Empire Rise: Spain

Chapter 156: Acquisition Plan And Talent Scouting

Minister of Industry Manuel Ruiz Sorolla naturally knew that his request was somewhat excessive, but he also knew that this was the best time to acquire these enterprises.

Don’t think that this acquisition order requires 520 million pesetas in funds; if it were before the economic crisis, even three times that amount in acquisition funds might not be enough to acquire these enterprises.

Just the existing equipment, technology, and assets of these enterprises already far exceed 520 million pesetas, which also means that as long as the Spanish Government can acquire these enterprises, it will absolutely be a sure profit with no loss.

Moreover, these enterprises can provide crucial help to various sectors in Spain. If this acquisition order can really be completed, according to the estimates of the Industry Department, Spain’s future industrial development will receive strong support and have more hope of becoming a true industrial power.

“Minister Ruiz, forgive my bluntness, but the government does not have so much funds to provide to the Industry Department to purchase these enterprises.” Before Prime Minister Primó could express his opinion, Minister of Finance Ewald could no longer sit still and quickly stood up to oppose Minister of Industry Ruiz’s proposal.

Not to mention whether the Spanish Government has this amount of funds available. Even if it does, Ewald would absolutely not agree to the acquisition plan proposed by the Industry Department.

The departments that need to acquire enterprises to enhance their foundation are not just the Industry Department, and the scope of enterprises that can be acquired is not limited to those designated by the Industry Department.

If the Industry Department’s acquisition order is fully approved, then what the Finance Department will face next will be acquisition orders from other departments one after another.

Even though Ewald knew that acquisitions would only bring benefits to Spain, the problem is that money cannot be spent like this.

“Prime Minister, we are confident that after this acquisition case, we can quickly enhance our country’s industrial development.” Minister of Industry Ruiz did not pay attention to Minister of Finance Ewald’s opposition, but continued to express his optimism about acquiring enterprises to Prime Minister Primó: “ Especially in heavy industry and chemical industry, if we can obtain the assets of these foreign enterprises, it will bring significant improvement to us.

After absorbing these foreign assets, within one year, our steel output can break through 200,000 tons, and pig iron output can break through 500,000 tons.

If given five years, I am confident that steel output can break through 1 million tons, pig iron output break through 3 million tons, thereby closing the gap with other great powers.”

“1 million tons of steel output? 3 million tons of pig iron output?” Prime Minister Primó did not indulge in the grand goals proposed by Minister of Industry Ruiz, but instead questioned this goal.

In terms of steel output, 1 million tons of steel and 3 million tons of pig iron would indeed close the gap with other European powers.

Considering that other European countries are experiencing severe economic crises, as long as this requirement is met, Spain’s industry will once again squeeze into the top five in Europe.

But the question is, is it really a good thing for Spain’s industry to achieve such a huge improvement in such a short time?

The current economic crisis has already proven that excessively rapid industrial and economic development speed is not a good thing. Only steady growth suited to Spain’s own environment is the best way for economic and industrial development.

Spain does have sufficient funds for acquisitions and does have hope of increasing steel output to several million tons within five years.

But doing so offers almost no benefits beyond blindly pursuing steel output, and it would instead be a burden on the country’s development.

Prime Minister Primó is not unsupportive of the acquisition plan for foreign enterprises. But acquisitions must align with Spain’s actual development needs, rather than adding all valuable enterprises to the acquisition list for those false grand goals.

Time passed minute by minute, and Prime Minister Primó still had a thoughtful expression, giving no answer.

Minister of Industry Ruiz was somewhat anxious and took a step forward to continue persuading Prime Minister Primó, but was interrupted by Prime Minister Primó waving his hand.

“The acquisition plan is very necessary, but we still need to think carefully about the enterprises on the acquisition list.” Finally, after pondering for several minutes, Prime Minister Primó gave his opinion: “

At the same time, the targets of acquisitions cannot be limited to factories in European countries; we must also look to medical enterprises and private research labs in various countries.

Minister Ewald, how much funds can the government currently provide for acquiring foreign enterprises?”

Hearing Prime Minister Primó’s question, Ewald immediately blurted out: “Prime Minister, the funds currently available to the Ministry of Finance are 320 million pesetas.

There is still some tax revenue this year that has not yet been transferred to the Finance Department, but considering the budget needs of other departments and our debts, the maximum funds that can be allocated are 210 million pesetas.”

Prime Minister Primó shook his head, clearly not satisfied with the amount of allocatable funds: “The Finance Department should gather another 90 million pesetas, for a total of 300 million pesetas invested in this acquisition plan.

For this acquisition plan, I hope we can carefully select the factories and enterprises to be acquired. Spain’s development does not need overly grand goals; we need to advance steadily step by step on the existing foundation.”

