The Rise Of Australasia

Chapter 900: Chapter 670: Boeing Company

Later generations would be familiar with the highly renowned Pepsi-Cola, but at this time it was not yet very famous; such an acquisition in Virginia didn’t even make the news.

Of course, the most important reason was that the United States’ economy had already collapsed. Every day in the United States, thousands of acquisitions were taking place, and who would care about a small company whose market value was only a few hundred thousand dollars?

Although the task of acquiring Pepsi-Cola Beverage Company was completed, Frank did not rush to leave, but instead announced in a high profile manner that he would invest 1 million dollars in Pepsi-Cola as its controlling shareholder.

This action was actually instructed by Arthur, after all, in history, Pepsi-Cola had gone through several bankruptcies, and if one were to wait for Pepsi-Cola to develop on its own, who knows how long that would be.

The biggest shortcoming of Pepsi-Cola was the lack of money, which consequently led to almost zero investment in advertising by the beverage company.

Without advertising, it simply could not be sold; people only knew about the more famous Coca-Cola and would assume Pepsi-Cola was a counterfeit product, not purchasing it of their own accord.

Under such circumstances, the sales of Pepsi-Cola would get worse and worse. Even though Prohibition had already started in America, Pepsi-Cola had never been able to replace alcoholic beverages and become a new drink for Americans.

The 1 million dollars that Frank ostentatiously invested was firstly to stabilize the situation of the Pepsi-Cola Beverage Company, so that the already scarce stock prices would not continue to fall.

Secondly, it was to give confidence to all the employees of Pepsi-Cola and make them understand how strong the new controller’s capital was.

Even in 1927, 1 million dollars was definitely a huge amount. In fact, companies worth more than 1 million dollars could already become large companies, and it was not a problem at all to emerge from the economic crisis with this 1 million dollars.

The last point was to provide Pepsi-Cola with enough marketing funds. Although the quality of the product itself is also very important, without undergoing extensive marketing, the brand of Pepsi-Cola would not become more widely known.

To make this beverage company into a colossal name in the beverage industry, relentless advertising would be necessary to enhance the familiarity of the Pepsi-Cola brand.

Although Frank handed over the funds to the manager of Pepsi-Cola, Pradoham, he was not at all worried that Pradoham would embezzle the money.

Firstly, Pepsi-Cola’s annual financial statements would be reported, so it would be apparent if there were any financial issues.

Secondly, if Pradoham wanted to abscond with the funds, he would have to see if the Intelligence Department of Australasia would agree.

The 1 million dollars was not a small sum, and without having ensured Pradoham’s loyalty first, he would be subject to a certain level of surveillance to ensure he would not run away with the money.

On February 26th, 1927, Arthur quickly received news from across the ocean about the acquisition.

In just three or four days, intelligence personnel spent 20 million dollars on the acquisition of more than 600 companies, with an average investment of about 33,000 dollars per company.

Although this sum might not seem very large, the American stock market had already bottomed out. These companies, whose average market value was only a little over 30,000 dollars, generally had a market value of about ten or several tens of thousands of dollars, or even more, before the economic crisis.

If not for the intelligence personnel adhering to the principle of prioritizing the acquisition of medium and large enterprises, the number of acquired companies would have been even greater.

Because many of the enterprises in the United States’ markets, worth thousands to tens of thousands of dollars, are on the verge of bankruptcy or have already gone bankrupt – acquiring these enterprises requires almost no cost, a few thousand dollars is enough to buy such a company.

Seeing some of the companies on the acquisition list that would be renowned in later generations, Arthur was very satisfied with this acquisition plan.

Although there were some setbacks during the acquisition, such as competition from other companies or forces for the acquisitions, leading to some of the enterprises Arthur was keen on being acquired first, and so on.

But after all, those forces and companies did not have foresight; they did not know which companies would perform well in the future market, only acquiring those they believed to be promising.

Arthur was still pleased with the speed of acquiring more than 600 companies in just a few days. If valued according to their worth before the Great Depression, the market value of these more than 600 companies could possibly be around a billion dollars. Now, to get them for only 20 million dollars was a complete bargain.

Moreover, the 20 million dollars was not solely for acquiring companies; some of the money was used for the development of the companies.

In the acquisition of companies, the main targets of Australasia were industries such as automobile, petroleum, beverage, and agricultural product companies.

These more than 600 companies were spread across the United States’ agriculture and animal husbandry, light and heavy industries, as well as a variety of grain products, chemicals, and so on.

