. But it was better than the binary choice of either sacrificing patents or sacrificing publication.
The funding close happened May 28th, 2026, in a room full of lawyers and investment partners reviewing hundreds of pages of legal documentation.
Chen Wei didn't attend—the legal formalities were Mr Wang's domain. But at 6:43 PM that evening, Mr Wang called the team with news:
"We're funded. ¥25 million is in our bank account as of 2 hours ago. Qiming Battery Materials is officially a ¥100 million valuation startup."
The announcement landed with strange emotional weight. They'd been operating on hope and deferred capital for four months. Now they were operating on actual venture funding. Real investors had committed to the vision. Real money was available for hiring, equipment, manufacturing partnerships, and scaling.
The team celebrated that evening in a restaurant near the office—nothing fancy, but genuinely celebratory. Zhang Mingwei and the second synthesis technician (whom they'd just named official employees rather than part-time consultants) joined them. Even Dr Chen from CATL stopped by to congratulate them.
Chen Wei experienced the sensation of standing at a threshold. The venture funding meant Qiming was no longer a theoretical startup. It was a real company with real capital, real obligations to investors, and real consequences if they failed to deliver.
His sister's university entrance exam results arrived on June 1st, 2026.
The call came from his mother: "She scored in the top 0.5% of the province. She's guaranteed admission to Tsinghua, Beijing University, or any top school she wants. She chose the Tsinghua physics program. She'll be starting in September."
Chen Wei felt something shift in his understanding of family obligation. His sister would now be his peer in an academic institution. She would live in Beijing. She would attend classes alongside students from across China who'd also achieved elite academic standing.
And his mother—after years of working double shifts, managing debt, sacrificing for her children's education—had achieved the outcome she'd been working toward: both children at China's most prestigious university.
"You did it," Chen Wei said to his mother. "You got us both here."
"We did it," she corrected. "You with your research, me with work, your sister with her studying. This was a family effort."
The conversation lasted three hours. His mother expressed pride in his startup founding, asked detailed questions about the funding and technology, and made him promise that he would actually graduate with his PhD rather than getting distracted by business.
"The degree matters," she said firmly. "Business success can evaporate. Education is permanent."
The first serious technical setback came in mid-June, during pilot manufacturing trials with CATL.
Dr Chen had arranged for Qiming's scaled synthesis protocol to be tested in one of CATL's pilot production facilities. The test was not small—they were attempting to synthesise 50 kilograms of composite material using the manufacturing-constrained protocol, testing it on a scale that approached genuine production conditions.
The initial 15 kilograms showed expected results: ionic conductivity of 0.91 mS/cm, consistent with laboratory and small-scale trials. The next 15 kilograms showed slightly lower performance but still acceptable—0.87 mS/cm.
The final 20 kilograms showed dramatic degradation: 0.64 mS/cm.
"What happened?" Li Na asked, examining the failed batch data with rising concern.
"Thermal processing consistency," Dr Chen explained, showing the furnace logs. "The industrial furnace has better temperature control than laboratory furnaces, but it also has greater thermal mass. When the furnace cycled temperature for the final 20 kilograms, the cooling phase was slower. The polymer phase was exposed to extended time in the 80-120°C range, where it undergoes secondary cross-linking that degrades ionic conductivity."
It was a problem that hadn't appeared in laboratory or small-scale trials because laboratory furnaces had fast temperature cycling. The industrial furnace required 20+ minutes to cool from 200°C to room temperature. During that cooling, the polymer phase underwent unwanted chemistry.
"So our protocol works perfectly at scales up to about 30 kilograms," Dr Chen summarised. "Beyond that, we need to modify the cooling protocol. Faster cooling rates, inert gas flow during cooling, and maybe staged cooling. But we'll need to re-optimise."
Re-optimisation meant another 8-10 weeks of experiments. It meant delaying the manufacturing timeline. It meant explaining to the investors why their ¥25 million bet had just encountered an unanticipated technical obstacle.
