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The Cool Docks (???) and Greek restaurant Mythos

Last night I had dinner at Greek restaurant Mythos at the Cool Docks in Shanghai (???, Lao Ma Tou, literally “the old docks”). I had not been to the Cool Docks before and had actually not even heard about it before. Why? I guess they did a terrible job at marketing the place since it opened last year. If people don’t talk about it or don’t write about it on the Internet, others won’t know about it.

The place itself is great however, it reminds me very much of Xintiandi. It also consists of an area of renovated (or at least old style) shikumen buildings combined with some more modern structures, with lots of bars and restaurants. It looks quite nice, not as tacky as Xintiaindi and not as ugly-modern as Tongren Lu. I think the place can be better than Xintiandi: most of the restaurants are located around a big open square with fountains that gives the place a different, more open, feel than Xintiandi. And it has the advantage of nice views over the Huangpu river and Pudong from some of the bars and restaurants.

The location is about 2 km South of the Bund, too far to walk and not close to any metro stations. Next to that the place is surrounded by construction sites. Not the best way to get started for a new dining and entertainment location. When I walked around the place last night (a Friday night) around 8 PM there was hardly anybody in the bars and restaurants, even though that should be one of the busiest times of the week. The place deserves better and maybe this blog post can convince a few people to go there and have a coffee or a beer.

The dinner at Mythos was nice, but I found the menu a bit disappointing. I expected more Greek menu items, most of them were just standard international dishes (beef tenderloin, sirloin steak, salmon etc.). The starters were better in that respect, we ordered among others feta cheese and tzatziki. As a main course I ordered one of the few Greek dishes I could find, moussaka. The food itself was OK, but we did not find it very special. Watch out, the staff only speaks a few words of English which can lead to miscommunications, especially because they do not confirm whether they understood you or not. Instead of a (white) Sauvignon Blanc they gave me a (red) Cabernet Sauvignon for example, that I of course returned. I did not spot any Greek wines on the wine list, although I may have overlooked some, and the house wines were all from Chile and Argentina.

What makes the place special, however, is the 3rd floor lounge with white sofa chairs and a nice bar, and with views over the river. The 4th floor roof top terrace is even better, an excellent place to relax once the weather gets a little bit warmer in Shanghai. I am quite sure I will be back, probably for food but certainly for drinks. I can imagine sitting there with friends on a warm Friday night or Saturday afternoon drinking a bottle of chilled wine watching the ships sail by. I found a set of pictures of Mythos here on Flickr.

I did not try any other bars or restaurants last night, but will do so in the near future. As mentioned above, the Cool Docks deserve better and I hope the place will come to life soon. If you’re looking for some new restaurants to try out, give the Cool Docks a try. And even if you’re just looking for a (still quiet) place to have a coffee, this is a good place to go to. Among others there is a Starbucks, but there are many other places serving coffee as well. If you come by car, there are parking spaces on the back of the complex next to the river. Typical Chinese planning in my opinion, because that is normally prime real estate for an entertainment complex. Lots of taxi’s drive by on Zhongshan Lu, so if you come by taxi it won’t be too difficult to catch a cab back either.

The Cool Docks, 479 Zhongshan Nan Lu, close to Fuxing Lu.
Mythos restaurant, phone 021-61526755

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Tudou.com announces partnership with the China Film Group for the 2009 Tudou Video Festival

After last year’s big success of the first Tudou Festival in Moganshan (see my blog post), there will be another one this year. The festival, that sets Tudou apart from its competitors, will be held on April 18 in Shanghai. For this year’s festival Tudou.com partners with the China Film Group Corporation, the most prestigious film production and trading organization in China. As Tudou’s press release from today says, this is a very significant milestone for Tudou: symbolically, the partnership is a marriage between a hundred-year old film industry and the only four-year old Internet video phenomena.

For five of the winners (out of a total of sixteen Award winners) there will be a chance to qualify for China Film’s Youth Director Project or for the New Media Production Project. This opens the door to China Film’s production facilities, funds, resources and channels – a gateway to the serious filming industry.

During the 2009 Tudou Video Festival there will not only be the finals of the Video Awards, but also the first Video Financing Forum. Gary Wang (CEO of Tudou.com) today said about this: “Based on the experience of our first Tudou Video Festival last year, our 2009 campaign aims for a bigger goal to build up the value chain for Internet video creative talents, who are getting insufficient attention and financing at this point. Our goal is to expand development and extend opportunities for amazing talents and vitality that we have seen on Tudou.com, hopefully in real terms such as cash financing and broadcasting opportunities.”

