Someone Else's Backyard
"Welcome."
Second floor of the Mipo National Industrial Complex management corporation. Nine-thirty in the morning. Jung Tae-sung had arrived ten minutes ahead of his appointment.
The moment he was shown into the office, the officer in charge rose from his desk and extended a business card.
"Oh Sung-min, Section Chief of Industrial Support."
"Jung Tae-sung, Director of Strategic Planning at SJ Holdings."
They exchanged cards and took their seats. A site allocation map of the complex lay spread across the table.
"You inquired about land within Mipo Complex. May I ask what the purpose would be?"
"Our subsidiary, Shinhwa Weltech, is currently operating Plants 1 and 2 here in the complex. Both are running at capacity, so we're looking at an adjacent plot for an expansion."
Jung Tae-sung produced the documents he'd prepared and laid them on the table — a copy of Shinhwa Weltech's business registration, three years of revenue trends, a summary of the expansion plan. For the management corporation, it was more than enough to establish credibility.
"Let me take a look."
The section chief skimmed the file, nodded, and turned his monitor around to bring up the site map on screen.
"Let's find the location. Shinhwa Weltech is in Block 4 at present, correct?"
"Yes. We're looking at Block 6 or Block 7, adjacent to us."
The chief's eyes stopped on the map — and the way he looked at it began to shift, ever so slightly.
"There's actually a negotiation in progress for Block 7."
"A negotiation — meaning the sale isn't finalized?"
"Not finalized, no. But there's a priority negotiation underway, so I can't give you an answer right away."
"And Block 6?"
"Block 6 is in a similar situation. I'm sorry, but I think the proper course is for us to check with a senior department and get back to you."
Jung Tae-sung tilted his head, playing puzzled.
"My understanding is that those lots haven't moved in three years?"
"Ah... well, that's true."
"You're not saying the negotiation has been going on for three years, are you?"
"It's... been a long-running negotiation."
It wasn't the face of a man lying. It was the face of a man being pressed down by something.
"Then are there no plots in any of the other blocks?"
"No, not at present. But how about this? One of the plants in Block 4 itself just came on the market. You could acquire that."
Absurd. Buying an existing factory lot while empty ground sat right next door — tearing a plant down and re-laying the line from scratch would only cost more money.
"I'm afraid that would be difficult."
"Then what can I do for you? I'm afraid I have nothing more to offer."
Two adjacent lots tied up at the same time — and both "under negotiation" for years. That wasn't a simple shortage of listings. Either someone had claimed them in advance, or instructions had come down from above to hold them. Either way, it was not a normal process.
But Jung Tae-sung did not lean on the section chief sitting across from him. This man, too, was clearly not the one making the decisions.
"Or, if you could wait a little, might I look into it and get back to you?"
When the chief offered that, Jung Tae-sung simply nodded. There was nothing more to be squeezed out of this room. The approach would have to change — go through the city instead of the corporation, or first find out who was behind the pre-negotiation on those lots.
"Then please contact us once you've confirmed."
Jung Tae-sung rose, took out a second business card, and placed it on the table.
"I've written my personal number on the back. This is time-sensitive, so I'd appreciate a prompt reply."
"Of course. I'll be in touch."
After Jung Tae-sung left the office, the section chief stared at the card for a long moment, then opened a drawer and slid it inside. He hesitated briefly before picking up the receiver and dialing a four-digit extension.
"This is Oh Sung-min. Please connect me to Industrial Policy."
Two rings, and the line connected.
"Yes, I'm calling about Block 7 in Mipo. SJ Holdings came in today asking about the land — for a Shinhwa Weltech expansion, they said."
He listened for a moment, then nodded.
"Yes... yes, understood. We'll proceed as originally directed."
With a resigned expression, the section chief pushed the documents and business card Jung Tae-sung had left deeper into the drawer.
"How did it go?"
Jung Tae-sung came by the lodging around evening, and one look at his face told me everything. It was not good news.
"We can't secure the land."
He sat down across from me and opened his notebook.
"Both Block 6 and Block 7 came back as 'under negotiation.' He said there was a priority negotiation and that they'd check with a senior department — but my personal read is that it's a rejection in all but name."
"Those lots have sat empty for over three years, haven't they?"
Shinhwa Weltech's corner of the complex was on the outskirts to begin with. It had never been prime real estate.
