Biogene
Earth Headquarters: El Dorado
Assets: 875 billion scrip
Focus: Genetic engineering, pharmaceuticals, biomods, geriatrics
Biogene is Earth's first, greatest, and in many ways definitive Incorporate, representing everything good and bad about them. Founded fifty years before the Blight, Biogene pioneered and codified the form and structure that all of Earth's subsequent megacorporations would follow. In 2199 it is one of Earth's dominant institutions, trailing only the GEO and a handful of independent states, and its empire includes holdings on Luna and the Belt.
Biogene won the right to build El Dorado in 2040, creating an environment where the company could set its own labor laws, operate tax-free, and diversify without antitrust action. Biogene promptly became an international pariah for the next 50 years, earning its reputation by a laundry list of activities that included violating an international ban on cloning, broadcasting the public executions of foreign nationals, and working with Germany and America to bioengineer the first human genetic redesign for a military black project.
The Blight proved a windfall for Biogene, destroying the company's major agribusiness competitor Fischer Foods and letting Biogene capture almost all of their remaining assets in the chaos. The company was instrumental in the Icarus Accords, establishing the conditions by which other corporations could ascend to Incorporate status. Most significantly, Biogene under Desmond Ballard won enormous and lasting contracts with major governments, the UN, and eventually the GEO; Biogene is rightly proud of its role in helping humanity survive the Blight.
Richer and more powerful than ever before, the Ballard family has spent the 22nd century investing Biogene's money heavily into philanthropy to shore up their new and improved image. The Ballards pour billions of scrip each year into higher education and charities around the world, and one of the company's pet projects is attempting to revive extinct species, partly to undo the damage of the Blight; Earth's only surviving sperm whale, Desmond, is one such clone.
Biogene on Poseidon
Poseidon Headquarters: Cliffside
Already ruling a space empire, Biogene naturally expanded to Poseidon, where it has more than 30% of its net worth invested in 2199. Biogene's first center was Haven's Ballard Arcology, but has since been relocated to Cliffside.
While most heavily concentrated in New Hawaii, Biogene's properties are far-flung, and the company maintains one of the largest standing security forces on the planet to protect them all.
See also
- Cochise Station, a fanmade Biogene research base on Apache in the Zion Islands