When Lee Hyun-woo officially mentioned the Jeju Island headquarters through the media, three CTOs went to visit Woo Sang-won.
“I thought it was just talk, but I didn’t expect him to actually establish the headquarters in Jeju Island.”
“When did you start preparing for this? According to the newspaper, it seems to have progressed quite a bit already.”
“How exactly is it being carried out?”
“Hey, how can you ask me that, Director?”
When they mentioned the specifics, Woo Sang-won looked at Lee Jung-woo with an expression of disbelief.
Lee Jung-woo then gave an awkward smile.
“I haven’t been going home much lately, haha…”
“Is that something to brag about? You don’t even ask your brother about it? A phone call would suffice. If that’s difficult, you can send an email.”
“Well, if I talk to my brother, he just tells me to come home.”
In fact, there was a similar promise made last time.
He told me not to go out claiming to work from home and to come home instead.
Since my brother’s logic was so clear, I agreed to it, but I postponed it because of the Go game that is about to launch.
If I call him under these circumstances, I feel like I’ll get caught up in his logic and be forced to go home.
“Well, I don’t know exactly what the CEO is thinking either. But lately, he talks a lot about Suwon.”
“Suwon?”
“Yeah. You know Guseong-ro there, right?”
“No, I’ve never been there.”
“Me neither.”
“Me neither.”
“Well, if you have time, you should go. If you go there, you’ll see how Guseong Group is transforming a part of Suwon. It seems the CEO plans to transform a part of Jeju Island through Jungle.”
“Wow, as always, he has big dreams.”
“But what’s amazing is that he actually achieves them.”
“It looks like it might happen this time too. I heard Kim Sung-moo met with the governor and congressmen of Jeju Island? They say he’s running around to build the infrastructure.”
“Yes, because of the presidential election, the government can’t do much, but the local politicians and officials are going crazy.”
“That’s not all. I heard that even Samjin Computer met with cable TV officials to build the ADSL infrastructure.”
“Oh? Really? How did you know that?”
“I have a friend over there. He bragged about it in a chat, saying it was on the Jeju news.”
Woo Sang-won chuckled.
Listening to them, it felt like they had more information than he did.
Yet, it was absurd that they came to him out of curiosity.
“Hey, why don’t our directors visit the CEO’s office these days?”
“Well…”
“The nagging has increased a bit…”
“Yes, last time he visited our home office and told us to commute from home instead…”
“He must have had a good reason to say that.”
“But we are doing our best.”
“Yes, we come to the office at least twice a week, like today.”
“Right. We hope he acknowledges our efforts.”
In the end, they didn’t want to hear the nagging, so they just wanted to extract information from Woo Sang-won.
But their intention was seen through.
Just then, there was a knock on Woo Sang-won’s office door, and Han Se-jin’s voice was heard.
“The CEO has asked the four of you to come up.”
“…….”
“…….”
“…….”
They were silenced.
Their expressions all seemed to say:
- How did he know we were at the office?
The reason Lee Hyun-woo called them was simple.
“In a few days, many investors from home and abroad will visit, right?”
“Yes, we know.”
“…….”
“…….”
“…….”
Seeing everyone except Woo Sang-won close their mouths, it was clear they didn’t know.
Remote work had its pros and cons.
To properly settle it in the future, there was a lot to supplement.
Even now, if they don’t come to the office often, they should actively listen to the news.
“Don’t you three directors think you’re overdoing it?”
“We’re sorry.”
“We’ve committed a grave sin.”
“We’ll correct it…”
“Remote work wasn’t established for you to ‘disengage’ from the company. It’s for work efficiency.”
The three had said earlier that they were getting a lot of nagging, and it seemed to be true.
Once he started, he even gave them an assignment to write a report on the amendments and supplements to remote work.
“Anyway, when the investors come, we need someone who can properly explain the company. Especially for technical aspects, you directors are much better than me, so all of you should attend.”
“Understood.”
“We’ll do that.”
“Yes, sir!”
“There should be materials prepared by our secretaries with details and expected questions for the people you’ll meet. Take them when you leave.”
“Yes, CEO.”
“As expected, you are thorough.”
“Seeing how prepared you are, I realize there are many things I need to learn.”
Perhaps feeling pricked, their flattery was no joke.
Listening to their words, a faint smile appeared on Woo Sang-won’s face.
‘He really knows how to handle executives.’
The push and pull, this is a skill only someone experienced with subordinates can perform.
Honestly, Woo Sang-won wasn’t very good at it.
So, he sometimes had a tendency not to delegate tasks but to do them himself.
The reason he stayed up all night during the last public recruitment was precisely because of that.
For Woo Sang-won to upgrade step by step, he would need to learn Lee Hyun-woo’s current push and pull strategy.
It was definitely a matter of experience.
After the four left, Shin Dong-woon came in to report on the investment details, making for an immediate comparison.
