Xiaomi Heavy Industry, its first entrepreneurial venture!

Chapter 195 General! Our good days have arrived! (Third update!)
Their curiosity didn't last long. After surveying the scene, Qin Chao nodded to Lin Yi and turned to walk towards the podium at the front of the hall.

He stood on the somewhat rudimentary-looking platform and gently tapped the microphone with his hand.

The microphone was tapped, and the knocking sound traveled through the microphone to the speakers and into the ears of everyone present.

Upon hearing the sound, everyone who was chatting stopped what they were doing and turned to look at Qin Chao.

Once everyone's attention was on him, Qin Chao tapped the microphone again, a smile spreading across his face, and spoke gently:
"I am Qin Chao, the Qin Chao that everyone knows."

"I am here today in a private capacity to attend the opening ceremony of Xiaomi Heavy Industry's various metal processing plants."

"So everyone, don't feel pressured. Eat, drink, and have fun."

"I'll take the liberty of expressing my gratitude on behalf of Lin Yi to everyone for taking time out of your busy schedules to come to Xiaomi Heavy Industry and attend this opening ceremony."

"And while you're at it, give him a little advertising."

Xiaomi Heavy Industry undertakes the design and manufacturing of various home appliances, as well as the customized precision processing and deep processing of various special metal products. Finally, it sells special high-performance batteries.

"That's all I have to say."

At this point, he turned his gaze to Lin Yi, winked at him, and continued to ask in a gentle voice:
"Is everyone here? If everyone's here, let's get ready to eat!"

Offstage, Lin Yi raised his hand and made an OK gesture. Qin Chao turned his gaze back to the microphone and tapped it again.

"Now, let's give a warm round of applause and start the meal!"

As he finished speaking, the side door of the hall opened, and more than a dozen waiters walked in one by one, each carrying a dish.

One dish per table, and after the dish is served, the waiter disappears again, only to be served a minute or two later with a new dish.

In just over ten minutes, the table was filled with dishes.

After the waiter finished serving the bowls and chopsticks, he turned around and disappeared through the side door.

After settling everyone in the lobby, Lin Yi led Qin Chao into a room that would temporarily serve as a private room.

The large round table in the room was already full of people.

At the large round table for 15 people, only Lin Yi and Ji Shuangshuang from Xiaomi Heavy Industry were present; the rest were Qin Chao's people or people he brought with him.

As the lid on the plate was lifted, the food inside was revealed to everyone.

The meal consisted of over twenty dishes, all of which were among the more elaborate but refined dishes in Huaiyang cuisine.

The characteristic of Huaiyang cuisine is its mildness.

There are no heavy meat dishes or vegetarian dishes, making it perfect for entertaining guests.

Qin Chao glanced at it, nodded in satisfaction, and then smiled at Lin Yi:

"You're really willing to spend a lot of money, kid."

Lin Yi naturally handed over the bowl and chopsticks, responding with a smile:
"With Secretary Qin in charge, I can only go and work as a cook."

"Get the banquet ready."

"Even if others don't give me face, they'll still have to say a few good words for me behind my back, out of respect for the banquet I've hosted."

This absurd logic startled Qin Chao. After thinking about it, he realized that it was indeed true.

After all, he's over 50 years old, and he still remembers the banquets he attended when he was a teenager.

He was the head of the table, and since he hadn't touched his chopsticks, the others naturally couldn't either.

Seeing this, he picked up his chopsticks, put some food into his bowl, and then said to everyone:
"Let's eat! No more talk today, let's just focus on eating!"

The chef's skills were excellent. Ignoring Xiao He's gaze, Qin Chao ate two large bowls of food as quickly as possible, tears welling up in his eyes.

When he was about 70% full, he put down his chopsticks and pointed to the middle-aged man with a receding hairline near the door:

"Liu Haifeng is a well-known investor in our city. In the past two years, he has been developing highways in the western part of the city."

"Many sections of the highways in the west need to be bridged, including many suspension bridges."

"We need a lot of special cables, and I brought them with me when he came back this time."

"If you're interested, you can exchange contact information and we can discuss it in detail later."

Seeing the Mediterranean man across from him, Lin Yi gave him a polite smile.

He knew this person in his past life.

Back when the industry had only recently become developed, a friend who had collaborated with Lin Yi a few times said that making money in manufacturing was too slow and too tiring. He knew a sure-fire way to make money and could take Lin Yi to try his luck.

Lin Yi followed his friend with some skepticism.