During the video financing forum fifty selected proposals in the categories drama, non-fiction/documentary, music/entertainment, animation, and reality show will do an elevator pitch of their ideas in front of potential content buyers and investors from TV channels, production companies, mobile/new media channels and brand advertisers, simulating a content trading platform. “Bold, indie and fresh are the creative qualities we are looking for,” Gary emphasized. “We hope by increasing exposure of this community that grew with Tudou, more people will get the chance to know and invest the young and uprising community as Tudou is committed to.”

If you have an idea for a video production or have a video that you want to submit for the Tudou Video Festival, you can still do that online until the end of March. The official Tudou Video Festival website you can find here: http://www.tudou.com/events/tudou/videofestival09/index.php

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This Saturday: pre-SXSW party at M1NT Shanghai


This week Christine Lu of the China Business Network is in town again and every time she is here she manages to organize a great party. This time it’s no different: on Saturday February 28 there will be a pre-SXSW cocktail at M1NT Shanghai.

Never heard about SXSW before? It’s the abbreviation for South by Southwest, a huge film, music and interactive festival in Austin, Texas (website). This year China’s tech sector will also be present at the interactive festival, and one of the aims of this party is to hightlight that. Expect a combination of networking, good food and drinks (free Moet & Chandon from 9-10 PM for example), great music and the opportunity to join a private Dom Perignon event at M1NT after 11:30 PM. So far an impressive list of high-tech & internet executives, as well as VC’s, bloggers and journalists have confirmed their attendance (see here for the current list, scroll down to end of page).

Entry fee is RMB 200 and part of the proceeds go to the Jet Li Foundation. RSVP is necessary at http://sxswshanghai.eventbrite.com/. Maximum number of participants is 150. Start: 9 PM.
Hope to see you there! If you cannot be there follow the party on Twitter, hashtag: #sxswshanghai

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China Entrepreneur – a must read for (future) entrepreneurs in China

Laurie Underwood doing the introduction of the book launch event

On Thursday I attended the book launch of “China Entrepreneur” by CEIBS professor Juan Antonio Fernandez and Laurie Underwood. This is their second book together after publishing China CEO in 2006. For this book they interviewed 40 international entrepreneurs in China (among others myself, hence the invitation), capturing their insights and experiences about how to successfully set up and run a business in China. I am quite impressed with the result and spent several hours today reading the book.

The 40 entrepreneurs that the authors talked to for the book come from 25 countries, so the book offers a truly international perspective on entrepreneurship in China. It is not a book with 40 separate interviews, which would have been boring, but the experiences of the entrepreneurs are neatly woven into the structure of the book, which makes for an interesting and highly entertaining read. As the book says, every single entrepreneur has met trouble somewhere during their China experiences and many of these problems, including how they solved them, are in the book. Some in the form of short case studies, others in the text itself.

Although the book is well-researched scientific book, it is quite easy to read. For me it was even a fun read, not because I am also featured in it but because of all the real-life examples that are in the book, many of which I recognize from my own experiences. Next to that many pages contain useful short quotes by the entrepreneurs in the left and right margins and the most valuable tips for potential future China entrepreneurs are highlighted there as well.

Professor Fernandez talking about his experiences while researching the book

The book is divided into several chapters, each describing a particular aspect of doing business here. Among the subjects covered in the book are:
– Getting started: understanding the business environment and dealing with the Chinese government
– Obtaining a business license and choosing the right legal form
– Choosing the right Chinese business partner
– Getting paid by customers
– Human Resource Challenges
– Ethics and Corruption
– Business negotiations

The book also has a chapter on living in China (hardships, hurdles and work-life balance) and a chapter to find out what traits are necessary in order to set up a business in China. It’s a book about blood, sweat and tears, but also how these can lead to big successes. Nothing is easy in China but everything is possible.

I found it a great read so far (I did not finish it yet), and I highly recommend it to anybody who plans to do business in China. If you plan to be, or already are, an entrepreneur or if you are working as an expat in this country, this is a book you will learn a lot from. Not everything may be applicable, but it prepares you for the worst and also shows you that there are almost always solutions for everything in China.

