The mayor had to meet as many as four business VIPs in a single day, talking to all about cooperation. On most days local newspapers published pictures and articles about the guests and their ambitious investment plans.

World business giants have only a 100-meter dash to enter the Chinese market, if China's 15-year effort to join the World Trade Organization (WTO) is compared to a marathon.

To many multinationals, China's accession to the WTO is only part of the issue. The competition to get a share in the Chinese market is being intensified even more fiercely.

Motorola announced in Beijing Wednesday that in the next five years it would add its total investment in China to US$10 billion, purchase US$10 billion worth of accessories and services in the Chinese market, and increase its output in China to US$10 billion.

On the same day, Wal-mart, the world's leading retailer based in the United States, signed agreements on opening five chain stores in Beijing involving a total investment of US$25 million.

Bayer AG of Germany announced in Beijing on November 1 that it would spend US$3.1 billion to establish a production base for chemical products and polymer in China.

The Oriental Plaza, an investment of Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka-shing, has received dozens of new tenants, including Lucent, Toshiba, and Panasonic.

Many others have flooded into Beijing's Central Business District in the eastern part of the Chinese capital.

Similar activity can also be found in other cities, such as China's commercial center of Shanghai, Guangzhou in the south, and even Xi'an in the west.

More than 40 of the world's Top 500 companies have opened branches or offices in either Beijing or Shanghai.

The mushrooming research and development (R&D) centers funded by multinationals further demonstrate foreign investors' confidence in China.

Motorola announced Wednesday it would make Beijing one of its global R&D bases dealing with its major technological research work.

An investment report released by the United Nations earlier this year shows that the multinationals have set up more than 100 R&D centers in China, focusing on computer science, and telecommunication, electronic, chemical, automobile, and pharmaceutical industries.

The number of the R&D organizations will be doubled in five years, says an official with the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation.

Intel's laboratory has cooperated with Chinese universities in three of the four key research fields it has selected as future goals. It has initiated studies on future Internet structure in five Chinese universities.

Ni Angli, general manager of Edelman Public Relations Worldwide (Beijing), confirmed that the company's business has grown on the eve of China's accession to the WTO.

Some multinationals which plan to come to China have asked for market research and brand polls.

Ni said that in an open market, customer recognition of brand names makes a direct impact on a company's market strategy.

Economists say that the WTO will force China to improve its investment environment. The sustained economic growth rate and the stable domestic situation will make China a light in the gloomy world economy.

(eastday.com November 12, 2001)