Chen Wei sat in the CATL facility conference room and experienced something like panic.
SYSTEM ASSESSMENT: This is not a catastrophic setback. It is a normal engineering challenge. You encountered an unexpected phenomenon during scale-up. This occurs in approximately 65% of hard-tech development projects. The appropriate response is: (1) Understand root cause; (2) Redesign protocol to address the cause; (3) Implement and validate; (4) Update timelines and communicate to stakeholders.
The system's calm analysis was helpful but didn't entirely resolve the emotional distress. This was Chen Wei's first experience with the gap between laboratory science and manufacturing reality at a meaningful scale. The protocol that worked perfectly in the lab, which had been carefully optimised and validated, had failed when exposed to the constraints of real industrial equipment.
"We need to understand this completely," he said to Li Na and Dr Chen. "What exactly is happening during the cooling phase? Are we getting unwanted secondary cross-linking? Crystallization? Migration of lithium ions? We need characterisation data."
Over the next week, Qiming and CATL collaborated on a detailed post-mortem analysis. X-ray diffraction showed that the polymer phase in the failed batch had indeed undergone additional cross-linking, reducing its ionic conductivity. Thermal analysis suggested this occurred in the 60-100°C range—far below the primary synthesis temperature but hot enough to activate residual chemical reactivity.
"We need to quench the polymer phase more rapidly," Dr Chen proposed. "Cool it to 50°C quickly, then allow gradual cooling to room temperature. That prevents the secondary cross-linking window."
"How do we do that at scale?" Chen Wei asked.
"Water quench," Dr Chen said. "Furnace doesn't have forced cooling in the design we're using. But we could extract the material and immerse it briefly in a controlled-temperature water bath. Rapid cooling, then transfer to an inert atmosphere for slow cool-down."
It was a manufacturing solution rather than a materials chemistry solution. Chen Wei would need to verify that water quenching didn't introduce contamination or cause other degradation pathways.
The verification experiments took three weeks. By mid-July, Chen Wei had validated that water-quenched samples maintained ionic conductivity and showed no signs of contamination or degradation. The protocol modification worked.
But the timeline had slipped. Manufacturing wasn't ready for June. It was now realistically August or September for validated scale-up.
The investor communication about the delay was harder than the technical problem-solving.
Mr Wang scheduled a call with the venture capitalists on July 15th. Chen Wei, Li Na, and Dr Chen joined from CATL's conference room.
"We encountered an unanticipated cooling-phase phenomenon during 50-kilogram scale trials," Mr Wang explained, with Li Na and Chen Wei providing technical details. "Secondary polymer cross-linking in the 60-100°C range was degrading ionic conductivity. We've identified the root cause and developed a modified protocol using controlled water quenching. We've validated the fix on a laboratory scale. We project manufacturing readiness delayed by 4-6 weeks."
The senior venture partner was quiet for a moment. "What does this mean for your timeline to first revenue?"
"First generation production would now target October-November rather than August," Mr Wang said. "First customer validation probably in December. Revenue timeline potentially slips to Q1 2027 rather than Q4 2026."
"That's a significant delay," the investor said flatly.
"Yes," Mr Wang acknowledged. "But it's a solvable technical problem, not a fundamental technology failure. The modification actually strengthens our manufacturing approach—it makes the protocol more robust for the industrial conditions that matter."
Chen Wei found himself adding, "This is actually not unusual in hard-tech development. You design at a laboratory scale, encounter scale-related phenomena, redesign, and then validate. This is the normal engineering process. It feels like failure because it's our first encounter, but it's actually the expected trajectory."
The venture partner seemed to accept this—or at least grudgingly understand that manufacturing reality involved iterative problem-solving. But the tone of the call shifted. The investors went from enthusiastic supporters to cautious monitors of execution. They wanted weekly progress updates instead of monthly. They wanted direct access to technical data rather than filtered summaries.
It was the first real experience of being accountable to external capital. Failure to execute wasn't just academic embarrassment—it was a fiduciary breach.
