Those ‘Dickensesque’ Internet Cafes in China
One of the purposes of our trip to China is to go far beyond the customary ‘oohing’ and ‘aahing’ at the Great Wall and the Bund and see how good your skills are are spotting new markets and new business opportunities. See, e.g., my recent post, Linking Global Buyers With Chinese Factories … In the Context of Lingerie.
For a number of you, the California or American market will likely not be enough to sustain your business and/or industry over the long term. My goodness; as just one example, see this NY Times article that was posted on its web site about two minutes ago, Apple Shares Soar on Chinese Interest in iPhone.
Like it or not, and whether popular or not with various political factions in the world, people with solid business skills spot market opportunities, both domestic and abroad, and try to create a business model that can fill said need, and if they want to be around for more than a few days they do so at a profit. The really admirable ones, of which there are many, work hard to do so in a socially responsible and ethical way.
I think the day will come when many of you are asked by your employer to get on a plane and fly to a place like China to see what type of business your firm could or should be doing there (or alternatively, you will be entertaining a group of Chinese business people traveling to the USA trying to better integrate their business model into the American economy).
Hence, this trip.
On that note I just came across these interesting October 11, 2007 posts by Paul Denlinger at the China Vortex blog:
He has an interesting business take on Internet cafes in China. What I found even more interesting was his take on the sociological ‘Charles Dickens like’ significance of said venues in China.
I have been in a few of these, but never thought of what Mr. Denlinger writes about. I wonder if things might be different in China’s second or third tier cities. During your off the clock time, step into one one these cafes if the opportunity presents itself and do your own market research.
By they way, during this year you will often hear the terms “first tier cities” (e.g., Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou, etc.), “second tier cities” and even “third tier cities” in the context of our China discussions.
Do you know how many cities China has with over 1 million people? China officially has 49 cities with populations over 1 million (source: Rob Gifford’s, China Road, 2007). This is a country where you can travel across China, arrive in a city that is twice the size of Houston, and never had heard of the place. This largely urbanized population can (not always) mean that American products are able to penetrate the Chinese market more easily.
What about India? Try 39 (as of 2001; source: List of Million Plus Cities — India, Wikipedia)
Did you know how many the US has? Try 9 (as of 2000; source: Nations Encyclopedia).
To appreciate China and India, at some point you have to try and get your head and arms around the masses of people and humanity in these two countries, and then think of how that impacts what you are seeing, feeling, tasting and smelling while you are there.
For example, most Westerner political leaders seem to have drunk that Kool-aid that makes them believe and argue that ‘western style’ democracy is a good thing that the rest of the world should follow and they don’t get why the rest of the world does not do so. Yet, one thing they often gloss over and never explain to the rest of us country bumpkins is whether such a model can really work in a country with a population of 1.3 billion, and how? Criminey, we/the US have a hard time moving forward and reaching a consensus with a population size of 330 million of largely white people. If a country had 300 federal level senators, rather than the 100 US talking heads, er, I mean US Senators that we have, with 50 plus ethic minorities such as China does, how would they function and get anything done in a reasonable time period?
India is a democracy, and it’s diversity of people is incredibly immense, but many believe that it has become a hyper-democracy that can’t get much done at the governmental level (but the business level is a whole other story).
See also this related article by NY Times Senior Reporter Harold French International Herald Tribune article titled, Letter from China: What if Beijing is Right? You also need to read Randall Peerenboom’s, China Modernizes.
What markets do places like China and India present, that you think you-your firm-your industry will be a part of in the future, whether you like it or not?
And is democracy the answer for China? If so, highlight what you think that would look like and how it would work, and then patent your solution — you will be rich and will have provided an answer to a complex question that nobody else has yet persuasively come up with and/or argued.
7 comments November 13th, 2007