CH23 : Pellets

The next day,

Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding.

"Let's eat."

Someone rang the lunch bell.

"Is it lunchtime already?"

I hadn't done anything all morning, yet time had flown by.

I couldn't decide whether to meet Van Flint all night last night.

He must have visited to discuss how much loan to give to the Ulsan Petrochemical Complex at the Korea-U.S. summit.

In history, he was the one who got the U.S. government to approve a massive loan of $150 million.

Come to think of it, the person David wanted to introduce was also Van Flint.

David called him an amazing person too.

"Did I pique his curiosity?"

He must have heard about me from David once and from Eric Malton once more.

Otherwise, why would such a big shot leave his phone number and insist on meeting me?

"President, enjoy your meal."

"Oh, yes. Eat a lot and stay strong."

"Thank you."

A passing employee greeted me.

I told him to eat a lot and stay strong.

In this era, telling someone to eat a lot was a good wish.

The abandoned factory... no, Daese Chemical was becoming a proper factory.

I selected only the skilled workers and hired them as employees, and many of them were chemists or physicists.

In total, there were nearly 200 people.

The dining hall made of steel beams and cement blocks was decent.

It would have been better to use insulated containers, but this was before the container era.

"Chansu! I mean, President! Where have you been? I've been looking for you all morning."

"Oh, Sambok! What brings you to Ulsan without even a call?"

Sambok was waiting in front of the dining hall.

It was good to see his face after a long time.

"Hey, you pay the employees' salaries, but why didn't you settle the dining lady's meal tickets? She called me directly."

"Did I make such a mistake? She should have told me."

"She must have found it difficult to talk to you. She seemed to be struggling alone. I settled it with bank interest, a total of 2.8 million won."

"Haha, well done. You truly are my friend."

It was a good decision to put Sambok in charge of accounting.

I almost became a villainous contractor.

"Do you even know how the company is running? Do you read the weekly financial reports I send you?"

"Why should I read them? You do."

Managing money takes more time than one might think.

Analyzing it takes mental energy too.

I'd rather work one more minute or sleep one more minute than spend time on that.

I should focus on making money, not counting it.

"You should at least know if we're in the red or black and understand major expenses. You are the president."

"How could we be in the red? Isn't our business doing great? We're making a lot of dollars from Singapore."

If we were in the red, Sambok would have been jumping up and down.

These days, I focus on investing in the right places.

"I knew it!"

Whack!

"What are you doing? That hurts, you jerk."

Sambok headbutted me.

"Business is great. Very! Incredibly! Unbelievably great. But your spending is even more unbelievable! Look at this! Look at how much you've spent in a month!"

He showed me the ledger.

"What? The balance is only 50,000 dollars?"

I was dumbfounded.

We kept receiving export payments from Singapore and made 100,000 dollars weekly from Gulf's catalyst supplies, but the balance was this low?

"Look at what you've spent. Factory repair costs and employee salaries are one thing. But why build a bathhouse and flush toilets in the factory dormitory? Alright, I'll admit that proper sanitation is important. But what's this? Why buy the surrounding land when this factory site is already so large? Are you speculating on real estate? Okay, maybe land prices will rise here someday. But why buy stainless steel pipes, bentonite, calcium carbonate, zeolite, ammonium butyrate, ethylene dichloride, and all this other stuff? Why use our precious barter rights from fabric exports to import this stuff?"

He was here to question my use of barter rights.

Well, he had a point. If I had the leeway, I'd sell the barter rights for a premium too.

But what can I do?

We need raw materials to run the plant.

"Calm down. You can't make synthetic fibers with just naphtha."

"Naphtha? What's that?"

"Naptha!"

"Naptha? Is this a naptha plant?"

At that time, naphtha was called naptha.

Though calling it naptha with an English accent is okay, the original term is naphtha from German pronunciation.

Historically, chemical engineering was strong in Germany.

"Yes, this plant will produce polyester and nylon raw materials. Then Hyesung will produce the yarn. And you'll make the fabric at the Seongsu-dong Factory. Didn't I tell you this?"

"No, you didn't! You and President Hwang kept the Ulsan operation confidential."

"Wow, our company security is great. We're running operations without even the head of the headquarters knowing."

Whack!

"Do you want to die?"

Sambok, feeling embarrassed, headbutted me again.

If he had known we were importing raw materials to localize yarn production, he wouldn't have made a fuss.

"Stop grumbling, I'll show you. Come on."

"Hey. Let me go."

"When else will you get a briefing directly from the president?"

I tucked him under my arm and headed to the back of the factory. The front of the factory was still under construction, but the back plant could operate normally.

This was the highest security area of Daese Chemical.

***

Clang.

I opened the security steel door and entered.

Only those with keys could enter here.

"President Hwang!"

"President Woo, have you finished lunch already?"

"I'll eat after work. Deputy Manager Lee is visiting after a long time."

Today again, President Hwang was working through lunch.

He worked until 10 minutes before lunch ended to avoid the line.

Few people worked as passionately as President Hwang.

Of course, it was directly related to the growth of Hyesung Nylon, so he had a reason to work hard.

"Oh, Deputy Manager Lee is here."

"What... What is this?"

Sambok's eyes widened.

It was a natural reaction.

Compared to the shabby front of the factory, the back was filled with towering, gleaming polymerization reactors.

"These are polymerization reactors for synthetic raw materials. President Woo also calls them Mike Towers."

Honestly, I didn't expect to set up the polymerization reactors this quickly. Since the factory warehouse was full of large and small polymerization reactor parts, we only needed to weld them according to the process flow.