“There was already a lot of good news, but this Jeju Island headquarters project seems to be really big news. Since the report broke, domestic investors have surged.”
“I didn’t aim for it, but it’s a good thing.”
“So, I was thinking, why not spread this news to foreign investment companies now?”
“Isn’t there a lot of work? Will you be alright?”
“I can just share the work with the subordinates, haha.”
This is what a team leader does, presenting tasks and then checking them later, rather than doing everything alone.
Shin Dong-woon, with his extensive experience, was doing this well.
What’s more commendable is that while managing the current investment, he was also preparing for next year’s listing steadily.
Furthermore, having worked in finance, he continuously proposed new ideas.
“There was an unresolved issue last time. It’s a mechanism to protect investors. It would be good to allow over-the-counter transactions between the current investment time and the later IPO.”
“Will that be okay?”
“If we don’t, there could be more illicit transactions. I think it’s better to report it to the stock exchange immediately after this investment and proceed.”
“Alright, please do that.”
There was no need to ignore a proposal from a financial expert.
And as long as proper safety measures were secured, over-the-counter trading didn’t seem like a bad idea.
Lee Hyun-woo was also curious.
At what price would Jungle be traded over-the-counter?
For reference, the current company had issued 144 million shares.
Some of these were allocated to his father, Lee Jung-yong, and some as stock options. Excluding the 1% or 1.44 million shares given to Guseong Group, Son Jung-yi, and Kim Yoon-soo, 18 million shares would be available for over-the-counter trading.
The concern was the potential misconduct of some employees.
Since Jungle’s stock was likely to become a blue-chip stock, they might sell off the stock options they received.
The instruction to set up proper measures essentially meant to prevent this in advance.
‘Well, he’ll do a good job.’
Once he delegated a task, Lee Hyun-woo rarely withdrew his trust, so after Shin Dong-woon left, he went back to his given tasks.
Meanwhile, the good news Shin Dong-woon mentioned kept popping up from various directions, both expected and unexpected.
First, there was a call from Chairman Son Jung-yi.
In Japan, Jungle Japan’s Jungle Shopping and Jungle Music were doing exceptionally well.
This good news came as high-speed internet was beginning to be stable around Tokyo in Japan.
Since Japan’s economy was much larger than Korea’s and intellectual property rights were well recognized, the purchasing power of the younger generation was significantly increasing, which directly translated into sales, filling Son Jung-yi’s pockets.
That’s probably why he invested 50 billion won last time to secure a 1% stake.
(You can look forward to the next quarter’s settlement. Hahaha.)
Son Jung-yi left this message and ended the call, but shortly after, emails from the Taiwan and Hong Kong branches came in, predicting their first profits this month.
It was earlier than expected, so Lee Hyun-woo couldn’t help but be pleased.
He quickly called Kang Dong-ho to instruct the external cooperation department in charge of overseas operations to expedite entry into China.
The success in Taiwan and Hong Kong was a rehearsal for entering mainland China, so breaking into areas adjacent to Hong Kong seemed like the right time.
Before being appointed as the Chief Secretary, Kang Dong-ho, who had been in charge of the external cooperation overseas part, immediately conveyed these instructions to his successor and started the China project.
At the same time, he discussed with Han Se-jin to produce and distribute press releases with the title ‘Entering China,’ and internet newspapers reported this immediately.
This was also good news, ensuring the successful attraction of investment for Jungle.
A day before attracting investors, there was a call from Joe Murphy.
(It’s me.)
“Oh, it’s been a while, Joe.”
Was it because of the succession of good news lately?
Feeling a welcoming atmosphere from Joe Murphy’s voice, Lee Hyun-woo asked in a bright voice.
“Are you doing well?”
(Of course. With the way things are going, I feel like I could live to be 100.)
“Hahaha, it seems you have a lot of good news.”
(That’s why I’m calling. Hahaha.)
Hearing this, Lee Hyun-woo felt expectant again.
In Japan, which has a larger economy than Korea, there’s a booming trend, and now, there was good news from the incomparable U.S.
To what extent?
(Two things have completely settled in the market, and two things are showing meaningful results.)
“The first two things you mentioned must be shopping and MP3 services.”
(That’s right. And the latter two are ‘Make Friends’ and ‘Forest.’)
“Oh? The web browser too?”
(Yes, that’s right. Hahaha.)
This time, Lee Hyun-woo was somewhat surprised.
He thought the web browser named Forest would take a bit more time.
The stronghold of Macro Soft’s ‘Internet X Cross’ was so solid, and Navigation was also widely used by people.
But hearing that it was performing well unexpectedly, it was clear that the simple features of Forest were appealing to users there too.
Was it because of that?
After ending Joe Murphy’s call, there was another surprising news from Shin Jung-soo who visited the chairman’s office.
“Chairman! Macro Soft will be attending the investment attraction presentation tomorrow!”
