Japan’s sogo shosha institutions and South Korea’s chonghap sangsa are among the top trading companies in the world. Along with other players in the international market, they have significantly contributed to the expansion of trade and to the economic development of their countries. In countries like Taiwan, Japan and Korea, trading companies were part of the driving force that propelled their global economic effort and they were an integral part of the economic miracles that transformed their economies forever. International trade benefits countries by improving the living standard of the population, lower prices for consumers, improved efficiency in production and a greater variety of goods. This business plan is focused on analyzing the feasibility of Guanxi Trading LLC, an export trading (ETC) company based in Honduras, with efforts oriented toward boosting the Honduran economy by trading with Taiwan. In doing so, it intends to replicate the success of trading companies worldwide in improving the economies of their nations. By trading with Taiwan, Guanxi Trading LLC also aims to enter the rising Asian market and increase its global presence in hope of helping in the development of the Honduran economy.

<p>I jakten på nya affärsmöjligheter ser allt fler svenska företag Kina som en potentiell marknad. Flera faktorer gör det svårt för utländska företag att etablera sig på den kinesiska marknaden, det tar tid, kräver hårt arbete och ett väl utvecklat kontaktnät. Guanxi är ett begrepp som beskriver hur kineser skapar och underhåller sociala relationer, både privat och i affärslivet. Det är nödvändigt för utländska företag att anskaffa kunskap om hur de utvecklar guanxi med lokala kinesiska aktörer för att framgångsrikt etablera sig i Kina.</p><p>För att exemplifiera problematiken har vi genomfört en kvalitativ undersökning på Alfa Laval och Exportrådet Kina. Syftet med denna uppsats är att med utgångspunkt i Blankenburgs nätverksmodell för utlandsetableringar undersöka hur Alfa Lavals etableringsprocess på den kinesiska marknaden och utvecklandet av lokala nätverk genomförts med hänsyn till guanxi. Etableringsprocessen på en främmande marknad underlättas av att det etablerande företaget har en välutvecklad existerande nätverkskontext samtidigt som de etablerar nya relationer till lokala aktörer på den främmande marknaden, vilket Blankenburg (1995) visar i de externa och interna etableringskrafterna i nätverksmodellen för utlandsetableringsprocessen.</p><p>Utfallet av studien visar att de externa etableringskrafterna varit mer pådrivande i Alfa Lavals etableringsprocess än de interna. Att Alfa Laval lyckats genomföra etableringen och utveckla lokala nätverk i Kina, trots att inte samtliga etableringskrafter verkat förstärkande, tror vi kan kopplas till den bransch Alfa Laval är verksamma inom. De har även insett det nödvändiga i att anställa kineser som har både kunskap om affärslivets komplexitet och kontakter på marknaden att utnyttja vilket också påverkat Alfa Lavals etablering positivt. Utifrån Alfa Lavals erfarenheter har guanxi påverkat deras etablering på den kinesiska marknaden och gör så fortfarande idag.</p>

I jakten på nya affärsmöjligheter ser allt fler svenska företag Kina som en potentiell marknad. Flera faktorer gör det svårt för utländska företag att etablera sig på den kinesiska marknaden, det tar tid, kräver hårt arbete och ett väl utvecklat kontaktnät. Guanxi är ett begrepp som beskriver hur kineser skapar och underhåller sociala relationer, både privat och i affärslivet. Det är nödvändigt för utländska företag att anskaffa kunskap om hur de utvecklar guanxi med lokala kinesiska aktörer för att framgångsrikt etablera sig i Kina. För att exemplifiera problematiken har vi genomfört en kvalitativ undersökning på Alfa Laval och Exportrådet Kina. Syftet med denna uppsats är att med utgångspunkt i Blankenburgs nätverksmodell för utlandsetableringar undersöka hur Alfa Lavals etableringsprocess på den kinesiska marknaden och utvecklandet av lokala nätverk genomförts med hänsyn till guanxi. Etableringsprocessen på en främmande marknad underlättas av att det etablerande företaget har en välutvecklad existerande nätverkskontext samtidigt som de etablerar nya relationer till lokala aktörer på den främmande marknaden, vilket Blankenburg (1995) visar i de externa och interna etableringskrafterna i nätverksmodellen för utlandsetableringsprocessen. Utfallet av studien visar att de externa etableringskrafterna varit mer pådrivande i Alfa Lavals etableringsprocess än de interna. Att Alfa Laval lyckats genomföra etableringen och utveckla lokala nätverk i Kina, trots att inte samtliga etableringskrafter verkat förstärkande, tror vi kan kopplas till den bransch Alfa Laval är verksamma inom. De har även insett det nödvändiga i att anställa kineser som har både kunskap om affärslivets komplexitet och kontakter på marknaden att utnyttja vilket också påverkat Alfa Lavals etablering positivt. Utifrån Alfa Lavals erfarenheter har guanxi påverkat deras etablering på den kinesiska marknaden och gör så fortfarande idag.