As a result, the two of them didn't even get through the door.

Because the minimum entry requirement is 2000 million in cash; if you want to join, you have to put up 2000 million in cash.

For the manufacturing industry, cash is life itself, so Lin Yi was naturally unwilling to accept it.

Later, that friend, whom I had only met a few times, sold everything he owned to get imprisoned.

However, because the investment funds were extended, he ran out of money.

I learned about the incident in the morning, the person jumped at noon, the case was closed in the afternoon, the person was cremated in the evening, the grave was erected at night, and the ashes were dug up in the middle of the night.

It was to see if there were any good things hidden in his coffin.

Even now, when Lin Yi thinks about it, he still feels a little sad.

Luckily, I was a coward.

As Lin Yi looked over, Liu Haifeng also looked over. The two stared at each other for a moment, and Liu Haifeng spoke first:
“Mr. Lin, several suspension bridges on the highways we're investing in do require cables, but the requirements are extremely high. If your product can meet those requirements, I can make a recommendation. However, whether we can get involved depends on you…”

"Don't say those things!" Qin Chao interrupted Liu Haifeng before he could finish speaking.
"I can guarantee the quality of the products from Lin Yi's side, understand?"

Despite being interrupted, Liu Haifeng showed no displeasure; instead, he smiled broadly and nodded repeatedly.

Seeing his smile, Qin Chao turned to face Lin Yi: "Eat quickly, and then we'll go check on your factory."

After the meal, a group of people followed Lin Yi leisurely into the production workshop.

We entered through the main gate, and as soon as we went in, we could see the electroslag furnace standing in the factory building.

The brand-new, barely used electroslag furnace stands like a giant on the earth.

Because of the opening, the factory did not start construction, and only a few people were walking around the factory building to maintain the equipment.

After looking around, Qin Chao was somewhat disappointed to see no signs of molten steel splashing or workers sweating profusely in the steel plant.

He glanced around and asked, "Didn't you say there was something to see today?"

"Where's the stuff?"

Faced with the question, Lin Yi raised his hand and pointed behind the electroslag furnace. Qin Chao looked in the direction he was pointing and could vaguely see that there was a production line behind it.

Just as he was about to speak, Lin Yi spoke first: "In the testing workshop."

"You can get to the testing workshop by going through the production line behind it."

"We'll go over now."

After explaining, he turned to the people behind him and said, "Everyone, the production workshop is not like outside. Everything here is dangerous, so please don't touch anything."

After arriving at the testing workshop without any major incident, Qin Chao and his team were stunned.

The scene in the testing workshop was quite different from what they had imagined. As the top official in Suzhou, Qin Chao had a broad knowledge base, and having brought Liu Haifeng along, he had also heard about the relevant testing requirements from Liu Haifeng.

The main focus is on tensile strength, yield strength, elongation, bending performance, spectral detection, brittleness risk, as well as static load failure, dynamic load failure, fatigue testing, anchoring, and corrosion protection.

But this was the first time he had ever seen a testing workshop like this.

The entire workshop floor was made of steel plates, which gave Qin Chao the illusion that he was not on the ground, but inside a ship's cabin.

To the left of this metal plate, there is an area about four or five meters wide. From the current angle, this area looks like a lathe.

On both sides of the longer end of this area, there are two very obvious fixed grooves.

There are also clips on the groove.

Inside this clip, a cable was being pulled along. It was clear that the cable wasn't securely fastened; it was loose, and it was unclear what it was being tested for.

Above this area are three sliding tracks.

The three tracks form an equilateral triangle, fixing a silver-white metal shuttle in the middle.

Between the shuttle and the track is a metal pulley.

The shuttle was pulled by a very thick metal cable at both ends, taut and straight, making onlookers fear that it might break at any moment.

Under the cold white lights of the testing workshop, the shuttle gleamed with a metallic sheen, clearly indicating its weight.

Below this shuttle, there is a protruding hook.

The hook hangs diagonally downwards, its length vaguely reaching the cable below.

After seeing the scene, Chen Chao was a little confused. He turned to Lin Yi and asked:

"This doesn't look like a cable used for roads and bridges at all."

"Are you sure you're not mistaken?"

“No mistake.” Lin Yi nodded, walked into the crowd, grabbed Smith who was following at the back, and pushed him to the front.

"Although we also produce cables for roads and bridges, these are definitely not cables for roads and bridges."

"This is a special cable ordered by an overseas customer, specifically for use as fencing for small airports in high-altitude mountainous areas."

