You promised to build cars, so why did you go into the military industry?

Chapter 67: Orders Surge

November 5th, the day after the rocket was successfully recovered.

Li Ran suddenly became very busy because, for some unknown reason, his private number had been leaked.

Countless venture capital firms approached Li Ran, waving their cash, hoping to get a piece of the pie.

When faced with foreign venture capital firms, Li Ran firmly rejected them, citing the Wolf Clause as an excuse.

After learning about Li Ran's attitude towards foreign countries, some domestic venture capital firms thought they had the upper hand, but they never expected that Li Ran would use delaying tactics, giving them a hard time.

Given the relationship between United Industries and the military, CNSA, and State Grid, they dared not sabotage each other in secret, so they could only use their own methods to ask the "experts" behind the scenes to mediate.

Therefore, Li Ran temporarily appeased the "experts" by citing the fact that aerospace is a highly sensitive industry and by leveraging the military's influence.

In light of this, some domestic venture capital firms followed in the footsteps of foreign venture capital firms and entered the US stock market, heavily investing in SpaceX.

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket recovery technology uses almost the same approach as the Joint One rocket's recovery process.

Therefore, with the successful example of the United One, the Falcon 9 was highly anticipated by countless investors.

In particular, the model of launching one rocket per month has led most investors to believe that SpaceX is the next company to successfully achieve rocket recovery.

As a result, some people have even started betting online, asking others to guess how many rockets will be destroyed during the Falcon 9 rocket recovery process.

However, some private space companies in the United States, especially Blue Origin, which also received technical support from NASA, saw SpaceX's stock soar and rushed to create a PowerPoint presentation.

They are trying to announce their reusable rocket program before other competitors.

Although these rockets are not uniform in size, they use a wide variety of propellants, including liquid oxygen and kerosene, liquid oxygen and methane, and even some that use nitrogen tetroxide/unsymmetrical dimethyl as a poison.

However, all of them have chosen the vertical recycling approach in their recycling technology.

But the market just happens to buy into that.

As a technology route that has been proven in practice, vertical recycling is highly trusted by stock market investors.

Whenever aerospace-related companies announce their own rocket recovery plans, and they also use vertical recovery technology, it's a sign of progress.

No need to overthink it, just buy it blindly.

Thus, a bizarre situation arose.

It was clearly a domestic company that achieved rocket recovery, but the first to stir up a storm was the foreign stock market.

Faced with the domestically unopened aerospace sector, most investors without connections can only watch enviously as US stocks rise.

Until November 16, with the issuance and implementation of the "Guiding Opinions on Innovating Investment and Financing Mechanisms in Key Areas and Encouraging Social Investment," domestic stock investors' investment sentiment in aerospace-related fields reached an unprecedented high.

However, since United Industries is not listed, any stock in the stock market that is related to aerospace, military industry, mining and other fields has experienced abnormal stock price fluctuations due to the mindless buying behavior of investors, and has had to disclose information. In some cases, it has even been forced to suspend trading for investigation.

Stock market regulators have also issued risk warnings, reminding investors to be aware of the risks of irrational price fluctuations.

At the end of the year, numerous private aerospace companies were established in China.

These private aerospace companies, which were originally planned to be established one by one many years later, have now caught the wave of Li Ran's successful rocket recovery and the opening of the market, and are using PowerPoint presentations borrowed from who-knows-where to seek investment from domestic and foreign venture capital institutions.

Venture capital firms that encountered setbacks with Li Ran, seemingly out of a desire for revenge, invested in these companies to varying degrees.

At the end of 2014, China's private aerospace sector ushered in its moment of glory.

However, all of this had nothing to do with Li Ran, who had changed his phone number.

It's not entirely true that there wasn't one, because after the successful recovery of the rocket, Lin Yu officially confirmed the price quote for commercial rocket launches.

Within 5.5 tons, 1.3 million yuan.

Those organizations that have invested real money to support the joint industrial research and development of rocket recovery technology—that is, all organizations that placed orders before the successful recovery of the technology—will enjoy a preferential price of 2 yuan per kilogram for up to 5.5 tons.