Rumors always trigger public panic in China, while the advanced Internet technology has tremendously influenced the daily life of the Chinese. Thus, the dynamics of rumor spreading via the social media in China are worthwhile discussing. In order to fulfill the aim of this research, one of the prevalent Chinese social media sites, the Sina microblog, is introduced and analyzed within the context of the salt-buying frenzy incident that occurred in China in 2011. Various theoretical approaches, from the sociological and media studies perspectives, are introduced to form the framework for analysis. The relevant data and materials were collected via questionnaires with Chinese Internet users, while previous academic research and publications provide supportive materials. From the analysis of this social media site and contemporary Chinese circumstances, it was seen that the Guanxi network extended and enlarged the influence of online rumors to offline Chinese. In other words, the Guanxi network, expanded by social media, can be considered as the most important part of the dynamic process of rumor spreading in China. However, the openness and freedom of the Internet atmosphere were found to be the main factors in eliminating online rumors.

Throughout Chinese history the dominant political philosophy has been that of the ¡§rule of men¡¨. This tradition has an indirect influence on scholars researching the problems of the CCP¡¦s political succession, as they often emphasize Chinese political culture, ¡¥guanxi¡¦ and faction theory, in which they analyze the patters of factional struggles and factional development through the perspective of a conflict. However, Susan Shrik tries to explain that the struggle for power involves other factors such as a person¡¦s departmental distribution of interests. Andrew Nathan discusses the development of factions from a systemic point of view. The group of scholars that focus on the latter perspective seem to be breaking away from the ¡¥social¡¦ aspect of political science, making it difficult to define the motivations of actors within different factions in humanistic terms. In this paper we decided to analyze the problems of political succession within the CCP not only through traditional theoretic patters but also incorporating ¡¥social capitol theory¡¦ as well. In this way we can better analyze how factions and their members build and manage their ¡¥guanxi¡¦ during the process of political succession. Through the analysis of the social context, institutions, and norms involved in factionalism and political succession we can better understand how factions and their members pursue power and legitimacy through the building of social capital in the political succession process. Thus, this paper seeks to use social capital theory to create a clear idea of the role of factions and their members within the CCP during the political succession process.

The purpose of this research is to discuss the Guanxi among the partners of strategic alliance, the influence on the degree of the trust among the strategic alliance partners caused by Guanxi, and the influences on the alliance performance and on the willing to cooperate in the future caused by the degree of the trust. As the internationalization and liberalization developing, many industries aware of the limitation of their own resources. A company is no longer able to compete with others alone, so they try to forge the strategic alliances to get the important resources to achieve their strategic goals. On the other side, the operation of the strategic alliances is deeply influenced by the trust and the interactions among partners. This trust could be broken due to the major differences on the organization cultures and on the management style in different partners, or due to the bad communications. The alliance could be broken because of the lack of the trust. The relationship between Guanxi and Chinese sociality is very closed. For Chinese enterprises, the development of the Guanxi can be the mechanism to overcome both the completion and the shortage of the resources. The managers in Chinese sociality are specially good at manipulate the Guanxi to construct the trust in an organization. They not only rely on the original Guanxi of the relatives and the acquaintances, but also expand the area of connections among people via the introduction of the intermediates. If both managers of two companies of strategic alliances have the interpersonal Guanxi, the degree of the trust between the strategic alliance partners will be higher. This research not only builds a theoretical framework by making a complete survey, but also verifies this framework by collecting and analyzing 112 effective questionnaires according to the structural equation model, SEM. The results show that the differences of basic types of the Guanxi among the alliances will be affected by the degree of the closeness and by the degree of the trust (including benevolence trust and credibility trust, from family, acquaintances, to strangers, in the descending order). The past cooperative experience of the alliance partners and the common interpersonal relationship are also able to affect the degree of the trust. There are also positive influences on the alliance performance for the degree of the trust among alliances (including the degree of satisfaction on the cooperative relationship and the degree of completion of the goals). And this degree of the trust among the alliances and the alliance performance are of the positive influences on the willing for alliances to cooperate in the future. Because the strategic alliance in essence is both competition and cooperation, the companies must carefully consult and discuss with each other when progressing the forge of the strategic alliances. Based on the Guanxi, the alliance partners should enhance the trust and the understanding between each other. If the alliances partners could be sufficiently trusted, it is believed that the alliance performance can be improved and the win-win can be fully achieved.

