Chapter 2631

Su Xinghui smiled and said, "I didn't recommend the wrong person to you, did I?"

Mi Xiuyuan said, "Yes, your eye for people is really quite good. This Li Yimiao is not only a technical talent but also has good management brains and knowledge. He is familiar with the situation in the factory and is a person with a strong sense of justice. Rest assured, once I successfully cooperate with Hujiang Machinery Factory, I will utilize him."

After this day, the negotiations between Hujiang Machinery Factory and the Ono Precision Machinery Manufacturing Company were temporarily shelved, and they started negotiations with the Mi Group.

Ono Taro protested to the Hujiang Municipal Government with great anger, saying that the Hujiang Municipal Government was destroying the rules and acting without integrity. He said that their Ono Company had already approached a cooperation agreement with the Hujiang Municipal Government, and the Ono Company had already done a lot of preparatory work for this, paying a lot of manpower and material resources.

He believed that the Hujiang Municipal Government's introduction of another negotiating enterprise now had caused huge losses to the Ono Company. He urged the Hujiang Municipal Government to immediately stop their wrong behavior, suspend negotiations with the Mi Group, and restart negotiations with the Ono Company.

Not only that, he also moved the Consul General of the Japanese Consulate General in Hujiang. This Consul General expressed to the Hujiang Municipal Government that he maintained a high degree of concern for the cooperation project between the Ono Precision Machinery Manufacturing Company and Hujiang Machinery Factory, hoping that the Hujiang Municipal Government could handle this matter fairly and justly in accordance with the principle of maintaining China-Japan friendship.

What principle of China-Japan friendship, what fairness and justice—in reality, it was just to let the Hujiang Municipal Government allow Hujiang Machinery Factory to cooperate with the Ono Company. This is a common trick used by the Japanese; they often exert diplomatic pressure on the Chinese government so that their enterprises can gain an advantage in competition.

This move by Ono Taro was, of course, pointed out to him by Xiao Minggui. Xiao Minggui was very familiar with the temperaments of Chinese leading cadres. Many Chinese leading cadres are very nervous about protests from foreigners. Generally speaking, they treat protests from foreigners, especially from foreign embassies and consulates, very cautiously.

Otherwise, how could there be the saying of "first-class foreigners, second-class officials, third-class minorities, and fourth-class Han Chinese"? Although this saying has its extreme aspects, it is not groundless.

Xiao Minggui naturally hoped to cooperate with the Ono Company. As long as the two cooperated, besides being able to let his son study in the United States, he could also get 200,000 US dollars. This was a large sum of money, so he came up with this idea for Ono Taro.

Ono Taro heard this idea and treated it like a treasure. He immediately went to the Japanese Consulate General in Hujiang to find the Consul General and asked him to come forward to help, and this Consul General also agreed to help very readily.

The Consul General agreed so readily because he knew that his protests were very effective. Every time they protested to local Chinese governments, they would gain some benefits, and being able to let their Japanese enterprises gain benefits was also one of the duties of this Consul General.

Of course, now the negotiations between Hujiang Machinery Factory and the Mi Group had just begun, and things hadn't been decided yet, so the Consul General only expressed high concern about the matter and hadn't raised a protest yet, but this was enough to make the Hujiang Municipal Government nervous.

The Hujiang Municipal Government specifically held a mayor's office meeting for this to discuss countermeasures. Since the normalization of China-Japan diplomatic relations, the relationship between the two countries had once been like a honeymoon, with Japan providing interest-free loans to China and giving China a lot of aid in some projects.

Therefore, the Chinese government's attitude towards Japan was also very friendly. Now that the Japanese Consul General had expressed high concern, if this matter was not handled cautiously and affected China-Japan friendship, who could bear this responsibility?

However, this matter was really difficult to handle because the cooperation plan proposed by the Ono Company had conditions that were truly too harsh. It was easier to talk about it before there were competitors; no matter what the conditions were, as long as Hujiang Machinery Factory could resume production, it was acceptable.

But now, the Mi Group had already put forward their plan during the negotiations. Their plan was much more generous than the plan proposed by the Ono Company. Whether it was profit distribution, technology transfer, or layoffs, the conditions they proposed were more favorable to Hujiang Machinery Factory.

If they could cooperate with the Mi Group, Hujiang Machinery Factory would definitely be able to successfully get out of its predicament. This was the consensus of these leaders of the Hujiang Municipal Government.

Moreover, the Mi Group was not to be trifled with either. They were now vaguely the largest consortium in Hong Kong and had quite good relationships with many central leaders. The Hujiang Municipal Government couldn't afford to offend the Japanese, but could they afford to offend the Mi Group?

This made the leaders of the Hujiang Municipal Government have a headache. This matter was really a dilemma. How should it be handled?

The Hujiang Municipal Government held this meeting for a long time, until the early hours of the morning without any result. No one was willing to express any definite opinion. This was a hot potato; offending anyone was not good.

In the end, everyone tacitly adopted the "delay tactic." They slowed down the negotiation process with the Mi Group. For such things, dragging it out one day at a time is fine.

Mi Xiuyuan was not in a hurry either. He handed over the negotiation matters to his subordinates, and when he had nothing to do, he would find Su Xinghui to drink and chat.

This day, he and Su Xinghui started playing Chinese chess in Su Xinghui's room. Mi Xiuyuan moved first; he used a cannon at the head, and Su Xinghui casually used a horse to cover it. Mi Xiuyuan said, "Xinghui, I heard that that Ono Taro has put forward a new cooperation plan again. This time the cooperation plan has made some concessions compared to their previous one."

Su Xinghui said, "It's okay. No matter how they make concessions, it's impossible for them to be more generous than your cooperation plan. If that were really the case, what benefits would they have to speak of?"

Mi Xiuyuan said, "Actually, even if their cooperation plan is the same as ours, there is still profit to be made. It's just that there isn't that kind of exorbitant profit. With a long stream of water, this investment method is more stable."

Su Xinghui shook his head and said, "Ono Taro's mentality is different from yours. If there were no exorbitant profits, it would be impossible for him to accept it. Therefore, this determines that the cooperation plan he proposed cannot be the same as yours."