Chapter 125: A Way to Solve It in One Go

As the time for contract renewals approached, the executives could not hide their anxiety. 

It was only natural for the subjects to change when the king did. They assumed not every official would be replaced, but they believed that those who survived would be the ones who caught Jinhyuk Park’s eye. To the executives, the business plan presentation was their only opportunity to do just that.

Contrary to their thoughts, however, Jinhyuk had already decided on the personnel changes. His evaluation was strictly based on value—an objective assessment that filtered out all external factors. 

He simply hadn’t announced the results yet. He felt that taking a test after already knowing the results was just as demoralizing for executives as it was for high school students.

Jinhyuk arrived at the conference room and looked around. Perhaps because they felt this was their final exam, a heavy tension surged through the air.

‘They should have acted like this from the start. They always wait until the last minute anyway.’

The executives, sensing that this meeting might be their last, stared at Jinhyuk with rigid expressions as he walked in.

“Let’s begin.”

As soon as he sat down, Jinhyuk ordered the presentations to start. At his word, an employee in charge of the proceedings at the front of the room made the announcement.

“We will start with the Media Division.”

Directors and executives from each division came forward one by one to present. They had clearly poured their hearts into these final presentations, to the point where any observer could feel the sheer effort they had exerted.

However, Jinhyuk still saw no value in them.

“…For those reasons, we believe it would be beneficial to expand our terrestrial channels in the future.”

‘Worth 6 billion won.’

The Media Division had ambitiously prepared an OTT service business in connection with terrestrial broadcasters. The business plan stated that the necessary costs for the project would be approximately 200 billion won. In Jinhyuk’s eyes, the value of that project appeared as 6 billion won.

‘They brought this out as their trump card? How disappointing.’

Jinhyuk nodded toward the Director of the Media Division, who had just finished his presentation, and pushed the business plan to the side. Seeing this, the Director squeezed his eyes shut. It was obvious that the plan he had worked so hard on had failed to impress Jinhyuk.

“Next is the Product Planning Department.”

Jinhyuk picked up the business plan prepared by the Product Planning Department and reviewed the contents while listening to the presenter.

“We plan to release a package deal combining the new strategic phone from DS Electronics with a new service plan. DS Electronics’ new strategic phone will—”

It was a series of predictable stories. Still, Jinhyuk watched their presentation with patience. Even though it was a worse business plan than the OTT service from before, he respected the sincerity they had put into preparing it. 

Yet, the presentation still failed to catch his eye.

After the Product Planning Department finished, over an hour of tedious business plan presentations had passed, and Jinhyuk was starting to grow weary. He knew there wouldn’t be many worthwhile plans, but it was almost impressive that not a single one was worth pursuing after months of preparation.

Finally, the last presentation was being set up.

“The final presentation is from the Network Division.”

Jinhyuk looked up at the presenter who was hesitantly stepping forward. It wasn’t the Director of the Network Division who usually gave the presentations, but a new face. Perhaps because he was standing before so many executives and the notoriously fierce Jinhyuk Park, the man looked incredibly nervous.

The executives looked at the gray-haired man with amusement, as he seemed as intimidated as a primary school student.

In Jinhyuk’s eyes, however, this one man who hadn’t even started his speech was better than all the executives in the room combined. His value proved it.

’25 billion won? There was someone worth 25 billion won here?’

The most valuable executives were only worth a few billion or a few hundred million won. But the man preparing to present at the front was sporting a value of 25 billion won over his head. After a long time, he finally finished his preparations and stood before the microphone.

“Hello. I am Kim Jeong-jin, Manager of the 1st Business Department within the Network Division. I will be presenting today on behalf of the Director.”

As Kim Jeong-jin began to speak, Jinhyuk watched him with interest. He was curious to hear what a man worth 25 billion won had to say.

“Our Network Division has been observing the changes in overseas markets from various angles. After confirming recent development patterns, we analyzed which sectors we could involve ourselves in. Most overseas companies specialize in either telecommunications or software. It is very rare for a single group to handle both, as we do in our country.”