In the development of the global software industry, what kind of development trend can we observe? Which kind of role does Microsoft act in the development of the global software industry? On the other hand, how to develop the software industry in China? What is the development procedure of the Chinese software industry? This paper concentrates on studying the relationship between Microsoft and China. After analyzing the entry strategy and management tactics of Microsoft, we can understand the delicate relation between Microsoft and Chinese government. And we may realize, in addition, why China does need Microsoft. How does China receive more advanced technologies through the competition between the software manufacturers? Because Microsoft has offered more investment and assistance, China will have the capabilities to develop its own software industry. In order to get more long-term development in China, Microsoft also needs to develop the good relations with Chinese government, from central government to the local governments, and utilizes these relations; Microsoft may obtain more favorable development chance in China.

Researchers who focus on strategic management and event management have used stakeholder theory to understand the relationships between a focal organization and its stakeholder. Nevertheless, achieving collaborative solutions can be difficult due to the widely varying values among actors as well as the influence of institutional forces such as legal or social norms. Furthermore, organizational, industrial, and national cultures in which these norms, values, morals, and ethics are embedded vary enormously. What varies culturally, however, is the perception of stakeholders and how a focal organization interacts with its stakeholders. What has yet to be examined in depth, however, is the relevance of national culture on stakeholder theory and factors that facilitate or impede networking and alliance formation for and through events in different cultural setting. The main research objective of the study is therefore to re-examine the relationship and interactions between a sports event organization and its stakeholders in Chinese culture. By conducting an ethnography study on a sport event company in Taiwan, this study attempted to perform a cultural configuration on the Western-developed stakeholder theory. The methods of data collection in this ethnographic study include participant observation, interviews, field notes, event analysis, and document analysis. Thick descriptions with detail the patterns of culture and social relationships in this specific cultural context are generated. A thematic was performed and thirteen themes emerge. Eleven of them are related to guanxi and concepts of stakeholder theory. The other two are not directly related but unique to the context of this study, i.e., the sport industry in Chinese society. Themes related to guanxi and concepts of stakeholder theory fall broadly into four categories: managerial level, organizational level, inter-organizational level, and macro level. The results suggest that Chinese culture does indeed have, at various levels, a profound influence on stakeholder theory. The finding of this study also indicates that the guanxi, renqing, and mianzi that embedded in Chinese culture could have a substantial influence on legitimacy, trust, and reciprocity that determine the way CEOs recognize and interact with their stakeholders. In conclusion, this study, coming from such an interpretivist viewpoint, uses an ethnographic approach to seek alternative and narrative accounts in a different national culture for stakeholder theory development. Lastly, limitations and recommendations for future studies are provided. / text

