'He took the bait ~'
A hint of cunning flashed in Luca's eyes.
In fact, for Tony at this point in time, the most common thing he did to alleviate his anxiety was to throw himself into upgrading and modifying his Mark series Armor.
To put it bluntly, he was worried about potential future enemies and developed a 'firepower deficiency phobia'.
When he heard Luca say that better materials would be used to upgrade the robots he manufactured in the future, he immediately thought of his own Mark Armor upgrade work.
'If I replace the existing titanium alloy with this material, the Mark Armor's performance will surely be greatly improved!'
However, after hearing Tony's question, Luca did not answer immediately; he just rolled his eyes, turned back to his workbench, and pretended to study the blueprints.
But the more Luca acted this way, the more eager Tony became, and he quickly explained.
"I'm not saying I want to buy out the patent for your material; I just want a license to use it. No, no, no, as long as you accept my order and purchase the finished material, that's fine!"
Hearing Tony's words, Luca's ears twitched slightly, and he turned back around, uttering two words with a helpless tone.
"No money."
"Huh?"
Tony reached out in surprise and pointed to himself, motioning for Luca to look closely at his face.
"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 already preparing to manufacture what he called 'E-carbon' on-site to build those 'junk' robots, it stood to reason that the preparation process for this material was already very mature.
Even if the process might still be a bit complex, could the price really be more expensive than Vibranium?
In reality, if it weren't for the scarce total amount of Vibranium on the market and his own Armor's rapid upgrade iteration frequency, Tony would have long since built the Mark Armor entirely out of Vibranium.
And now this kid in front of him was saying he couldn't afford it?
Tony felt as if he was being underestimated by the other party.
However, Luca's next words made Tony slowly recover.
"It's not that you don't have money; it's that I don't have money."
"Did you forget, you guys at Stark Industries closed your weapons division four years ago, and two years ago you shut down Hammer Industries."
"After two consecutive blows, our family's company is almost bankrupt. Even with new technology, setting up factories, upgrading equipment, and recruiting employees—which one doesn't cost money?"
"It's good enough to keep the company afloat right now; I don't have that much spare money to start new businesses."
Hearing Luca say this, a hint of awkwardness immediately flashed across Tony's face.
Actually, Tony hadn't paid much attention to these things Luca mentioned before.
However, after the Battle of New York, when he learned about Luca, he did pick up on a few things, which was one of the reasons he had Pepper send his business card earlier.
However, in this situation, he could only stubbornly say,
"There wasn't much good in cooperating with a company like Justin Hammer's anyway..."
After speaking, he immediately perked up and said enthusiastically,
"The money problem is easy to solve..."
But just as he was halfway through his sentence, Luca, as if oblivious to his words, shook his head and sighed to himself.
"I don't want too much external investment coming into the company and losing management control. You understand, right? That situation where you invent something new that can benefit society, but then your plans get delayed again and again because of infighting with shareholders? It's disgusting!"
What Luca said immediately brought back some bad memories for Tony.
His uncle, Obadiah, and those useless corporate shareholders.
In fact, Tony had later bought back most of Stark Industries' shares during the period when the company's stock price fell.
This was why he could now comfortably focus on his research and be a superhero.
So he naturally understood Luca's concerns.
However, this made it a bit difficult for him to bring up his original intention of injecting capital into Orange Industries.
After a brief hesitation, Tony looked again at the young man in front of him, who resembled his younger self, and finally made a decision.
"I can provide the money!"
Seeing Luca about to speak, Tony directly raised his hand.
"Don't rush to refuse. You can establish a wholly-owned subsidiary, and the company will still be under Orange Industries."
"You only need to contribute the technology, and all the funds will come from Stark Industries."
"1 billion U.S. dollars in capital, 10% shares. Stark Industries can help your new company with site selection, manufacturing equipment, and recruiting employees. But I will only receive dividends and will not participate in management. I only require you to give Stark Industries priority purchasing rights for E-carbon!"
Saying this, Tony Stark looked at Luca, who was deep in thought, hesitated for a moment, and then dropped another bombshell.
"If you are willing, in the future, after Orange Group is established, I can also use my Stark Industries shares to exchange for Orange Group shares, allowing the two companies to have cross-shareholdings."
"Hiss ~"
Luca, who was contemplating the pros and cons, directly gasped.
'Tony is truly generous.'
Although Stark did not specify the share exchange ratio for cross-shareholding.
But even with a one-to-ten exchange, given Stark Industries' trillion-dollar scale, this yet-to-be-established Orange Group would instantly become a company with a market value of hundreds of billions.
'No, just this E-carbon manufacturing subsidiary, after Stark's investment, is already valued at tens of billions.'
In just a few words from Stark, this young master, who was on the verge of bankruptcy, was about to see his net worth multiply by a hundred times?
Luca had originally only intended to get some benefits from the other party, but he didn't expect Tony to directly stuff the fat into his mouth.
Taking a deep breath, he quickly calmed his emotions, and when he looked at Tony again, there were no longer any extra emotions in his eyes.
"Okay! However, these financial matters should be discussed by professionals later."
"People like us should be more concerned with the technology we possess!"
Of course, Luca, the impostor, was just bragging and trying to gain favor by aligning with the other party's thoughts.
But in Tony's eyes, seeing this kid calm down so quickly, an expression of admiration once again appeared on his face.
"Hmm, then let me see if your E-carbon is really worth the price."
Next, their attention returned to the blueprint, and Tony also pulled out his Mark Armor design blueprints and began to compare and analyze them.
It was as if the previous billion-dollar transaction never existed.
"I really doubt if you've studied mechanical dynamics? This robot arm is made so thick; even if E-carbon is light, it will affect the arm's output!"
"Ion confinement isn't used like this. Making such flashy transformations only increases power by 20%. With that space, you might as well replace it with ion thrusters, which can also provide flight capability!"
"Why is there such a large hollow design in the robot's chest? What? Do you want to take your head off and put it in to pilot the mecha?"
"Harro! Hit him!"