Conference Program

China, Inc. – Build on the Boom consists of three components.  Aside from the Conference Proper on April 7th, HCR also provides two networking opportunities; the Cocktail Reception on April 6th as well as the Dinner Formal on April 7th.  Please note that registration for all three events is separate (LINK: Register).

Conference Proper:
Join us on for a day of panels that discuss the forces and institutions driving China’s new economy.  As the sessions may run concurrently, please refer to the schedule (LINK: schedule) for details on their rooms and timing. 

Chinese Enterprises
Consumer
Education
Energy
Finance
Healthcare
Investment
Law
Media
Sino-US Relations
Social Responsibility

Charles Hotel Cocktail Reception:
A networking opportunity, HCR has arranged an exclusive cocktail reception on Friday April 6th for professionals and other members of the community to mingle with our distinguished speakers and special guests.  Held at the Charles Hotel ballroom, there will be a cap of 100 attendees.  Registration available on our website (LINK: register).  Please note that this event has a semi-formal dress code.

Charles Hotel Dinner Formal:
Yet another opportunity to meet with our distinguished speakers and special guests, following the conference proper on Saturday April 7th.  The event will also feature a prominent dinner keynote.  With the same cap to capacity, please register online soon (LINK: register).  Attendance in business formal attire.

Panels:

Chinese Enterprises Panel

Bigger Game: Chinese Enterprises’ Global Ambition in Post WTO Era

China’s economy is fast emerging with a profound impact on the global economy. Subtly felt by global citizens thanks to the ubiquitous made-in-China label and heated debates over job transfer due to outsourced production. After almost 20 years of economic reform and a 5 year WTO probationary period, key Chinese enterprises are taking ambitious steps to establish global brand recognition. This will take considerable intellectual investment and a shakeup in corporate governance to match the world class standards of their competitors.

  • How should Chinese enterprises poise themselves in this new challenge?
  • How to help them playing this bigger game?
  • What are their going-global strategies and what options do they have?
  • What will they learn from Japan, Korea and Taiwan’s experience?

[Back to top]

Consumer Panel

Chinese Consumers: 1.3 billion pockets

With over 1.3 billion consumers, China is a market with huge potential. Consumer behavior have been quick evolving with growing disposable income and increasingly informed saving habits. With the gradual relaxation in regulatory policies, no business executive can afford to ignore the potential wealth of opportunities. The dairy sector alone expects to double in size by 2010, growing at least 22 percent per annum. Large companies are not the only participants in the business game. Entry to China’s market from foreign small business owners is also picking up—and rapidly. Domestic small business owners are slowly but surely striving to take a slice of the pie. One inherent trait of opportunity, however, is risk. To be and continue to be successful in China, companies must constantly assess the following: identify cultural and social factors that motivate Chinese consumers, adjust their product portfolio to reach their seemingly wide-ranging market segments and actively revise the competition strategy between foreign and domestic entities.

  • Does the Chinese government have favorable regulatory policies towards consumer products industries?
  • How successful were the market entry strategies by the major global players?
  • What are the strategies Chinese companies will be implementing to try to emerge as global players?
  • What are the prospects for small business owners trying to do business in China recently?
  • How will consumer sector evolve; will companies opt for consolidation or will fragmentation continue to pervade?

[Back to top]

Education Panel

A More Dynamic Pattern to Educate the Labor Force?

Over the past two decades, China has made remarkable progress in a nationwide campaign to eliminate illiteracy and to provide free compulsory education for all. With the world’s largest population, development of this human capital will provide the nation with a platform to retain its mastery in manufacturing and move yet further ahead into value-added services.  With the exponential demand for well-educated, high-skilled labors, the informal education/training market is estimated to be RMB 1.5 billion for English testing prep and RMB 4.1 billion for IT training. For disadvantaged groups with no access to quality education, the World Bank, Ford Foundation, and other organizations have designed and implemented education projects to reduce geographic, gender and ethnic inequality. Entrepreneurs, researchers and practitioners will here share their expertise, passion, and experience in the field of China education, providing a view from the eyes of stakeholders, introduce recent empirical findings, and discuss current controversial educational topics.

  • What are the barriers to education, especially for disadvantaged groups?
  • Is education a good investment for individuals, company, and society in China?
  • What are the forces driving families, employers, and the government to pay for education or training?
  • What are the pros and cons of the booming for-profit education sector?
  • What will be the foreseeable scenario if all the stakeholders (government, students & families, schools, employers, NGOs, communities, etc.) participate in China’s educational system?

[Back to top]

Energy Panel

Energy Security – New Subject in Chinese Strategic Thinking

China has surpassed Japan to become the second largest consumer and importer of crude oil in the world. Its voracious consumption of energy of all kinds in the past few years, coupled with volatility in OPEC countries, has raised concerns about the sustainability of its economic growth. As oil supplies remain stagnant, rising demand drives up prices in the international market. The shortage that ensues has forced some factories to shut down occasionally. Moreover, the sharp spike in China's demand for oil comes at a time when coal, the traditional pillar of China's energy consumption structure, is already straining from shortage problems. China's appetite for energy shows no sign of abating as its economy is increasingly anchored by energy-intensive industries. Yet, energy-saving measures, while high on the agenda of the government, cannot be instituted soon enough to alleviate the pressure on the international energy market. China’s attempts to shield its economy from the vicissitudes of the open market by stepping up exploration projects, buying shares in foreign oil fields and pipelines, and locking up energy resources from governments shunned by the West. The panel will also address energy security, a new subject in Chinese strategic thinking. Attempts at securing additional sources of oil and establishing a strategic reserve have had a mixed record of successes and failures.