Vid inträde på nya marknader kommer företag att agera under andra förutsättningar än de är vana vid. Under denna process är det viktigt för företag att bygga nätverk och skapa relationer till politiska aktörer. I Kina är relationer till politiska aktörer särskilt viktigt då landets affärsliv präglas av statlig kontroll. För företag som etablerar sig i Kina kommer nätverksoch relationsbyggandet till politiska aktörer att skilja sig från andra länder, då relationer i landet karaktäriseras av fenomenet guanxi. Denna uppsats har för avsikt att undersöka hur svenska företag upplever och hanterar relationer till politiska aktörer i Kina med avseende på guanxi. En kvalitativ metod har tillämpats där det empiriska materialet samlats in genom intervjuer med tre olika företag. Nätverksteorier med fokus på politiska aktörer i nätverk och de olika karaktärsdragen av det kinesiska begreppet guanxi utgör det teoretiska ramverket. Studiens resultat har visat att de svenska företagen i stor utsträckning fokuserar på personliga politiska relationer och att företagen anställer lokala personer med guanxi till politiker för att nå ut till politiska aktörer.

Den ekonomiska jätten i öst växer som aldrig förr och affärsmöjligheterna för företag har gåttfrån att bara ha varit ett land där man förlägger sin produktion, tack vare att kostnaderna är såpass låga, lockar numera den snabbt växande konsumentmarknaden fler och fler företag atttesta lyckan i landet. I denna uppsats tas den affärskulturella skillnaden upp både internt iföretag där man har kinesiska kollegor samt externt, hur man jobbar med kinesiska företagfrån ett svenskt perspektiv. Den stora problematiken längs vägen mot en hybridkultur är denkulturella skillnaden som råder mellan Kina och Sverige som medför utmaningar för varjeföretag som ämnar etablera sig i Kina. Skillnader i värderingar, religion, normer, vanor medmycket mera bidrar till en skild uppfattning om hur affärer ska skötas.Genom att söka relevant data i litteratur, tidskrifter och artiklar samt genomföra kvalitativaintervjuer med personer som har erfarenhet och kunskap av den kinesiska kulturen då de harantingen verkat i Kina eller har arbetat med kinesiska kollegor under en längre tid, hoppas vikunna skapa en djupare förståelse för hur svenska företag bemöter den kinesiskaaffärskulturen. Dessa personer hittar vi i både stora och små företag som verkar i Kina för attfå fler perspektiv på hur kulturen fungerar. Hur mycket de kommer i kontakt med begreppsom guanxi1 och mianzi2, som är stora delar av den kinesiska affärskulturen, är också relevantför denna studie. Vi ville även undersöka hur aktuell befintlig data inom ämnet är och om denär i behov av en modernisering för att spegla dagens rådande affärsklimat.Hur ser de kulturella skillnaderna ut för ett svenskt företag och hur gör de för att överkommadessa för att lyckas på den kinesiska marknaden? Hur mycket behöver de anpassa sig till denrådande kulturen samt hur mycket anpassar sig de kinesiska företagen till de svenskaföretagen? Var är den internationella affärskulturen i Kina på väg? Detta är några av de frågorvi försöker få svar på genom denna studie. / The financial giant in the east expands like never before and the business opportunities havegone from just being a country where you place your production due to the low costs, to arapid growing consumers market that attracts more and more companies to try out their luck.In this thesis the business Culture is described both internally in the company where you haveChinese colleagues and externally, how you work with Chinese companies from a Swedishperspective. The main issue along the way towards a hybrid culture are the culturaldifferences between China and Sweden as well as the challenges that comes with it for everycompany that tries to establish themselves in China. Differences in values, religion, habits andnorms among much else contribute to a separated opinion on how business is supposed to bedealt with.By searching for relevant data in literature, periodicals and articles as well as carry outqualitative interviews with individuals with experience and knowledge about the Chineseculture where they have worked in China or have had Chinese colleagues under a longerperiod of time, we hope to create a deeper understanding of how Swedish companies treatsthe Chinese business culture. We find these people in both large and small companies that arein China to get more perspective on how the culture works. How much do they get in contactwith concepts like guanxi1 and mianzi2, which are major parts of the Chinese business culture,is also relevant to this study. We also wanted to do research of how up-to-date current data inthe field is and if the data is in need of a modernization to reflect the current business climate.How do the cultural differences look like for a Swedish company and how do they go about toovercome this to succeed on the Chinese market? How much do they need to adapt to theculture and how much do the Chinese companies adapt to the Swedish business culture?Where is the international business culture heading? These are just a few of the questions thatwe are trying to find an answer to with this study.