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Chapter 554  Monopoly or Outreach?

Ye-Jin sprayed the mouthful of beer on his friends and coworkers, none of whom cared. He picked up his phone and, for the first time since he’d had a smartphone, fumbled to unlock it under the expectant gazes of his good brothers.

He finally unlocked the phone and opened the email and his lips mouthed the words as he read it. Then he tossed his phone back to the tabletop in disappointment and chugged his beer before saying, “It wasn’t from the empire. But if you want bigger dicks, boy do they have some pills for you.” He laughed, then leaned back on the couch.

“To be fair, even having a chance like this is the empire’s generosity. It’ll take a lot of time, effort, knowledge, and even luck to succeed. But even if we’re late to the table, we should at least be able to pick up some leftover crumbs, and that’ll be enough to cover us in the beginning.

“So don’t have super high expectations right now, brothers. We just need our passion, drive, ambition, and hope—just like Imugi!” Park Seo-Yon exclaimed, putting his hand palm down over the coffee table. His friends put theirs in as well, and with a cheer of “Imugi-danche!” the people in the room broke apart, laughing.

Similar discussions were taking place in many locations among many different groups. Some were school clubs, others were megacorporations like Walmart, and even agribusinesses like Monsanto and Tyson were getting involved in what they saw as the ground floor of another industry they could use to further diversify their investment portfolios.

But in a few businesses—like SpaceX, Blue Origin, and Virgin Galactic—the tone of discussion was much different. Unlike the optimism of the school clubs or the ruthless financial discussion of the megacorporations or companies seeking to diversify their investment portfolios beyond their core competencies, the space-focused companies were more businesslike as they spun into action.

While the rest of the groups were meeting in classrooms, conference rooms, or Wall Street offices, the space companies started in the boardroom. The decisions they made were a matter of course, delegating design and testing tasks to various engineers working for them. They even sending out headhunters to recruit more people who specialized in tasks they felt were necessary.

With the privatization of the solar system, at least within limits, the space-focused companies were determined to come out the victor in what they saw would be an epic scramble to divide the pie that was the solar system.

But for now, whether amateur, professional, or anything else, everyone would need a response to their proposal from the imperial space agency. Similarly, they would need to consider whether or not they would contract out their production to Hephaestus Heavy Industries.

After all, whether they were among the first or last companies to facilitate the exploration and exploitation of resources in the solar system would depend on their manufacturing capability. And HHI was currently the only company that had the capability to manufacture spaceships that could pass any safety standards, no matter how stringent. A startup, on the other hand, might be able to manufacture them, eventually, but there would be... accidents.

And not a single insurance company had publicly revealed their stance on whether they would underwrite such a risky profession as asteroid miner or space explorer. Thus, the risks were commensurate with the potential profits and everyone getting involved had an important decision to make.

One might wonder why, with the capabilities that Hephaestus Heavy Industries showed, they didn’t simply monopolize the manufacturing industry entirely. They certainly had the technology to do so, after all. Most people even expected monopolization would be a foregone conclusion, as what sane person would let others climb their personal mountain of gold?

Thus, people had been busily producing their signs and coming up with their slogans to protest against a monopoly that... simply never appeared.

Indeed, with Felix at the helm, HHI offered outreach instead of miserly stinginess. Instead of buying designs from people for a pittance, they publicly released a list of services they would provide to entrepreneurs.

Sure, they offered to outright buy designs and manufacture themselves, but the company itself recommended against doing that. The offer was simply for those who found themselves overwhelmed and foundering, barely able to tread water in a shark-infested ocean that had just been thoroughly chummed. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

(Ed note: Chumming is the act of throwing bloody offal, usually fish intestines, skeletons, and heads, into the ocean in order to attract sharks. Shark fishermen use it to make catching sharks easier, and adventure tour companies that offer “swim with sharks” packages use it to ensure that people actually see sharks when they go down in their shark cages.)

But what they recommended was a balance between profit and safety. They would instead allow people to license their production lines for the cost of raw materials plus a scaling percentage of the final sale price of whatever it was they were manufacturing. The percentage ranged from five to twenty percent, and the list of goods was thoroughly comprehensive, to say the least.

The only thing HHI kept strictly to themselves was their own technology, and not even the most rabid anti-fan with an overweening sense of “justice” could argue against that.

What currently held the public’s attention, though, was the capability of HHI in the space-related industry field. Their offerings were... unbelievable, to say the least.

@Maalik91: [Bruh. I just read the list of @HephaestusHeavyIndustries space manufacturing stuff and I don’t believe it. NOBODY can offer 100% guarantee!]

@HephaestusHeavyIndustries: [Oh @Maalik91 but we do offer that. All products manufactured by HHI are guaranteed to meet or exceed 100% of all safety and usability requirements as well as a 100% adherence to the design schematics we receive.]

@ahmed_94: [@Maalik91 lol u just got owned. Sick_burn.gif]

@Maalik91: [@HephaestusHeavyIndustries @ahmed_94 If there really are zero manufacturing defects in any of HHI’s products I’ll livestream myself chopping off a finger!]

@HephaestusHeavyIndustries: [@Maalik91 please don’t cut off your fingers. What’ll become of your love life if you run out of fingers?]

The arguments online were intense, to say the least, and the flame war practically burned the internet to the ground.