Dutch East India Company

The Dutch East India Company was established on March 20, 1602 and dissolved in 1799. It is referred to as VOC, and the full text in Chinese should be translated as United East India Company. The company's logo connects O and C with V, and the A above is the abbreviation of Amsterdam. In the nearly 200 years since the establishment of the Dutch East India Company, a total of 1772 ships have been dispatched overseas, and about 1 million Europeans took the 4789 ships to Asia. On average, each overseas base has 25,000 employees and 12,000 crew members.

The Dutch East India Company was established in the 17th century in Europe during the era of great navigation, when European countries began to venture at sea, explore the world's geography, and develop business opportunities in the open sea. In the 16th century, Portugal had colonies and commercial development in South East Asia. In the 1560s, a group of Dutch merchants sent Haotmann (? -1599) to Portugal to spy on business. After Haotmann returned home, the merchants established a company and used this information to develop in the East India region. From April 1595 to 1602, the Netherlands successively established 14 companies focusing on the East India trade. In order to avoid excessive commercial competition, the 14 companies merged and became a joint company, the Dutch East India Company. The Dutch parliament at the time granted the Dutch East India Company a monopoly on trade from the Cape of Good Hope in the east to the Strait of Magellan at the southern tip of South America in the west.

The Dutch East India Company was the first company to organize its own mercenaries, issue currency, and was also the first joint-stock limited company. It was allowed to enter into formal treaties with other countries and exercise the right to colonize and rule the area. The Dutch East India Company established its headquarters in Batavia, Java (present-day Jakarta, Indonesia). By 1669, the Dutch East India Company was the richest private company in the world, with more than 150 merchant ships, 40 warships, 50,000 employees, and an army of 10,000 mercenaries, with dividends of up to 40%.

The main reason for the dissolution of the Dutch East India Company was the continuous wars between the Netherlands and the United Kingdom in the 18th century. The war between the two countries between 1780 and 1784 caused the Dutch East India Company's economy to fall due to a sharp decline in domestic demand for Asian goods, and finally announced its dissolution on December 31, 1799. The company's site is the current University of Amsterdam.