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[Comp112]

Don't rent anything. Start working on a Freighter using the new hull.

All I can say is, I agree with this.

[Kogan Loloklam]

Guys, why are you in such a big hurry to get into debt? Seriously, you don't need a loan. We need to let the company stabilize a little better. Get some Petty cash going so we can afford to be flexible. If we have lots of Loan Debt and something happens, how are we to get a loan to fix it? The key here is to stay solvent. We aren't just currently competitive, we are the top competitor in our field. We need to stay on top yes, but we can't go off in crazy directions that puts our core in jeopardy.
Also, we hired Tavian for a reason. We can't ignore it in favor of blood. He needs to be listened to.
And, why are we trying to create something new when we can improve on the old. If we improve the current Modules to be better, we can increase the amount of people who want Llamas. This would also decrease the amount of effort it requires to design new ships or retool our factories. This equals to increased production. In particular, if we can reduce the weight of the A18, we can increase the effectiveness of our engines without retooling, and we might decrease the cost of producing them. So let's Develop the Hull A18a!
Lastly we WILL need another assembly line to produce for new designs, since we will take a retooling hit and we'll need the extra production to fill our dock space on every refit. While we COULD get a standard assembly line, Let's take a Guns for Fun line to keep their people employed (good PR, and because they are an experienced crew. Might be worthwhile) and to get the blueprints

1) Explain to your sister that a Combat Pilot stating designs are unsafe is pretty damn significant and that the design should be fixed.
2) Offer a cash bonus for increased production on the lines to squeeze out a 10th Llama, otherwise 9 Llamas.
3) Continue Research assignment, but add an additional one to improve the Hull A18 in all ways for Tavian, and set our sister to examine how to retrofit the Llama line with the new design without disrupting production too severely.
4) Attempt to get a standing contract for a set amount of Llamas from someone at a consistent price. Buy 1 of the "Guns for Fun" Lines to get the blueprints and experienced workers. Retool it to produce the new engine when it is done.

(Edit: I should explain to you guys what we have from my Point of View. We have a Tug Boat. A workhorse that acts as a locomotive for moving cargo behind it in external containers or towing ships. I imagine it gets lots of use in asteroid belts. It seems like it'd do well moving rocks to smelters. A Cargo Vessel is not what we are known for yet. Arming our Tugs might be an idea, but because of where we are the only person we would want to sell to would be the fleet. Armed Inspection Boats might be a good path to design towards, but we should have the modules and get a contract with the Military first. No matter what though, Maneuverability is good for us. Power is also good because it allows them to pull bigger ships. We might want to look into designing "carts" for our tugs to pull too. External ships with no engines and minimal comfort that can be delivered to destinations and dropped off.)

[Comp112]

Gotta say, I like all that. My vote is with the above.

[Kogan Loloklam]

It occurs to me an assumption I have made might be false...
Where are we and what are we called?

I am assuming we are in Viako and are called Antaris Yard, but I didn't really see anything.

My statement about the Military contract operates under this assumption. We don't want to be known for our ships as pirate ships in a pirate infested system, and that a heavily traveled trade route inspection/rescue tugs would have some demand. But if we are in Bolear, we could get away with selling to "salvages"

[Armok]

What Kogan said.

[Ukrainian Ranger]

Yep I should write somewhere that you are based in Viako. And don't worry, pirates usually don't buy ships legally

As for Llamas, they are pretty universal, they can be used as a tug boat, as a launching stage for satellites or ships with bad acceleration, for evacuation and so on. In fact it's your job to find uses for it and then advertise.

Turn soon

[NRDL]

I had a very hairbrained scheme, which will no doubt fail catastrophically. 

We can produce quite a few ( weak ) ships, and the demand is enough for us to stay afloat for a bit, but if we don't make enough of a profit, we'll go under.  So here's my crazy idea. 

In order to increase demand, we must find a way to make sure the ships that we sell have to constantly replaced.  For this, we have to ensure that our ships get destroyed repeatedly AFTER we sell them, thus forcing our clients to buy from us, again and again and again. 

We can't sabotage our own ships, or rig them to explode, no we need something much more subtle than that.  So here's the ( very idiotic ) plan: We get in contact with the pirates, negotiate a deal.  We will plant a device on each of our llama haulers that will emit a signal.  This signal will be easily traceable by any pirate who is a part of our deal.  The pirates swoop in, destroy and loot the ships, and our customers have to come back to us for replacement llama haulers. 

