Kim and Gaul Enterprises
History:
Kim and Gaul Enterprises, more commonly referred to as K Enterprises or simply as K is an anomaly among corporations. Not only on Dumassas, but within the Inner Sphere, as they are perhaps the only corporation with a vested and personal interest in what many consider to be obsolete and even primitive technologies.
Founded in 3002, the company's co-founders. A. Kim and S. Gaul, were born on Terra before the turn of the 31st century. Coming from influential families, the pair had been inseparable since childhood, and after winning a rather considerable lottery, ventured on what they described as a trip planned by 'two idiots with more money than sense' over the next two decades.
During this time, the pair would travel to various former Hegemony worlds, and some House worlds, in search of lost knowledge and artifacts. While failing to discover any knowledge regarding coveted losTech such as the secrets to Extended Range weapons, Double Heat Sinks, or EndoSteel, they did uncover countless other minor artifacts and knowledge, including the designs for various mechs not seen since before the Star League Civil War. Other designs were recovered from the few Archives that they were granted access to, to the chagrin of the few Great Houses that would see their own ancient designs fielded by others.
The other minor artifacts, such as the Star League collection of James Bond, the Comic Series; 'Captain Cosmos and the Deep Periphery', and telenovella series 'A Match made on Terra', while not as sought after, would provide them with additional funds as their lottery winnings ran out. S. Gaul would refer to the deals made selling some of these collections to various media corporations as 'Some of the worst one-sided deals we had to make'. An apt analysis, as by all records, the pair were given millions for collections that would net their new owners billions.
When asked how or why they set up their corporate headquarters on Dumassas, both avoid answering the question by going off on tangents. In the years since they arrived on Dumassas and founded their company, the company had grown, using the information and blueprints they had recovered to assist in restoring Dumassas' industry and military capability, along with some minor boosts to the entertainment industry.
Manufacturing and Products:
Unlike most other corporations, on Dumassas or elsewhere, K focuses on the recovery and modernization of obsolete, and 'primitive' designs. Referred to as 'Retrotech' by the founders, they believe that older designs still have potential and considerable value in the modern age, if any were willing to modernize them.
K , working alongside Ajax Industries, provided Dumassas with its first domestic tank production since being granted independence in the form of the Merkava Mark IX Main Battle Tank. While the work to establish production of the tank and all its constituent components were done by Ajax, K provided the blueprints, both for all the Merkava variants prior to and the new Mark IX. While producing several of the systems themselves, other components were sub-contracted out to other businesses on Dumassas, further spreading jobs out across a wider area.
At the time of the Raider's arrival, K were working on a joint program with Ajax on the development of domestic autocannons and potentially improved rifles, with designs already established for domestic rifle production if needed. Following the arrival of the Terrans, and the establishment of the city of Sanctum, K approached the Terrans with their blueprints in the hopes of manufacturing them. They would be granted an opportunity to turn their dreams into reality, and over time, turn the world of Dumassas/Haven into the hub of Retrotech across the Inner Sphere.
RetroTech: A definition and Advent
The term Primitive Tech is used to define technologies and designs that are either classified as such designs, such as the original Mackie battlemech, vehicle rifles, and last-generation fusion engines, and other older designs that have since fallen out of both production and use throughout the Inner Sphere and the Periphery, having long since been replaced by newer models. RetroTech, in contrast, refers to the new technologies that have been iterated from these old designs.
The Merkava for example, is a tank design that fits the definition as its various marks over time used primitive technology (Mark I-VII), modern technology but was abandoned as a design (VIII), and was reintroduced to the Inner Sphere (IX). While the Mark-IX is in some ways inferior to the Mark-VIII, the fact that it is a comparable vehicle after its reintroduction has defined what Retrotech can be.
