China Sales Dog Blog

Is China somehow limited by its culture and design?

Explaining the many nuances of China to an uninformed friend is always difficult. There are so many angles on everything China that the "uninformed" cannot begin to comprehend the "expert's" divergent seemingly disconnected explanations. You know that old concept of yin-yang, the one represnting "dark-light", "good-evil", "hard-soft" and a whole slew of other opposing yet intertwined forces in the universe? Originating in China, there is no other place it describes better than China. Even today, China is pulled by many "contradictory" forces, the majority being internal.

 

Read the below referenced article

Slap in the "Face" ... China's high-speed rail debacle

From the Wall Street Journal Online .... here is what I consider a good account and analysis of China's recent high-speed train wreck. As the accident unfolded, the government responded in classic expected ways ...

Chinese Premier says "Americans are simple" and he's right

I am a native Californian that has been living and helping US companies sell in China since 1997. My wife of 11 years is Chinese. After a concerted effort to understand, I have a pretty good read on Chinese thinking. Premier Wang is right, we Americans are simple and, in fact, the Chinese envy this. We are simple in the sense that when I say "ok, we have a deal

China wants to your intellectual property and why not

Subtitle: Trains, Planes and Automobiles or Business Suicide 101

How has China come so far so fast on so many fronts? The answer is quite simple: China is not shy about acquiring "your" technology and in fact will go to great efforts to acquire then morph it just enough to call it "homegrown". Recent high profile examples sited by the Wall Street Journal include high-speed trains and Soviet style fighter jets. Automobile technology fits nicely in here as well. Just go back 5, 10 and certainly 15 years and you'll see a China without any real capability to manufacture let alone develop any of these higher-end technology products.

Now it's 2010 and all we've been hearing is the likes of "China develops world's fastest supercomputer", "Chinese developed bullet train sets world record", "China producing and exporting fighter jets", "China leading push for electric automobiles", and so on. Yeah, there's debate about how much China has done on their own but the fact remains: the Chinese have learned a whole lot in a short time and they have developed many of their own capabilities. And, as long as foreign business are willing to "give" the Chinese would be crazy not to accept.

As a company selling in China, what's all this mean to you? Continued ....

The Chinese will buy it ... not!

 When it comes to "advice on China," there are so many things to talk about, one can become easily distracted. Case-in-point: this blog is intended to offer insights on selling in China but we've yet to offer anything (because there's so much other stuff to talk about). I suppose we ought to fix that ...

Key Points of Post:

• China doesn't want to buy junk from the rest of the world and there are even government policies against it
• Chinese prefer new latest technology products and equipment
• China can produce much of what it needs to outfit its factories and buildup its infrastructure

Defense, how much is China really spending?

China's official military spending is purported to be $70 billion USD for 2009. Some international military experts estimate the actual number could be up to 400% more. Based on official Chinese numbers

China keeps investing and building, and building ...

Recently I have begun to contemplate the massive funding China continues to allocate to building up its infrastructure. It's awe-inspiring and to some degree alarming ...

Key Points of Post:

• The Chinese government is using banked foreign reserves to install a modern infrastructure while stimulating its economy; The Chinese say 一石二鸟, or as we say in the west, "kill two birds with one stone"
• The US government continues to pile up debt upon existing debt to simply to stay afloat; there's really not much left to upgrade an aging infrastructure
• A dollar spent on infrastructure in China goes much farther than the same dollar spent in the US
• America really needs to get our house in oder to remain competitive long-term

Chinese netizens bring justice to traffic scam victim in Shanghai

Here is a very interesting story contributed by China Alley Cat, a female Chinese National. It describes a recent spate of traffic scams in Shanghai and highlights the growing power of the internet to influence government actions and even social change in China; this is in spite of heavy internet filtering ("The Great Chinese Firewall"). Key points of the post include: