While acknowledging the size of the potential market and the efforts of the national Chinese authorities to ensure a fair and equitable business regime, the country manager in China for Boart Longyear, Leonard Stephens, cautioned against irrational exuberance on China.
"China is a tough challenge for manufacturing. Everyone sees the huge opportunities here, the big population, you can really see the market but you have also got to collect the money," Stephens told MiningNews.net at the China Mining 2004 conference in Beijing.
"China didn't invite foreigners in because they wanted them to share in the financial rewards, they invited them in because they want the expertise. Joint ventures are for the benefits of the Chinese, not for foreigners.
"It's a tough manufacturing and selling environment. Piracy is a huge problem – sometimes it's from our own employees filtering drawings out. We've had cases where competitors have paid warehouse owners of customers of ours to keep the packaging intact so they can use it for their pirated products.
"Sometimes it's brazen, we've had people coming up trying to buy the paint that we use so they can paint their machines the same. The Chinese authorities are doing something about it and they are trying to crack down. The senior officials are serious but it's not always the case at local level."
Overall though, Stephen's assessment of China's prospects remained positive.
"It will change. People talk about the boom in China, but China is booming now, it's a long-term boom, it's going to go for years."