Merkava Mark-IX
The Merkava Main Battle Tank is an ancient Main Battle Tank design, having started its service life in the 2295 under the Terran Alliance, continuing to serve as the Alliance was replaced by the Hegemony, before concluding its three hundred years of service with the end of the Reunification War in 2597. This ancient design served Terra faithfully, and while seeing almost no action under the Terran Alliance with the exception of the Terran Alliance Civil War, the Merkava would see service in every major battle of the Terran Hegemony. The Terran Alliance Hundred and Fifth Mechanized Armor Division, stationed just outside Geneva, was among the first to declare their Allegiance to James McKenna after his declaration. Using their Merkavas, they laid claim to the city, and keep much of the upper echelon of the political parties present in the city from fleeing. From there, the Merkavas would make their mark participating in James McKenna's expansion of the Terran Hegemony, as both parade units for worlds that willingly signed on, and as the armored fist on the worlds they conquered.
Being in service for over three hundred years, Leopard Armor constructed numerous factories for the vehicle across Terra and the Hegemony, in addition to licensing the design, ensuring its longevity as a vehicle even after its service in the Hegemony came to the end. In the centuries after, the Merkava in various marks and custom models, along with the parts to service them, could be found in the possession of various mercenaries, militias, and private security firms up until the Succession Wars. But by the time of the Star League Civil War, most of these factories had been demolished or converted to other designs, leading to increasingly fewer numbers of Merkavas in operations.
The Merkava Mark-IX is the first new Merkava since Leopard Armor ceased production in 2601, having been resurrected by K and now sold to the Dumassas Militia. Reflecting the reduced technological capabilities of the Succession Wars, and Dumassas's own modest capabilities, the Mark-IX was designed to be a cost-effective solution for bolstering the planet's defensive capabilities.
The first of these is the power plant, replacing the powerful Vlar 300 Fusion engine with a much simpler and cheaper locally produced Ajax 225-rated ICE. While this dropped the cruising speed to a mere 32 KPH, the removal of the Fusion Engine and its required supplementary systems freed up eight and a half tons of weight for other systems. With that free weight, the Mark-IX replaces the SRM-4 with a Shannon SH-60 SRM-6, adding on another ton of ammunition for both the SRM-6 and its replacement GM Whirlwind Class-5 autocannon. The remaining free weight was used for armor, increasing it to an incredible fifteen and a half tons of standard armor. The remaining armaments are unchanged but for their manufacturer, all of them being manufactured locally as is the rest of the tank.
The design would not see production begin until mid-3017, due to delays in establishing and retooling factory lines for the new design. In addition, several important systems, such as K 's own Hwacha LRM-15 and the Shannon SH-60 SRM-6 incorporated many handmade components, further delaying production. The first completed model would not roll off the lines until March 3018, with one tank being manufactured per month. K Enterprises and Ajax Industries are hopeful that production will rise to two tanks per month before the end of the year.
A/N: Hello all. Apologies for this not being another chapter, but the muse has not been cooperative with me. It gives me plentiful ideas for the next chapter, but it refuses to give me the words to format them into a story. For those not familiar with how I write, I like to establish a stockpile of at least one, preferably two chapters before posting. When I posted chapter 6, chapters 7-8 were largely completed. The reason for this is that in the event during discussions by all you wonderful readers, a great idea is posted, I can incorporate it into the chapter without retconning too much, or address a potential plot issue before it is even posted, to the point I may even scrap an entire section because whoever pointed out that plot hole was indeed correct.
To that end though, to try and keep writing, I will be dropping little snippets into sections like informational and side-stories to hopefully keep me inspired and everyone entertained and hopefully inspire some of you as well. All of these snippets will be important somehow to the story, even if it ends up being not that important.
Now as for how the Merkava Mark IX fits into the prior chapters as it is a new creation and by all appearances, it should have appeared, well here is the background information. Only four Merkava Mark-IXs were actually completed by the time the story started, due to slow production as stated above. All four experienced, to quote the Chieftain, "A significant Emotional event", being destroyed by a combination of the pirates' combat vehicles and many of their mechs mounting a least a single flamer. They were destroyed out of sight of the main battle scenes.
If anyone wants to take a crack at making their own company, perhaps one even among the Terrans, feel free. And if anyone wishes to see just what they can work with, if they wish to create vehicles, here is a list on the tech thread. It is not a complete list, just the current list. If anyone wishes to create one and make sure it is canon before posting here, post in the tech thread and ping me, and discussions can be had.