Schedule:

5:00pm Welcome and Opening

5:05pm Yifu Liu interviewing Howard Chao @ Doon Capital

5:35pm Open Q&A

6:00pm End

Event Description:

The world is de-globalizing and the US and China are decoupling, and the Covid-19 pandemic is accelerating both of these trends. How should startups and multinational businesses focused on US/China cross border business rethink their strategies in this new environment?

Even before Covid, a partial decoupling of the two economies was in process. The US government was imposing much tighter controls on Chinese investment in the US and technology outflows to China. Chinese investment in the US was falling to a small fraction of its former volume. The US government was becoming quite suspicious of Chinese exchange students. At the same time, the Chinese government has been moving towards greater technology self-reliance, and some foreign technology companies may find it increasingly difficult to stay relevant in China.

In the wake of the Covid crisis, even more is changing. International travel is at a standstill and will take a long time to come back. International trade is projected to be down 10-30% this year. Multinationals will be reducing their supply chain reliance on China and many Chinese companies will be shifting their focus away from the US market. China will export less to the West, selling more to the East Asia region, the developing world and China’s vast domestic markets. Some predict that the world is fragmenting into two technology blocks, one led by the US at its center and the other with China at its center.

How should tech entrepreneurs and multinationals who were targeting business in both the US and China think about these developments? Is it still possible for tech startups to maintain a truly global strategy? Should US startups avoid taking investments from Chinese investors? If I am originally from China, am I better off doing my startup here or in China?