(A.K.A. DUCKING THE BLAME)
One of the big issues that whoever gets that top seat is going to have to deal with is the fallout from CFD and dealing with where the blame falls. From what ev- eryone seems to be saying, the private blame is going to hit NeoNET, and thanks to Boston their corporate beatdown will seem like a punishment for something in that city and not CFD. The monad issue is going to have eyes over on Evo as they’ve opened their doors to all, even while blame falls elsewhere for the root cause. But even with all that to come for the new boss, Evo has already begun the process of avoiding damage to their bottom line by compartmentalizing and making early changes. Evo, as a specific brand, will be virtually non-existent by the end of the year. Over the course of the next few months they’ll rebrand everything into their existing subsidiaries or create new ones in order to keep the Evo brand name off existing products.
The megacorporation will still be known for its open acceptance of all, and anyone applying for employment or citizenship with Evo will be brought through Evo offic- es and headquarters and then transferred to where they are needed. Tracking ownership back to Evo is going to become one of those unpleasant and long data hunts you send the hacker on while they’re still jacked up on long haul. This will hopefully create the kind of separa- tion the megacorporation needs in order to avoid dam- aging business with their efforts on the monad issue, which I’ll cover later.
For now, let’s look at those rebranding efforts and ex- pose why they are so important when Evo is not the corp taking the blame. The two biggest reasons are views on tech advancement and efforts to avoid losses when the Revision Committee comes to look at Evo assets.
Tech advancements are usually viewed in one of two ways: with awe and wonder by those who see the val- ue the tech adds to life, and with suspicion and fear by those who wonder what the tech costs, both in terms of money and morals. The latter is the group Evo is trying
to avoid rousing simply by the presence of their name. They don’t want people to become instantly suspicious of their newest products just because they are made by Evo. That may sound suspicious, and it is. The reason for Evo’s sudden tech leap has nothing to do with years of hard work finally coming to fruition and everything to do with their new relationship with the monads. Again, more on that later, but for right now I’d like to just men- tion a few points where Evo has been gaining new in- sights and what that means for us and maybe a com- ment or two about the world at large.
Evo has new gadgets and tech galore. They’ve re- cently starting field testing and limited release on prod- ucts through Pensodyne, Lightning, Roskosmos, Red Star, CrashCart, ByDesign, and a suddenly well-funded little corp called Arcane Revolutions. These tests are also just the things that these companies have announced publicly. I’m sure some of our esteemed members have seen more than just these corps and the products they’ve announced hit the local gangs, squatters, and barrens “volunteers” over the past months.
>
Chip truth. ByDesign is new on the market, but the bleeding-edge cyber that street rippers are claiming came from them is generations ahead of even the top SpIn and MCT designs. The money that’s being paid to snag some of these guys is way out of standard range too. I haven’t seen much of it, as the front end is really low or non- existent and the back-end requires the target to not self- destruct. A few messy jobs later and I’ve stopped taking them.>
Balladeer>
Arcane Revolutions is a front for Evo?! No wonder. I did ajob to try to snag a few guttermages who were burnt out from slinging a few too many cheap-o spells for kicks. Easy gig. Hackster tracked the money back to AR. Small, no major red flags. That should have been the red flag. Point is, three weeks later I see one of those guttermages on the street, and he recognizes me. He’s dressed a lot nicer and has a nice AR corporate pin on his lapel. I’m ready to walk away when I get this little tingle on my neck, and he’s wiggling his fingers and smiling at me. He invites me for a sit down, and though I’m seriously leery I grab a cup of soykaf. He’s super grateful and tells me all about how I saved his life and how AR has revolutionary techniques to help rekindle the Talent. Bulldrek meter fills up, and then when we’re about to leave he asks if I want my arm healed. It was in a sling and cast from a too- close shotgun blast and was on its way to the ghoul feeder once I scraped the cash for a replacement, maybe before if the infections got worse. I decline politely, thinking the last time I saw him healing a paper cut would have likely stroked him out. He insists, and I get ready to dial the meat wagon. Moral of the story: my arms healed, he didn’t even break a sweat, and AR has some prime techniques that could change the world forever.
>
Sticks>
Pensodyne has some field test offers out that seem likepart of this. Bioware systems that seem ahead of their time and some gene therapies they claim create zero cyber rejection. They’ve put out some nanoware pitches too, but I’ve been skeptical of all of it because it all sounds too good to be true. The sales line is too heavy. All of it was probably true, and there’s probably some teenage street knife out there right now running with next-gen systems and no clue, or care, where the tech came from.
>
Stone>
With the deep space trip coming up, a lot of runs againstRoskosmos have occurred in the last year hoping to get some info on the ship. Evo finally laid full claim on Roskosmos and moved in Yamatetsu Marines to guard all of the high-security facilities, but it wasn’t soon enough to keep plenty of plans from leaking out. None of them appear to be the actual deep-space ship, but Evo might
be the first to make civilian space-faring vessels a reality. That’s if the plans I’ve seen even make a functional ship. It’s way beyond my schooling, and no one is taking it seriously enough to make me an offer high enough to compel me to dig up a preview.
>
Mika>
Any chance these designs show the finished product, andit looks like a flying needle?
>
Kane>
They do and it does.>
Mika>
Give me a PM and we’ll talk. I’ve seen several out overthe South Atlantic and have a decent idea where they’re taking off from. Let’s get you paid and this info to the right people. Namely me, so I can become the first space privateer!
>
Kane>
Don’t like the sound of space pirate?>
Slamm-0!>
I plan to be funded early on. Piracy will come later.>
Kane>
Saotome and Lightning have collaborated on the releaseof limited supplies of a new product for market evaluation. It’s a seaweed breed supposedly grown on Central Pacific open-ocean farms. Documentation on it states it has a growth rate ten times faster than its base species, its growth absorbs unsafe levels of heavy metals and carbon from the water, and it releases oxygen back into the ocean cycle at a parallel rate to its growth.
>
Ecotope>
SeaBites! Those are so delicious. The texture’s great too.It almost makes me forget that I’m eating processed seaweed in the shape of little fish. This stuff better make it big. It’s actually good.
>
Slamm-0!>
Slamm-0!, you ever notice how little in the way of valuableinformation you contribute here?
>
Glitch>
Challenge accepted!>
Slamm-0!Their corporate maneuvering places more value in Evo’s assets than in the parent megacorporation. This will help Evo subsidiaries maintain independent ranks if they are already a single- or double-A and provide them with increased asset value with which to hold rank, improve
rank, or just avoid being bought by another megacorpo- ration. Some of these companies are breaking down even further into smaller subsidiaries to add more steps to the identification process and help focus the business and employment of each segment. Their efforts are leading to a lot of work identifying whether or not new players are actually new, part of Evo, or part of another corp looking to use the same strategy in order to avoid being down- graded by the Corporate Court. As long as Yamatetsu stays within the Evo primary corp, they’ve got their seat and can help out all their subsidiaries by divesting funds and value into the mix. Being at the bottom of the Big Ten still offers more power than being the biggest of the AAs.