The Hwaan Group Brat
While I was busy gathering information on Thomas Motors, Cooloud’s management made its decision.
As expected, they accepted Syd’s demand and agreed to hand over an additional 15 percent stake.
"This is the contract."
Syd brought the contract over to us, and David studied it carefully.
It wasn’t a capital increase. Instead, each shareholder would contribute a proportional slice of their own stake.
If it went through, Alex’s ownership would drop from 38 percent to 32, Rolf’s from 37 percent to 31.16, and PrestigeA PE’s would fall to 16.84 percent.
Syd’s stake, on the other hand, would rise to 20 percent.
Of course, they weren’t giving it away for free. The contract was loaded with conditions.
If he quit within fifteen years, he’d have to return not only the 15 percent he was receiving now, but also the 5 percent he had already been given. And during that entire period, the shares would be under lockup, so he couldn’t sell them either.
"They’ve thought this through. If he leaves within fifteen years, he walks away with not a single share. They can also adjust the ownership ratio whenever they want through a capital increase."
I nodded.
"In the end, they’re just trying to keep Syd tied to Cooloud for at least the next fifteen years."
Ten years could change everything.
In the IT industry, where trends shifted at breakneck speed, fifteen years was basically the same as telling someone to work there until retirement.
If they later decided he was no longer useful, they could simply dilute him through another capital increase and cut his stake down.
Either way, the reason they were willing to hand over shares was that they still believed they’d be able to keep Cooloud under their control.
It would all be easy enough to deal with once I took it over anyway.
I looked over the revised ownership percentages again. The numbers lined up exactly the way I wanted.
"It’s fine. Sign it."
Syd signed the contract.
The handsome blond man spoke as if he deserved applause. "Alex didn’t want to do it, but I managed to persuade him. I guess I may have been a little neglectful of you. I should’ve taken care of it sooner, before you even had to ask."
Syd gave a halfhearted nod.
"Yes."
Back when he was holed up in his room, he’d read article after article about Rolf.
People said Rolf was a genius from Silicon Valley, and Syd had genuinely wanted to work with him. So, not knowing any better, he applied to the company.
And a year had passed like that.
Syd remembered the first time he’d seen Minerva.
It was the most perfect program he had ever seen. That was why he’d come to respect Rolf all over again.
But then...
It turned out Rolf hadn’t made it at all.
Jason Kim had built the whole thing from start to finish, and all Rolf had done was change the name and set up the company.
Even so, when he went on the record with the press, he spun up lies about the development process and tossed out stories that had never happened. Calling a man like that a genius was an insult to real geniuses.
When Syd signed the papers, Rolf patted his shoulder and said, "Good. You won’t be talking about leaving the company anymore, right?"
Syd nodded with complete sincerity.
"Of course."
Because the one who’d be leaving this company wasn’t him.
Gabriella sent photos of the factory, and Maurice sent over the results of interviews he’d done with former Thomas Motors employees.
When I put all the materials together one by one, it was a complete circus.
David shook his head.
"They haven’t even started the foundation work on the factory yet, and the solar power facility that was supposed to produce hydrogen isn’t even operating. At this rate, mass production won’t be possible even in three years."
Even if you managed to build a prototype, mass production was an entirely different problem.
To mass-produce anything, you had to pour in enormous amounts of money to build production facilities, hire people, and control quality.
That was why, even when electric vehicle startups unveiled new cars at CES or the auto show, only a handful ever made it all the way to actual production.
So had they at least made the prototype properly?
The location where the T1 FCV driving video was filmed had been difficult to track down. Thomas Motors had kept it secret.
Fortunately, Maurice had narrowed it down to a few places through a friend, and after digging through Guble’s satellite images, we finally identified the site.
When Edward went there himself, he said in an excited voice, "You were right! The thing really did pick up speed up to sixty miles per hour with the gear in neutral. I filmed it with a drone just now and sent it to you by email."
"Thanks for your hard work."
After watching the video, David couldn’t hide his amazement.
"They really rolled it down a hill. I can hardly believe it, even after seeing it with my own eyes."
If it was shocking even when I already knew the truth, how much worse must it have been for someone seeing it for the first time?
David looked at me, puzzled.
"But how did you even figure this out?"
I brushed it off.
"I just had a hunch. I got lucky."
A company like this had a market cap of forty billion dollars.
Its founder and CEO, Brad Button, held 16 percent of the shares. He’d already made six billion dollars.
At this point, even KNC International, which had inflated cobalt mine claims with help from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, almost seemed cute by comparison.
As expected of the United States, even the fraud was on a different scale.
David and I sat down and started planning how to blow the whole thing open.
"A regular attack won’t do much," he said.
"Then we’ll have to make it as big and flashy as possible. Something everyone can’t help but notice."
If a normal strike wouldn’t move them, then we’d just hit harder.
"First, draft a report. I want two versions."
One to release before things blew up, and one to release after they did.
"How are you planning to get it to the press? Do you know a journalist?"
"Fortunately, there’s someone suitable."
"So Hwaan Energy is the key."
If we could turn the enemy’s strongest ally into our own, we’d already be halfway to victory.
I nodded.
"I’ll go meet their team leader first."
Montgomery, Alabama.
I booked a room and waited on my own, when a call came in from Chairman Yoo Jae-ho.
