Ladies and gentlemen,

I've traveled over 23 jumps to be here tonight.

I couldn't get away sooner because my new operation was coming in over at Abudban's Ice Deposit anomaly and I had to see about it.

That ice mining operation is now flowing at two million cubic meters per hour and it's paying me an income of eight billion one hundred sixty million interstellar credits per day. I have twenty exhumers mining and I have two other such operations producing at Emolgranlan.

So, ladies and gentlemen... if I say I'm an ice man you will agree.

My offer:

I do my own mining, and the men that work for me, work for me... and they are men that I know. I make it my business to be there and see to their work. I don't lose my hulks in the belts and spend months refitting them; I don't botch the hauling and get tackled by war targets on gates ruining the whole operation. I'm a family man-I run a family business. I offer you the bond of family that very few ice men can understand.