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I really enjoy my occasional trips outside of Beijing. Although air travel in China is not a ton of fun, these excursions are generally a breath of fresh air (literally) and a showcase of what’s going on in the provinces.
My latest travels took me to Weihai, a city on the northern coast of Shandong province that did a short stint as a British colony. Weihai’s what I would call a KFC town: large and prosperous enough to support one outlet of the fried chicken franchise, but not quite ready for McDonald’s or Starbucks. It’s neither the provincial capital nor Shandong’s top economic engine. But that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a lot going on.
What amazed me most about this outpost was the prevalence of technology. Mobile phones were as ubiquitous as anywhere else on China’s prosperous coast. And in terms of pure advertising messages, the city seemed to be a battleground for consumer technology.
One of the first messages I saw upon arrival was an ad for China Network Communications Group (China Netcom). Not long afterwards, I saw one for China United Telecommunications (China Unicom). Unicom’s presence was no surprise: in the ongoing battle with its larger competitor, China Mobile Telecommunications (China Mobile), Unicom has gone for market share by offering lower rates on mobile phone calls, a prospect which is increasingly appealing the further you get from major urban centers.
During my 24-hour stay, I saw ads for technology everywhere. Along with the mobile giants was China Railway Communication (China Railcom), a smaller player whose ads I didn’t recognize because I can’t remember ever seeing one in Beijing. Nokia and Sony Ericsson were there, as was Taiwan’s Acer.
Of course, there were more than just ads. Almost every display was located near a store where the products or services being promoted were available. My hotel, a non-affiliated local venture, had in-room broadband. Along the main street I saw Internet cafes (scarce in Beijing due to tough local regulations) sponsored by different telecom providers, the way Coke or Pepsi will provide a free sign for a neighborhood grocery store.
Perhaps the biggest surprise was the seeming lack of South Korean technology companies. With Seoul just an hour from Weihai by air, Korean companies are significant investors in Shandong generally and Weihai specifically. I expected to see quite a bit more from Samsung and the like
It’s easy to fly into Beijing, drive to Zhongguancun in the city’s northwest Haidian district, visit a few tech firms and walk through some equipment stores, and think China has embraced a hi-tech future. But in many ways (although a lot of Western executives and venture capitalists do just that), it’s like flying to Orlando, driving to Disney World, and declaring that the United States has embraced mirth. To get a real sense of what’s going on, you need to get out of the big cities.
India’s been in the headlines a lot over the past few weeks, with IBM’s US$6 billion investment, and U.S. interest in making it a strategic regional partner. But go to India’s equivalent of Weihai, and you won’t see the mobile phones, the connectivity, the pervasiveness of technology in the life of the average person. In China, even in the provinces, technology is no longer in the future.
— Steven Schwankert (IDG News Service)
04:25 PM 
Mark Hiratsuka •
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