“This friend placed an order before our factory was even built.”

"Today, we'd like to invite everyone to witness this. Once we've completed the testing, we can begin delivery."

As he spoke, Lin Yi led Smith to the control panel, pointed to a button on the panel, and said to Cao Bin beside him:

“You teach Mr. Smith how to operate it, and let him start the test himself.”

Cao Bin took over the conversation and turned to teach the bewildered Smith how to operate the device.

Lin Yi was also pulled aside by a bewildered Qin Chao, who lowered his voice:

"Are you sure your factory can produce cables for road and bridge construction?"

"affim!"

"Then why are you suddenly producing these cables for small airports?"

Hearing Qin Chao's question, Lin Yi held up two fingers with his left hand and pointed at Smith with his right hand, lowering his voice: "A cable costs $20 and is 120 meters long."

"Minimum order of 1000 pieces!"

"Tell me, is this money-making?"

Upon suddenly hearing three simple numbers, Qin Chao wanted to say a few more words, but his ears and brain were faster than his mouth, and in a lowered voice, he accurately caught the word "dollar".

So, the words he was about to say were forcibly replaced by his brain:

"$20 per piece? Ordering 1000 at once?"

"You're not kidding?"

After asking the question, he noticed that the person opposite him was looking at him calmly. When he turned back to look at the foreigner, he found that the foreigner had already started the test system with the help of the technician.

The motor was running, emitting a series of buzzing sounds.

The metal shuttle hanging on the track was dragged backward along the track by the sound of the motor running. When it finally came to a click, it seemed to have been stuck by something.

At this moment, Smith, with Cao Bin's help, pressed another switch at the control panel.

The switch was pressed, and the motor went into overdrive, its buzzing sound piercing the sky and reaching everyone's ears from all directions.

The next second, the latch at the back of the metal shuttle disengaged, and the silent metal shuttle was dragged by the cable in front, like an arrow shot straight forward. In that instant, the metal wheel and the track rubbed together, and sparks flew wildly outward.

It's so exciting to watch!

Just when everyone thought the metal shuttle would crash through the wall and break off the track, the seemingly ordinary cable below the track suddenly sprang up.

Under everyone's watchful eyes, the cable snapped precisely into the hook, accompanied by a sharp, screeching sound.
The hooked cable slid forward, leaving a trail of sparks on the metal floor.

With a slight reduction in force, the cable suddenly contracted like a seatbelt, forcibly halting the rapidly advancing metal shuttle.

As the metal shuttle was forcibly stopped, the surrounding sounds fell completely silent, with only the hum of the electric motor echoing in the huge testing workshop.

A few seconds later, the metal shuttle was pulled back by the cable behind it and returned to the beginning of the track.

The electric motor roared once more, and the metal shuttle was launched again, speeding forward, only to be intercepted and dragged away precisely by the cable.

At this moment, Lin Yi smiled and looked at Qin Chao: "Do you think I'm joking about investing so much money and effort?"

Upon receiving confirmation, Qin Chao's expression changed swiftly. He gave a thumbs-up and turned to walk towards the control panel.
"Let me have a turn!"

Behind him, his secretary, Xiao He, had a long face, unsure whether to speak or not.

He decided to go all in and retreated to Lin Yi's side, pointing his chin at the cable below the track:
"Mr. Lin, what exactly is this thing for? It's so expensive."

Lin Yi, feigning ignorance, nodded his chin at Smith and said softly:

"America is sparsely populated, but they like to live in those remote and out-of-the-way locations."

“Many places can only be accessed by small planes. Planes need airports, but building large airports in those remote and obscure locations is a waste of time and money.”

"They can only build small airports. Small airports are more likely to overrun the runway, so they need this."

"At $20 apiece, it's more cost-effective than a plane running off the runway or spending money to build a large airport."

These words involuntarily reminded Xiao He of Zanwu Airport.

To build the airport, previous leaders went to great lengths and used every possible means to secure the necessary quotas and land.

After securing funding, the airport project was finally launched.

Compared to the money and effort required to build an airport, simply buying a few ropes like these is definitely more convenient.

Next to the control panel, Smith took two steps back, took out his phone, found Baroque's contact information, and sent a message.

General, our good days have arrived!

This factory has a complete testing facility, and I'm testing it right now! Barring any unforeseen circumstances, this cable will absolutely meet our requirements.

[The price is a bit high, though, at $50 per piece.]

(End of this chapter)