This probably sounds very reckless and stupid, I myself believe it is, so feel free to disregard it, but this is a viable option.

On a more serious note, do we even have ANY competition in the ship business? 

[stabbymcstabstab]

I like it. but heres the down side what if people figure it out? We'll be in a shit load of trouble or better yet the fleet will come and I doubt the pirates are that loyal if we pay them so we should make our own pirates.

[NRDL]

I like it. but heres the down side what if people figure it out? We'll be in a shit load of trouble or better yet the fleet will come and I doubt the pirates are that loyal if we pay them so we should make our own pirates.

Hire them out as mercenaries?  We don't have the money, or the need for that.  If this deal works out well, we will have money, and we can use pirate/mercenaries to crush any competition. 

We'd need both a good legal team, and someone who could hide evidence.  Don't want the law enforces ( whoever they are in this sector ) to arrest us. 

[RAM]

A transmitter is not a good choice for something that is not meant to be noticed...

'Accidentally' losing a load of fast attack ships to the pirates may drive up demand for ships generally, but would be a significant initial investment and may result in additional military presence...

[NRDL]

A transmitter is not a good choice for something that is not meant to be noticed...

'Accidentally' losing a load of fast attack ships to the pirates may drive up demand for ships generally, but would be a significant initial investment and may result in additional military presence...

The transmitter would work only on a very, very exclusive and secret wavelength, something which only our pirate contacts would have access to.  Since we're already making a decent ( sort of ) profit with our llama haulers, imagine the sales we'll get once our clients start losing ships by the dozen, and start replacing them en masse. 

[Kogan Loloklam]

The problem I see is that any emission that you have the ship making can be detected. How do you propose to make it secret? What do you say, that it's a flaw in the system?
Our ships are cheap haulers, not fat juicy cargo freighters. It'd just flood the area with noise of low-profit targets and end with us not having a single ship to sell, since we are broadcasting crazy signals wildly. What does that say about our engineers? Best to ignore that crazy idea for now.

Ram's thought is something to consider. We could broadcast about how our new experimental armed tugs are being kept in a safe asteroid so that their guns can't accidentally damage any nearby shipping as we run trials on them. Maybe a set of 20-30 of them tugs. Accidentally "leak" the location we are storing them and keep the area unoccupied by our people. Someone would probably run off with them pretty quick. We would still need ships to lose, and the profit margins to afford it. We might be liable for any damages that those lost ships cause though, so we want a financial cushion first. Those ploys are for bigger companies to make. First we gotta grow and become more stable. Besides, we already produce at capacity and sell just as quickly.

[NRDL]

The signal will do absolutely nothing except emit a signal ( which can be easily hidden by other, more obvious emissions ) which will simply allow the pirates to track down these ships.  It's like a carefully hidden GPS, which only the pirates can find. 

I agree with the low-profit attacks, these aren't laden with valuable treasures, but there has to be some value.  Considering that they're also going to be very lightly defended, it will be a cost effective way for the pirates to earn loot. 

This won't make us billionaires, but it will help, if it works. 

[Kogan Loloklam]

Except that the reputation for cheap and reliable becomes a reputation for cheap, reliable, and easily found by pirates somehow.

Insurance rates for our craft go through the roof, and nobody wants to buy from us anymore since they disappear and fail to make their destination more often. Then Insurance adjusters pay lots of people to find out why our ships keep getting lost and they spend lots of money so they can recoup their lost finances from us.

[NRDL]

Except that the reputation for cheap and reliable becomes a reputation for cheap, reliable, and easily found by pirates somehow.

Insurance rates for our craft go through the roof, and nobody wants to buy from us anymore since they disappear and fail to make their destination more often. Then Insurance adjusters pay lots of people to find out why our ships keep getting lost and they spend lots of money so they can recoup their lost finances from us.

Your logic wounds me, Kogan. 

I myself think this is an absurd idea, but it's fun, that's why I'm arguing for it.  And because I think there is potential here.  Perhaps this plan would work if we had other ships besides llama haulers, ships that are actually valuable?  And on the insurance thing, we don't have to do this operation all the time.  We make a profit from it, when the heat gets too much, stop, then continue selling legally.  Once the heat calms down, we start back up.  With increased profits, and with a bit of luck, we can afford great lawyers, forgers, people who can hide our crimes, bribe some officials, etc.  So much potential, why waste it?