"The time is 8 p.m. Dalton Hotel. If you speak in the lobby, they’ll guide you."
"Thank you."
"Ah! Team Lead Heo Min-woong is known for being outrageously arrogant, so keep that in mind."
"Yes. I saw that in the news."
No wonder they called him the Hwaan Group’s brat.
There was a well-known story about how he’d casually used informal speech with Vice Chairman Kwon Hyeok-jun in private, only for Chairman Yoo Jae-ho to find out and fly into a rage.
On top of that, he’d assaulted staff at entertainment bars three separate times, and been in two drunk-driving accidents.
The most famous incident of all was the brawl he started at a club while drunk.
It had supposedly begun over a woman, and he’d even punched out the guards who tried to break it up.
What was more interesting was that when the police later investigated the case, the victims all claimed, in one voice, that they had started the fight first.
If that was what the press had learned, how many stories had gone completely untold?
Any man born into a chaebol family seemed to have at least a few such “heroic tales” to his name.
Chairman Yoo Jae-ho said, almost jokingly, "Still, he’s very respectful with me."
"Is that so?"
No matter how wild he was, he didn’t seem to have the guts to act up in front of the chairman of Yuseong Group.
"Let me ask you one thing."
"Yes."
"Long or short?"
He had figured out right away why I wanted to meet him.
"As you might guess."
It was hard to push a stock any higher once expectations were already soaring. On the other hand, dragging it down was relatively easy.
He’d probably stay on the sidelines and watch, but he wouldn’t just sit there forever.
Chairman Yoo Jae-ho’s wealth ranked first in Korea. But most of it was tied up in stock, and he was said to have almost no cash on hand.
But was that really true?
In this world, what you could see wasn’t everything. Beyond the officially known assets, there was bound to be a massive slush fund accumulated by his family over generations.
And because Yuseong Group was Korea’s largest conglomerate, the size of that slush fund would be beyond imagination.
That money had probably been passed down untouched, without a single tax paid on it.
The fact that he had asked me at all meant he was probably interested in getting in on the action. If we were going to make money either way, we might as well do it together.
Then a good idea came to me.
"How about investing in me?"
"Invest?"
"Yes."
"How much?"
"The more, the better, but how about around one hundred million dollars?"
Chairman Yoo Jae-ho sounded amused.
"You’re not seriously talking about one hundred million won, are you?"
"It’s dollars."
If that had been company money, maybe it would’ve been one thing, but for an individual it was no small amount.
"Do you really think I have that kind of money?"
"Well, fair enough."
He might not have that much liquid cash himself.
"If you know of an investment firm, you can introduce me to one."
For example, a paper company in a tax haven.
"What are the terms?"
"Half the profits."
"That’s quite a lot."
"You’ll still make at least double."
"What if it’s a loss?"
"Then I’ll work as hard as I can right beside you, Chairman."
"That won’t be easy if you expect to pay it back from your salary."
"Just trust me and let me handle it. You won’t be disappointed."
A moment later, Chairman Yoo Jae-ho spoke again.
"May I give you an answer by tomorrow?"
"Of course."
Heo Min-woong welcomed a guest in his hotel room.
"Hello. I’m Han Miru."
"I’m Heo Min-woong. Nice to meet you."
He’d been wondering who this guy was, and it turned out to be an ordinary-looking Korean man in his mid-twenties.
Han Miru, was it? I feel like I’ve heard that name somewhere before.
Then something clicked.
"Could you be the one from the Primus scandal...?"
The other man nodded.
"Yes. That would be me."
The Primus scandal was famous even in business circles. It had changed the heir apparent of DA Financial Group because of a rookie employee’s exposé.
Heo Min-woong was thrown off balance inside.
Why the hell is this guy here?
He was known to have quit the company after breaking the Primus case wide open.
It was shocking enough that he had come all the way to meet him in the United States, but the fact that the introduction had come through Chairman Yoo Jae-ho was even more surprising.
How the hell does this guy know Chairman Yoo Jae-ho? What kind of relationship do they even have?
If Yoo Jae-ho had personally called to tell him to meet this man, then they clearly weren’t just casual acquaintances.
Heo Min-woong asked casually, "How exactly do you know Chairman Yoo Jae-ho?"
"We happened to get acquainted through work."
"Through what kind of work?"
"You’ll have to ask the chairman about that. It isn’t something I can explain."
"..."
The more he said it, the more curious Heo Min-woong became.
So what the hell is the connection here?
A securities employee who exposed a bad fund and quit, and the chairman of Yuseong Group. No matter how he looked at it, he couldn’t make sense of what linked the two of them.
But he couldn’t exactly call Yoo Jae-ho and ask him outright.
After introducing themselves, the two men sat facing each other.
Heo Min-woong stared at the young man in front of him.
This is the guy who brought down Yang Jeong-uk?
An employee should do his job and nothing more. Reporting was fair game, but whether to accept that report was management’s decision.
Going behind their backs and exposing it to the press was presumptuous.
A guy who can’t even read the room and just runs wild.
Heo Min-woong didn’t particularly like people like that. But since he’d come on Chairman Yoo Jae-ho’s recommendation, he had to treat him properly and send him off without incident.
He said bluntly, "So what is it you wanted to see me about?"
Han Miru smiled.
"That was pretty blunt."