According to the current exchange ratio of US dollars to Australian dollars, the value of 20 million US dollars is equivalent to 8 million Australian dollars, which Arthur did not consider a significant expense.

The American market still has tens of thousands of enterprises on the brink of bankruptcy or already bankrupt, all waiting for Arthur’s funds to come to the rescue.

In order for Americans to have stable jobs, Arthur had really invested some serious money, instructing Director Barty to order those intelligence personnel to acquire a large number of American enterprises at all costs, with the working capital expanded to one billion US dollars.

With Arthur’s strong financial support, many intelligence personnel once again went undercover to acquire a large number of scattered enterprises across the United States.

The new round of acquisition targets included the aviation industry, machinery manufacturing, airplanes, military industry, shipbuilding, and steel companies, showing a clear trend of directly monopolizing the American industry.

Among the many acquisition targets, the renowned Boeing Company had become the primary choice in the airplane sector.

When it comes to Boeing Company, what usually comes to mind first are the various series of famous civilian airplanes it manufactures.

But in fact, Boeing is also a manufacturer of military aircraft and has achieved notable success in the field of dual-use aircraft.

Boeing Company was established in 1916 by the illustrious William Edward Boeing.

Seeing William Edward Boeing, one can clearly understand the origin of the Boeing Company’s name, which was indeed after William Edward’s surname.

Currently, Boeing’s main focus is still in the military aircraft field, with only a slight involvement in the civilian market, specifically in transport planes, and they have not yet ventured into civilian passenger planes.

But this does not in the least conceal Arthur’s desire to acquire Boeing. It’s not that Boeing is very powerful at present, but by depriving the United States of a Boeing Company, it would weaken the United States’ capability in aviation just a bit.

Because William Edward Boeing was of German descent, the Royal Security Intelligence Agency cleverly sent Scott Costild, who was also of German descent, as the acquirer.

At the headquarters of Boeing Company, Scott successfully met with the helmsman of the company, William Edward Boeing.

The renowned airplane designer was actually only 46 years old at the time.

But in the original history, the United States had split Boeing into three different companies during the Great Depression, which led to William Edward Boeing directly retiring after the company was divided.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Boeing,” Scott said, extending his hand first and smiling at William Edward Boeing, who had personally come to meet him.

“The same for me, Mr. Scott,” William Edward Boeing nodded first then went straight to the point, saying meaningfully, “Mr. Scott, your procurements in the United States have made the news. Not to mention anything else, just by giving many Americans the chance to have work again, you’re quite a friend to the American people.”

Hearing William Edward Boeing’s direct reference to his purpose, Scott was not embarrassed, instead, he pretended to be very honored and replied with a smile, “So, it seems Mr. Boeing isn’t opposed to my acquisition, right?”

Upon hearing what Scott said, William Edward Boeing did not respond directly but fell silent for a while, sighed, and then spoke somewhat reluctantly, “If it weren’t for this damned financial crisis, I would definitely not want my company to be acquired. But now, we can’t even afford to pay our workers their wages, so it’s time for Boeing to change.”

William Edward Boeing was quite open to the changes Boeing was about to undergo, which was also the reason he retired honorably immediately after the company was divided.

After all, Boeing had made enough money for him to live comfortably as a wealthy man.

“Thank you, Mr. Boeing, for your high regard. Please be assured that should we acquire Boeing, you would still have control over the company if you wish. Of course, as a sign of our sincerity, you can retain a 5% stake in Boeing and see for yourself how it grows and flourishes,” said Scott smilingly.

Since William Edward Boeing was not opposed to the acquisition of his life’s work, the proceedings that followed were much easier.

Offering shares in Boeing, acquiring the company, and relocating the headquarters to Australasia, this was Scott’s mission to follow.

“However, Mr. Scott, I have to remind you. The current market value of Boeing is as high as 5 million dollars, are you sure you have enough capital to acquire it?” Looking at Scott, whose confidence seemed to signal that the acquisition of Boeing was a done deal, William Edward Boeing became curious. Could the capital behind him really be that robust?@@novelbin@@

“You need not worry about the funds, Mr. Boeing,” Scott said with a smile: “After the acquisition of your company, we can inject an additional 2 million US dollars into Boeing as R&D funds to help you research the technology of monoplane.

We only have one requirement, which is that Boeing’s technology must not be transferred or sold to others without permission and no finished airplanes or parts may be sold to any person or power without permission.

Moreover, we would like to move Boeing’s headquarters to a more suitable place, which will be more conducive to the development of Boeing.”