Chapter 87: The Meeting of Korea's Two Richest Men
Chapter 87: The Meeting of Korea's Two Richest Men
The plan was to meticulously poach Arcor's employees.
Lee Jong-yeop, Kim Sang-gi, and even Team Leader An Myeong-guk.
He had brought in most of the people who were once on the same team.
‘There might be people with better skills, but right now, I need people I can trust.’
And it seemed the rumors had already spread.
These days, thanks to group chats, news traveled in an instant.
- Na Sang-guk: Shin. I can do anything.
He didn't reply.
A minute later.
- Na Sang-guk: I can work my hardest and do my best. The gaming team is fine, Biolife is fine. I'll be someone who can be helpful to you anywhere.
Three minutes later.
- Na Sang-guk: CEO Kim Shin. I would like to formally apologize for my past wrongdoings. As you know, CEO, I've gotten my act together and have been living diligently.
He had no intention of bringing Na Sang-guk on board.
There had been various uncomfortable incidents in the past, and his recent thought was...
‘Is there really a need to fix and reuse people?’
The world was wide, and there were plenty of people.
* * *
Isung Biologics.
Though a young company, only nine years old, it had grown with the full support of Isung Group, the nation's top conglomerate.
“Welcome. We are honored by your visit, CEO Kim Shin.”
From President Choi Sang-rip, a veteran of the pharmaceutical industry, to the managing directors, senior managing directors, and team leaders.
They were waiting on the road in front of the headquarters, and as he stepped out of the car, they bowed deeply in a formal greeting.
He hadn't expected such a grand welcome.
“Hello. You really don't have to do all this.”
He shook hands with President Choi Sang-rip, then with the other executives in succession.
“Vice Chairman Seon Jae-yong will be giving you the factory tour himself.”
“The Vice Chairman?”
“He's right this way.”
Vice Chairman Seon Jae-yong stood among the executives.
He politely extended his hand first.
“A pleasure to meet you, CEO Kim Shin.”
“I didn't expect the Vice Chairman himself to come out and greet me.”
“Haha. A client who has allowed Isung Biologics to leap several steps forward is visiting. Of course, I had to be here.”
He took Vice Chairman Seon Jae-yong's hand.
Seeing him brought back memories of his twenties, when he worked part-time at a PC bang.
4,300 won an hour.
“As soon as a customer leaves, clean the station immediately. Tidy up. The kitchen equipment and smoking room must always be spotless.”
“Yessir!”
“When a customer comes in, greet them with a smile. Especially the female customers.”
“Yes, sir.”
“If a customer is having trouble adding time to their account, you jump out and help them right away. This is the priority over everything else. Got it?”
“Understood.”
Calculating fees, cleaning, organizing supplies, fixing broken computers.
If there were no customers in the PC bang, he had to endure the owner's nagging just the same.
He would take apart keyboards to wipe each key one by one before reassembling them, and even the mousepads had to be tidied up perfectly.
While working at that PC bang for over five years, he would see Seon Jae-yong, the heir to Isung Group, on the news.
‘I wonder how happy that man is.’
Those were simpler times, when he thought having a lot of money was all it took to be happy.
To think his life had changed so much in just two and a half years after discovering Bitcoin.
“I'll guide you myself. Haha. It's been a while since I've been here too, so I made sure to memorize the materials.”
“Yes, please do.”
Songdo International Business District.
In the heart of the bustling planned city stood massive buildings: Plant 1, Plant 2, and Plant 3.
“Construction on Plant 4 will begin next month, thanks to Biolife and you, CEO Kim. And we have plans to start construction on Plants 5 and 6 next year.”
“I see. The scale is truly immense.”
Earth Resource was an IT company, so it didn't invest much in facilities.
The most they did was build or acquire data centers for their cloud services.
“Plant 2 is currently producing 100 million doses of flu vaccine for export to South America.”
“Flu vaccines?”
“For flu vaccines, governments typically hold a bidding process a year in advance. Companies like ours participate in the bidding, win the contract, and then produce and deliver the vaccines within the specified period.”
Even after working at a pharmaceutical company for a long time, he didn't know much about the drug supply market.
Flu vaccines were supplied to each country by the company that won the bid by offering the lowest price through mass production.
A flu vaccine shortage usually happens when a country's forecast is wrong, and consumption exceeds the amount ordered.
“The funds allocated for the construction of Plant 4 amount to about 1.7 trillion won.”
“For just one plant?”
“That's right.”
Seon Jae-yong was subtly boasting about his wealth.
As expected, the scale of facility investment in the manufacturing industry was staggering.
“Isung Biologics is already the world's number one company in biopharmaceuticals. And our goal is to capture an even larger market share.”
“That's incredible.”
“Haha. To achieve our plans, we are in a position where we must actively seek help from technologically advanced companies like Biolife.”
* * *
The Senior Managing Director of Biolife.
From the moment he accepted the offer, An Myeong-guk expected his life to change.
‘This is incredible.’
Since it was a Saturday and he didn't have to go to his old office, he had come along to follow Kim Shin's schedule.
Korean pharmaceutical companies were not very large by global standards.
He was amazed that Isung Group could pull something like this off, having decided to make it their future growth engine and pouring investments into it.
“Team Leader Seo. Have you ever been to Isung Biologics?”
“This is my first time.”
“This place is a completely different world. The pharmaceutical plants in Osong or Jecheon are actually quite large when you see them in person. But this place is as big as all of them combined.”
“The facilities are all state-of-the-art, too.”
“This must be the power of Isung Group.”
While he was amazed by the prowess of Isung Group, he was even more surprised to see Seon Jae-yong giving the tour himself.
