Chapter 706 - Establishing subsidiary companies in India and in China (1) – Part 1
Gun-Ho was dozing off in his office after having a cup of tea that Secretary Hee-Jeong Park brought to him. President Song entered the office after knocking on the door.
“It’s almost lunchtime, sir. Are you not going out for lunch today?”
“Oh, it’s already noon?”
“Would you like to have lunch with the executive officers? It has been a while since we all had lunch together.”
“Sure. Why not?”
“I will call them.”
Gun-Ho went to a Korean restaurant in the middle of a plum farm, for lunch with GH Mobile’s executive officers. The restaurant was not far from GH Mobile. Ms. Accounting Director Min-Hwa Kim, who was the only female director in the group, looked so excited when she saw plum trees there.
Gun-Ho sat at a table and looked around. There were President Song, the chief research officer, the general affairs director, Ms. Accounting Director Min-Hwa Kim, Mr. Production Director Park, and the director at the quality control department.
President Song looked at Gun-Ho with a smile, and said, “The general affairs director and Production Director Park have been working hard and busily since we acquired the former food packaging company next door.”
“I’m aware of it. I went there this morning.”
“The new building that we just acquired will be our second factory. We will refer to it as GH Mobile’s factory no. 2. Once we complete the painting and building the storage there, we will move our hydraulic press machines to that location.”
“Hmm.”
“We couldn’t hire enough workers even though we need more labor, because our factory no. 1 is already full, and there is no room for additional workers to work at. Since we now have an additional production site, we will post job openings as soon as possible. We currently need 50 more production workers, but we will eventually hire 100 more workers for the production department.”
“We need that many production workers?”
“Our sales are on the rise as we need more people. We will generate more than enough income to pay additional workers. You don’t have to worry about paying the new workers, sir.”
The food that they ordered hadn’t come out yet. They had a glass of water in front of each person at the table. Director Chang-Ik Pyo from the product quality department, who was fiddling with his glass of water, said, “The product quality department needs more workers as well. We lost many of the workers at the product quality department to Dyeon Korea when it was established. We haven’t added anyone to the team since then.”
“Hmm, really?”
“In order to maintain our ISO certificate and the recognition as a startup company with technology, we sometimes have to send some of our workers to a training or a meeting. And, all of our 16 machines are fully working right now, and we don’t afford to have them off the work even for a short period of time. We are short of labor sometimes even with our 100 workers.”
“Discuss with Vice President Adam Castler, and hire workers as many as you think we need.”
“Yes, sir.”
“The reason why I asked you two to come to my office today is that I wanted to discuss our future factory establishment in China and India.”
“Have you received a call from them? Did they find a factory on the market for sale?”
“Manager Lee from India called me the other day. He found a 5,000 pyung large factory near the Chennai Industrial Park. It’s on the market for sale.”
“Is that right, sir?”
“Also, President Min-Hyeok Kim called me, and let me know that there is a factory for sale in the Suzhou Industrial Park. I want you two to go on a trip to India and China to visit those properties that are for sale. If you determine that they are adequate properties for our business, then make a purchase contract.”
“Well… sir,” the internal auditor hesitantly said.
“Yes. Please tell me freely about what you think.”
“My area of expertise is the finance field where I have been working for a long time. I don’t think I’m the right person for it. Mr. Director Kim is the perfect person to handle this type of work though.”
Director Kim looked at the internal auditor and said, “Mr. Internal Auditor, if we have to make a contract to purchase a factory, you are the right person for it. Let’s do this then.”
“What are you suggesting?”
“I’ve already been to India previously, so, I suggest that you go to India this time, and I will go to China. If you are not comfortable going on a trip to India by yourself, you can go with Mr. Adam Castler. One of India’s official languages is English, so Mr. Adam Castler will be of great help during the trip.”