China Entrepreneur – Voices of Experience from 40 international business pioneers, Juan Antonio Fernandez and Laurie Underwood, published by John Wiley & Sons, ISBN 978-0-470-82321-7

The book is available from Amazon here, and I assume it will also be available at Chaterhouse and other foreign-language bookstores in China.
http://www.china-entrepreneur.org

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A fabricated interview is not a smart idea

When I started my entrepreneurial career after leaving Daimler China in 2002 I among others had a consulting company that advised foreign companies on doing business in China. One of our competitors was Dezan Shira and I admired the company for the way they seemed to be growing and for the political connections that its founder Chris Devonshire-Ellis seemed to have. I never met him, but at that time he was for me the personification of a successful foreign entrepreneur in China.

Because I moved my business activities from consulting to new media I did not follow Dezan Shira much, but occasionally I picked up their China Briefing magazine in a bar. Each time I saw it I had to laugh a bit, seeing Chris in it on many pictures with high-level China politicians or shaking hands with new clients. A bit too much to my liking, but of course you have to build a brand and showing off your connections and clients is a good way to attract customers. People criticized him for that, but I know from personal experience that everybody who steps into the spotlight will get negative comments. You just have to live with it and move on.

But this morning I read an article on ChinaLawBlog on Chris that changed my perception of him quite a bit. What happened? Chris did an interview with the Chairman of the China Banking Regulatory Commission and put it on the China Briefing site. In the interview Mr. Liu Mingkang among others talks about the RMB exchange rate, saying that it may weaken against the USD to around RMB 6.9-7.0. Because of this news the RMB/USD moved. Great for Chris to get such a scoop, except for the fact that the article seems to be completely fabricated! This is what the website of the China Banking Regulatory Commission showed this morning:

The CBRC Statement

For me it was hard to believe at first that someone would do that, until I followed some links to among others several articles on FOARP about Chris. That blog claims among others that Chris lied about his qualifications and that he threatens bloggers such as Wang Jian Shuo with law suits if he does not remove negative comments about him. A tweet by Humanaught about the fact that Dezan Shira’s wikipedia page was removed because of ‘blatant advertising’ got a follow up by Chris threatening Humanaught. By the way, also Chris’ own Wikipedia page was removed because the article “does not indicate the importance or significance of the subject“. There is a whole discussion about him on Twitter now, he even has his own hash tag #cde (go to search.twitter.com and search for #cde to read the tweets).

Does Chris not realize that it’s better to sit out the storm instead of immediately overreacting? If you Google him now there are a lot of negative results about him that he could have easily avoided. The fake interview will probably make this even worse, which is neither good for him nor for his company and all the staff that he employs. If I were him I would just sit still for a while, assuming he does not get into legal or government trouble because of the fabricated quotes. I assume he learned a lesson, but if his lawyers start calling me after this blog post I will know that is not the case.

Update (Feb. 23, 2009): Chris Devonshire-Ellis resigned all his positions today.

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Construction companies: Spil Games Asia will NOT move

Monday afternoon it suddenly started, I received a call from a construction company telling me they heard that our company would move and that they were interested in designing and constructing the new office. I told them they had the wrong information, but they insisted their source was very well-informed. An hour later the boss of the company called me with the same story, seemingly trying to pressure me to admit that we would move our company in the near future. He even said he knew how many square meters we rented. I stayed polite and told him he was wrong.

Tuesday two other construction companies called me with the same question, all telling me that their sources told them that we would move and that they are interested and qualified to work with us. This continued the whole week and it’s driving me nuts. If I get a call now and hear the word ‘construction company’ I immediately say “we are not moving” and hang up on them.

I think I know where the rumor comes from, another company that I am involved in is likely going to move to a much bigger office (no name, otherwise they will get all the calls). For some reason the well-informed source mixed up my name with the person in charge of the other company and has given all construction companies that he has connections with my name and mobile phone number. Hopefully some of them will first Google my name and find this blog post before calling me.

Update: Right after posting this I received my first call from a moving company, telling me that ‘their friend’ told them we are relocating to a new office. I hope the call is not the beginning of another trend.

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M1NT Shanghai roof terrace

Today was a beautiful day in Shanghai, not only did we have a blue sky but temperatures went up to 26 degrees around lunch time – see the screen shot below from Yahoo Weather. I had an excellent lunch at M1NT again, Dan Segall is doing a great job as the new executive chef at M1NT. With 4 people we decided to order all 12 different items on the lunch menu, and all of them not only looked impressive but also tasted fantastic. Because of Dan’s fusion cooking talent M1NT has quickly become my favorite place for lunch.

Because of the nice weather I afterward decided to have a look at the roof terrace. That did not open yet officially, but once it will open in April this year it will be one of the best places to hang out for after work drink. As you can see from the picture, M1NT put half-open windows in the exterior walls, so you have a great view over the city from the 25th floor roof top. By April there will also be a big open-air jacuzzi installed in one of the corners, so you can even enjoy the views while soaking in a hot tub. I now already look forward to that!

