Company Visits: Recapping a Couple of Days

At this point, about six hours before we leave for the airport, I should write some stuff about the companies and people we've visited in the last few days. I realized I haven't actually done that.

So where I last left off was Capsugel in Suzhou, China on Friday. That was about a week and two cities ago. Clearly, more time needs to be dedicated to blogging about this trip.

Saturday we boarded the bus to go to Shanghai, but we were temporarily waylaid. Our tour guide set up some sort of tour of a silk factory in Suzhou without telling anyone; even Dr. Watson & Richard seemed to be confused by what was happening. Part of the group toured the factory, part of the group remained on the bus. I'm skeptical about the factory-ness of the factory (as in, how legit was it) because they were letting tour groups get almost on top of the equipment and touching the raw silk threads as it was being spun into hanks.

However, once in Shanghai, we visited Fudan University to meet with some of their IMBA students. One guy was a Chinese-American student, studying in China. He came over without knowing a word of the language and said he's gotten a mixed reception. Another student was from Chile and she didn't know a word of Chinese when moving here, either. I really liked those two students because they were very open -- the Chilean student even answered our questions about the squatty potty and her experiences with them! The Chinese students had been in Boston this spring and were taken to a lot of parties; they wanted to know if we partied like that too.

...

Of course we don't.

On Sunday we went to the International Expo, which I've already covered.

Monday morning was the only day this trip we got to sleep in! Our company visit in the morning (Covance) had been rescheduled to the afternoon, so we got to sleep an extra hour. Right after lunch we visited one of 3M's R&D centers in Shanghai. One of the best experiences on this trip! We got to see some of the cool things 3M's had a hand in creating.

After 3M, we went straight to Covance. At Covance, the mayor was visiting, so we were put off for about forty minutes (we were also thirty minutes early). Not a problem for us MBA students -- we just found the closest Starbucks and parked! Downside: the Starbucks didn't have the coffee blends for frappacinos. Therefore, most of us wound up with caffeine-free beverages contrary to our initial goal of dosing ourselves with caffeine and sugar. Once we were able to get into Covance, we met with one of the Vice Presidents.

I've said it before, but there's a definite difference between people in China that have been Western-educated and those that haven't. The ones that have are more gregarious than those that haven't. This man was funny and informative. I didn't realize that companies can contract out their drug research or clinical testings. I also found out that stomach and liver cancer are very prevalent in China!

No company visits on Tuesday since we flew to Beijing!

Since this is already pretty long, I'll do Mr. Fu's company and our politician visit and the dinner with ex-pats tomorrow. :)

Two Cities, Two Companies, Free Beer!

It's about 11:40 PM here in Suzhou, China so I'm going to make this REALLY quick! My roommate is asleep and I should probably follow her lead... we have to be downstairs and checked out in about eight hours.

Today we went to a Chinese animation studio. It was really cool, especially the server farm right by the entry. We got to see some interesting renderings they're working on/worked on, including little sculptures of characters that look like the Tar Baby. There was even one of the pseudo Tar Baby crucified and molded into a pencil holder. Several people in my group were astounded. Pictures coming soon. The animation studio had some Korean workers. Interestingly enough, the Korean employees don't speak Chinese but they do speak English. One of the guys said that they learn Korean then English or Russian or Chinese. The US needs to pick up on this second language thing stat.

After a three hour drive from Hangzhou (which included a really ridiculously amusing trip to a Chinese KFC), we arrived in Suzhou. In Suzhou, we headed immediately to the Capsugel China headquarters. I'm pretty sure it was the GM that spoke to us, but I'm a bit hazy on that as several different titles were thrown out. He was personable and funny and imparted some really interesting information. For example, in countries like China, the high tech equipment has to be balanced out with a low tech workforce because of costs. After the lecture, we went on a factory tour.

They didn't let us take pictures in the changing room, but I wish they would have. We all looked so silly in our booties, hair nets, face masks, and lab coat things. The tour itself was awesome. They make a lot in a very little space.

After the tour, we got stuck in traffic but Richard and Oscar kept us going with show tunes.

Dinner was the best: LEGITIMATE Chinese buffet. Legitimate how? Because it's in China. it was like a cross between Great Wall and Texas de Brazil. Buffet meets wandering meat. HEAVEN. Best part? The FREE beer. Oh yes. Free beer + Chinese Buffet = Happy American Students. The fact that it was only $10 USD made us even happier students. Then came the foot massage, which I'm leaving to a post all its own.

WalMart!

Yesterday was our first business visit -- to WalMart's headquarters here in Shenzhen. It was kind of crazy; the Chinese have a different sense of 'business casual' than we do. It's crazy casual! The meeting room we were in was very bare bones; the ex-pat VP we met with told us that it was a WalMart thing: focus the money elsewhere.

After listening to the VP (and learning some interesting things... did you know that the average basket of goods at WalMart in China is US $9?), we visited the Sam's Club. Now here's an interesting conundrum: the Sam's Club here is targeted at the upper middle class to the upper class folks. For example, they sell 3D TVs and a 103" television and US $50,000 bottles of Cognac. Very odd indeed.

We walked around the Sam's club and saw the monster TV and the expensive liquor, but we also got to see live shrimp in a tank ready to be picked, a cut up alligator on display in the seafood section, and we got to try some monster fruit from Thailand.

At the moment, I can't find my camera's cable, so all these pictures will be up later.