In other words, the price for a fully loaded Joint One launch is 1.1 million yuan.

When Li Ran asked Lin Yu if he would lose money, Lin Yu produced a detailed calculation sheet.

After the base upgrade, the mature production lines and technology will reduce the cost per kilogram of payload of United One to 1.05 yuan!

Li Ran's breathing quickened as he looked at the price: "A profit margin of nearly 50%? Isn't that too much profiteering?"

Lin Yu shrugged and said, "That's what happens with cutting-edge technology; people who need it will only think it's cheap and affordable!"

Moreover, we're already overwhelmed with orders; the latest orders are booked up for two years from now.

If we hadn't promised a price reduction after successful technology testing, we wouldn't have secured sufficient funding for research and development.

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Upon hearing the reason for the price reduction, Li Ran nodded in agreement: "Lowering the price is the right thing to do, otherwise it will damage our reputation."

On November 7, a video went viral on major video platforms.

The video begins with Lin Yu gazing at the aerospace workers, accompanied by the caption, "That year I stood like a lackey —"

After experiencing the launch of the Joint One rocket, the atmospheric disintegration of the Lingyun probe into a meteor shower, the first rocket recovery explosion, the second "halfway champagne pop" drama, and the subsequent stable landing and relaunch of the recovered rocket.

The story concludes with Lin Yu standing confidently in front of the large red screen, announcing that United Industries has successfully mastered reusable rocket technology.

Accompanied by background music that builds from gloom to triumph, the entire video fully documents Lin Yu's life journey from October 2010 to November 2014, spanning four years.

As the video went viral, United Industries finally rose to fame.

After all, the footage of a rocket launch is quite visually impactful.

Not to mention the sheer scale of a 3.5-meter-diameter, 25-meter-high behemoth falling rapidly from the sky and landing steadily; the shock and impact of this scene can transcend the screen.

As the only civilian product launched by United Industries, the Lingyun SU7 has naturally gained national recognition.

With its stunning appearance and intelligent controls that far surpass those of current gasoline-powered vehicles, the Lingyun SU7 offers exceptional value for money.

Meanwhile, it was discovered that there is at least one official Lingyun 4S store in first- and second-tier cities across the country, providing high-quality services to car owners 24/7.

Car owners can enjoy free car washes, charging stations, meals, and other services at any of the shops.

Suddenly, the Lingyun 4S store saw a surge in foot traffic, and the slogan "Lingyun SU7 never runs out of power" was imprinted in the minds of countless car buyers.

Even worse, some people found out after placing an order that the waiting list would take almost half a year!

Impatient and irritable customers tried to negotiate with the 4S store to exchange their queued orders for display cars in the store.

Once it happens, it happens again. Within just one week, 70% of the 4S stores cleared out all their vehicles, including display cars.

"Mr. Li, we just received a warning from the order system. The longest wait time for our current customer is over 8 months."

The news brought by Wang Bing brought Li Ran both pain and joy.

But a very obvious question arises.

Based on the progress, the planetary-level integrated industrial base is expected to be completed by the end of December.

Once completed, this industrial base will significantly increase the production of the Lingyun SU7.

It would be a huge waste to have such a powerful heavy industrial base produce only one type of car.

However, United Industries, currently burdened with debt, truly cannot do without the cash flow generated by the booming sales of the Lingyun SU7.

For a moment, Li Ran didn't have any good ideas, so he could only comfort them by saying, "Don't be afraid. Don't impose any restrictions on customer orders. Once the base upgrade is completed by the end of the year, it's no problem for the annual production of the Lingyun SU7 to reach one million units."

Although Li Ran provided a solution, for Wang Bing, using the base's valuable production capacity to manufacture cars was truly a waste.

After expressing his views, Wang Bing proposed the idea of ​​building integrated car manufacturing plants in other parts of the country.

Upon hearing this, Li Ran rubbed his chin, recalling the location of BYD's production base in his previous life, and asked, "Which do you think is better: the heavy industrial base in Northeast China, or Chang'an or Shangdu in the four provinces?"