"Good day, gentlemen. I've been waiting for quite some time."
As soon as they entered the conference room, a sharp and capable woman stood in front of them.
Seeing her, the owner of the flash memory factory felt a tremor in his heart.
They knew this woman very well.
To them now, she looked like the devil.
It was this very woman who had, with her dazzling words, convinced the flash memory factory owner to expand his production lines. At the time, Takayuki had said he planned to expand cartridge production again and urgently needed new OEM partners. So Gamestar Electronic Entertainment was willing to set aside past grievances and continue working with them, so long as the price remained at a reasonable baseline.
This made the factory owner quite happy—at least it meant he could get through his current crisis.
But he had to pay a price in advance—expanding the production line.
...
...
So he gritted his teeth and pulled out the last of his hidden funds—money he'd set aside in case he needed to run—and used it to add new production capacity.
As long as this order went through, the returns would be several times the investment. He thought it was worth it.
What he never expected was that it would all be a trap.
Just as he enthusiastically launched the new production line and was ready to go all in, Matsubashi Mi—this same woman—suddenly claimed that due to the booming sales of the GS1, upper management now believed optical discs would be the future format. Cartridges were likely to become obsolete, and the cartridge production plan would be indefinitely postponed.
These words left the flash memory factory owner dumbfounded. He went wild trying to contact Gamestar Electronic Entertainment. After finally receiving a clear and definitive answer that there would be no further cartridge orders, he flew into a rage, began cursing Gamestar Electronic Entertainment nonstop, and became their number one hater.
But such commercial grievances rarely made waves—especially when Gamestar Electronic Entertainment was enjoying so much public favor.
Officials from the Japanese government even reached out to the flash memory factory owner, advising him to let it go. His failure, they said, came from blindly believing someone's words when there hadn't even been a written guarantee.
This showed just how desperate the factory owner had been to make money again.
And it was precisely that desperation that had blinded him, allowing Matsubashi Mi to lead him by the nose.
Unsurprisingly, the flash memory company was now on the verge of announcing bankruptcy because of this.
A new production line with no new orders was nothing but scrap—virtually worthless. Enraged, he even considered taking Gamestar Electronic Entertainment to court, determined to drag them into a messy lawsuit.
But he completely forgot the smug look he wore when he first tried to jack up prices. Now all he could think about was how he was the victim.
Then Matsubashi Mi appeared again—this time with an acquisition offer. The price she proposed was just enough to let the factory owner pay off about 95% of his debt. As for the remaining 5%, with some honest work, he might still pay it off in his lifetime.
From wealthy man to penniless in an instant—but that was still better than ending up deep in debt and being chased by creditors, or being driven to jump from a building out of despair.
So in the end, he gave up on suing Gamestar Electronic Entertainment and agreed to the acquisition.
At that moment, the plan's final goal had already been achieved.
Takayuki had acquired the cheap flash memory factory he needed, and the owners who had tried to screw Gamestar Electronic Entertainment with price hikes got the punishment they deserved.
Of course, it wasn't a death sentence. Becoming an ordinary citizen was punishment enough.
What remained now was just the acquisition process.
"Please, have a seat."
Matsubashi Mi stepped aside, and only then did he realize that two or three people were already seated behind her.
He recognized them all—they were owners of other small-to-medium-sized flash memory factories.
In that moment, how could he not understand what had happened?
Business competition.
In the end, it was all just business competition.
Only now did he realize that even though Gamestar Electronic Entertainment looked like a young company with a young CEO, that didn't mean they were easy to deal with.
The fact that they could thrive in the U.S. market without getting pushed out—while continuing to dominate and rake in profits—was something very few Japanese companies could achieve.
Only a handful of Japanese companies had comparable market power in the U.S.
In the end, he had made the mistake of underestimating Gamestar Electronic Entertainment—assuming they were small players.
The other two flash memory factory owners, who had already taken their seats, were struck by the same realization. Their hearts were filled with both clarity and a sense of sadness and regret.
Why had they messed with Gamestar Electronic Entertainment?
If they had just done their job as OEM partners, none of them would be in this position.
Now they were the ones being acquired. Gamestar Electronic Entertainment would pick their bones clean—it was honestly kind of tragic.
But at this point, there was nothing left to say. The last factory owner could only accept his fate and sit down in an empty chair.
Soon after, several standardized contracts were placed in front of the flash memory factory owners.
These were the formal acquisition contracts.
Full acquisitions. The owners would take the money and walk away.
In the past, even a modest flash memory factory like theirs could have fetched over $100 million. Now? They were only worth about $30–50 million.
But they had no choice.
Even if they knew flash memory was the future—knew it would eventually dominate—none of them had the capital to hold out until then.
The aftermath of Japan's economic bubble was just too devastating. Whether rich or poor, most had taken heavy losses.
Only those who lived through it could truly understand how helpless it all was.
Each of the three factory owners signed the contracts. They had officially cashed out.
And Gamestar Electronic Entertainment now had three new subsidiary flash memory factories.
Next would be the integration of their existing resources and technical data, merging them into one factory focused solely on cartridge production. And that factory would serve only one client: Gamestar Electronic Entertainment.
With control over the manufacturing process, cartridge production would no longer pose a problem.
As for raw materials—unless war broke out or something equally extreme—no one would dare stir up trouble.
And with that, Gamestar Electronic Entertainment had a complete in-house cartridge production line.
Now, Takayuki could finally spread his wings and leverage his resources to break into new markets.
Before this, he had been holding back—deliberately downplaying the cartridge format.
But now? He didn't need to anymore.
It was time to start promoting cartridges—properly.