  • What motivates international companies to pull out or stay in collaborative schemes with China?
  • How important are alternative and renewable energy sources in allaying the energy crisis?
  • Is China's energy demand going to threaten the US’s supply of oil?
  • What can we learn from the case of the failed acquisition by CNOOC?
  • How will China tackle the problem of excessive pollution, if regulations threaten to slow down its rapid growth?
  • Is China going to loosen state restriction of energy prices?

[Back to top]

Finance Panel

Opportunities and Risks: Gold Mining as China Opens its Financial System

RMB, the official currency of the People's Republic of China, appreciated to 7.9 (for US dollars) in Sept, 2006, breaking the record for the past 12 years. Several Chinese commercial banks reformed their capital structures by raising equity, which lead to the world’s largest multi-billion dollar IPO’s, all of which were extensively oversubscribed up to eighty times. Meanwhile, China is dramatically internationalizing the other sectors of its financial system, including carrying out the terms of China's entry into the WTO by opening its financial system to foreign countries by the end of 2006. The reform has created opportunities and challenges for institutional and individual investors both. We already observed China’s stock market soar in 2006, after an eight-year long decline. The panel will address the flexibility and regulation of China’s financial systems and help predict future trends.

  • How fast will the RMB appreciation be? What terminal price is it approaching?
  • What kind of regulation and flexibility will the Chinese government impose on the currency market in the future? And what are the major consequences following its appreciation?
  • Why did the several major commercial banks choose IPO’s as their corporate financial strategy?
  • What problems will be revealed during the asset pricing process?
  • Are Chinese corporations well prepared for the exposure to Western investors?
  • How will the government encourage and regulate the loan market? How will that stimulate the growth of China’s financial market?
  • What efforts will be made to develop China’s credit system? And what will the benefits be from building such a system?

[Back to top]

Healthcare Panel

Developing China’s National Healthcare Infrastructure

The healthcare industry in China has and is continuing to experience immense growth in investment, government sponsorship, and technological innovation. On three separate fronts – in hospital services, medical devices, and life sciences – the industry has been transformed by both domestic entrepreneurs and multinational firms alike. With a government committed to investing in new scientific research, technologies, and in building a modern healthcare system to address the Chinese population’s growing healthcare needs, China has the potential to become a world leader in delivering excellent medical care to patients.

  • What new healthcare infrastructure is critical to developing a modern healthcare delivery system for China? (i.e. healthcare insurance/payers, hospitals, government funding of research, private R&D, new medicines)
  • How will domestic firms rise to meet the challenges posed by large multinational companies?
  • What impact will generic drugs have on drug development in China?
  • What implications will regional differences within China have on development of a national healthcare system?

[Back to top]

Investment Panel

Cope with a Harmonious Society

For the first time since China’s liberation, the government of China has set a “harmonious society” as the goal of its latest Five Year Plan for National Economy and Social Development. Unlike the past Five Year Plans, where economic development was put on the topmost position in the country’s development list, the new Five Year Plan has restricted China’s FDI policies in an attempt to rely on internal support to stimulate domestic development. Investors are questioning whether China’s “DOOR” is to be closed down after being open for 20 years and whether this will turn out to be a deterrent or a motivator to its domestic growth? China has well established its “Trade Warehouse and World Factory” position in the international marketplace for more than two decades. Recently, the world has witnessed a growing trend of China exporting capital-intensive, technology-intensive high-end products and services, which represents another challenge and opportunity to investors.

  • What is the implication of the 11th Five Year Plan to international investors, especially when the new policy direction pushes back the earlier priority for accelerated economic development? Will this new national strategy further fuel China’s growth through reducing investment risk or will it slow down China’s GDP growth due to lack of FDI?
  • Will China lose its attractiveness to investors’ as a result of this new internally focused policy?
  • How will investors revise their investment strategy, if at all, to address China’s growth in exports?
  • In the next five years, what industries will create the most value to investors? And what would be the
  • most promising investment approaches?

[Back to top]

Law Panel

Rules of the Game: China’s Legal System

During the past three decades, China has endured a series of domestic reforms that have hastened its integration into the global economy. Behind the headlines, China’s legal sector has provided indispensable contributions to China’s process of advancing into a market economy. New legislation has improved, and, in some cases, established for the first time, rules for market players’ entry into, performance in, and exit from the market. Recent statistics show expanded and better-trained legal professionals, both in-house and at private law firms.

  • However, can the legal system catch up with the needs of the world’s fastest changing economy?
  • How efficient is China’s current legal framework and what are the deficiencies in China’s major areas of law?
  • What improvements must be made to China’s legal system?

[Back to top]