Divine Artifact in a Scientific World

"Great. Now what about Jensen Manufacturing? Do you have any ideas about how to proceed there?"

"Yes. It's actually a family-owned business, and I know the owners. I think they will be very receptive to a merger offer if we promise to retain their employees or offer generous severance packages."

"That's great. Are you comfortable leading that effort?"

"Yes, I'd be happy to. They supplied our first displays, and I loved working with them. So it has been hard watching them struggle."

"Okay. I'll let you handle the timing. But reassure them that I, their new owner, want them to continue to run their division after the merger."

"They'll be happy to hear that."

After a pause, he said. "If I may, I think there are a few other people in Horizon and Jenson that we should talk to with an eye toward offering them a soul bond. If they accept, it will make things go much more smoothly."

"Oh, which people?"

"For Horizon, my COO and two key engineers. For Jenson, the head of the family and their head of production."

"What kinds of problems would we avoid if they accepted?"

"My COO is rather opinionated, and having him onboard will just make things go more smoothly. I can still make things work without a soul bond; it'll just be harder. And my two key engineers are a flight risk. If we lost both of them, it would take some time to find replacements."

"I'd prefer to keep soul bonds to a minimum for now. So let's hold off on those conversations. What about Jenson?"

"Hans Jensen will be easier to work with if he's in the know, and his head of production is going to need to know a lot about your fabrication machines if he's to work with them. It will be hard to keep your secrets from him."

Jack smiled. "Even if we published the blueprints of our fabrication machines on the internet, our competitors would be unable to replicate them. Our competitors will be unable to create certain parts."

"Ah. So your secret-sauce isn't in the display design, or even the fabricator design, but the technique needed to make critical fabricator components?"

"Yep. It's the only reason I'm willing to take this approach. Otherwise, I'd wait until we had AGI robots and go with fully automated manufacturing. No humans, no leaks."

Phineas blinked. "AGI? Do you think you can crack that nut?"

"I'm not sure. We'll probably crack photonics first. We have over one hundred million Cerebras brute forcing that and other problems right now."

Phineas coughed. "One hundred million?!"

"Yes. We're using them to search for better A.I. model architectures, and new transistor designs, and nanotech component designs."

"You know, my daughter is about your age," said Phineas.

Phineas' unexpected comment surprised Jack, and it took him a few moments to process. He sort of understood why Phineas would hint to Jack that his daughter was available, but really, he had enough girlfriends at the moment.

"Sorry, my dance card is full. I already have seven girlfriends. That's enough. And I have old man Wallingford trying to push his granddaughter onto me as well. I don't need more of the same."

"Seven. Right. Sorry, I had to ask. Figured it wouldn't hurt to try." Then, changing the subject, Phineas asked, "So, how soon will you begin?"

"We'll start quietly buying up Horizon stock starting tomorrow. I'll let you know when we get to a point where we can't buy more without setting off alarm bells."

"Sounds good. So, can I get a tour of the rest of your soul space?"

Jack had been thinking about how he wanted to deal with Phineas, and others like him that were sure to follow. At the moment, Phineas was a business partner, not a friend.

And letting Phineas enter his soul space at will was like giving him a key to his house. It felt...invasive. Sure, part of it was that Phineas was a man and not a woman, but mostly it was the difference in relationship.

"I hope you won't be offended, but I want to keep my personal and business lives separate. So, I'll create a separate area you can access where we can meet. But I need to conserve energy, so I want you to limit your parallel self time. A few hours a day is fine."

"Understood. I'd do the same. Even a few hours a day is a huge benefit so thanks for granting me the option."

They talked for a few more minutes, then Jack created a separate room connected to his white room with a hallway with two interlinked secure doors. His girls could enter and leave the new room, but Phineas and Page could only access the new room and was not allowed to open the secure doors.

In the physical world, Jack had finished lunch and then gone to the library and reserved one of the small single-person study rooms.

He called Henry and asked him to set up a secure teleconference with Natalie. Now that he knew she could be trusted, he didn't mind if she heard his voice.

After Henry set up the call and made introductions, Natalie said, "Before we get to the purpose of this call, I just want to say, sir, how honored and pleased I am that you would entrust me with managing your wealth."

"I'm just glad to have acquired such a skilled and trustworthy employee," said Jack, wondering if he sounded sufficiently businessmen like.

"So, to what do I owe the pleasure of your call?" she asked.

"We plan to acquire Horizon VR and take it private. I have the full cooperation of Phineas Dermot, the founder and CEO, but we want to try and keep the price down, so we want to acquire as much of their stock as we can on the market first."

"Ah, a wise choice. Snap up as much of the individual investor's shares first to dry up the liquidity, then make the offer to the remaining major shareholders. Can I assume you want to avoid making waves?"

"Yes, we don't want anyone getting wind that a buyout is possible. Otherwise, other majority shareholders, greedy bastards that they are, will try to drive the price up before an official offer can be made."

"Understood. I think I can pick up about 30 percent of the total outstanding shares without pushing the price over 2.2 credits. But it will take a month or two. Is that acceptable?"

"Yes, that should be fine. I'll let you know if we need to accelerate things."

After Natalie disconnected, Henry said, "I'm sure you already know this, but I feel it prudent to point out that this deal is beyond my capabilities. I recommend you use Dan at Summit Partners."

"I thought you might say something like that. Do you want to be part of the team? It seems like it might be a great learning experience."

"Yes, I'd like that."

"Alright, schedule a meeting with Dan."

Jack felt excitement as he finished the call with Henry. It was still early days, but buying Horizon felt like the first real, tangible step towards his goals.