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A transportation company based on Troy (DM-39 14192).
The Trojan Exploration Corporation (TEC) is wholly owned by the Trojan Stock Exchange (TSE) and is their personal transportation company. Transportation contracts are traded through the stock exchange and the TEC has no sales department of its own. The Trojan public companies fund the costs of employment and training of crews and the construction and repair of starships. The TEC represents all of Troy's companies and reports both directly to them and the Trojan Stock Exchange.
All TEC employees are also members of the Trojan Territorial Navy. During combat training exercises one or more TEC ships are always rotated out of normal operperations to join the Star Combine Navy. In the event of a crisis, the Trojan Territorial Navy (TTN) has the right to take over all of the Trojan Exploration Corporation's ships and use them for the duration of the emergency. Because of the TEC's military role, any non-native company wishing to use the TEC to move goods must first pass a security vetting by the Trojan Intelligence Service (TIS).
Following the discovery of the natural wormhole in the Troy system in 132 AI (2348 AD), the Trojan Exploration Corporation was set up by the Troy government to take commercial advantage of the wormhole. At this time TEC was a self-regulating government agency and its original function was to investigate the phenomenon, and develop commercial applications from it.
One year after it was founded the corporation proved that the wormhole was stable and that spaceships could safely pass through it to the Kruger (Kruger 60) star system. A TEC survey showed that the eight planets and numerous asteroids on the far side of the wormhole were rich in minerals and that one of the planets was partially habitable. However, TEC advised against colonisation of this planet because Kruger 60 B, one of the system's two stars, was a flare star.
The Trojan government accepted the Trojan Exploration Corporation's recommendation and auctioned off mining rights for the new star system, which were bought by the Eastern Mining Company. The money raised by the auction was given to the corporation, which decide to carry out research to see if wormholes could be created between Troy and other star systems.
The corporation examined the two years of wormhole research data and decided to concentrate on two projects. The project most popular with the corporations scientists was the "StarGate" project. This was an attempt to create a linked pair of gates that would connect two points in space. However, by 138 AI (2354 AD) the corporation was no closer to getting the project to work. The project was scaled back and most of the scientists were transferred to the second project.
The second project was the "StarDrive" project. This was an attempt to create a wormhole around an object and use that wormhole to move the object to another location. At first this project was seen as the least likely to succeed, as the first few probes failed to move or disappeared to never be seen again. However, in 136 AI (2352 AD) debris from a destroyed probe was found 0.01 AU away from the point at which it was launched and the technology was proven be workable. In 148 AI (2364 AD), the Trojan Exploration Corporation tested a prototype starship and the StarDrive project was hailed as a success.
The government congratulated TEC on the success of their starship, before auctioning it off to the highest bidder. StarDrive Industries bought 99 year patent rights. With the project completed TEC scaled back on research and about a third of their technical and scientific staff went over to work for StarDrive Industries.
The Troy government also took this time to privatise the Trojan Exploration Corporation. In order to ensure it would not favour one Trojan company over another 100 percent of the stock was sold to the Trojan Stock Exchange. The TEC was given a new task - one that would require more than one starship. The corporations new role was to travel to other star systems. It would contact other colonised star systems and negotiate trade agreements on behalf of all Trojan businesses. It would also survey uninhabited star systems to assess their economic potential. The Troy government gave both the money raised from the StarDrive auction and the money from the privatisation back to the TEC in order to finance construction of a small fleet of starships.
The following year StarDrive Industries completed TEC's first few starships and the ships headed out to visit the closest systems to Troy. Some of these ship used the wormhole to Kruger (Kruger 60) as a short cut and this sparked a dispute with the Eastern Mining Company, who had bought the mining rights to the Kruger system back in 133 AI (2349 AD). EMC demanded royalty payments for the use of "their" wormhole. After TEC refused to pay EMC took out a six month injunction preventing TEC ships from entering their space. However, they backed down on the first day of the injunction, when the chief judge of the Trojan Supreme Court pointed out that they had only bought mining rights to the Kruger 60 system and would be heavily penalised if they tried to renew the injunction without some actual evidence that they owned the wormhole. EMC's legal director took early retirement later the same year.
Relations between the two companies remain strained for the next twenty one years with, both of them ordering their ships to avoid radio contact, except in emergencies. The silence was broken in 170 AI (2386 AD), when farm workers on Kruger's habitable world, ordered a shipment of goods that was delivered by a TEC ship. The farm workers welcomed the ship's crew and gave them an open invitation to return whenever they wanted. After that ships started stopping off to pick up supplies of real food. When managers of both companies realised that relations had been unofficially restored, they formalised the arrangement.
In 176 AI (2392 AD), one year after destroying the planet Wolf in the First Interstellar War, the Centaur Attack Fleet assisted a military coup in their home system and the Centaur Federation was born. The new power bloc began to seize control in the worlds that were previously controlled by the Wolf Dictatorship. Because the Centaurs had used the Wolf Wormhole to attack the Wolf homeworld, there was fear on Troy that the Federation might try to use the wormhole between Kruger and Troy to invade Troy. Trojan shareholders demanded a national solution to the risk of invasion. Troy began negotiations with its trading partners.
The Trojan government passed an emergency law forming a reservist navy called the Trojan Territorial Navy. The ships of the Trojan Exploration Corporation were requisitioned by the government, and their crews were drafted into the Trojan Territorial Navy. The ships were upgraded to give them some fighting capability and help boost patrols of the Kruger and Troy systems while Trojan negotiators seek a long term solution.
The following year, negotiations to deal with the "Centaur problem" concluded with the formation of the 9 Star Combine. Like the other eight members Troy merged its navy into the new Star Combine Navy. Protection of space controlled by all nine members was handed over to the new authority. The Trojan Territorial Navy (which was not merged into the new navy) was stood down from active service and its ships were passed back to TEC.
After the establishment of the 9 Star Combine, the Trojan Stock Exchange allowed the other members of the Combine to use TEC starships to transport goods and passengers. They later even allowed non-Combine members to use the ships. However, as the starships still had a duel role with the military, all non-native cargoes and passengers had to be cleared by the Trojan Intelligence Service.
In 283 AI (2499 AD) a conflict broke out between the Centaur Federation, Eridani Republic and Star Kingdom of Pegasus in the Valhalla (DM+71 482) star system. The Trojan Territorial Navy was put on active service for the second time in its history for the duration of the Valhalla Crisis. The ships helped boost Star Combine Navy patrols in the Troy and Kruger system and the surrounding areas.
Following the Valhalla Crisis, the ships returned to normal corporation service until 297 AI (2513 AD) when the Centaur Federation backed a military coup on Valhalla and civil war broke out. The 9 Star Combine was put on war alert until the Valhalla Military Junta was defeated the following year. The Trojan Territorial Navy was not put on full active service this time, but was instead put on standby status. All leave was cancelled, non-Trojan cargoes were prohibited on TEC starships for the duration of the conflict and all journeys had to be approved by TTN officers.
Since the end of the Valhalla Civil War, in 298 AI (2514 AD), the TEC appears to have returned to normal service, and the stock exchange is now trading to non-Trojan companies again. However the Trojan Intelligence Service is again vetting companies that wish to purchase TEC goods movements from the Trojan Stock Exchange.