Chapter 130: Doing the Opposite

Centering on the component factory in Shangguan Town, the surrounding civilian houses, factories, shops, and fields have all begun to be continuously inquired about prices and acquired since last night.

Now the commercial housing in Pingyang City and Shangguan Town has not yet risen, and the land has not been speculated. A house with a courtyard costs only more than 10,000 yuan. After all, building a new two-story three-room house costs about 20,000 yuan. Now that someone suddenly offers twice the price to acquire it, many households in Shangguan Town are suddenly moved.

And it was not until the arrival of many foreign license plates and even out-of-province license plates, coupled with the arrival of those professional land speculation teams and companies, that the land in Shangguan Town began to be truly speculated.

First, it was speculated from 300 or 400 yuan per square meter, then to 700 or 800, until later it was directly speculated to over 1,200 yuan. This price is more expensive than the housing price in the provincial capital of Hanxi!

And seeing the news reported on TV stations and newspapers, many people who had signed an agreement last night to sell the houses they lived in regretted it so much that their thighs were about to be swollen.

The establishment of the Torch Group, no matter how ignorant of the industry, is clear that Shangguan Town is about to take off. Whether the house is requisitioned, given a compensation payment, and then entering the Torch Group to work, even if the land is not requisitioned, it can be transformed into a shop to do business, or rented out, all can make a lot of money!

Pengcheng is the best proof. The rent of civilian houses in Pengcheng has been speculated to a sky-high price in the past few years, and even if you have money, you may not be able to rent it.

Although the civilian houses in Shangguan Town may not reach the point of being in short supply like Pengcheng, think about the huge consumption market that will be born after the Torch Group is built, with hundreds of companies, tens of thousands of staff, and their families. This account can be calculated by slightly calculating it!

Under the addition of various land speculation teams, the land in Shangguan Town was speculated to fly. In less than two days, it was speculated to the 1,000-yuan land level. This fierce speculation method made Pingyang and the provincial government people who came to Hanxi see how Pengcheng and Yazhou were played. This speculation method is really too stimulating.

But facing the land in Shangguan Town that was speculated to fly, the Pingyang Municipal Government couldn't sit still. If it continues to be speculated, and the land in Shangguan Town is speculated to a sky-high price, then the cost of the Torch Group requisitioning the land will be ridiculously high. If you really play like this, then you haven't done anything, and you spend tens of millions or hundreds of millions to buy land. Then the Torch Group can run away. Even the provincial capital is not so outrageous.

If the Torch Group really wants to relocate, then all parts of Hanxi Province, including the provincial capital, estimate that their mouths will laugh crookedly. This splashing wealth actually fell on them. Guangdong, Qianjiang, Jiangsu, and other places also estimate that they will welcome the Torch Group to settle in with both hands.

"The land in Shangguan Town will be requisitioned and demolished at a price of 700 yuan per square meter!"

The Pingyang Municipal Government urgently announced the suspension of land transactions in Shangguan Town and then announced the pricing for land requisition. Although this price is a bit more expensive than the land price in Shangguan Town before, it is much cheaper than the land that was speculated.

Once this requisition and demolition price came out, although there were still people privately acquiring land in Shangguan Town, the price could no longer be speculated to the point of sky-high prices.

But even the 700-yuan land requisition price is an unexpected joy for the households in Shangguan Town. As long as the household registration and land are in Shangguan Town, they will have the opportunity to get a requisition and demolition payment that is quite good in this era, enter the Torch Group to work, or be a landlord, and they don't have to leave their hometown to go to coastal areas to work.

There are countless people in Pingyang who envy Shangguan Town. Pingyang has a total of 99 towns, but it can be expected that the town with the best development in Pingyang next will definitely be Shangguan Town, and even the three urban areas may not be as well developed as Shangguan Town. How can this not make people envious.

The arrival of municipal personnel from Yanjing and the provincial capital, various land speculation companies, lighter-related industrial companies, media reporters, etc., all ran to Pingyang. For a time, the streets of Pingyang were full of cars.

Especially the road leading to the municipal gate and the Changqing Road leading to Dongling High-Tech caused the first traffic jam in Pingyang for so many years. This time, it was not bicycles that were blocked, but cars. This scene made many local people in Pingyang marvel. Even if people were slow, they felt the changes happening in Pingyang.

When the outside world is like this, the people in this storm feel it even more strongly, especially the Shangguan Town Component Factory, which has become the center of the storm!

As an "old employee" of the component factory, Liu Caiyuan, when he came to the component factory again, saw that it was noisy. Standing at the gate, he saw that the sign of the component factory had been removed, and a temporarily made sign of "Torch Group" was hung on it.

Looking at this sign, Liu Caiyuan was deeply moved for a time. He joined the component factory, no, now renamed the Torch Group, and he was already in the factory when Zhang Xiaocheng took office.

Liu Caiyuan can also be considered to have witnessed the rise and fall of the factory in front of him. Before it was about to close down, it started producing satellite dishes. After the satellite dish that lasted less than a year didn't make money, the factory became depressed again, but now it has become the current Torch Group.