"I raised exactly that point. The section chief just squirmed."
It wasn't as though I hadn't anticipated this. If land was sitting idle in a complex with plots to spare, there was a reason. I just hadn't expected the block to be this direct.
"So I dug further."
Jung Tae-sung turned a page in his notebook.
"A first-tier subcontractor of Sunjin Motors has been informally slotted into Block 7. A plating and surface-treatment supplier — no contract signed yet. Nothing signed, and yet the lot is already spoken for."
"Same story with the other block?"
"Yes. That one appears to be earmarked for another Sunjin Motors subcontractor."
Well, well. I hadn't been blind to this possibility when we first came to Ulsan — but it was more blatant than I'd bargained for.
"And there are signs of an unofficial arrangement between the city's Industrial Policy division and Sunjin Motors' purchasing headquarters. Sunjin Motors requested the land for a supplier-park expansion, and the city appears to have accommodated them."
"You found all that out today?"
"Yes. I have connections in the Ulsan establishment, so it wasn't difficult."
What a man. That morning he'd hit a wall at the corporation, and by that same evening he'd come back knowing exactly what stood behind it.
"You've worked hard. So — is Sunjin Motors trying to check us? Now that the name SJ Holdings is out there?"
I could see what was worrying him. During the management dispute between Sunjin Aluminum and Sunjin Group, Kim Seok-jun had ridden to my mother's side as a white knight under the SJ Holdings name. That name had been publicly exposed back then.
But that couldn't be the reason.
"I don't think so. Even if Managing Director Kim Seok-jun fought Sunjin Aluminum, Kang Tae-yong has no reason to step in personally and block a small outfit like Shinhwa Weltech."
There was no reason. Shinhwa Weltech made semiconductor chemicals — it didn't even overlap with Sunjin Motors' business.
And he had no idea I was standing behind it.
"If anything, I'd say this is just... the system doing what the system has always done."
All it took was one look at the weight Sunjin Motors carried in Ulsan. Tax revenue, jobs, and the entire subcontractor ecosystem — more than half of Ulsan's manufacturing revenue flowed from Sunjin Motors and its supplier network. If Sunjin Motors said it wanted the land, the city had no reason to refuse.
No — more precisely, it had no ability to refuse. No matter how immaculate our paperwork was, if Sunjin Motors wanted the same lot, the administration's choice would be Sunjin Motors. Kang Tae-yong hadn't lifted a finger. The city of Ulsan itself was Sunjin Motors' ecosystem. It could hardly have been otherwise.
"Can't we fight it?"
When my silence stretched too long, Jung Tae-sung asked first.
"We could work the press, open a channel through the city council, or pursue legal remedies — the options aren't zero. Fight it as a public-opinion battle and we'd have a strong chance of winning."
"Let's say we win."
I looked at him as I said it.
"Let's say we take the land. Then what about the permits? We'd need water rights, a power connection, a separate wastewater discharge permit. Running the plant means the city's and the management corporation's cooperation, every single time. Win once and then spend the next ten years watching their faces at every turn — would that be winning?"
As I laid it out for Jung Tae-sung, it crystallized for me, too.
"This was somebody else's backyard from the very start."
Shinhwa Weltech had put down roots in Ulsan because of Mipo's petrochemical infrastructure — raw material sourcing, permits, skilled labor. For semiconductor chemicals, it had been the perfect location.
But secondary battery materials were a different animal. Different customers, different supply chains, a plant scale on another plane entirely. And Synapse had nothing to do with petrochemical infrastructure at all.
At least now, there was no reason for either business to be in Ulsan.
"Director Jung."
"Yes."
"Let's leave it there for today. I'll think it over and get back to you."
Jung Tae-sung nodded, rose, and left the room.
Tonight is going to be a long one.
"Seon-woo, it's me. Am I catching you at a bad time?"
I was still sorting through my thoughts alone that night when the phone buzzed. The screen read Danny, New York. I hit accept immediately.
By the time difference, it was morning in New York.
"It's fine. This is about Volta, isn't it?"
"Yeah. I did my homework. But first, let me ask you something."
"What is it?"
"Why this company?"
There was no playfulness in Danny's voice. He was asking in earnest.
"I'll be straight with you. This thing is a mess."
Danny exhaled and launched into his report.
