It was the third day's morning of Hina's reign and we were in the executive meeting room with Hina at the head of the table. Closest to her on the right side sat Jisoo, and the left side chair opposite Jisoo was occupied by Mr. Yan, the longest-serving Managing Director of the Chan Group. The second pair of seats on the left and right were filled with Dr. Chide the CTO and Mr. Koh the CFO. Next to the CTO sat Dr. Jin the head of the R&D department we met the day before. These five were the ones that Hina met and knew already, and the rest that filled the room were the ones that Hina had yet to acquaint herself with, such as Mr. Lau the Chief Business Development Manager, Mr. Hong the Chief Production Manager, and so on. As for me, I was standing two steps to the right and two steps behind Hina just as I've always done with Chairman Chan.
"Thank you, everyone, for coming, and for those that I haven't met before, it's nice to meet you. My name is Hina and I have recently been appointed as the new Chief Executive Officer of the Chan Group. I look forward to working with everyone here and hope we can continue the success of the Chan Group"
A little round of applause, and then Hina nodded to Jisoo on her right and Jisoo rose from his seat to speak.
"Right, gentlemen. Although this is only the first time we've had the chance to formally greet our new CEO, you all know that we are not here just to say hello. Let's get started. Sin, please proceed"
That from Jisoo came off as a bit quick and terse.
Hmm, anyway.
"Thank you, Mr. Chan. I have already given a general briefing to Ms. Chan about the next major project to be announced in four weeks' time - the Unmanned Fast Attack Craft. We have the heads of most departments here, so we will use this opportunity to brief Ms. Chan on your perspectives on this project from your respective field. Could Mr. Lau start first please, as the Chief Business Development Manager?"
"Right. Ms. Chan, I am Lau from the Business Development department. The Unmanned Fast Attack Craft is a weapons platform that the Joint Chiefs of Staff wanted and has kept on its ten-year plan for a while now. The budget for it passed through the parliament last autumn and now the program is ready to be announced shortly".
Lau was a rather big and heavy man, so he took a little pause to catch his breath here.
"As an island nation, maintaining the Naval superiority over the neighboring countries is of paramount importance. In recent years, there has been a Naval arms race between our three neighbors due to the disputes over the ownership of islands that sit between their borders. While we are not involved in such dispute directly, we are seeing an increasing presence of their Naval forces close to our sea"
Lau gave a look at Hina at this point to see if she was still following well. Hina appeared attentive and nodded for Lau to continue.
"Unmanned Fast Attack Craft, UFAC, is what the Joint Chiefs of Staff considers as the optimal solution to counter these threats. We cannot match the scale of the other country's Naval forces by any normal means, but we can operate a greater number of unmanned vessels than, well, manned vessels. The Joint Chiefs of Staff, JCS wants to see the prototype of this boat in three years, immediately to be followed by serial production should the development be successful. The total number of UFAC the JCS wants to have within five years is 10, with the aim of doubling this number in ten years"
Mr. Koh the CFO took over from here.
"Just to give you an idea of the scale of this program. The budget for the R&D of the prototype is 600 million dollars. The cost of a single boat, once complete, is estimated to be at least 200~250 million dollars each. So 10 boats in five years will be a maximum of 2.5 billion dollars, and 20 boats for 10 years will be 5 billion dollars. So all in all, putting the R&D and acquisition budget together, we are looking at around 5.6 billion dollars"
Hina threw a quick glance at me, and I knew she was thinking something along the lines of "Hey that's a lot of money, but my family's private wealth alone is already more than that. Is 5.6 billion dollars that big a deal for the Chan Group?"
"But this project is worth more than 5.6 billion dollars for us", Jisoo interjected as if he read Hina's thoughts too.
"Mr. Chide, please explain"
"Yes, Mr. Chan. From a technological point of view, this will be relatively new territory for us, and the best chance for us to secure a budget that we can invest into strengthening our competence in the field of unmanned operation technology. Since KAK won the project for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, neither we nor Wanda have invested in this field and KAK has become a runaway leader in autonomous systems technology. For now, we can happily focus on the other areas we have traditionally been strong at, but down the road, there is a danger that KAK becomes the de facto leader in the weapons platform design and we just end up as a supplier of sub-components and consumables"
This was something I already went over with Hina two days ago so she should have a good idea of what's going on now.
"In other words, winning this program will not only mean an up to six billion dollar project, but it will also allow us to get into myriads of other platform businesses. Over the long term, the potential value of winning this project will be tens of billions of dollars", Lau concluded for Dr. Chide.
"Right. Thank you everyone", Hina appreciatively nodded her head.
"Ms. Chan - ", the way Jisoo said Ms. Chan sounded so intentional that it came across as somewhat sarcastic, "on the flip side, this means that failing to win this project could be the start of the decline in the Chan Group's position in the defense industry. The loss will not be just unrealized profit, but the status of the company"
"Let me tell you something", Mr. Yan, who had been sitting quietly next to Hina, finally spoke.
"It's a make-or-break situation we have here. Now that we've come to this stage I can say it to you all - the whole idea of developing and acquiring UFAC was actually an idea Chairman Chan planted on the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It was something he felt our country needed, but of course, also, what he saw as essential for the future of the Chan Group. It's his vision for the new era. We have to win this contract"
"I understand. We will not fail"
Hina stated with genuine confidence and determination, but the rest of the room didn't seem convinced. It's like a third-choice goalkeeper in a football team talking big that his team will win in the final and lift the trophy - sure, it could happen, but you won't be the one to take credit for it when the team wins. When you get your medal, just know that your team carried you to that podium.
However, there was a major difference for Hina. A third-choice goalkeeper would not be blamed for the team losing the final, but Hina would be blamed for it. And when she gets blamed for a big failure, she won't have the strong support to fall back on to recover and earn the second chance to bounce back. And when Hina loses her grip on her position, my career will be over too.