About three years ago, I set up a joint venture company in Tai'an, Shandong, PRC to develop and commercialize stem cell therapy products, especially, CARTISTEM, a treatment for OA by MSC from umbilical cord blood (http://www.medi-post.com/front/eng/stemcell/cartistem.do). Everything was new to me in China, but I really like people in Shandong.
Shandong is a place where Confucius is born thousands years ago and still sticks to its tradition which means they are generally conservative even for Chinese average. Shandong is ranked 3rd in whole China for state GDP, but their industry structure mostly belongs to traditional mess including chemical, petrol, and auto parts. The state government is very keen to a new industry like biotech and pharma especially from outside. Not much progress has been made though during my tenure for last 3 years due to lack of legit regulatory guideline for cell therapy in China, but I may not forget friendship with people there.
I handed over all my responsibility for the JV to my successor last year. It doesn't matter much though as I did more with people than business itself there.