As he spoke, he seemed to gradually shake off his nerves. He must have practiced many times, as he used the pointer naturally whenever a graphic appeared on the screen. Jinhyuk continued to watch with a focused expression.

“We found a gap here. We propose targeting a market that overseas companies cannot reach because they have to climb up from the startup level, and domestic companies are too intimidated by the scale to move into.”

Jinhyuk nodded. He had been thinking the same thing. It was something he had felt every time he checked the weekly and monthly progress reports from Silehub after investing in them.

“The higher a company climbs, the more they need, and they must receive constant investment to fill those needs. However, receiving investment is not the end. There is the difficulty of having to build the necessary base for the business themselves. That is where we got the idea for this project. The new business plan the Network Division is proposing is a data center platform.”

He finished speaking and briefly checked Jinhyuk’s expression. No matter how the lower employees were evaluated, the final decision ultimately rested with Jinhyuk. How much interest he showed now was a vital indicator of the presentation’s success.

Kim Jeong-jin wanted to confirm if his presentation was going well through Jinhyuk’s expression. However, he could glean nothing from Jinhyuk’s blank face.

Kim Jeong-jin let out a tiny sigh that no one could hear and continued.

“With the explosive increase in data, many companies are looking for places to collect, store, and distribute their data. Major search engines and other internet companies that use massive amounts of data invest their own capital to build data centers. However, except for those few, most companies do not have the resources to build their own. If we step into that gap, build data centers, and lease them out, we can attract many companies as customers.”

At Kim Jeong-jin’s words, the executives shook their heads.

“We already have about ten data centers. What more are you saying we should do?” one executive asked, unable to hold back.

As if he had been waiting for that question, Kim Jeong-jin answered immediately.

“The data centers we and other telecommunications companies own are small-scale. They only have enough capacity for our own use. Our goal is not that kind of data center, but to build facilities capable of processing massive amounts of data and leasing them out for a fee.”

It sounded plausible, but it wasn’t the type of business DS Telecom had pursued until now. The executives snickered and scoffed at Kim Jeong-jin’s words. 

To Jinhyuk, however, it was a fascinating story.

“This is an interesting story.”

It was the first reaction Jinhyuk had shown while listening to the new business plans. He had remained silent because he didn’t want to influence the evaluations, but this time, he showed interest.

“You’re suggesting we build large-scale data centers instead of small ones. In that case, what is the estimated budget for building a large-scale data center?”

“We estimate the construction cost alone to be between 150 billion and 200 billion won. And we expect it will cost two to three times the construction cost to fill the center with equipment. Furthermore, if you consider the electricity and cooling costs required for operation, it will take approximately 1 trillion won to establish a single data center building.”

At the mention of 1 trillion won, the executives shook their heads vigorously. Kim Jeong-jin seemed to realize he had named a massive amount, as he swallowed hard after speaking.

Jinhyuk smiled at the sight. It was obvious why the Director had sent a subordinate to present instead of doing it himself.

Jinhyuk turned his gaze back to the business plan.

**[60,000,000,000,000]**

60 trillion.

It was a business plan that showed a value of 60 trillion won. Although the initial costs were higher than expected, it was a business without toxic inventory, just as Jinhyuk wanted. Material costs were absorbed into the initial investment, and there was no need to scramble to find sales channels after production.

Moreover, once a contract was signed, the business would continue for years. This was exactly why Jinhyuk had come to DS Telecom.

“Good. It seems no one has entered this field on a large scale yet. Let’s overwhelm the other companies with sheer scale. If it costs 1 trillion, let’s spend 1.5 trillion won to increase the size. We’ll provide ample space so multiple companies can use it, and we’ll build several of these centers. That should secure our lead in the market, wouldn’t it?”

The executives were shocked by Jinhyuk’s words. Even if it was a project Jinhyuk liked, the budget was a problem. One of the executives spoke up in opposition.

“CEO, the initial investment is simply too high. Investing over 1 trillion won to build a single building is a burden for DS Telecom. And construction isn’t the only issue. The problem is the astronomical amount of money that follows. If nearly 1 trillion won is needed just to build it, I can’t even begin to calculate how much more will be needed after that.”