"Volta Motors. Ryan Holt. Made a fortune selling an online payments company, then sank every cent of it into an EV startup."
The name was familiar to me, and I knew how the future turned out — but Danny's voice was dead serious.
"They're building their first car, a model called the Lightning. Still pre-production. The prototype's done and the performance holds up — zero to sixty in under four seconds, more than three hundred kilometers of range."
Three hundred kilometers of range, from the very first EV. Ryan Holt really was something else.
"That means the technology's there, doesn't it?"
"The tech's there. The problem is everything else."
Danny ticked off the list, one item at a time.
"For one, they've got no proprietary platform. The Lightning is built on a borrowed Lotus chassis from England. Developing a dedicated EV platform would cost hundreds of billions of won more, and he doesn't have it. So he pitched joint ventures and investments to the big automakers — GM, Daimler — and got turned down flat. An electric car? Now? Who's going to buy it? That's the mood out there."
"What about the VCs?"
"Same story. The financial crisis just detonated and investment appetite has frozen solid. Most of the Silicon Valley VCs are waving him off, and the investment banks won't even take the meeting."
The Fed was pumping money into the system, but the aftershocks of Lehman still lingered. Even the venture funds — the firms that existed precisely to make bets like this — were spending with extreme caution.
"There's no floor to how much money an EV company can burn. It's not a software venture where a handful of engineers write code — you have to build a factory, buy batteries, assemble cars. There isn't a VC in this market willing to fund capital-intensive manufacturing right now."
"So what's his financial situation?"
"Holt's sunk nearly his entire personal fortune into it. Word is he's even borrowing from friends now, and it still isn't enough. He opened a funding round and it won't close. Nobody knows how many months he can hold out."
Danny paused, then added:
"And honestly? On Wall Street, some people are calling it a scam."
Scam.
The con of luring investors with a plausible-looking project, taking the money, and then going bankrupt or vanishing altogether.
"A scam?"
"People are asking whether EVs are even viable, or whether he's just torching the investment. Because it's Holt, they stop short of calling him an outright fraud — but 'eccentric crackpot' is the consensus. Almost nobody's taking him seriously."
The consensus was clearly that EVs were premature for this era. But innovation, in the end, only begins when some madman the world has written off charges in first.
"So I'll ask you again — why this company? I know you're not the type to burn money for nothing. There's a reason."
"I need Volta Motors for the value chain I'm building."
Shinhwa Weltech would make the battery materials; Synapse would make the robots that assembled those batteries. That was the value chain I intended to build.
And what sat at the very top of that chain?
The electric car.
Only when EVs reached mass production would battery demand explode — and only when battery plants rose would demand for Synapse's robots follow.
"Electric cars?"
"Yes. I don't think it's a scam. Someone out there is straining to force open a door the whole world has slammed shut. That someone is Ryan Holt."
That was exactly what Volta Motors had become in my previous life. If Volta was struggling now, then I simply had to appear as the white knight. A friend met in hard times is a true friend — that held true in America as much as anywhere.
And even if I couldn't push Shinhwa Weltech and Synapse into its supply chain, it wouldn't matter. The investment alone would return staggering profits.
"Danny."
"Yeah."
"The age of the electric car is coming."
I said it flatly, without a shred of hesitation.
"Nobody believes it now. But once battery prices fall and oil prices rise, the market opens. That happens within five years. And the EV company still breathing when it does takes the whole market."
"And that's Volta?"
"Right now, is there any other lunatic on the planet trying to build a battery EV from the ground up besides Holt?"
Danny went quiet for a moment.
"...No."
"Which is why Holt has to survive. If Volta survives, my business survives with it."
I heard Danny exhale through the receiver.
"Alright. So what's the play?"
"I need to meet Holt in person. Set up the meeting. The sooner, the better."
"It's Christmas season, so I can't promise it'll land. But given the state he's in, Holt can't afford to turn you down either."
"I'm counting on you."
"Got it. So you're coming to the States yourself?"
"Yes. I'll firm up a schedule and call you. See you in America."
"Okay."
I hung up with Danny and sat there for a while. Volta was decided.
One thing remained.
No need to think this one over long, either.
I picked the phone back up and called Jung Tae-sung.
"Director Jung, it's me."
"Sir. What can I do for you?"
"I'm dropping the Ulsan site."
A short silence passed between us.
"We're leaving Ulsan."