He took the bait~
A flash of cunning gleamed in Luca's eyes.
In fact, for Tony at this point in time, the thing he did most to alleviate his anxiety was to immerse himself in upgrading and modifying his Mark series armors. To put it bluntly, he suffered from "insufficient firepower phobia" due to worry about potential future enemies.
When he heard Luca say that he would use better materials to upgrade his robots in the future, Tony immediately linked it to his own Mark armor upgrade projects.
If I replace the existing titanium-gold alloy with this material, the performance of the Mark armor will inevitably be significantly improved!
However, after hearing Tony's inquiry, Luca didn't answer immediately. He simply rolled his eyes, turned back to the workbench, and pretended to look at the blueprints.
The more Luca acted this way, the more tempted Tony became. He quickly explained:
"I'm not saying I want to buy out the patent for your material. Just an authorization to use it—no, no, no, as long as you accept my orders and let me buy the finished material, that's enough!"
Hearing this, Luca's ears twitched slightly. He turned back around and uttered two words with a helpless tone:
"No money..."
"Huh?"
Tony gestured to his own face with a look of utter bewilderment, signaling Luca to look closely at who he was.
"Are you saying I can't afford it? Look at who I am! I'm Tony Stark! The richest man in the world!"
Since Luca was prepared to manufacture this "E-Carbon" on-site to build that "junk" robot, the preparation process for the material must be quite mature. Even if the process was tedious, could the price possibly be higher than Vibranium?
In fact, if the total amount of Vibranium on the market wasn't so scarce and his own armor iterations weren't so frequent, Tony would have used full sets of Vibranium to build Mark armors long ago.
Now this kid was saying he couldn't afford it? Tony felt like he was being looked down upon.
However, Luca's next words made Tony snap back to reality.
"I didn't say you have no money. I said I have no money."
"Did you forget? Four years ago, Stark Industries shut down its weapons department, and two years ago, you took down Hammer Industries."
"After those consecutive blows, my family's company is on the verge of bankruptcy. Even with new technology, setting up a factory, upgrading equipment, and recruiting employees—which of those doesn't cost money?"
"I'm lucky if I can keep the company alive right now; I don't have the spare cash to start a new business line."
Hearing this, a flash of embarrassment crossed Tony's face.
In the past, Tony wouldn't have cared about these things. However, after the Battle of New York, when he looked into Luca's background, he learned a bit about the situation. This was one of the reasons he had Pepper give out her business card earlier.
In this situation, he could only say stubbornly:
"A company like Justin Hammer's wasn't really worth collaborating with anyway..."
After saying that, he immediately perked up again and spoke with great interest.
"The money issue is easy to handle—"
But just as he got halfway through his sentence, Luca acted as if he hadn't noticed him speaking and sighed, shaking his head.
"I don't want to let too much external investment into the company and lose management control. You should understand, right? That feeling when you've invented something new that can benefit society, but the plan gets delayed over and over again because of infighting with shareholders? It's disgusting!"
Luca's words immediately triggered some unpleasant memories for Tony.
His uncle, Obadiah Stane, and those useless group shareholders. In fact, Tony had already repurchased the vast majority of Stark Industries' shares during the period when the stock price dropped. This was what allowed him to conduct his research and be a superhero with peace of mind.
Therefore, he could naturally understand the concerns Luca mentioned.
However, this made it a bit difficult for him to bring up his original idea of injecting capital into Aurantius Industries.
After a slight hesitation, Tony looked at the kid who reminded him so much of his younger self and finally made a decision.
"I can provide the funds!"
Seeing Luca about to speak, Tony raised his hand.
"Don't be so quick to refuse. You can establish a wholly-owned subsidiary, and the company will still remain under Aurantius Industries."
"You only need to contribute technology as equity; all the capital will be provided by Stark Industries."
"One billion US dollars in funding for a 10% stake. Stark Industries can help you with the new company's site selection, manufacturing equipment, and recruitment. But I will only take dividends and will not participate in management. I only need you to give Stark Industries priority purchasing rights for E-Carbon!"
Saying this, Tony Stark looked at Luca, who was silent and deep in thought. After a moment's hesitation, he dropped another bombshell:
"If you're willing, after the Aurantius Group is established in the future, I can even use my shares in Stark Industries to swap for shares in the Aurantius Group, allowing the two companies to achieve cross-shareholding."
"Hiss~"
Luca, who was weighing the pros and cons, sucked in a breath of cold air.
Tony is really going all out.
Although Stark didn't specify the exchange ratio for the cross-shareholding, even at a ten-to-one ratio, given Stark Industries' trillion-dollar scale, this yet-to-be-established Aurantius Group would instantly leap to a valuation of hundreds of billions.
Wait, just this subsidiary for manufacturing E-Carbon is already valued at ten billion after Stark's investment.
With just a few sentences from Stark, the net worth of this little young master on the brink of bankruptcy was about to multiply a hundredfold?
Luca, who originally only intended to "borrow" some resources, didn't expect Tony to shove a piece of fatty meat right into his mouth.
Taking a deep breath, he quickly calmed his emotions. When he looked at Tony again, his eyes were clear of excess feeling.
"Deal! However, we should leave these financial details to professionals to discuss later."
"People like us should care more about the technology we hold in our hands!"
Of course, Luca, the "fake" genius, was just talking big to align with the other party's mindset and boost favorability. However, in Tony's eyes, seeing how quickly the kid calmed down, a look of admiration appeared on his face once more.
"Hmm. Then let me see if this E-Carbon of yours is actually worth the price."
Next, the two returned their gaze to the blueprints. Tony pulled up the design diagrams for his Mark armor and began a comparative analysis. It was as if the billion-dollar deal from moments ago didn't even exist.
"I seriously doubt you've ever studied mechanical dynamics. These robot arms are so thick; even if E-Carbon is light, it will affect the arm's power output!"
"Ion constraint isn't used like that. Making such fancy transformations only increases power by 20%. With that space, you'd be better off swapping it for ion jet ports so you can have flight capability!"
"Designing such a huge hollow in the robot's chest? What? Are you planning to take your own head off and put it in there to pilot the mecha?"
"Haro! Hit him!!"