He had never imagined a scene where Vice Chairman Seon Jae-yong and President Choi Sang-rip would be kindly explaining things one by one to Kim Shin, essentially making a sales pitch.
The high-ranking executives of Isung Biologics followed behind them in a line.
Executives at the team leader or division head level here would be considered higher up than the presidents of most other pharmaceutical companies.
“What an incredible sight.”
“Tell me about it.”
An Myeong-guk's mind was a whirl of thoughts.
He had been doing reasonably well at Arcor.
Feeling disillusioned with corporate life was something everyone experienced, after all.
Could he really take on a new challenge and endure?
As he was lost in such thoughts, someone next to him struck up a conversation.
“I'm Ha Do-young, Managing Director and Head of the Quality Operations Center at Isung Biologics. What is your relationship with CEO Kim Shin?”
“I'm...”
An Myeong-guk habitually reached for a business card but then hesitated.
He hadn't officially resigned from his old job yet, but he wasn't here as a team leader from Arcor.
“My name is An Myeong-guk. I will be joining Biolife as a Senior Managing Director.”
“Ah, I see. And what will your role be?”
“I'll be in charge of the company's Management Support Center, and I'll also be the liaison with Isung Group.”
In corporate life,
when you meet people from other companies, a client-contractor relationship naturally forms.
You tend to weigh which company is larger and which one is the primary contractor holding the work.
Even if it didn't go as far as an abuse of power, it was decided which side could act more confidently.
‘We're the ones giving them the work. Does that make us the client?’
An Myeong-guk remained silent.
He was having trouble figuring out the hierarchy because Isung Biologics was an affiliate of Isung Group.
“I'm Kim Hee-jung, Managing Director and Head of the Global Sales Center.”
The only woman among the executives.
A woman who looked incredibly smart and competent took out her business card and offered it with both hands.
“I think we'll be seeing each other often from now on. I plan to visit until you tell me to stop coming. If Biolife needs anything, please don't hesitate to let me know.”
Do executives at major corporations really act this deferential?
Isung Group was formidable, and Isung Biologics' influence in the pharmaceutical industry was astounding, but...
when he thought about it, about 70% of that company's revenue for next year depended on producing Biolife's vaccine.
‘A life-changing opportunity wasn't just about the salary.’
An Myeong-guk was finally beginning to realize just what kind of company he had joined.
* * *
He didn't inspect the factory in detail.
It wasn't as if he was going to examine the state-of-the-art equipment closely and discuss its technical capabilities or specifications.
‘It's big, and it's nice.’
He ended up in a conversation with Vice Chairman Seon Jae-yong in the president's office at Isung Biologics.
“Thank you for the tour of the plant.”
“Don't mention it. Thanks to you, CEO, Isung Biologics' stock price has tripled.”
“Tripled is quite an achievement.”
“It's not easy for a company of this size to see its stock price rise so much in the Korean market.”
The first and second richest men in South Korea.
He had expected some wariness or a sense of rivalry before they met, but in person, Seon Jae-yong had a polite and pleasant side to him.
“CEO Kim Shin, thank you once again for signing the contract with Isung Biologics.”
“It was for the production of the vaccine.”
“Even so, from our company's perspective, it's a huge opportunity that allows us to leap forward two or three steps.”
“I'm glad to hear that.”
While running his business in the U.S., he hadn't thought about Korea all that often.
Nevertheless, it was good in many ways for a Korean company to do well.
They hired employees, earned foreign currency through massive exports, and paid a lot of taxes.
Seon Jae-yong said with a smile.
“To be honest, I've personally been following your lead in my investments. I recently put some of my cash assets into U.S. stocks.”
“Your stocks must have gone up, then.”
“They went up a great deal. I was amazed almost every day watching the New York Stock Exchange soar. It made me think you're even better than Isung Group's own economic research institute.”
To think that the Vice Chairman of Isung Group was one of the Korean investors buying up U.S. stocks.
It was both surprising and amusing.
As someone with numerous information networks, he probably didn't invest just by watching my YouTube channel, but still.
The factory tour took two hours.
They spent another thirty minutes drinking the coffee his secretary had prepared.
More time had passed than was necessary just to express gratitude for the vaccine production contract, and then Seon Jae-yong spoke up.
“There's something I'd like to propose to you, CEO. Isung Group is very interested in Earth Resource's cloud business.”
“Interested?”
“Yes. We were incredibly impressed to see you expand from various ventures into the cloud market. Isung Group has also been very interested in the cloud. Amazon, Microsoft, and Google generate tens of billions of dollars in revenue from the cloud each year. It's rare to find a business that also grows by over 30% annually.”
“That's true.”
After Earth Resource entered the cloud industry, he had thought there was no better gold mine.
With customers all over the world, the utility of the cloud was only increasing as the internet and IT technology advanced.
“However, it would be difficult for Isung Electronics to officially enter the cloud industry.”
“Because of your clients, I assume?”
“That's right.”
Amazon, Google, Microsoft.
They purchase massive quantities of semiconductors from Isung Electronics to build their data centers.
If Isung Electronics were to seriously enter the cloud market, they might switch to other suppliers to avoid nurturing a competitor.
“We'd gain one market but lose another. Frankly, Isung Group's lack of software expertise is another reason it's difficult for us to enter. We're ingrained in the public's mind as a manufacturing company.”
“...”
He didn't realize Seon Jae-yong was such a candid person.
Seon Jae-yong made his proposal.
“We at Isung Group would like to build the data centers that Earth Resource needs.”
“In Korea?”
“Not limited to Korea, but all over the world. Dozens of large-scale data centers. I believe there is no company more suited for this field than Isung Group.”
Since they couldn't enter the cloud market themselves, they wanted to at least cooperate in building the data centers.
It was similar to selling jeans to the miners heading for a gold rush.