The Mech Touch novel Chapter 1089

The Aurora Titan held two meanings to Ves. He did not plan on explaining to anyone of the deeper meaning that came from his heart.

The memory of witnessing and facilitating complete resonance was his and only his to enjoy in the comfort of his mind.

As to the others, Aurora Titan was simply a fancy and exaggerated way to describe his super-medium space knight. The word titan stood for his mech’s larger size while the word aurora alluded to the visual glow that polarizing fields emanated when they became active.

Aurora Titan. A name that came with two entirely separate meanings.

It satisfied both the emotional and descriptive requirements for an appropriate name for his new mech design.

Eventually, someone started to ask a very important question. "So.. how much do you expect to charge for this Aurora Titan? It looks like a really expensive mech."

Ves constantly tried to figure that out himself. The added size and bulk increased its cost substantially, and the polarizing module itself wasn’t cheap by any means.

He could not afford to underprice the Aurora Titan.

At the same time, he also couldn’t overprice the Aurora Titan either. If he charged 100 million credits or more, he would break through a psychological price barrier that would instantly deter the vast majority of buyers in the market looking to supplement their outfits with a sturdy space knight!

Right now, Ves had not fleshed out his draft design into an exact set of schematics that fully outlined its component and material usage. He still possessed some freedom to adjust the final cost of his mech in his subsequent design work.

Nevertheless, it would be better if he defined its pricing beforehand so that he could plan around it from the very start. It was better than to name a price at the end where he had little choice in the matter.

"I think the base price of the Aurora Titan will not be less than 80 million credits." Ves finally announced.

A lot of people held their breaths. Sure, a real heavy mech cost at least three or four times as much. Yet compared to the cheapest edition of the Blackbeak, the Aurora Titan demanded at least 20 million credits more!

By setting his target at designing a mech that people would be willing to fork out 80 million credits to buy a copy, Ves determined that his actual design should not cost more than 60 million credits to produce.

This cost limit not only included the cost of exotics and raw materials, but also the capital and labor required to produce it. In addition, Ves also needed to take into account the various royalties each copy bequeathed to the licensors of the components used in the Aurora Titan design.

Designing and producing a mech was expensive business! The figures only racked up even higher as the size, bulk and quality of the design increased!

For an instant, Ves considered whether he should design a light skirmisher instead. He wouldn’t have to deal with such insanely high prices when he designed a smaller and thinner mech.

Ves quickly shook his head. It wasn’t in his nature to give up on a mech design before he even completed it. To charge 80 million credits for his super-medium space knight was a fair price to ask considering its strengths.

Even so, he wasn’t ignorant of the challenges. Neither was Gavin, who looked troubled at the prospect of trying to market a weird mech that cost so much.

"It will be a hard sell." Gavin said. "It’s one thing if you’re a Journeyman. The market is more willing to trust your design ability that they won’t automatically scoff at such a high price. The problem is that you aren’t one. Not yet. For an Apprentice to dabble so much in the premium price segment as you makes you seem rather greedy. Publishing an even more expensive mech design than the last two will only reinforce your reputation as a money grubber."

"Quality comes at a price." Ves stated. "The Aurora Titan is very capable as a defensive space knight. It is worth every credit as long as their owners and mech pilots employ them correctly."

"Even with the support of Professor Ventag and NORA Consolidated, I don’t foresee that we can capture any significant market share for your mech. A lot of people don’t like the idea of super-medium mechs in the first place. Your mech design will attract a lot of negative comments due to that factor alone."

"I’m already aware of the consequences. Innovation is not without its bumps. Even if the Aurora Titan flops on the market, I still won’t regret designing it due to all of the lessons I’ve learned in the design process. If I ever design another space knight, I’ll be able to take all of the pitfalls I’ve encountered previously into account."

This was a form of hedging usually employed by mech designers. So what if one of their mech designs flopped? They could easily attempt to design another mech of the same type but with a concept to see whether their second attempt succeeded.

In fact, design studios turned this practice into the core part of their business model. They pumped out design after design, many of which consisted of variants of their base model designs in order to offer any company in need of a mech design to round out their mech catalog an enormous amount of choice.

It didn’t matter if ninety-nine percent of their mech designs never got licensed. Just a single success made up for all of the effort spent on designing the flops!

This also illustrated that designing a mech did not cost a mech designer all that much. Perhaps the most valuable resource they wasted was time. All those months or years spent on designing a failed mech design that would never see any use could have been used to design a better mech.

Regarding time, younger mech designers often possessed a lackadaisical attitude towards it. Since they were so young, they had all the time in the world to explore their design capabilities and to experiment with their developing design philosophies.

Only until they reached middle age or older would they begin to feel the press of time. All that time wasted on designing failures could have been used to design successful mech designs that earned them lots of money or pushed their advancement forward!

After a hearty and honest discussion, Ves dismissed the gathering, satisfied with the feedback he received. None of his confidants held back in expressing their honest thoughts. To them, Ves was still Ves instead of some mythical figure as he was sometimes portrayed in the news. _{ƒreewebɳovel.com}