China rising: Its private firms set sights on rest of world

Amid the torrent of clothes, electronics and toys surging out of China comes a little-noticed export: international companies.

For centuries, individual Chinese have sought their fortunes abroad, creating Chinatowns around their restaurants and shops. Now, Chinese firms are going global, pushed by a government turned capitalist, pulled by untapped markets and armed with bundles of money from a thriving economy back home.

Auto plants are popping up in Latin America. A sprawling commodity bazaar promises a provincial Swedish city new life. A car parts distributor is snapping up ailing companies in the U.S. Rust Belt, a TV factory hums in South Africa, and a high-tech firm is landing contracts to revamp the Persian Gulf's telecommunication networks.

Just as the earlier arrival of Japanese companies changed U.S. manufacturing, over time Chinese companies could affect how their Western rivals approach innovation, competition and business itself.

"We not only consider ourselves pioneers," says Sean Chen, who at 26 is overseeing the construction of a $100 million electrical parts plant and industrial park in the U.S. "We also consider ourselves explorers."

Chen and his fiancee, Joy Chen — both took American first names — moved from Shanghai to Atlanta to set up shop for General Protecht Group Inc., a company controlled by his father. While the goal is profits, Sean Chen and his father view the venture almost as a social experiment — its aim, he said through an interpreter, is to marry the best Chinese and American work practices.

"I want to have the efficiency and execution normally shown by the American employees and the brotherhood that a Chinese company normally shows," Sean Chen says. "There are capitalists and there are socialists and I want to see whether they can get along."

The Chinese corporate presence is still small overseas, but it's growing fast:

• Chinese companies invested more than $30 billion in foreign firms from 1996 to 2005, nearly one-third in 2004-05 alone, according to an analysis by Usha Haley, a professor of international business at the University of New Haven. Computer maker Lenovo Group helped launch the frenzy in December 2004 by announcing it would acquire IBM Corp.'s personal computer unit for $1.75 billion.