The experience of the past two years, Liu Caiyuan feels that the ups and downs are much greater than the experience of the previous ten years!

After entering the Torch Group, Liu Caiyuan saw that the entire Torch Group was busy. Originally, because of the suspension of work, many people like Liu Caiyuan were released on vacation and went home, receiving a basic salary every month, but now the staff have all been recruited back.

This place has actually become the headquarters of the Torch Group and the base camp of the Torch Group industrial park.

The factory wall is being demolished, and construction teams and large infrastructure equipment have been pulled over one after another. The design team invited from Yanjing is designing the layout of the Torch Group and the industrial park in a tight manner. Now what the engineering team is doing is leveling the ground and the foundation, and then construction will begin.

Liu Caiyuan saw that the original factory buildings, lounges, etc., were hung with signs of different departments. Especially the previous warehouse was rebuilt into a laboratory. Various materials and experimental equipment were continuously pulled into it, and there were several burly men guarding the laboratory door, obviously attaching great importance to it.

"Today, this place must be leveled, and banners and other things must be hung up. By 12 o'clock, the groundbreaking ceremony will be held here. Everyone, lift your spirits!"

After finding his supervisor, Liu Caiyuan and a group of people were assigned work and started to get busy. From today on, they are considered to be working normally, and they don't have to receive a basic salary of more than 100 yuan. They can get overtime pay, bonuses, prizes, etc.

Today, the Torch Group headquarters is the busiest place in the entire Pingyang, and even Hanxi. A group of people from Yanjing, provincial capital, and Pingyang Municipal Government have all arrived at the scene, plus media reporters, making it noisy.

"The laboratory must be built as soon as possible. No matter when the Torch Group can be built and put into production, technical personnel must be recruited first, and products must start R&D!"

"Poach the best technical personnel in the industry, even if it is a lighter technology industry engineer in Japan or Korea, as long as people are willing to come, the Torch Group can pay the liquidated damages!"

In the laboratory under construction, Li Dongling said to Zhou Wenyan, who had just been promoted to the technical supervisor of the Torch Group, which is the old ox in the Xicheng Wireless First Factory before.

Zhou Wenyan was transferred to the component factory because of work relationship. Now it seems that it is his luck. Under Zhang Xiaocheng, he didn't treat Zhou Wenyan as an old ox, but valued him very much.

For Li Dongling's words, Zhou Wenyan responded busily. Li Dongling is the nominal major shareholder of the Torch Group and a member of the Torch Group board of directors. He is also Zhou Wenyan's immediate superior. The old ox dare not take Li Dongling's words to heart.

"These three technologies must be developed by the laboratory before production, no matter how many technical personnel need to be poached and how much R&D funding needs to be invested, it must be done!"

Li Dongling handed a document wrapped in kraft paper to Zhou Wenyan and said to him with a serious face.

"I understand,

"It seems, Li Zong, you have already had the development of the Torch Group all figured out!"

A voice came over; it was Wu Yaoguo who had walked over. Looking at the document in Zhou Wenyang's hand, he smiled and said to Li Dongling.

Li Dongling glanced outside. Wu Yaoguo had surprisingly not stayed with the leaders who had come from Yanjing and the provincial capital, but had instead run over here.

"I do have some ideas!"

The die was cast; the Torch Group's project had already been finalized. Dongling Gao Ke and the Hanxi State Investment Group had each invested their first batch of 50 million RMB, both of which had already arrived. Subsequent funding would be allocated based on the progress of the construction. This matter could no longer be reversed, so Li Dongling had nothing left to hide from Wu Yaoguo.

Taking a document from the assistant behind him and handing it to Wu Yaoguo, Li Dongling said, "The lighter industry is not one that can generate high profits, but the technical and brand competition is equally intense. Of course, if we can meet expectations, this will be a quite stable and long-lasting industry. On this point, there will be no mistake!"

"I plan to have the Torch Group research high-temperature resistant plastic materials, lighter safety locks, and constant-flow valve lighter technology, and we must register these globally!"

Wu Yaoguo did not have a technical background, but he was willing to listen to these technical details. He had always firmly believed that one might not need to be a technician, but one could not be completely ignorant, or else one would be fooled into being a fool.

"The lighters produced by the Torch Group must definitely be exported overseas. The domestic market alone simply cannot consume such a large production capacity. To enter overseas markets, we will definitely face competition from overseas lighter giants like Ronson, Tokai, Leica, Hansen, and so on. The methods they will use will be nothing more than using technology to throttle Torch, accusing Torch products of being unsafe, or even inciting local departments to launch anti-dumping investigations against the Torch Group!"

"For the last point, the Torch Group can fight lawsuits, but technically, the Torch Group must absolutely not be controlled by others. We must even go the other way and use technology to suppress those companies like Ronson. Who says Ronson must be the boss of the lighter industry? It must be them acquiring other lighter brands—why can't it be Torch acquiring them?!"

(End of chapter)