Government officials from a local Suzhou district economic development zone recently visited our office. The three of them – though only one talked – wanted to fill us in on the happenings in their Zone and to encourage us to point foreign investors to their area. Seems foreign investment in their area has slowed down considerably. The district is about 30% Western investment; the rest is Chinese – Hong Kong and Taiwanese, mostly.

They have a couple dozen newly built factory spaces, single-floor, two-floor and three-floor that are going unused. And open land for greenfield projects, to boot.

They told me they recently visited every Western company in their district as a self-promotion exercise and to gauge investor sentiment in the area. Most companies, they said, are looking forward to a decline in business going into 2009, but are expecting by the autumn of next year to begin to see a recovery. Most of the Western companies in their area are selling into the China market, B2B.

By comparison, local gossip has it that Asian exporters like Asus is laying off 10,000 staff, a sixth of its operation; Sony 1,000 employees, while another Asian operator is rumoured to be mulling its own local downsizing. A Western exporter decreased operating hours to three days a week, without laying anyone off.

Winter has arrived in Suzhou.