Extraordinary Genius

Chapter 149 – Soviet Union’s light industries

In the evenings, Feng Yu left the camp in a military vehicle. But this time, he had informed the organizing committee, in case he caused trouble to Third High School again.

Although Feng Yu decided not to drink that day, in the end, he was drunk and was carried off to the hotel again. It was because Kirilenko’s business partners had all arrived.

The powerful Ukrainian military 2nd generation partner had earned quite a handsome sum when Feng Yu bought all the obsoleted trucks last time. How could he not toast with Feng Yu? After a few rounds of toasting, Feng Yu got drunk again.

However, Feng Yu did not forget his purpose of coming to the Soviet Union. When they just started drinking, Feng Yu told the Ukrainian partner what he wanted to buy. Temporary, this Ukrainian’s family was still more powerful than Kirilenko. This was a fact that even Kirilenko, himself admitted.

At the dinner, Feng Yu got lots of information. For example, the Soviet Union was still powerful in the manufacturing industry. However, the Soviet Union had placed more emphasis on military production, the light industries were not doing well. There was an imbalance in this sector. Although there were lots of resources, there was not a lot of trades to push up the economy, creating a drastic drop in the standard of living of the civilians.

Many technologies were developed, but there were not sufficient funds to put these technologies to good use. This created skills inequality between the experts and the ordinary workers. The standard of the average workers was worse than China.

The Soviet Union’s industrial capabilities had dropped from being one of the world’s top industrial nation to be overtaken by some European countries, like West Germany. It was because of the same reason. There were advanced research facilities with advanced technologies, but there were insufficient funds.

Also, many of the scientists bought into the Soviet Union had returned to East Germany. This was due to rumors that West and East Germany will be unifying soon!

Feng Yu guessed the reason why so many East Germany scientists were allowed to return. Now, East Germany was considered colonized by the Soviet Union and their technological capabilities were divided by the Soviet Union. The country that benefited most was Russia.

Those scientists that were allowed to return were mostly old men that were not able to contribute to the Soviet Union anymore. The Soviet Union does not want to take care of these people, and those capable people were most likely still under the control of the Soviet Union.

Feng Yu looked at these proud Soviets and sighed in his heart. After both the East and West Germany unified, the Soviet Union would start to collapse. In the history of his previous life, the first country will leave the Soviet Union in March next year. That was the time when people panicked and tried to get the most for themselves.

That would be the best opportunity for Feng Yu. He could import the heavy industries and even the military industries machinery and technologies back to China. Even planes and cannons were all possible!

Luckily, Kirilenko did not share a room with Feng Yu that night. If not, he would hear Feng Yu shouting about buying up all of the Soviet Union factories.

In the day, the camp taught about Arts. Feng Yu, who had no interest in Arts, just lazed around and in the evenings, he applied for leave and left the camp.

Wen Dongjun and the rest of the students and teachers were all used to Feng Yu leaving the camp at night. They could not do anything about it, so they just let Feng Yu do whatever he likes.

Furthermore, the 3 professors were hinted by Zhang Ruiqiang that they got the chance to visit Moscow University’s research facilities was due to Feng Yu’s family influence.

So, the professors also turned a blind eye to Feng Yu’s behavior. They were slightly unhappy with Feng Yu as Feng Yu had a good family background but did not take full advantage of it in his studies. Initially, they wanted to recruit Feng Yu into Technology University, but now, they changed their minds. Recommending such a student to their university would be a disgrace!

That evening, Feng Yu went on a “tour” at a television factory. After walking around the workshop of the factory, Feng Yu felt disappointed.

This was the biggest television factory in the Soviet Union? These lousy televisions produced by the factory would not sell in China!

Feng Yu looked at Kirilenko unhappily: “Brother Ki, are you joking with me? This is the biggest television factory in the Soviet Union? The facilities here are worse than the factories in China!”

Feng Yu did not know that at that time, the world’s top television manufacturers nations were Japan, followed by the Us and then China. The Soviet Union was ranked 4th, behind China. He had thought that the Soviet Union television manufacturers were the best in the world.

Even after the year 2000, in Russia, there were still millions of black and white, and colored televisions, manufactured in the 70s and 80s, in use. Later, the market was captured by Japanese firms like Sony and Panasonic. As for Russia domestic television brands, they were purchasing parts from China and assembling at their state-owned factories near to Moscow.

Kirilenko was embarrassed: “This factory is really the largest production plant for television in the Soviet Union. Since you are not interested in the production machinery here, then you should be interested in their technologies. They have a clear image technology which can be used for larger screens.”

Feng Yu looked at the so-call clear image technology. It really can’t be compared to Japanese. There was not much difference with China’s technology. There were no profits to be made for this technology.

Feng Yu gave up on the first factory and Kirilenko was disappointed. He had lost his commission, and he found out that Feng Yu was not buying everything. Feng Yu only wanted technologies or machinery that were more advanced than China.

But the high power electric furnace Feng Yu wanted, could not be bought cheaply. Although the Soviet Union had changed from a planned economy to a market economy and the state-owned factories were allowed to manage their own finances, machinery that was used for military purposes were still not easily available.

Should he bring Feng Yu to visit the motorcycle factory? Maybe he should bring Feng Yu to the textile mills first.

The next day, Feng Yu visited a textile mill which had machinery which was not too old. The textile mills also had some technology, but it was not more advanced than China.

Feng Yu shook his head. China was catching up with the Soviet Union’s light industries. China should be able to overtake the Soviet Union in 8 to 10 years!

However, Feng Yu still ordered a 1987 production line from the textile mill. This “Obsolete” machinery was too cheap. Even though the technology was not more advanced than China, Feng Yu could still make money out of it as the cost was less than half the price compared to China. Bing City’s textile mills had wanted to buy a new production line, and Feng Yu could sell it to them. This was considered as a contribution to his motherland.

Of course, Feng Yu would still make some profits from this deal. 20% profit should be okay.

The next few days, Feng Yu went shopping at the light industry factory around Moscow. He bought cheap machinery and advanced technologies at low prices. This trip, Feng Yu had spent only about 1 million Rubles, and he could sell all these for at least 3 million Rubles back in China. The profits were more than doubled!