From Amsterdam to Venice

June, now deep into summer, the entirety of Prussia remained unaffected by war. The streets and alleys of Berlin teemed with pedestrians, shops and factories operated normally, presenting a vibrant scene.

For two months, Ernst had been busy with the establishment of the Hohenzollern Development Bank. Fortunately, setting up a bank in this era was relatively easy, with fewer prerequisites and regulations.

After two months of preparation, the Hohenzollern Development Bank was officially founded. Numerous company executives under Ernst attended the opening ceremony. Following the confirmation of equity with the many factories under Ernst's control, the Hohenzollern Conglomerate began to take shape.

Upon its establishment, the Hohenzollern Development Bank, in addition to offering basic services like savings and loans, made its first major move by funding the creation of the Berlin Electric Company and the Berlin Energy and Power Company.

This was, naturally, Ernst's brainchild. Currently, these two companies were mere shells. To find management personnel for the new companies, Ernst went to great lengths. Besides visiting various universities, he conducted inspections of companies within the industry and placed recruitment advertisements in newspapers. After a substantial screening process, On July 28th, Étienne Lenoir, a Frenchman, became the first General Manager of the Berlin Energy and Power Company. This Étienne Lenoir was the inventor of the first internal combustion engine.

Although Lenoir was a significant proponent of internal combustion engine development, his research had consumed vast financial resources, and no one had invested in collaboration with him. Consequently, he was not wealthy and lived a rather frugal life.

Upon receiving Ernst's invitation, he readily accepted, as Ernst not only offered a generous salary but also promised to support his research.

Concurrently, a young man on the verge of graduation, Karl Friedrich Benz, became Lenoir's assistant.

At this time, Karl Benz was still a student about to graduate from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in the Baden-Württemberg region of Germany.

Ernst discovered him early and appointed him directly as the assistant to the elder Mr. Lenoir, bypassing his original historical career path of factory internships.

The Berlin Energy and Power Company also purchased the engine patent of a young Frenchman, Alphonse Bo-Rochat, and appointed him as a technical consultant, thus forming the initial structure of the company.

This Alphonse Bo-Rochat is not famous in history, but it was he who historically preemptively registered the patent for Nikolaus Otto's carburetor.

Nikolaus Otto was the inventor of the four-stroke engine in history. Ernst had initially intended to recruit this inventor, who influenced the course of human history, for a senior position in the company.

However, it was unfortunately too late. Nikolaus Otto had already obtained the patent rights for innovations in the two-stroke engine in 1863. Soon after, he found a partner to provide him with funding, named Eugen Langen. Eugen Langen was the son of a German sugar merchant, a typical rich second-generation heir. Together, they founded a company manufacturing internal combustion engines.

Nikolaus Otto currently had no need to seek new partners or investors; their factory was already profitable.

The newly established Berlin Energy and Power Company also recruited many recent university graduates as talent reserves. University students of this era were genuine elites. With these talents, the Berlin Energy and Power Company began to look quite substantial.

Ernst's first directive to the new company was to develop a more advanced four-stroke engine based on Alphonse Bo-Rochat's patent.

Historically, Alphonse Bo-Rochat's patent did not result in any prototype production and was thus forgotten. However, Ernst still purchased his patent and intended to further refine and develop it.

Coupled with the assistance of Lenoir, a pioneer in the field of internal combustion engines, this goal was not insurmountable for the new company. They might even manage to develop a practical four-stroke engine before Nikolaus Otto.

As the first person to invent an internal combustion engine, Lenoir's engine, though rudimentary and extremely inefficient, made him one of the most knowledgeable individuals in the world on the subject.

With Benz, the designated successor, in the future, Ernst could lay the groundwork for the automotive industry in advance.

On October 3rd, the young Carl von Linde was appointed as the first General Manager of the Hohenzollern Development Bank, and the Berlin Electric Company commenced operations.

Compared to industries like internal combustion engines, which had steam engines as a precursor, the theory of electricity had only recently emerged, with many theories still immature.

Ernst scoured all of Europe to find Carl von Linde as the only suitable candidate. Carl von Linde was historically the inventor of the refrigerator.

As for other talents in the field of electricity, they were too difficult to find. The most famous Siemens family in Germany was itself aristocratic and highly regarded by the Prussian government, leaving no room for Ernst to intervene.

Moreover, Siemens was synonymous with being a prodigy. Ernst only knew of America's Edison and Tesla as figures comparable to them, not counting the theoretical giants.

