Weyland Consortium

Aside from its dramatic and public association with the New Angeles Space Elevator, better known as “Jack’s Beanstalk” or simply “the Beanstalk” after designer Jack Weyland, the extent of the Weyland Consortium’s holdings is little known among the general population. This shadowy organization owns or invests in other corporations, leveraging the enormous assets granted them by the Beanstalk to buy and sell smaller megacorps at an alarming rate. For the past several decades, the Weyland Consortium’s obvious specialty has been construction, a legacy of its involvement in the Space Elevator project. Many of its subsidiaries are construction companies, often on a local level, or suppliers for construction companies. By some estimates, half the arcologies in New Angeles were built by a Weyland Consortium-controlled company, and cunning accounting and business practices ensure that even when the client companies fold, the Consortium somehow comes out ahead. Part of the secret of the Weyland Consortium’s success lies in its ability to secure government contracts and lobby for favorable legislation, especially in the United States and China. It is often a war profiteer, securing lucrative reconstruction bids in the Mediterranean, United Korea, and the Sub-Saharan League nations. In the wake of the Lunar War, Weyland snatched up almost 70% of the orbital reconstruction contracts on Earth and nearly all of the Heinlein contracts. Unfortunately for Weyland, its apparent magic with local governments does not appear to extend to the Martian separatists, who consider the Weyland Consortium a corporate extension of Earth’s hegemony. Still, Weyland remains confident that the bright future of the human race is in outer space. The Consortium is a major source of funding for space exploration and continues to acquire aerospace and orbital construction companies. Some suggest that the Weyland Consortium seeks a monopoly in outer space, that it wants to control all human habitation outside Earth’s atmosphere. Many of these alarmists are Martians who distrust the Weyland Consortium on principle. Given the Weyland Consortium’s proclivity for operating in war-torn regions, it should be no surprise the corporation is comfortable playing hardball. While little has been proven, some mysterious deaths are blamed on elements within the Consortium. Weyland favors a brute-force approach to most problems, using its vast resources to get its way.