Story of a Big Player from Gangnam

Gun-Ho and General affairs manager walked out of the Izakaya pub.

“General affairs manager Hwang, you can’t even stand straight. I will call a paid designated driver for you.”

Gun-Ho asked the Izakaya pub owner to call a paid designated driver for him.

Gun-Ho walked to a motel close to Dujeong Station where he had parked his car earlier. He decided to spend a night in a motel rather than driving all the way to Seoul that night.

“Let’s stop by Mulpasaneop’s factory on the way to Seoul tomorrow morning.”

Mulpasaneop’s factory was located in Yeongin Town, Asan City.

Even though the factory was not manufacturing products as many as before, the 5,000 pyung large factory still looked majestic. A security guard was still working at the main entrance and there are many trucks in the parking lot. There were just not many people seen outside the factory.

“Let’s get the real estate registration of this factory.”

As soon as Gun-Ho arrived at his office, he turned on his computer and searched Mulpasaneop on the Internet. He could easily find its address and a location map.

He then opened the court website to request the real estate registration of that factory.

“The provisional seizure has already been issued.”

Gun-Ho continued to read the section of the real estate registration where the provisional seizure and the mortgage loans are listed in.

“Sh*t, there are many provisional seizures for unpaid wages. The company seems to be in big trouble.”

Gun-Ho was wondering how much the Mulpasaneop factory would be worth.

“The land is over 5,000 pyung, so it would be more than 5 billion won, without adding the price of the factory building since the building is already too old to price.”

Gun-Ho wanted to acquire this factory.

“Can I handle their situation? They seem to have a lot of debt.”

Gun-Ho started thinking about acquiring the Mulpasaneop’s factory.

Manager Kang came back from his business trip to China.

“Jinxi Industrial Park in China is awesome. The land is huge and the newly constructed factory is so big as well. I admire you, sir. You are the co-venturer of that industrial park.”

Gun-Ho smiled.

“What did other people say about it?”

“They seemed to fall in love with the industrial park after having a tour of the factory and the industrial park. The required security deposit of 200 million won is not much for the people who run a big factory. I guess many of them will make a contract soon.”

“The factory is a prefabricated building. Have you seen any part of it leaking?”

“I… don’t know.”

“When I worked in a factory before, a prefabricated building had leaking issues. Especially, it rains a lot in the area where the industrial park is located…”

“I haven’t heard of the leaking building issue. It is a newly constructed building.”

“How’s Min-Hyeok? Is he doing well?”

“I didn’t know what he was capable of when he was working as a residential manager in the OneRoomTel. He is really doing great as a president of the joint venture in China.”

“How great is he there?”

“He is managing workers effectively and he already speaks simple Chinese. And he knows a lot about a factory.”

“He used to work in a quality assurance department in a factory. He knows well about ISO too.”

“You have good eyes in selecting good workers, sir. President Min-Hyeok Kim looked really different from the time he was working as a residential manager.”

“Haha, really?”

“He was a great host for the tour group. He seemed to know how to make their visit pleasant and offer food in a friendly and appropriate way and so on. When we all participated in karaoke, the visitors absolutely loved him.”

“That sounds great. I hope that led them to make an actual contract.”

“Two companies already made a contract. You will see more details about it in the next weekly report. We could make a contract right away for those two companies because the companies’ owners were there, who are the decision makers.”

“Haha, really?”

“And, this…”

“What is it?”

“I bought a tie for you at the duty-free shop.”

“Haha, really?”

“And this is for Ms. Ji-Young Jeong.”

Ji-Young’s eyes widened.

“For me?”

“I purchased cosmetics for you.”

“Oh, thank you so much.”

Ji-Young looked happy and satisfied.

Gun-Ho got lost in thought while looking outside the window.

“They can now build eight factories. The monthly rent from those companies will be about 15,000,000 won. That is enough to pay those 30 workers’ wages in China. My friend, Min-Hyeok, I guess you can stay as a president of the company at least for a few years while riding the Audi.”

After the joint venture had been established, it became fall after summer.

Gun-Ho received a call from Manager Hwang of YS Tech.

“Mr. Gun-Ho Goo? How are you? I am calling to ask you if you happen to know any short-term hard money lender.”

“Why? Do you personally need money?”

“No, YS Tech needs to borrow money. The president asked me to look for a hard money lender.”

“Did they ask a non-bank financial institution to borrow money?”

“We already borrowed too much money using the factory as collateral, so they refused to lend money to us.”

“Didn’t Mulpasaneop pay YS Tech for the products yet?”

“They haven’t paid for this month yet. It’s getting late. We need to pay to our employees soon. We just need 200 million won sharp.”

“Hmm.”

“Mulpasaneop is currently considering the court receivership.”

“Really? You should get the payment for the products delivered to Mulpasaneop as soon as possible. Once they start the court receivership, you might not be able to get the account receivable.”

“Nothing much we can do if they just don’t pay.”

“The president of Mulpasaneop is the YS Tech president’s brother-in-law. He should insist on getting his payment.”

“I will tell him.”

“As to a hard money lender, you can easily find a list of them on the Internet. Just call them.”

“Okay.”

Gun-Ho wanted to help the YS Tech president since he owed the president big time.

“He doesn’t have any asset to use as collateral. If I lend money to him without collateral and if he couldn’t pay me back, the relationship between him and me could be broken forever. I should find a way that I can constantly help him, rather than giving him just one-time help.”

Gun-Ho was thinking deeply. He could lend 200 million won to him; that was not a problem at all. However, he was worried about the possibility that could hurt the relationship if something went wrong.

After two days, Gun-Ho gave a call to Manager Hwang at YS Tech.

“Did you borrow money from a hard money lender?”

“They said they couldn’t lend any money without collateral. After reviewing our financial statements and credit score, they just declined our loan request. F*ck.”

“How about the wages you had to pay?”

“We couldn’t pay the workers yet, and they are certainly concerned.”

“What’s the total amount of wage you need to pay for the month?”

“We don’t have many employees anymore. We have about 65 workers and 200 million won will suffice.”

“Hmm.”

“I have to pay my credit card bill this month. I am worried about my payment too.”

“Could you tell the president that I will come by tomorrow to talk with him?”

“You are going to meet the president? Why?”

“I think I can get him some money to borrow.”

“Really? You shouldn’t lend your personal funds to the company. I can see that you are making good money lately but don’t use it like this. You could lose all of them.”

“No, I just want to talk with him.”

“It’s 200 million won. You could blow it. You shouldn’t lend your personal money. The company should borrow money from a bank or from another company. You are just so naïve.”

“I don’t have that much money. I just want to introduce a hard money lender that I know.”

“Oh, really? In that case, I will let the president know that you are coming tomorrow.”