These were all geniuses Ernst had painstakingly sought out. As a science and engineering student, Ernst knew of many famous scientists and inventors from later generations. However, some had already achieved fame, others were still obscure in some corner of Europe or America, or were still children or not yet born.

After filtering out those too young or not requiring investment or collaboration, the task was like searching for a needle in a haystack across the globe.

Fortunately, neither of these fields had yet unleashed their full potential and represented the cutting edge of technology for the era. The number of individuals engaged in related industries and research was limited.

By focusing on companies and renowned universities already making strides in these fields, it was possible to find a few prominent figures.

For the Berlin Electric Company, Ernst had no "cheat codes" and could only rely on his subordinates to make small innovations in line with the era's development.

In the future, they would need to follow the lead of Siemens and some American companies. After all, earning a modest income through patent licensing to operate factories was feasible.

On October 20th, while the Congress of Vienna was in session, Ernst visited the port of Amsterdam in the Netherlands for an inspection. His objective this time was to find suitable partners to prepare for the development of the Far East market.

As his hometown in his previous life, Ernst naturally held a deep affection for the Far East. Of course, the lure of profit was also irresistible. Besides resource-rich regions, the contemporary world's areas eyed greedily by European colonial powers and major nations due to their vast populations were India and East Asia.

India, that mystical country, was Britain's lifeline. Moreover, with the peculiar mindset of the Indian people, Ernst dared not get involved.

East Asia, however, was different. Ernst could confidently claim that no one in Europe understood East Asia better than he did. Compared to countries like India, which capitulated upon encountering a strong enemy, the people of East Asia possessed a certain resilience. This led to Western powers opening the doors of a certain major country in East Asia, yet finding it difficult to establish a firm foothold.

Even if all the major powers united, they could not fully control the situation in East Asia. The internal factions were a chaotic mess. Even for a Prussian, blending in to make a profit would not be conspicuous, allowing Ernst to fish in troubled waters.

However, Ernst could not possibly swim to East Asia himself to get involved. Therefore, he needed to cooperate with long-distance commercial shipping fleets. Recently, Ernst had reached agreements with several established Dutch long-distance trading companies. Ernst would send people to East Asia to establish purely commercial outposts, while the Dutch would earn the middleman's profit.

The transportation of goods between Europe and East Asia, as well as the transmission of commercial intelligence, would have to rely on the Dutch. Compared to a country like the Netherlands, whose foundation was commerce, Ernst did not trust the British. If a prominent German aristocrat like himself sought cooperation in Britain, would the British government pay special attention? Ernst wished to avoid any dealings with officialdom, as it meant trouble, especially without any connections in Britain!

Although the Dutch, having been sanctioned by the British, could not match the cost-effectiveness and safety of the British in long-distance trade, they were more cautious about damaging their reputation than the British. After all, the Dutch relied on commercial trade for their survival, and credibility was more important in Europe.

Of course, Amsterdam in the Netherlands was merely Ernst's best option for the time being. In the future, Ernst would shift his focus to ports along the Mediterranean coast.

Within a few years, after the opening of the Suez Canal, Ernst could leverage this intelligence advantage to establish his own fleet and routes.

Furthermore, after Germany's unification, commercial trade routes could pass through Austria. Prince Constantin had some old friends in the Austrian Empire. After all, Hechingen was not far from Austria. Geographically, Hechingen was closer to Vienna than to Berlin, implying a safer route.

Finally, through ports on the Adriatic Sea like Venice, and via the Suez Canal, they could avoid the long detour around the western coast of Africa, directly halving the distance to East Asia and reducing shipping costs.

Not to mention, goods departing from the Netherlands could also be transshipped through the Mediterranean and the Suez Canal to their destinations.

Before Ernst's long-held plan could commence, Hamburg in Germany also served as a transitional option, but that would have to wait until after Germany's unification. The German region currently lacked experience in long-distance commerce, and their shipbuilding technology was inferior to that of the Netherlands and Venice.

Therefore, Ernst was not in a hurry to invest in shipyards in Hamburg. The current focus was on Venice. The scale of his own industries had not yet reached a point where they were heavily reliant on maritime transport, as he had not yet ventured into bulk commodity trading. Thus, even though transporting goods from Berlin to Venice, under the rule of the Austrian Empire, involved land transport, Ernst could afford the cost.

It would be timely to establish a fleet in Hamburg later, when he engaged in the trade of large-volume goods.

Therefore, the groundwork for establishing a presence in the Mediterranean could begin. After concluding his trip to the Netherlands, Ernst planned to conduct an inspection around the Adriatic Sea.