Chen Wei's first published paper appeared in print in May 2026, creating a strange moment of simultaneous celebration and irrelevance.
The superconductor research—the work that had launched his entire trajectory, that had driven him to collapse from heat stroke, that had taught him about DoE methodology and experimental rigour—was now a published artefact in Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter.
He received the printed journal in the mail, held it in his hands, and experienced the deeply anticlimactic realisation that published papers look exactly like papers you haven't read before. There was no external validation in the physical object itself. The validation was entirely internal—the knowledge that peer reviewers had examined it, that he had contributed something permanent to the scientific record, that it existed in libraries and databases globally.
But his superconductor work felt ancient history now. He was no longer a researcher optimising perovskite transition temperatures. He was a startup CTO managing manufacturing scale-up challenges, a PhD candidate whose research had shifted entirely toward battery materials, and a son whose monthly salary contributions were beginning to make a material difference in his family's financial trajectory.
The battery materials manuscript was submitted to Advanced Energy Materials on July 1st, with Li Na, Professor Liu, and Chen Wei as co-authors. The submission included careful attention to what could be revealed without compromising Qiming's patent strategy. The paper described the composite architecture and demonstrated the performance advantages, but omitted the specific manufacturing protocol that was still being optimised at scale.
It was honest science but strategically curated science—revealing enough to contribute to the field while protecting enough to maintain commercial advantage.
By late July 2026, Qiming's team had expanded to eight people. The office now included a dedicated synthesis lab space, characterisation equipment, a business development manager, and a supply chain specialist who was beginning to build relationships with precursor material suppliers.
Chen Wei's role had evolved beyond pure technical research. He was increasingly involved in:
Hiring technical staff (evaluating candidates, conducting interviews, assessing cultural fit)
Investor relations (preparing technical updates, explaining manufacturing challenges, defending timelines)
Strategic partnerships (coordinating with CATL on manufacturing, negotiating with materials suppliers, exploring licensing partnerships with battery OEMs)
Product planning (deciding which electrolyte formulations to prioritise, defining performance specifications for different customer segments)
His PhD coursework continued, but at reduced intensity. "Advanced Materials Characterisation" was completed with high grades—the practical synthesis troubleshooting was directly applicable to the course material. "Statistical Methods for Materials Science" was ongoing, increasingly abstract and slightly disconnected from the urgent manufacturing realities consuming his attention.
Professor Zhang had suggested Chen Wei consider a more direct path: "You could structure your entire PhD research around Qiming's technology development. Your dissertation would be 'Manufacturing-Constrained Design of Solid-State Battery Electrolytes: From Laboratory Optimisation to Pilot Production.' It's intellectually rigorous, contributes to materials science knowledge, and directly supports the company's work."
The suggestion was appealing but also slightly concerning. It meant his PhD research would be entirely entangled with commercial work. If Qiming succeeded, his research succeeded. If Qiming failed, his dissertation failed. The intellectual independence that universities traditionally protected was being compromised.
But it was also practical. His time was already being consumed by Qiming work. Channelling that work into his PhD thesis meant academic credit for effort already being expended.
The system provided a quarterly assessment on August 1st, 2026:
SYSTEM QUARTERLY REVIEW: Q2 2026 RESULTS
Startup Progress:
Funding closed: ¥25M Series A (April 28th)
Team size: 8 employees
Manufacturing timeline: Revised to August-September (4-6 week delay due to cooling-phase phenomenon)
Investor relations: Stable but cautious (post-delay monitoring increased)
Equity value: ¥2M (post-funding dilution; still subject to vesting)
Academic Progress:
PhD coursework: 2/4 courses complete
Research direction: Redirected toward a manufacturing-constrained design thesis
Publications: 1 published (superconductor), 1 submitted (battery materials)
Dissertation timeline: Projected 3-year completion (2029)
Family Financial:
Monthly contributions: ¥20,000 (consistent)
Q2 total: ¥60,000
Cumulative H1 2026: ¥85,000
Projected annual: ¥240,000
12+ year debt service trajectory confirmed
Psychological State:
Confidence in technical capabilities: High
Stress from dual demands: Moderate to elevated
Sleep quality: Degraded but maintained above 5.5 hours minimum
Imposter syndrome: Reduced; replaced with cautious confidence
System Assessment: Hybrid path remains functional. First scale-up challenge encountered and resolved appropriately. Investors' confidence slightly diminished but was not materially threatened. Success probability: 65% (slight decrease from 68% due to manufacturing uncertainty).
