Sherrysha March 9th, 2008
Following the great global transfer of manufacturing started in seventies of last century, the global transfer of the service industry has taken the first place as a new tide. And offshore outsourcing, as the keystone of the new-round global integration, brought Chinese companies both opportunities and challenges.
VioletStar November 23rd, 2006
Chinese President Hu Jin Tao’s visit to India this week has raised a lot of buzz in the region as well as internationally. The two fastest growing economies discussed promotion, investment and bilateral trade. Both sides declared that comprehensive economic and commercial engagement between the two countries was a core component to their strategic and cooperative partnership. In money term, the volume of bilaternal trade will be increaded by USD40 million by 2010!
Hu’s visit was of highly symbolic and strategic significance. The two countries had border dispute since 1962 and have not been at ease with each other. Yet they acknowledged the importance of having alliances to their economy and entered into a new level of the world stage. A lot of people focussed this visit on bilateral trade. In fact, another important issue is around energy reserves. Both countries are looking for ways to secure a supply of natural gas and oil to sustain the rocket growing economies. China failed attempt to acquire US oil company earlier this year urges them to create a regional energy market. Working with India and other regional players to build a network of pipelines and promote stable supply is critical to the country. The collaboration with India will also help them to have a better negotiation situation with the Middle East.
After talking to Hu, Mr Manmoham Singh, Prime Minister, of India said that there was enough space for the two countries to develop together in a mutually supportive manner.
The world will continue to see how the Couching Tiger will work with Hidden Dragon peacefully!
Violet Star
VioletStar November 9th, 2006
Hong Kong’s former director of health Margaret Chan was nominated World Health Organisation director-general. I had the chance to work closely with her department when I worked in the Pharmaceutial Industry in Hong Kong. Dr Chan sometimes spoke in the functions organised by Hong Kong Association of Pharmceutical Industry (HKAPI). During this WHO election, she saw her lead all the way in four rounds of voting and was granted 70% of votes and had beaten representatives from Mexico, Japan and other countries. Dr. Chan was well known internationally for her handling of bird flu outbreak in Hong Kong in 1999 by killing millions of poultry. She will start her new position from Jan 2007. Her victory was generally considered to be the results of vigorous lobby from Chinese government. This is the highest position for any Chinese to serve in United Nation organizations. It is considered to be an important milestone both within and outside of China.
After two decades of working closely with WHO, Dr Chan joined the organization as Director of the Department of Protection of the Human Environment in 2003. In June 2005, she became Assistant Director-General for the Communicable Diseases cluster of departments and took up the newly-created post of Representative of the Director-General for Pandemic Influenza.
Dr. Chan is the second Asian that has got senior position with United Nations or International Organization recently. South Korean Foreign Minister, Ban Ki-Moon, 62, was earlier nominated to succeed Kofi Annan to become U.N. Secretary-General. It is expected that influence of Asia on international affairs will continue to escalate in the next 5-10 year.
Violet Star
VioletStar November 7th, 2006
Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis plans to invest INR5 billion over next five years to set up a research and development facility near the southern Indian city of Hyderabad, the Financial Express reported quoting unnamed government sources. Novartis has sought a 60-hectare site to set up the research facility. The company also plans to set up information technology backup operations along with its research facility, the report said.
Novartis is also building up R&D activities in China with the planned investment of up to $100 million over the next few years in facilities which will focus on cancers related to infectious diseases endemic in Asia.
A 5,000sq m pilot facility on a site in Shanghai’s Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park is due to begin operations next May, and the construction of a permanent 37,000sq m building for around 400 researchers, mostly recruited locally, will start in July.
Novartis’s chairman and CEO, Dr Daniel Vasella, hinted around a year ago that a new R&D facility in China was being considered and said that scientific expertise in the country was now “rising rapidly”. The aim is to combine modern western and traditional Chinese approaches to medicine research, which it is hoped will also yield diagnostic tools such as biomarkers and gene expression profiling which can be used in the firm’s global research programmes.
The early focus of activity would be on common Asian disorders such as liver cancer due to hepatitis. The B virus affects around 130 million people in mainland China alone, causing an estimated 300,000 deaths annually, it noted.
Other firms upping their investment in China recently include AstraZeneca, which said in May that it had set aside $100 million for a new R&D centre to start operations by the end of 2009, also focusing on cancer. GlaxoSmithKline is also considering expanding its Chinese R&D activities, but the Novartis facility appears to be concentrating on more advanced technology than some of the other multinational programmes in China.
The firm opened an institute for tropical diseases in Singapore several years ago, concentrating on neglected diseases such as dengue fever and tuberculosis.
Violet Star
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