Chapter 671: Russia's Interest

The supplying mission to the International Space Station was both the international duty of the major aerospace powers and the perfect opportunity to develop the aerospace industry. Domestic aerospace companies could only develop new engines if they gained profit from the billion Rupee project.

Contracting to Celestial Trade indeed could decrease the budget in this area, but it would be bad news for domestic aerospace companies. Since there were only so many launch planned for each year, other than SpaceX being able to profit from commercial launches, most aerospace depended on the national projects to survive.

What Natasha said was also the message from Russia’s leader.

If Celestial Trade was willing to sell the rocket, Russia would be happy to purchase. But if Celestial Trade was only planning to take the contract, there was no point to discuss it further.

“Are you not going to hear my bid?” Jiang Chen said helplessly.

Natasha shook her head.

“Kremlin won’t give it the okay, even if your price is tempting.”

It was hard.

But Natasha’ words were certainly not without reason. From a pure cost saving perspective, why wouldn’t Russia just contract the project out to SpaceX? Falcon with the capability to reuse the first stage rocket could reduce the cost of missions to a terrifyingly small number.

Even if this seemed to be without possibility, Jiang Chen was not the type to give up easily.

After deliberating for a moment, he said.

“Do you really not want to discuss the price? I’m referring to the RM-320 rocket engine.”

“I said this… Wait, what did you say?!” Natasha suddenly froze. She stared at him in shock.

Natasha soon hid away the shock on her face and looked him calmly and quickly articulated.

“what do you want?”

Based on the paper provided by Celestial Trade and the observation by Russia experts, RM-320 rocket engine’s capability far exceeded Russia’s most proud RD-180, even SpaceX’s Merlin 1D engine could not fare against it.

Combustion chamber that can withstand 500 atmospheres of pressure, a 1: 300 thrust to push ratio, and the cost of production only one-half of the Russian RD-180!

Natasha didn’t think Jiang Chen would agree to sell the engine, so she didn’t even bother mentioning it.

Joy came so unexpectedly.

Jiang Chen’s eyes scanned across Natasha’s face as he used a playful tone, “Take a guess?”

Looking at the undisguised sight, Natasha turned, blushing. However, she quickly noticed the mockery inside his eyes and she responded by giving him a hard stare.

“I don’t know.”

Jiang Chen put up five fingers.

“Five years of time. Over the five years, Russia’s International Space Station supplying project will be contracted to Celestial Trade. Five years later, we’ll sell RM-320 rocket engine’s prototype and blueprints at market price to Russia.”

Five years of contract work in exchange for an outdated technology was too great of a value.

As to why it is “outdated”? Because once space elevators are created, any rocket launching technology would become obsolete.

Because of the existence of space elevator, the launch cost in the millions would be squeezed to a few hundred. This was the reason why launch vehicle technology was completely halted by the end of the 21st century.

“… I can’t give you a reply, I have to speak with my superior,” Natasha said with difficulty.

Jiang Chen signaled her to go ahead.

Natasha nodded, walked to the side, and called the KGB headquarter in the far away Moscow.

The phone call lasted for a long time. Then her expression took a sudden turn as she walked beside Jiang Chen.

“Our superior hopes to speak with you.”

She passed the phone over and took two steps back.

With the phone by his ear, before Jiang Chen spoke, he heard someone speak English with a heavy Russian accent.

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“At most three year.”

The voice sounded familiar, but he couldn’t recall it.

“Three years is too short.”

“We have to consider the evolution of technology.”

“You don’t have to worry about that. Even if it is after eight years, RM-320 engine will remain the leader in the market,” Jiang Chen said with certainty.

The phone was silent for two seconds.

“Three years. Three years you’ll sell RM-320 rocket engine’s technology to us. We’ll contract you the supply mission at 40 billion Rupees for eight years.”

“Deal!” Jiang Chen agreed without any hesitation.

Although his expression didn’t change at all, he was laughing hard in his mind. It equated to a contract of 600 million USD a year. At most it will take him two years to create the space elevator. By then, the cost for a supply mission will be less than a million!

It would be Rupee, not dollar.

“Looks like we are in agreement.” The voice on the other side seemed more relaxed when he heard Jiang Chen’s confirmation without realizing he just got scammed.

“I feel your voice is familiar. Before you hang up, could I ask who you are?” Jiang Chen asked joyously.

“Our Miss Agent didn’t tell you?”

“She just said you were her superior.” Jiang Chen suddenly realized something.

Wait, Natasha used “we” and not “my”.

There was a short silence before a lighthearted response came from the other side.

“You can call me Putin. If there is an opportunity, I welcome you to Moscow…”

Jiang Chen blanked out while still holding the phone.

[Wait, I was doing business with Russia’s President?!]

[And I just scammed him?!]

…

With the successful launch of the 12th quantum satellite, Celestial Trade announced paid Wi-Fi coverage to Australia, New Zealand, New Guinea, Malaysia, and Moro. Based on the cooperation with the local telecommunication providers, any of the users who paid for the service could receive 12 hours of WI-FI trial time. After the expiry of the trial time, user could select different speed plans based on their geography.

Celestial Trade was currently engaged in discussion with UA, Canada, and France providers regarding a potential partnership with the plan to push Wi-Fi coverage globally.

On the other hand, the fight between Future Group and B City Consortium still persisted. But neither parties made a new move and they remained in a stalemate. The Department of Justice was still gathering evidence in anti-trust investigation while B City Consortium was busy putting out the fire at the bank.

Problematically, Websense’s response for the cyber security breach of First B City Bank was fully upgrading its firewall and specifically focusing on defence against hacker infiltration.

Based on what Xie Lei said, the upgraded system was like an impenetrable barrel with all the previous holes filled in. Unless they could use an internal computer as a back door, even with the quantum computer’s attack power, it would be nearly impossible to infiltrate remotely.

The programmers they hired were not there to sit around.

On the other hand, Jean collected news regarding both companies and presented them to Jiang Chen.

“The Federal Reserve injected 100 billion USD to First B City Bank. The Capital hosted a cyber security summit with top tech security firms. The area of financial security was the focus of the summit.”

“The Federal Reserve made a move. It looks like First B City Bank is now stabilized.” Jiang Chen furrowed his eyebrows.

Just as he was thinking about the next step, Xia Shiyu’s called him.

“Hello?”

“Someone wants to see you in person.”

“Who is it?”

“Carson Loki, the majority shareholder of First B City Bank.”