New Employees With an Annual Salary of 1 Trillion Won - Chapter 198

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 198. Infrastructure Construction (3)

I visited Redline after a long time.

CEO Park Dae-hyeok, whose name differed by only one character from Neowiz’s CEO, greeted me with a bright face.

“Branch Manager! Thank you so much for giving us such a great opportunity.”

“What great opportunity are you referring to?”

“I wanted to thank you for entrusting us with the PC Bang franchise business.”

The PC Bang business that started to dispose of NVIDIA’s bad inventory.

Since Tiger Fund or its subsidiaries couldn’t enter directly, we entrusted that role to Redline.

“Is the PC Bang business progressing smoothly?”

“We’ve currently expanded to 70 stores nationwide. And all stores are recording higher sales than expected.”

“I was worried about losses due to the growing scale, but it’s fortunate that things are going well.”

“Rather, customers are flocking because of our large scale.”

I never intended to make money from the PC Bang business from the beginning.

It was just a business I planned to use as an outlet to clear bad inventory.

To consume large amounts of inventory, we had no choice but to expand the scale, and the goal was to operate with minimal losses.

But CEO Park Dae-hyeok’s perspective was different.

He operated the business in a way that generated profits rather than losses, earning greater returns than expected.

“Still, it couldn’t have been easy to make profits. How did you manage it?”

“I used military-style methods.”

“Military-style? You didn’t designate competing PC Bangs as enemies and attack them, did you?”

“We never started trouble first. But when surrounding PC Bangs colluded to kill us or did unreasonable things… we deployed Redline Employees to handle it.”

All Redline Employees were outstanding agents.

I was momentarily speechless that such personnel were deployed to deal with competing PC Bangs.

“What exactly did you do? You didn’t do anything illegal, right?”

“We only moved against PC Bangs that touched us first. We infiltrated to check for illegal software use, secured evidence of minors entering after 10 PM, and checked everything including fire safety violations before reporting them.”

The competing PC Bang owners were in a pitiful state.

Redline never started trouble first.

But once they began responding, they were so thorough that opponents could hardly endure it.

In any industry, when large stores appear, surrounding small stores usually join forces to respond.

But unfortunately, their opponent was Redline.

Who could have imagined they were dealing with agents from the military, ANSP, and intelligence services?

“So that’s how you expanded to 70 stores.”

“Yes. Moreover, we created PX-style snack bars inside the PC Bangs. Food sales are doing better than usage fees. Thanks to that, people hoping to start businesses are lining up with money.”

“With Redline backing them, there’s absolutely no chance of failure.”

The Redline PC Bang franchise structure was distinctly different from other places.

Aside from having large stores with many PCs, they didn’t demand excessive franchise fees or additional costs like regular franchises.

Since Redline directly managed and coordinated from behind.

The probability of new Store Owners failing naturally decreased, so aspiring entrepreneurs had no choice but to flock to them.

“And there are other additional benefits.”

“What kind of benefits?”

“We were able to collect much more information from PC Bangs than expected.”

“What kind of information is coming in? Game-related information?”

Few places were as convenient for Information Gathering as PC Bangs.

All Users were gaming and doing internet activities through PCs and programs installed by Redline.

“Game-related information comes in the most. We can secure not only new game reactions but also regional user preference data. We can also identify what games different age groups prefer and what sites they use.”

“That’s data that’s not easy to obtain. It would be useful in many ways.”

Game-related information seemed like it would be of great help to Neowiz.

And being able to read current trends in real-time was also an unexpected achievement.

“And we were also able to secure security-related data.”

“Security incidents must happen frequently in PC Bangs too.”

“More than expected. We consistently catch people using illegal programs, and there are cases of attempting hacking using PC Bang computers. Through such cases, we were able to analyze illegal program types and hacking patterns.”

The more I heard, the better the PC Bang business seemed in various ways.

Businesses that could make money while securing various data weren’t common.

“Are there any other benefits?”

“Having stores nationwide greatly helps with information manipulation and public opinion formation. Using thousands of computers, we can instantly change the atmosphere of specific sites.”

“Even if you can’t completely control internet public opinion, you can at least create trends.”

It was quite a useful weapon.

We wouldn’t be the first to wage public opinion wars.

But if competitors attacked with false information, it was sufficient as a reliable defensive measure to block them early.

“Then how about expanding the scale a bit more?”

There are already dozens of Store Owners waiting for store openings. We can expand as much as we want.”

“Let’s expand to 200 locations all at once this time.”

“200 locations? As you know, our stores are at least 200-seat scale. So the initial investment is considerable. There are many aspiring entrepreneurs, but not many with such large capital.”

Money wasn’t a big problem.

The funds needed to additionally open 130 PC Bangs could be sufficiently supported by Tiger Fund Korea Branch.

“You know that Hana Bank is under Tiger Fund, right?”

“I know very well.”

“Hana Bank and Redline PC Bang can form a partnership. We’ll make it possible to get loans for over 50% of startup funds at very low interest rates.”

“If that happens, even people who hesitated due to insufficient initial capital will all flock here! Not just 200 locations… expansion to 300 locations would be possible!”

There was no reason expanding the scale would be bad.

We could consume not only NVIDIA’s GPUs but also chips produced by Dae-hyeon Semiconductor,

And establish a foundation for nationwide data collection and, when necessary, use as a secret weapon.

