THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, February 8, 1996 TAG: 9602080425
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MYLENE MANGALINDAN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 67 lines
Hidden behind an unassuming parking lot in downtown Norfolk, sandwiched between an art supply store and a church, lies the latest hope for trade with China.
Started by two Beijing natives, the China Business Center USA Ltd. will try to spark international trade by providing a forum for business transactions between Chinese and American companies.
The Norfolk-based corporation will allow Chinese-based companies or businessmen to display and sell their wares in a six-floor building on Granby Street. The center is recruiting companies selling an array of consumer and manufacturing goods such as clothing, auto parts, jewelry, electronics and machinery.
Buyers will be able to inspect the items at the Granby Street site and place orders. The center will open officially in September.
``There are other Chinese companies that will use this as a base of operation in terms of marketing their products and also to solicit business from U.S. companies to do business in China,'' said Norfolk's former mayor Joseph A. Leafe, an attorney representing the China Business Center.
China Business Center President Wenson Ge decided to undertake this venture because he wanted Chinese firms to succeed in the American marketplace.
``I found a lot of Chinese companies came to the United States to do business and a lot were not successful,'' said the University of Massachusetts graduate and physics major. ``They don't quite understand how to do business.''
Through the Norfolk center, Ge will help Chinese companies make in-roads while providing them with a base of operation.
``If only two companies were bound together, they would have enough strength and power to do business,'' he said.
China Business Center closely resembles China Market USA in Portsmouth, a $6 million venture launched in November 1994 that also provides office and showroom space for Chinese companies. The difference is that China Marketsells mostly retail items to consumers, said Ge, who has served as vice president for China Market. His Norfolk venture will concentrate more on selling wholesale to businesses.
Ge, who has lived in the United States for 10 years, has invested $407,000 in the Norfolk buildings. He has backing from a private China-based parent company, which he declined to name. Ge runs the company with the help of Vice President Pingping Fan and two part-time employees.
China Business Center will occupy two adjoining buildings at Bousch and Granby streets. The sale for the buildings closed last week.
The six-story Granby Street building is the larger of the two and will hold a coffee shop, a Chinese restaurant, a clothing and jewelry store, and a computer repair shop on the first floor. Offices will occupy the top floor, and showroom spaces will be available on the remaining floors.
Ge, president of the China Business Center, wants to organize international trade shows, including a Chinese product show in April, and introduce some type of high-tech venture between American and Chinese companies. ILLUSTRATION: Color phot by Gary C. Knapp
China Business Center USA Ltd., a Norfolk-based corporation, will
allow Chinese-based companies or business people to display and sell
their wares in a six-floor building on Granby Street in Norfolk.
Area Shown: China Business Center USA
by CNB