In mid-June 1049, William formed the East India Company, following the formation of the Five Ports Alliance, with the aim of exploring the Eastern Route and monopolizing Indian trade.

The company was not wholly owned by William, but a joint-stock company, consisting of the royal family, the Norman consortium, the Norman noble lords, and a group of entrepreneurial and influential merchants, with a total of 276 shareholders and a capital of 80,000 pounds.

Among them, the Normandy royal family has a royal shipyard, a detachment, a 20-year monopoly on Indian trade, and 20,000 pounds of silver funds hold 50% of the shares, the Normandy consortium has 20,000 pounds of silver funds, 10,000 pounds of silver loans, and a trading fleet holds 30% of the shares, and the remaining 20% of the shares are mostly divided among the influential noble lords, while those entrepreneurial and influential merchants hold less than 6% of the shares with a total of 10,000 pounds of silver.

These entrepreneurial and influential businessmen spent huge sums of money and only held a small number of shares, but they were not in the slightest bit dissatisfied, but were glad about their decisiveness.

Because after the official establishment of the English East India Company, William granted the exclusive monopoly authorization for India and Oriental trade for a period of 20 years.

It was India, the legendary land of gold and honey, and the silk, porcelain and tea of the Orient, all of which were sought after by the aristocracy and the wealthy in the Middle Ages.

Monopolizing the trade of the East means an endless supply of gold, and the yellow-orange-orange cuties will be inexhaustible.

In addition to the trade monopoly, William granted it assistance in ruling and military functions, the possibility of forming fleets and armies, the establishment of an overseas colonial government and the rule of the East India Company.

William's granting of privileges to the East India Company of England shows the importance he attached to trade between India and the East, which not only brought William valuable goods such as silk, porcelain, tea, rice, cotton, jute, sugar, spices, etc., but also saltpeter, which was necessary to make gunpowder.

India had the best nitrate resources at the time, concentrated in the east, that is, in the Bengal region, which was controlled by the local militias and earth kings, which was one of the reasons why the Mughal army frequently ate turtles when they attacked the region.

In medieval Europe, saltpeter resources were extremely scarce, and even William, who attached great importance to saltpeter, could only adopt the method of building public toilets and making saltpeter from nitrate, which was also an important reason why William did not promote gunpowder weapons in the army.

Perhaps the only gunpowder weapon William had so far had in his army was the hundreds of black powder grenades carried by the two hundred grenadiers of the Guard.

Of course, in addition to the abundant saltpeter in India, which is far away in the world, saltpeter is also produced in the heavenly world.

Historically, in Europe, the Salt Resources were also an important diplomatic bargaining chip, for example, when the Saadian envoys to the Netherlands stressed to Prince Morris that the United Provincial Republic would have access to "endless resources" in Morocco in exchange for the support of the Dutch maritime power.

The Dutch later discovered that this was a great exaggeration, and that the Moroccans supplied much less nitrate than they had agreed.

Even the most astute merchant nation of the 17th century was fooled, which shows how precious this resource is.

However, at that time, there were very few countries that dared to risk offending the Holy See and trade with the Moors of the Heavens, and it was not easy to obtain saltpeter from the Celestial World.

However, William was not a man to give up, and he secretly sent fleets to the Celestial Kingdoms, the Tima Dynasty, and the Seljuk Dynasty in North Africa, secretly setting up trading posts along the local coast and cooperating with local forces to collect saltpeter.

Since this trade was carried out in secret, and it was not possible to openly send large fleets to and from the transportation, William received less saltpeter from the Celestial Trade each year, and could not support the needs of his firearms legion.

This is why William formed the East India Company, not only because of his desire for the lucrative Indian trade, but also because of his thirst for saltpeter resources.

As for Chile, which produced saltpeter in later generations, considering the unfavorable factors such as the vast desert, the harsh environment of water shortage, and the lack of labor, William did not consider Chilean saltpeter for the time being.

In addition to trading and searching for saltpeter, William gave the East India Company the task of establishing a colony in India, searching for opium, cotton, sugar cane, spices and other crops and raw materials, especially cotton, which the Norman kingdom was desperate for.

The development of the hydraulic industry in Normandy was earlier, and the cotton textile industry using water-powered textile machinery developed very rapidly, not only the Normandy consortium invested heavily in the cotton textile industry, but also the Norman aristocracy, merchants and gentry also invested in it because of the huge profits of the cotton textile industry.

Over the years, Normandy had replaced the Duchy of Flanders as the new textile center, where numerous cotton factories and workshops were concentrated, and the woolen textile industry was also extremely prosperous.

The developed cotton textile industry needed more raw materials, but the Norman kingdom, and even England and France, did not have enough cotton supply.

Although William has vigorously developed the cotton planting industry, it is limited to the poor varieties of cotton seeds, the yield and quality need to be improved, and the planting area is small, and the cotton textile industry, which was once booming, has begun to show a momentum of stagnant growth in recent years.

William was extremely concerned about this situation, and he adopted various incentives to encourage the aristocracy to expand the cotton cultivation area on the estate, but the effect was not obvious at first, and after thinking about it, he finally set his sights on India, which was rich in cotton.

India is the country with the longest history of cotton planting in the world, and was the world's major exporter of cotton textiles in the early days.

India's cotton fields account for about 23% of the world's total cotton fields. Cotton is mainly found in Punjab, Hayana, Ratastan and some parts of the northwestern Deccan Plateau.

Among them, Punjab has the largest cotton field area, accounting for about half of the country's cotton fields. Punjab, Ratastan and other states are located in subtropical arid and semi-arid lands, mainly relying on irrigation, and the soil is mostly arid, saline-alkali soil, alluvial soil and other types, and the soil pH is high. The cotton field soil in the northwest of the Deccan Plateau is black cotton, with relatively sticky texture, good fertilizer and water retention, and fertile soil.

India has always been a major exporter of cotton and cotton cloth, and it was not until the rise of the British machine textile industry at the end of the 18th century that fine machine cotton textiles squeezed Indian handmade cotton textiles out of the market, and India turned into a supplier of raw cotton.

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The English East India Company was soon formed, with its headquarters in London and Winchester, and the ports of Dover and Southampton as the home ports of its trading fleet and fleet, from which future fleets to explore Indian routes would depart.