Story of a Big Player from Gangnam

The next morning after Gun-Ho had the high school reunion, Gun-Ho called Min-Hyeok Kim.

“Did you have a good time last night?”

“Don’t get me started. After everyone left for home except seven of us, we had a second and third round last night.”

“Oh, you did? I had to leave early yesterday. I took Min-Ho outside the restaurant since he was too drunk and started talking gibberish. After sending him home by taxi, I came home as well. I couldn’t stay longer to join another round; I was so drunk myself too.”

“What’s wrong with Min-Ho? I think I will have to have a serious talk with him.”

“Don’t do anything stupid! He was just too drunk to talk straight. He must have probably regretted by now what he did last night once he sobered up.”

“Other friends also agreed with me that we have to do something about Min-Ho.”

“Who were those seven people whom you stayed with till late last night?”

“They were Suk-Ho Lee, Won-Chul Jo, Byeong-Chul Hwang, and Jae-Sik Moon. I paid for the second round, and Jae-Sik paid for the third round.”

“That’s good.”

“I am going back to China tomorrow. I will have to get back to my work.”

“Oh, I was going to ask you. We received 1.5 billion won when we terminated the joint venture with Kunshan City. How much funds do we have left now?”

“We spent 500 million won out of that fund to handle the equipment situation of the factory. Some of the machines had stopped working because they were not in use for too long. We also used some of the funds to pay for the unpaid wages of the workers and for the outstanding balance of the factory rent.”

“So how much do we have left now?”

“After we resume the business of the factory, we made some profits, and those are saved in your bank account. So, we have about 1.3 billion won now.”

“1.3 billion won… Let’s then buy a storage with that money.”

“A storage? Our factory is large enough to store more stuff. We don’t need an additional storage.”

“The storage is not for the use of GH Parts Company. It will be used for the business of the future joint venture with Dyeon.”

“Oh, I see. We will need a space to pile up Dyeon Korea’s products that will be sold in the China market.”

“That’s right.”

“How large do you think we will need for the storage?”

“I am thinking of a space in the range between 300 pyung and 1,000 pyung. Since the space is for storage purpose, not to be used as a factory, we won’t need a high electricity capacity.”

“I will look for one and will let you know how it goes.”

“When you look for a storage, you also have to make sure if we can buy the land with our name.”

“If we buy land, we will get the ownership of the land.”

“As you may know already, China has a different system. There are some lands that we can acquire with our own name, and also there are some lands where a landowner would lease the land to us and would say we would be able to still register as our own land, which is a total lie.”

“Hmmm. I will keep that in mind and take a good look at it.”

“You want to look at the location as well. It needs to be convenient to come and go. Also, we want a land that has the potential to increase in price in the future.”

“So we want a land that will be used for storage but also that could be a good investment property.”

“Yeah. That way, we can borrow money from a bank using the land as collateral in the future if necessary.”

It was early fall. People started wearing long sleeves.

Gun-Ho was meeting with Attorney Young-Jin Kim at Incheon International Airport to go to Seattle together.

“Hey, you are wearing long sleeves, so am I. It’s chilly these days.”

“You brought a huge bag. What is that for? Are you planning to bring a pretty blond girl in that bag?”

“It’s almost empty. I am just taking some clothes and a few books; that’s all.”

“I brought some books too. I guess I need them for my over 10-hour flight.”

“What book are you carrying? What’s the title?”

“Oh, this? I just brought this hoping it would help me with my long hour trip.”

“What’s the book title? Business Model Design Compass? Is it an American book?”

“Haha. Let me read it first, and I will tell you everything about the book.”

“I brought only some magazines.”

“Magazines are good.”

“I’ve reserved Korean Air business class for us.”

“We could have taken the economic class. That’s good enough.”

“It’s going to be a long flight. We need some space to stretch our legs out.”

Gun-Ho and Attorney Young-Jin Kim arrived at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.

Seattle was a city located in the Pacific Northwest. The Boeing company was situated in Seattle. Also, other large companies such as Starbucks and Amazon.com had headquarters in Seattle. Amazon was founded in this city. Lymondell Dyeon which Gun-Ho was heading to was located there as well.

“We can rent a car at the airport, but let’s take the subway instead. It will take us to downtown.”

“I’m good either way.”

Gun-Ho and Attorney Young-Jin Kim arrived at their hotel—Sheraton—when the sun started going down.

“President Goo, we will have a long day tomorrow. Let’s take a good rest today. We can go to the town for a tour tomorrow.”

“Sure. I think I need to stay at the hotel today, anyway. I think something went wrong with the food that I had during the flight.”

“Do you want me to get you some medicine?”

“Nah. I brought all kinds of medicines in preparation for all sorts of cases I could think of; I came prepared for diarrhea, cold, skin cuts, etc. I always carry these around when I go on a trip.”

“Wow. You are indeed well prepared. I guess I have to learn from you.”

“Are we renting a car tomorrow? We will have to go to Dyeon America.”

“The hotel will prepare that for us. I wanted to have a field trip to the Boeing company since we are in Seattle; however, I am not sure if we have time for that.”

“We can do it later. I was told that it would take more than a day to have a tour of their factory. They have an enormously large factory.”

“Yeah, probably we should do it later. We will have to have at least dinner today, right?”

“Of course. Let’s meet at the lobby after unpacking in our rooms.”

Gun-Ho and Attorney Young-Jin Kim had dinner in a restaurant that was attached to the hotel. Attorney Young-Jin Kim ordered a wine for himself; however, Gun-Ho couldn’t drink that night because of his diarrhea symptom.

“The food is not bad here, right?”

“Yeah, it’s good. The hotel doesn’t look super luxurious, but I like its downtown location. I can easily go out and walk around downtown.”

“Since you are not feeling well, why don’t you go up to your room and take a rest?”

“Nah, it’s okay. I think I want to take a walk downtown after having dinner by myself. It will help me digest food.”

“That sounds good too. You probably want to walk around after a long hour flight.”