Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile ("Mao-Kwik" or "Maokwik") is a company owned in part by Jules-Pierre Mao, assumed to be the result of a merger between his company and Kwikowski Mutual Interest Group. It is one of the fifty largest corporations in the Belt.
History[]
Background[]
The corporation was originally a legal firm involved in the failure of the Venusian cloud cities (which were slated to be built by Tycho Manufacturing and Engineering Concern) eight decades ago. The lawsuit, after the project fell through, lasted for decades, and Mao-Kwik earned a significant amount of money, which allowed them to diversify and expand, mostly into interplanetary transport.
Eros Incident[]
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Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile (MKM) was Protogen’s parent company prior to the Eros incident. They supplied nearly everything Protogen used on Eros and to construct Thoth Station, such as medical equipment, the radiation rooms, the surveillance and encryption infrastructure.
They were at least partly aware of Protogen's illegal activities, as Mao's wife Ariadne tried prior to the Eros incident to persuade their daughter Julie to return home for her safety; then during the aftermath, MKM argued that they didn't know what their equipment was used for, and no evidence was found to implicate them. After Protogen was exposed, they turned over a terabyte of confidential correspondence with Protogen to the investigative committee charged with getting to the bottom of the conspiracy, implicating others, such as Gutmansdottir and Kolp.
Ganymede Incident[]
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However, it was later discovered that Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile had been working with rogue factions of the United Nations and Martian Congressional Republic to create human-protomolecule hybrid soldiers. The United Nations sentenced Mao to life imprisonment, and Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile was disbanded, and its assets nationalized.
Notes[]
- The luxury cruise yacht owned by J.P. Mao, the Guanshiyin, has a Mao-Kwik logo on the doors as well as on the docking bay.
- The racing pinnacle the Razorback also has the Mao-Kwik logo.
- The Mao-Kwik logo consists of the Chinese glyph 毛 that is pronounced as "Mao"[1], and a K standing for Kwikowski.
- The Chinese glyph 毛 also translates to "hair." The proper name glyph should be 茅.