Critical observation: You have now experienced the transition from researcher-as-individual-contributor to founder-as-team-leader. This transition is psychologically and operationally significant. You are learning business skills through doing rather than studying. This is effective but also creates knowledge gaps that periodic coaching would address.
At the end of August, Chen Wei received an unexpected email from Dr Shen Wei at Li Auto.
Dear Chen Wei,
I know you committed to the Qiming startup path, which we respect. We maintain a strong interest in your battery materials work. Would you be interested in exploring a licensing/partnership agreement? Li Auto could provide ¥10 million annually for battery development rights while allowing Qiming to maintain core equity. This would provide Li Auto with access to your technology while supporting your startup. Please consider. – Shen Wei
It was an appealing offer on its surface—additional capital without further equity dilution. But it also represented strategic complexity that Chen Wei wasn't sure Qiming could navigate while managing manufacturing scale-up and venture investor relationships.
He discussed it with Li Na, Mr Wang, and the venture capitalists on a call that became contentious.
"We should explore it," Mr Wang argued. "Additional ¥10 million annually is a significant capital injection without dilution."
"It's a distraction," one of the venture partners countered. "You're supposed to be focused on building a complete battery materials company, not licensing component technology to competitors."
"Li Auto isn't a competitor in our market," Chen Wei observed. "They're a customer or potential partner. They want access to advanced materials. We could get capital support plus a major OEM partnership."
"Which constrains our flexibility," the venture partner argued. "If Li Auto has licensing rights, they might exclude us from competing in EV battery markets."
The conversation went in circles. By the end, the consensus was: table the Li Auto opportunity for 6 months. Qiming would focus on manufacturing scale-up and building independent relationships with multiple OEMs rather than accepting exclusive partnerships that constrained future options.
It was the right strategic decision, Chen Wei understood. But turning down ¥10 million in annual capital was a meaningful sacrifice—a recognition that venture-backed startups play a different game than hybrid student-companies could navigate.
On September 1st, 2026, Chen Wei's sister moved into a dormitory at Tsinghua, officially beginning her first semester as a physics undergraduate.
The family gathered for the occasion—his mother had arranged time off work, his sister was excited and nervous, and Chen Wei found himself in the strange position of showing his sister around campus, introducing her to facilities, helping her understand how to navigate university bureaucracy that she would need to navigate independently.
Walking through Tsinghua's campus with his sister, he experienced the peculiar sensation of looking backwards through time. He had stood in these same places as an anxious 21-year-old three years ago. The campus felt both familiar and transformed—he was no longer a student moving through it, but an alumnus with commercial commitments and doctoral research.
"Do you regret it?" his sister asked. "The startup instead of pure research?"
"No," Chen Wei said. "But I didn't anticipate how complex it would be. You think entrepreneurship is about innovation and market opportunity. It's actually about managing people, navigating investor relationships, and learning to live with uncertainty. The science is maybe 30% of the actual work."
"That sounds exhausting," his sister said.
"It is," Chen Wei confirmed. "But it's also genuinely important work. The technology matters. The team matters. The company matters. I've contributed something that's becoming real in the world rather than existing only in papers and laboratories."
His sister processed this, then asked: "Do you think I should start a company?"
"No," Chen Wei said immediately. "Stay in school. Finish your degree. Do research. Learn the science deeply. If you want to start a company later, you'll have a better foundation. I didn't have a realistic sense of what I was attempting. You'd be wiser to avoid my specific path and chart your own course."