“Expand the scale as much as you want. It doesn’t matter if there are losses. We’ll support all the losses. And if there are profits, you can use all that money as Redline operating funds.”

“I’ll definitely expand it! I’ll create Korea’s number one PC Bang chain!”

It was an answer from CEO Park Dae-hyeok that clearly showed his military spirit.

But Redline’s main business shouldn’t be reversed.

The PC Bang business was merely an additional business, and Redline’s core was security, Information Gathering, Analysis, and utilization.

“You can continue maintaining existing work while doing the PC Bang business, right?”

“Of course! If the PC Bang business interferes with existing work even slightly, I’ll immediately halt expansion!”

“That’s all you need to do.”

It was a trustworthy answer.

But the moment I planned PC Bang business expansion.

A new business item surged up, and a gear structure that could overturn the existing game distribution System came to mind.

***

Most companies under Tiger Fund were closely connected to IT.

Not only Game Companies like Neowiz, but also Rollbook, Dae-hyeon Semiconductor, and even Rollbook Mart all required vast data and stable server environments.

So we had no choice but to build various infrastructure ourselves.

Especially as we began full-scale large-scale artificial intelligence research, server shortages could occur at any time.

“How is the data center construction progressing?”

“Construction is currently underway simultaneously in Gyeonggi-do and Gangwon-do. The relatively small Gyeonggi-do data center will be completed by early next year at the latest.”

We were already preparing data centers.

One of the conditions for bringing Professor Hinton, the core of artificial intelligence research, to Korea was also the data center.

“Construction is progressing faster than expected.”

Daehyeon Construction is directly constructing it, so we could greatly shorten the construction speed. Moreover, the Gyeonggi-do center isn’t large in scale, so the overall construction period is short. However, the Gangwon-do data center is more than three times the size of Gyeonggi-do, so completion will probably be late next year or the year after.”

Two data centers.

In Korea, there were almost no cases of companies or groups owning their own data centers.

Most companies rented servers from IDCs, and only telecommunications companies built data centers directly.

But even those couldn’t compare to the data centers we were building.

The scale, power facilities, cooling systems, and even security.

The facilities we were building were closer to ‘hyper scale,’ much more massive than the medium-sized data centers owned by telecommunications companies.

“I’d like to build more data centers.”

“…Do you mean to construct additional ones? The center we’re building now is already too large. Even if all the subsidiary companies under the Korea Branch use servers, at least 70% of the capacity will remain unused.”

Data centers were facilities with enormous maintenance costs.

To keep the servers at a constant temperature, the cooling system couldn’t be stopped even in the dead of winter.

The power consumption was enough to exceed that of a decent-sized factory.

“If we build it, we can find ways to utilize it somehow.”

“But even if we proceed with rental business to Korean companies or internet websites, there will still be excess capacity. In this situation, if we build additional data centers… it will be difficult to utilize them properly.”

The Deputy Branch Manager’s concerns were perfectly reasonable.

No matter how high Korea’s internet penetration rate was.

The population was still limited, and naturally internet usage couldn’t exceed a certain level.

But times were changing.

We couldn’t make judgments based solely on the current situation.

We had to prepare infrastructure in advance, considering the future internet environment that was coming.

“Right now, most internet services don’t use much traffic. Only games are slightly higher. But soon all services will require high traffic.”

“I don’t quite understand.”

“Just look at Rollbook. After starting video services, traffic has already nearly doubled.”

The Deputy Branch Manager still had an expression showing he didn’t understand.

For his sake, I showed him part of the picture I was envisioning.

“Right now, most games are supplied in CD format. Only online games are downloaded.”

“Although the online game market has expanded, there are still more packaged games sold on CD.”

“I’m thinking of changing that packaged game market to an online platform. When that happens, all games will become download-based, and naturally server demand will explode.”

It was a thought that came to me while looking at Redline PC Bang.

To enjoy numerous types of games, an online-based platform was necessary.

And to create such an era, large-scale data centers were essential.

“I understand what you’re saying. But even if we create a game platform, the data center we’re building now would be more than sufficient.”

“That’s not the end of it. I’m thinking of making Korea Asia’s data hub. From Google to Amazon. The global companies we’re cooperating with will need a center if they want to expand into Asia.”

“Are you saying that having data centers will make them choose Korea as their Asian base?”

I nodded strongly.

Now, when no one had attempted it yet, we had to move as quickly as possible.

“If we properly build data centers and make global companies choose us as their Asian base, we’ll generate hundreds of billions in revenue annually from that moment. And additional revenues larger than server usage fees will naturally follow.”

“If all the global companies use our data centers… the two locations we have now would definitely be insufficient.”

It was a goose that laid golden eggs.

No matter how expensive the goose might be, if it laid golden eggs, wouldn’t you have to buy it unconditionally?

“So push forward with additional data center construction right now. One in the Capital Region, and one more in Busan, close to the submarine cables. The government is currently prioritizing balanced regional development, so they won’t oppose it.”

“I’ll move immediately.”

“And send official letters to global companies too. Include a proposal that the data centers will be completed soon, so let’s build an Asian base together.”

Data centers – a new cash cow.

But they weren’t simply facilities for making money.

When the era I envisioned arrived, data centers could become power itself and strategic weapons.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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