For those of you that don’t know, Facebook and Twitter have been blocked here in the People’s Republic of China for the past several months. While most would say that this offers a lessons regarding censorship, an equally important lesson is what it teaches us about systems engineering, specifically the design of communications networks. Because [...]

Chinese media is reporting that China Unicom and Apple have signed a 3 year deal to sell the iPhone in mainland China.  Reports are that Unicom will purchase iPhones from Apple for 3,000 Chinese Yuan each and guarantee sales of 1 to 2 million units per year and revenue of 5 billion Chinese Yuan. It [...]

My friend Karen and her business partner Andy have been hard at work introducing the concept of gourmet frozen yogurt to the Guangzhou consumer. Their brainchild, Yogurt Workshop, recently opened its first two stores in Guangzhou. Yogurt Workshop offers 4 flavors of frozen yogurt, Original, Green Tea, Guava and Mango. I am a particularly big [...]

There is a lot of confusion about invoices in China.  If you ask for an invoice from a vendor in most of the world and you will get a piece of paper issued by the vendor that lists the items or services you are buying, total amount due and terms.  In Mainland China, asking for [...]