Chapter 176: Frenchmen Proactively Seek Cooperation

Night fell, the Frenchmen sat with grim faces in the cafeteria eating.

Sha certain person had left, the Ha Gong Da people also left; today afternoon's events made them utter clowns!

Thinking of this, everyone hated it to the point of itching teeth; this contract, given to Easterners, was wasted; it should have gone to the French!

"Hmph, we'll see how Easterners can develop this kind of attack helicopter; bragging is easy, but making it real isn't that simple!" Qiewaliye put down his fork, gnashing his teeth; today, as the chief engineer sent by the aviation company, he lost a lot of face!

"Exactly, if they can't solve the problem, they'll still have to come beg us!" Auguste said: "When the time comes, if they want us to propose a plan, they'll have to pay, pay high consulting fees!"

Just then, Turam, who had been silent, suddenly spoke up.

"Easterners have landed such a big deal; they surely can't handle it all; later they'll have to share part of the R&D project with us; now, cooperation is the only win-win; tomorrow we'll go talk to Easterners about cooperation!"

Everyone widened their eyes.

Turam, what are you saying?

Is this really the difference between an ordinary engineer and an dispatched team leader?

Everyone else thinks about how to screw Easterners, vent some anger, while Turam actually thinks about business?

Exactly, in Turam's view, this is already the best choice!

Ha Gong Da is truly uncanny; many things Easterners originally couldn't make, Ha Gong Da has managed to produce!

For example, the 155mm truck cannon—its performance impresses the French, who very much want to bring it back to copy!

Also, the Red Flag-2 modified surface-to-surface missile has already shown its power on the Iran-Iraq battlefield!

Also today, the suggestion to mount the radar above the rotor sounds like a wild idea, but after Qin Miao explained it like that, it actually seems feasible! This is definitely another innovation.

Rather than stewing here, it'd be better to cooperate with Ha Gong Da—we could make money and study technology; they could easily transfer these technologies to their French attack helicopters!

Cooperation brings win-win! And it's the French who win twice!

Thinking this through, Turam finally felt relieved—eat! Tonight he ought to eat more; this pork stew with vermicelli is really good!

Elsewhere.

Seeing off Sha certain person et al.'s private jet, the Land Rover returned to Ha Gong Da; in the car, Director Tao was still anxious.

"San Shui, today we mocked the French like that—wasn't it too much?"

"Too much? Wait till tomorrow, they'll come begging for cooperation—do you believe it?"

"How could that be? Being human means having backbone; they..."

"What supports Westerners' faith is not backbone, but profit. If they can land the contract, today Sha certain person made the French kneel and learn to bark like dogs, and they'd still do it—do you believe it?"

Director Tao felt helpless; he really didn't believe it, but… we'll talk tomorrow. After going back, he should sleep well; these days he's been utterly exhausted.

However… Director Tao had a miserable night of insomnia, tossing and turning over these things; the next day, with panda eyes, just having come from the family quarters to the office building, he saw… the Ha Cheng Aircraft Factory's 212 parked at the entrance, and the people who got out… were actually Frenchmen?

Qin Miao, this kid, is a prophet.

"Hello, Director Tao!" Turam was very enthusiastic.

"Hello everyone, what brings you to Ha Gong Da?"

"We… want to meet Qin Miao, Mr. Qin."

"Him? He's busy; lately he's taken on many projects, I guess…"

"We know he's busy; this time we came specifically to help him share the workload—please be sure to let him know to come over and talk with us."

"Alright, go wait in the meeting room."

The meeting room clock ticked away—one hour, two hours… almost an entire morning passed before Qin Miao finally rushed in.

"Everyone, sorry, I've been busy all day." Qin Miao said: "If you have something to say, just say it; I have at most five minutes."

Qin Miao now is a real busybee!

"Mr. Qin, we… we want to jointly develop an attack helicopter with you."

Qin Miao's brows furrowed: "Isn't that a bit inappropriate?"

"What's wrong with it?"

"I suspect you want to steal Ha Gong Da's technology; the top-mounted radar scheme I mentioned yesterday—did it catch your eye?"

"This…"

The French really want to just get up and leave—do we need to steal your tech? But… if Ha Gong Da really has this technology, they'd certainly want it!

"See, I guessed right, didn't I?" Qin Miao said: "We don't want to spend money hiring you to develop, only for you to walk off with the technology!"

"But the Dolphin Helicopter we originally exported to you came with technology, including permission to transfer to a third party!"

In the Mirage 2000 fighter project, the French held the upper hand; regardless of price or licensed production, they refused to budge, for various reasons—naturally including the losses they suffered on the Dolphin Helicopter.

To secure this deal, the French were very sincere—not only did they ask for little money in technology transfer fees, they also allowed Easterners to export to third countries!

Otherwise, even if the Zhi-9 were modified into a professional attack helicopter, it couldn't be sold to Sha certain person! The French would use these as leverage to block cooperation between Easterners and Sha certain person.

Now… they want to jointly research some technology, yet not let it be taken away? Easterners, you're being excessive!

Wait a moment!

Turam suddenly realized—the point isn't taking the technology away, but not wanting to spend money!

"Mr. Qin, if you let us participate in R&D and take the technology, our consulting fee can be waived."

Engineers' salaries are small change; R&D funds are the big expense!

Indeed, this guy gets it! Qin Miao felt pleased, saving another sum—actually he had planned to give it anyway—his expression unchanged: "Since that's the case, let's first try cooperating, start with the airframe; we need to extensively modify the original airframe."

"Sure, no problem… but to finish the airframe R&D quickly, we need computer-aided design; our French aviation company uses Dassault System's CATIA software, and the computers are IBM minicomputers…"

"Fine, we can fund the purchase of this equipment; however, we'd like it delivered ASAP—you… should be able to coordinate that, right?"

"Of course!"

"Actually, the key is buying the IBM minicomputer; if you can copy a few copies of the CATIA software over, then the software procurement cost can be split half-and-half with you!"

The French wanted to refuse—isn't that piracy? But after thinking, they nodded. No consulting fee, still they need to find a way to make some extra cash.