It seemed the original concept of the factory was a combined refinery and polymerization reactor plant.

"Mike Towers... What? Are those... pellets?"

Sambok was once again surprised as he looked around.

On one side, rice grain-shaped pellets were pouring out.

Instead of drawing fibers directly from the polymerization reactor, we first made small pellets of nylon or polyester, melted them, and drew fibres through a spinning machine.

The important thing was that the raw material lumps produced by this polymerization reactor were not low-grade flakes but top-quality, rice grain-shaped pellets.

As a textile industry worker, Sambok was astonished to see the heap of pellets.

"Pretty, aren't they? These are polyester pellets. We just need to draw fibers at Seongsu-dong."

"Are we really localizing polyester?"

"Not us, President Woo succeeded in localizing it. He designed all the plants here and set the process conditions himself. He's truly Korea's top chemical engineering genius."

The man who had shed tears of joy a few days ago was now speaking calmly.

"Chemical engineering? Chansu, you majored in business administration."

"I've always been interested in chemical engineering. Didn't you know?"

I shrugged my shoulders, pretending to be smug.

"Can you do this just by being interested?"

"Aren't I a genius?"

"No, you're not. I... should keep my mouth shut."

Contrary to my expectations, Sambok's reaction was quite calm.

It was like he thought, "If it's Chansu, it's possible."

It seemed he acknowledged that I might be a genius.

"Oh, President Hwang. Gulf opened the main valve for naphtha yesterday afternoon. Let's open our valve too."

"Really? Are we finally mass-producing polyester?"

"We should draw nylon too. We're sending nylon fabric to Singapore first."

"Don't worry about producing caprolactam (nylon raw material). We've tested it several times with Reactor 2."

In the backyard, there were several polymerization reactors. The large Reactor 1 was assigned to polyester, and the slightly smaller Reactor 2 was assigned to nylon.

As time goes on, the demand for polyester will increase more than nylon, so it was a natural assignment.

"Chansu, how much yarn will we produce when we go into mass production?"

Sambok asked, half-expectant and half-worried.

"Well, annually, it should be about 30,000 tons of polyester and 30,000 tons of nylon. We'll also produce about 10,000 tons of plastic for coatings."

"Are you crazy? How do you plan to sell such massive amounts of material?"

"Don't worry. Our fabrics will sell like hotcakes. We won't just dominate Southeast Asia but the global market."

"Dominating the global market?"

"We can produce all the necessary materials. Imagine using water-repellent nylon as the outer layer and polyester as the inner layer. It would outperform any other fabric in waterproofing, windproofing, breathability, washing, and drying."

"... You mean the fabric is double-layered? Is that possible?"

"Of course, it is."

"Are you... really a genius?"

"Probably."

Sambok was at a loss for words.

Honestly, this fabric was the result of a genius idea. In the 90s, it dominated the global sportswear market under the name Polytech.

The important point was that Polytech fabric was used not only for sportswear but also for U.S. Marine Corps uniforms.

What I liked even more was that the company that initially made the fabric went bankrupt in the 2000s after over-expanding its business.

So, even if I took over Polytech technology, the butterfly effect wouldn't be significant.

It's manageable.

"President Hwang, please look after things here. I need to go to Seoul."

"Me? Look after things here?"

"Just for about a week. We need to hand over the pellets we've produced so far to President Hwang and make polyester, then create fabrics in different colours and send them to Singapore. Of course, we'll also try to break into the military uniform market with double-layered fabrics."

"Military uniforms?"

"For the Vietnam War. Both Korean and U.S. soldiers."

"!!!!"

Both of them were startled by my words.

Come to think of it, it's natural.

Even the newspapers were making a big deal about whether Korea should send troops to Vietnam.

At this time, the general atmosphere was about making foreign exchange by participating in the Vietnam War.

There was also the logic that without sending combat troops, the U.S. would withdraw their forces from Korea, creating a security vacuum.

"The Vietnam War! Chansu, you are a genius!"

"Why do you keep calling me a genius?"

"This time it's true. You're a genius! A business genius."

"Stop it and load the stuff onto the truck. Let's go to Seoul."

"Let's go!!!"

Sambok, who had come down with a grumpy expression, was now jumping with joy.

President Hwang also cheerfully loaded polyester and nylon pellets onto the truck.

In my mind, the pellets had already transformed into dazzling Polytech fabrics, boarding export ships.

"Buckle up."

"Step on it, Chansu!"

"Get a truck license. If you don't, I'll fire you from the manager position."

"Oh no, I'm scared!"

"I'm not joking."

"Yes, sir."

We joked around as we headed to Seoul.

On the way, we remembered we skipped lunch, so we had some refreshing naengmyeon (cold noodles).

The season for naengmyeon was already approaching.

***

Hyesung Nylon.

"President Hwang!!"

"President!!"

"Where did he go?"

We arrived in the evening, planning to unload the pellets and get some dinner, but President Hwang was not at his place.

"Oh my, isn't it President Woo?"

"Oh, ma'am. Where's the president? I have something to ask him."

"President Woo, now is not the time for work talk. Go to the factory quickly. It's chaos. The president also rushed over there."

"Our factory? What happened?"

"It's bad. A bunch of dark-clad men stormed in and Miss Kim and the employees are being held captive. It's a disaster. Go quickly!"

"What? Our employees are being held?"

What nonsense is this?

I looked at Sambok, but he was as clueless as I was.

"Let's go quickly, Chansu."

"Yeah!"

We rushed to the factory without further ado.