China Trip, Day Six—April 11: This was yet another packed day, but it proved to be very interesting. As the previous day, we headed up to Tianjin outside Beijing to visit Danish industrial giant Danfoss’s main China facilities. Frequent readers of my blog will remember that Danfoss was the case company of the CBS Case Competition 2006, which gives it a special place in my heart. And it was amazing to travel thousands of kilometres across the globe to see that the buildings Danfoss has in Beijing, look just like the ones in Denmark. On the other hand, and equally inspiring, was how the structure of the organisation had been adapted to Chinese norms. It is big as well as little things, such as how the canteen is and how employees are appreciated, that meet the eye.
The visit at Danfoss was only for the morning—we drove back to Beijing for the afternoon to visit PricewaterhouseCoopers and learn about the insides and outsides of the legal environment for doing business in China as well as the comprehensive tax system. In addition to all that wisdom :-), one major takeaway from that visit was the view of the city from their offices (below).
