Sail across the sea

"Gao Fan, do you know what you missed!"

In the taxi taking Gao Fan back to the hotel, Bob asked Gao Fan with some regrets and jokes.

In private occasions, Bob and Gao Fan always speak Chinese, so there is no need to worry about the taxi driver hearing their chat.

"What did you miss?" Gao Fan asked knowingly.

"Alia asked where you live, why did you say you lived in my house instead of a hotel?"

"She said she would drop me off at the hotel, but I didn't want to bother her, so I just said so."

"Are you sure you don't understand her?"

"But I'm still a child..."

"Hahahaha, save these words and go back to China and say them in front of your parents. In the United States, at your age, if you haven't had a dozen girlfriends, everyone should suspect your sexual orientation."

"The sage said, all the chacha not for the purpose of marriage are hooligans."

"Why haven't I heard this sentence before, did Confucius say it?"

"By the way, Bob, are you familiar with Penglaier and Alia?" Gao Fan changed the topic just now and asked Bob for confirmation.

Bob shook his head: "It's just ordinary friends. As I told you, I met Penglaier when we played basketball in the past, and we met a few times later. We have some common hobbies. Alia is also through Penglai Introduced by Er, I just met her, including this time, I have only met her three times. However, this is the first time I have seen Alia ask a boy where he lives."

Seeing that Bob wanted to take the steering wheel again, Gao Fan didn't follow his lead, but continued to ask, "Then, how did they hear about me?"

"I don't know about this, maybe one of my friends told them about it." Bob didn't think there was anything strange about this question.

When he came back from a trip to China, he naturally wanted to inform a few friends, and by the way, he also said that he had brought a Chinese over.News spread quickly among young people, and it was not surprising that Pennrel heard about it.

Of course, it was a bit abrupt for Penglaier to contact him actively, saying that he wanted to get to know his Chinese friend. After all, Penglaier's friendship with him did not reach this stage.

"By the way, Gao Fan, our loan application has been approved by the group. The group needs a guarantee from an official Chinese institution. Can you do this?"

Seeing that Gao Fan was not interested in topics unsuitable for children, it was inconvenient for Bob to drive all the time, so he brought the topic back to business.

"Guarantee is not a problem, I will make a report to the Department of Chemical Industry when I go back." Gao Fan said.He had already inquired about this matter before he came out. The province attaches great importance to attracting foreign investment, and it is not a problem to provide a guarantee for the enterprise.

"So, the next step, should we continue to understand the demand intention? I think there are enough companies that have been contacted a few days ago. The demand alone far exceeds our estimated production capacity." Bob said.

Gao Fan laughed and said, "Isn't it good to have a lot of demand? Production capacity is like Penglaier's chin..."

"What do you mean?"

"There will always be crowds."

"Why don't you use Arya as an example?"

"If you don't mention her, we can still be friends."

Just kidding, Gao Fan said: "We have visited quite a few companies these days. Now that the company has agreed to grant us a loan, I think it's time to contact the equipment manufacturers. Do you have any chemical equipment manufacturers that you have cooperated with? There is no need to find a large company, after all, the equipment we want is not very high-end, just find a few companies with lower prices."

"That's perfectly fine," Bob agreed lightly.

The Hatch Group is specialized in investment, and has extremely rich contacts in the industry. It is not a problem to contact any kind of company.Before Gao Fan came to the United States, he had already told Bob that one of the purposes of this trip was to find sales, and the second purpose was to find equipment manufacturers. Someone in the group had already made arrangements for this.

The matter of Pennrel and Alia was just a small episode in Bob's view.The next day, Bob drove to the hotel where Gao Fan stayed and took him to a factory in the suburbs.

"This is the Odin Machinery Factory, and the Hatch Group owns 30% of its shares. I came to this factory with my father when I was a child, and it was still very prosperous. But in the past few years, it has continued to lose money and has carried out three layoffs , and now the remaining workers are less than 1/3 of what they used to be."

When seeing the factory building from a distance, Bob introduced the situation of the factory to Gao Fan.

"What is the reason for the loss?" Gao Fan asked.

"There is no order." Bob said, "Odin Machinery Factory is a professional chemical equipment manufacturing plant, and the investment in the chemical industry in the United States has been declining. The demand for equipment is not even half of that in the 60s, and many of these needs have been replaced. Japanese chemical equipment manufacturers took it away.

"You know the problem in the United States. Labor costs are too high, and the machinery manufacturing industry is completely uncompetitive."

"So, does this factory still have production capacity?" Gao Fan asked.

Bob shook his head: "I don't know, I need to talk to the factory manager. Its factory manager is called Vallance, an old man. He founded this factory. He developed from orders. At that time, he had insufficient funds, and the Hatch Group provided him with an investment in exchange for 30% of the equity.”

"Has the investment been recovered?" Gao Fan asked rather gossip.

"It's been taken back a long time ago." Bob said, "During World War II and the reconstruction of Europe after the war, the United States provided industrial equipment for the entire free world. At that time, the profit of the Odin factory was very high."

"This moment, that moment." Gao Fan said with emotion.

The "deindustrialization" of the United States is a perfect tense in later generations.The United States that Gao Fan knows is still the second largest country in the world in terms of added value of manufacturing, but many categories of manufacturing have been abandoned.

At present, the United States still retains the huge industrial system accumulated during World War II and the Marshall Plan, but this system is rapidly melting like an iceberg under the scorching sun.Gao Fan traveled through this time, and he was able to witness the process of "de-industrialization" in the United States from the beginning.

"Look, that's Mr. Vallance. He came to meet us at the gate of the factory in person."

Gao Fan followed Bob's fingers and saw a short old man standing outside the gate of the factory, with a slightly hunched back. Against the backdrop of the huge "Odin" Logo next to him, his figure looked a bit bleak .