“Yes, Prime Minister.” Minister of Finance Ewald nodded, not daring to question Prime Minister Primó’s order in the slightest.

A smile also appeared on Minister of Industry Ruiz’s face at this moment. Although the final funds for acquisitions were less than 60% of what he proposed, it was still a huge amount of 300 million pesetas.

In the context of the economic crisis ravaging Europe, the value this amount of funds could generate was at least equivalent to 5 billion pesetas before the economic crisis broke out.

Using 300 million pesetas to acquire foreign enterprises was a decision made by Prime Minister Primó after careful consideration.

The Spanish Government is not unable to provide more funds. Although the current funds in the Ministry of Finance are not much, with the gold from the temple treasure, the Spanish Government can easily print several hundred million pesetas more.

But one must also understand the principle of biting off more than one can chew. Spain can indeed purchase more factories and enterprises from abroad, but whether it can smoothly digest these factories and enterprises remains unknown.

Moreover, if it indiscriminately buys up bankrupt enterprises from these great power countries, it will inevitably attract the attention of those great power countries.

Spain has already been eyed by others for not suffering much impact from the economic crisis; if it also kicks them when they are down during the economic crisis, the subsequent diplomatic situation might not be so favorable.

Although 300 million pesetas is not too much, it can ensure that Spain purchases a sufficient number of enterprises and factories to fill the gap in industrial foundation.

With these factories and enterprises, Spain’s industrial development can also achieve faster growth. Coupled with the impact of the economic crisis on other countries, the gap between Spain and the European great powers will further narrow.

Furthermore, Spain’s development must still proceed steadily step by step, without overemphasizing data on paper.

For example, 1 million tons of steel output and 3 million tons of pig iron output are completely unnecessary for Spain at present.

Under Prime Minister Primó’s order, Minister of Industry Ruiz still modified the Industry Department’s plan.

The latest Industry Department plan is to increase Spain’s steel output to 100,000 tons and 200,000 tons respectively within one year. Within five years, increase Spain’s steel output to 500,000 tons and 1 million tons respectively.

As long as this goal is achieved, Spain can rank among the industrial powers. The steel produced each year can not only meet domestic demand in Spain, but even export to neighboring country Portugal and other industrial stake countries.

A few days later, Prime Minister Primó reviewed the acquisition list submitted by the Industry Department again and completely removed all armory-type enterprises from it.

The reason was also simple. The royal family’s acquisition plan included armories, so the government naturally had no need to do redundant work.

The funds available to the Spanish Government were really limited, and there was no need to repeatedly purchase enterprises already bought by the royal family.

In fact, purchasing those bankrupt enterprises was just one part of the plan, and the action to dig for talent in various countries was being carried out alongside it.

Obviously, just having these enterprises is not enough. Spain must close the gap in technical talent with other countries to further develop various industries domestically.

The current economic crisis is a good opportunity. The unemployment during the economic crisis is not limited to ordinary workers; it also includes skilled workers, technical workers, and senior engineers with certain technical abilities.

Of course, compared to skilled workers and technical workers, the situation for senior engineers is obviously better.

Except for those engineers whose enterprises have gone bankrupt, most engineers can still barely make ends meet, at least maintaining subsistence is not a problem.

After all, senior engineers in this era are already mid-to-high-level in enterprises, with income levels that have entered the high-level stratum.

Precisely because of this, the digging for talent in various countries has detailed divisions.

Although great powers obviously have more senior talents, the environment for these senior talents is also better, and the enterprises they are in are unlikely to face bankruptcy crises; even if there is a bankruptcy crisis, they are likely to be saved by the government.

While small countries have fewer senior talents, the enterprises they are in are also smaller. Small enterprises naturally cannot withstand the impact of the economic crisis, and small countries have limited capabilities, unable to save every enterprise.

Spain’s plan for digging talent is summed up in one simple sentence: prioritize collecting relevant technical talents and senior engineers in small countries such as the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal, and others.

If Spain’s all talent needs cannot be met in these small European countries, then turn eyes to European great powers such as England, France, Germany, etc., to further fill the talent gaps.

The benefit of doing so is that it is unlikely to attract the attention of those great power countries. Even if small countries discover Spain’s frenzied buying and digging behavior, they can at most condemn it, naturally lacking the ability to take actual action.

Compared to Spain’s development, being condemned by these small countries is just condemnation. Although Spain has a certain gap with great power countries, compared to these small countries, it is still a powerful juggernaut.

Doing so will also have a problem, that is, the talents dug up speak different languages from various countries, and even need translators to communicate and exchange with enterprises and experts on the Spanish Mainland.

But this is also unavoidable. Spain’s weakness has lasted a long time, and the Spanish language naturally has not received much enthusiasm in Europe.

In the early stage, translators can only be provided to these technical talents and senior engineers to ensure no problems in their work and normal communication.

