What Can the Matlab Ban Teach Us About Building Long‑Term Tech Dominance?

In early June, students at Harbin Institute of Technology discovered they could no longer use MathWorks software, sparking widespread online discussion.

On June 19, Professor Bao Yungang posted on Weibo about the "Matlab banned" incident and shared his reflections.

Many examined the ban, reviewed challenges in China's industrial software ecosystem, criticized piracy and weak software protection, and suggested open‑source alternatives for Matlab functionalities.

Professor Bao then posed a forward‑looking question: over the next 10‑20 years, can we create something that becomes indispensable to others?

He traced Matlab’s origins to Professor Cleve Moler’s teaching tools in the 1970s and distilled four guiding principles from its evolution:

1. Build things, not just publish papers

Mol­er’s early NSF projects aimed to develop high‑quality mathematical software rather than produce academic papers, resulting in tools like EISPACK and LINPACK.

2. Make things usable, not discard them after development

Although EISPACK and LINPACK were not groundbreaking academically, they proved highly useful; EISPACK’s manual has been cited over 1,800 times, and LINPACK became a benchmark for supercomputers.

3. Leverage teaching scenarios instead of treating teaching as a burden

Matlab was created to help students grasp linear algebra and numerical analysis, and student‑driven rewrites helped it evolve into a commercial product.

4. Adopt a long‑term battle mindset rather than seeking quick wins

Consistent focus on a single goal over decades yields remarkable cumulative effects; many technologies that now “lock the neck” of others have 20‑plus years of accumulation.

Examples of long‑term accumulation include EISPACK, LINPACK, LLVM (17 years), Eclipse (19 years), Wireshark (22 years), Coq (31 years), and GCC (33 years).

MathWorks, founded in 1984 with one employee, grew slowly but continuously added functionality to Matlab, reaching $10 billion in revenue and over 4 million users by 2019.

The key takeaway is that to create technology that becomes a hidden champion in a niche, we must change our mindset and actions, following the four principles above.

Build things, not just papers.

Make things used, not discarded.

Use teaching scenarios, not treat teaching as a burden.

Embrace a long‑term battle mindset, not quick wins.