“No, that’s not true. Once it’s built, there won’t be any difficulty in operating it. In the past, we had to build them in cold regions due to a lack of cooling technology, but now many new cooling technologies have been developed, so there’s no great burden in building and operating them in our country.”

As if he had expected this opposition, Kim Jeong-jin refuted the point immediately. Once the debate began, Jinhyuk found himself liking Kim Jeong-jin’s stubbornness.

Jinhyuk folded the business plan he was reading, placed it on the desk, and spoke.

“I received an interesting report not long ago. It said our internal reserves have exceeded 30 trillion won. Our annual revenue isn’t even 30 trillion won, yet our reserves are 30 trillion. What are you planning to do with all that piled-up cash?”

“CEO, internal reserves are saved up to prepare for emergencies.”

“When exactly is this emergency coming? They say Verizon’s internal reserves aren’t even 20 trillion won. In what way are we better than Verizon? If a company with less than a quarter of the subscribers of a 100-million-user carrier has more reserves than they do, doesn’t that mean we aren’t doing business properly? That’s why I told you all to come up with new business ideas.”

Jinhyuk stood up from his seat. Pointing at Kim Jeong-jin, he continued.

“This is exactly what I wanted. You’ve grown so accustomed to sitting still and bleeding your subscribers dry that the only plans you come up with are new service packages. Or you try to stick a foot into e-commerce, credit cards, or coins just because everyone else is talking about them. Are they not all businesses where you try to make money without any investment? A business must have investment to have income. Manager Kim, I want to see a detailed plan. Bring it to me as soon as possible. The new business project will be the data center platform.”

Jinhyuk left the room after he finished speaking. Kim Jeong-jin stood there dazed for a moment, looking around as if he couldn’t believe his plan had been chosen so suddenly. Then, at the reminder to bring it quickly, he snapped to his senses and rushed out.

As Jinhyuk walked out, he called Junwoo Kim over.

“Tell Na Min-ho at Silehub not to worry, as we’ll be building the data centers. Tell him to use other facilities until then, and to be ready to move once the specific plans are out.”

“Did you push the data center plan because of what you heard from Silehub?”

“That was part of it. If we’re going to build a data center anyway, it’s better if DS Telecom builds it and uses it, right?”

“That may be true… but aren’t you trying to take the whole pie for yourself?”

“Taking it all is a good thing. What is there to worry about?”

Jinhyuk laughed and nudged Junwoo in the ribs.

Not long ago, Na Min-ho from Silehub had come over from San Francisco to meet Jinhyuk. They had aimed for 1 million subscribers, but it turned out they would be able to attract 3 million by the end of the year. 

Word of mouth was spreading, and as stories emerged about how much the platform helped developers with their projects, the number of subscribers was exploding. He also shared the encouraging news that the company was growing so rapidly that hiring couldn’t even keep up with the scale of the business. 

As a result, they were being noticed by many IT giants. Microsoft and Google had already made acquisition offers. Since the market still believed Na Min-ho was the owner of Silehub, the offers had gone to him. 

They pointed out that Silehub might run out of data processing space at this rate, arguing that the time for individual expansion had ended. They had offered to buy Silehub for 200 million dollars. 

In less than a year since Jinhyuk’s investment, his capital had quadrupled. However, he didn’t believe this growth would end here. If the data center issue, which was currently seen as a stumbling block, could be resolved, the business looked like it could grow ten or twenty times larger.

That was why Na Min-ho had come to request new investment. His idea was to stop living in someone else’s rented space and build their own data center to handle the explosive growth of data themselves. Using someone else’s space in a business where data was money could eventually become a problem.

Jinhyuk had pondered the proposal for a while. Building a data center required hundreds of billions of won. Since Jinhyuk didn’t have that much liquid capital at the moment, he had even worried if he should let go of Silehub despite its obvious growth potential.

But that worry had been solved in one go. He had found a way to facilitate both the new business of DS Telecom and the growth of Silehub.