In the later stage, special language classes can only be opened for them to help them master Spanish faster. After all, these dug-up talents will serve Spain in the future; if they do not learn Spanish, should Spaniards learn their languages?

On this point, Portugal’s importance is highlighted instead. Portuguese and Spanish are very similar, even understandable as two evolutions of one language.

Communication between Portuguese and Spaniards is mutually comprehensible, with Portuguese better able to understand Spanish, while Spaniards need to listen carefully to understand Portuguese.

This has led to the fact that Portuguese can live easily in Spain. Because there are almost no language barriers, this is also the special nature of Portugal and Spain as the Iberian duo.

Precisely because of this, when the Industry Department proposed the need to dig for talent, Prime Minister Primó specifically instructed to place the first stop for digging talent in Portugal.

Regardless of whether these talents have lost their jobs due to their enterprises, anyway, as long as they are senior talents from Portugal, dig them all first.

As a neighbor on the Iberian Peninsula, Spain is not afraid of offending Portugal. In fact, Portugal can only tremble before Spain; the strength gap between the duo is very large.

Although there are not many senior engineers domestically in Portugal, there are still some relatively excellent technical workers and ordinary engineers.

Prime Minister Primó’s opinion is naturally to dig a batch whenever there is one; anyway, Portugal’s development does not need so much talent, and they are destined not to develop.

Soon, under Prime Minister Primó’s request, various departments jointly submitted a talent demand list even thicker than the acquisition plan.

In this talent demand list, various departments proposed their own needs for talent, and the entire list was thick with several stacks.

Spain currently needs two types of talent the most. The first type is skilled technical workers needed for industrial development, engineers from various industries, and so on.

The second type is scientific research personnel, or rather those scientists. Whether researching physics, chemistry, or biomedicine, steel smelting, petroleum extraction and refining, anyway, the Spanish Government’s attitude is to accept all comers, with the gates open anytime for these talents.

For the solicitation of scientific research talents, Prime Minister Primó and Carlo reached a unified opinion.

First, Spain is extremely lacking in this type of scientific research talent. In posterity, Spain had no winners in physics or chemistry for the Nobel Prize, which also proves the gap in this type of talent.

To express importance for these talents, whether solicited by the royal family or the government, they will be uniformly added to the Royal Academy of Sciences established by Carlo.

The Royal Academy of Sciences has been established for several years, and has built several large laboratories for research in physics, chemistry, biomedicine, mechanical design, and chemical industry, open free to all scientists of the Royal Academy of Sciences.

If they do not like these large laboratories where they have to compete with other experts for time, the Royal Academy of Sciences also provides private laboratories for scientists of sufficient rank, ensuring they can conduct scientific research anytime, anywhere.

Yes, after several years of development, the Royal Academy of Sciences has also established relatively detailed rank divisions.

Carlo himself places great importance on scientists and naturally great importance on the development of the Royal Academy of Sciences.

Although the Royal Academy of Sciences is just an academic research institution, the power it holds is quite substantial.

All scientists joining the Royal Academy of Sciences are called academicians of the academy, enjoying three types of income: basic salary + research and development rewards + position rewards.

First is the basic salary. Academicians of the Royal Academy of Sciences have three levels: first-level academicians, second-level academicians, and third-level academicians.

The basic annual salary for first-level academicians is 1,800 pesetas, for second-level academicians 3,200 pesetas, and for third-level academicians 4,500 pesetas.

Although the basic salary level is not top-tier in Europe, compared to ordinary people, it is already a dozen times the income gap.

Moreover, the basic salary is just one part of the academy academicians’ income, not even the main part.

In addition to the basic salary, all research results achieved by Royal Academy of Sciences academicians will receive a certain share based on the contribution of the research results, up to 5%.

Although a twentieth share is not much, it depends on what the research results are. For example, if advanced drugs are researched in biology, it could represent income of several hundred million or even billions of pesetas.

In such a case, even just 5% share is enough to turn academy academicians into millionaires overnight.

Finally, there is income from positions. All scientists of the Royal Academy of Sciences are uniformly called academicians, even the dean of the academy is the same.

Although positions like dean have no difference in rank, there are significant differences in power and income.

However, positions within the academy are relatively few; more positions are actually in the closely related Royal Academy of Sciences.

Academicians of the Royal Academy of Sciences can take concurrent positions in the science academy, at minimum as honorary professors, with income of 500 pesetas.

Adding up the three incomes can ensure that the income level of Royal Academy of Sciences academicians is comparable to that of senior talents in other European countries, or even slightly higher.

This is also the confidence of Carlo and Prime Minister Primó in soliciting talent; after all, scientists need to eat their fill first no matter how much they love research.

5,100 words two-in-one chapter seeking support!