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Holiday in Kuala Lumpur and Langkawi

It’s been a while since my last post. Not because I am getting tired of blogging (not at all!) but because I have been on vacation for the past 2 weeks. First I spent a couple of days in Beijing for Chinese New Year. It was freezing cold so among others we went skiing in Shijinglong, one of the many ski resorts north of Beijing. For some pictures see for example here, here or here. We also visited the ice sculptures in Longqingxia and we went bathing in an open air hot springs north of Beijing – very nice to warm up in the middle of winter.

After Beijing we went back to Shanghai for a day to pack our suitcases for a week-long trip to Malaysia. We decided to fly Air Asia from Hangzhou (a 2-hour drive from our home, 1 hour more than to Pudong airport). Air Asia is a low-cost carrier that offers a “business class” type seat on its A330 which was a lot cheaper than business class seats on a regular flight to Malaysia. With Scott it’s better to have a bit more space on the airplane, especially during a 5-hour flight. We were quite happy with the airline (we also used them from KL to Langkawi and back), the planes were excellent and they had very friendly staff. The only thing they should improve is the international terminal at KL airport (at the LCC terminal), this was dirty, noisy and far below what I had expected after having seen the domestic terminal.

We (my parents, my wife Grace and our son Scott) spent 2 days in KL to do some sightseeing and shopping. We stayed at the Renaissance Hotel in KL, the same hotel where I stayed 5 years ago as well with Grace. Still a good choice and excellent value for money and a central location next to the Petronas Towers.

On Sunday we took the 1-hour flight to Langkawi, a beautiful tropical island that had not changed much since I last stayed there a couple of years ago. Langkawi is not as developed and commercial as most of the Thai islands, and I therefore it has a more relaxed atmosphere than places like Koh Samui. The only downside is that Malaysia attracts a lot of conservative muslims, so you should not be surprised to see women dressed in burkha’s on the beach. I always feel a bit strange when I see muslim men wearing shorts, tank tops and sport shoes in the tropical heat, but their wife (or wives) has to wear the black robes covering their whole body including their face. I don’t judge it, people should make their own decisions about their religion or how they want to live their life, but it’s very different from what you see in most other tropical resorts where I normally go.

The vacation in Langkawi was great: we stayed in a good resort (the Meritus Pelangi Beach Resort) and had a relaxed week. But it was also a bit different than former beach holidays because Scott joined us this time. I probably spent more time in my hotel room trying to get him to sleep (and staying with him while he’s sleeping), feeding him, changing his diapers etc. than on the beach or at the pool. But it was nice to be with him 24 hours a day, and he also liked it a lot to see us all the time.

I rented a minivan upon arrival so we could travel all over the island whenever we wanted. We made a couple of trips to other beaches and to visit some of the other beach resorts, and we went to one of the night markets on the island. If you go to Langkawi I would advise you to rent a car, it’s relatively cheap and there is not much traffic in the island.


It turned out that our resort was not very busy, even though it was high season. While talking to the owner of a local restaurant we learned that this was because of the global financial crisis, they are really starting to feel that there as well. He told us that normally around this time of year he would serve 150 tables per night, and on the night we were there we only saw two other tables… If the crisis gets worse I think a lot of restaurants and resorts might have a very hard time to survive.

Interesting was that one of my Dutch Twitter friends (www.twitter.com/fishinchina) was also staying in our resort . We found out by coincidence (through Twitter) and we had a couple of beers in the swimming pool bar. He closed down his agency for a while to travel the world with his wife and kids and Langkawi turned out to be their first stop. Interesting enough my father knows his father quite well, it’s really a small world – and Twitter makes it even smaller!

During this holiday I tried not to work too much and that worked out well. On average I only checked my mail once every two days or so and I just answered the most important mails. I felt good because I was informed about what was going on in the company, but I did not feel the urge to reply all mails or make phone calls. In the past I could not really distance myself from the company, except when it was impossible to keep in touch – such as during our bike trip in Tibet or while climbing Kilimanjaro. But I realize I am more and more able to let go. Good to know, and I plan to keep on doing this during future vacations!

The only downside is that I spent most of the da
y today in my study catching up on email, because I want to be up to speed on everything before entering the office tomorrow. But I feel very relaxed and am ready to go back to work. One week on a tropical island with my family is exactly enough for me to recharge my batteries. Maybe I should do this more often?