Same Bed Different Dreams: Negotiating in China
April 20th, 2010
I recently found myself talking a European businessman in the energy sector out of forming a company a joint venture in China. With so much activity in general in China and in the energy sector specifically, it’s no wonder that a business person in China after just a few short months wants to get in on the game. Of course, he had not done any due diligence on the JV partner, leave alone the sole-supplier from which they were supposed to draw product and sell it onto the international market.
Andrew Hupert in his monthly online negotiation column for the China Economic Review writes about just some of the pitfalls in doing business deals in China. As is his pithy way, Andrew cites five must-do’s, my favorite of which is under the heading, “There is a Chinese metric system – how do you measure a ‘win’?” Andrew writes, ” Amateurs demand that onerous penalty clauses get inserted into English-language contracts that don’t mean anything in local courts. Pros want the right to pick the financial controller who keeps the company chops in his office safe.”
Amen to that.
Related posts:
Is China Still a Risk Worth Taking?
