When Wu Shengying's wine-selling business failed in 2003, he abandoned farming in his hilly village in Shandong Province and turned to an idea that he hoped would please Chinese palates as much as KFC chicken wings.

Roasted eggs

Almost everybody around Wu, including his wife, doubted he could succeed, since roasting can easily break an egg without getting the tastes through. But Wu forged on, and after breaking several thousand eggs in experiments, he finally worked out a formula that he believes strikes a perfect balance between temperature and timing to make good roasted eggs.

"I was in a run of bad luck at that time and was about 350,000 yuan (US$43,500) in debt with the wine business," Wu recalled. "The rest of my life would be a failure if I could not work out a project that demands small input but makes money quickly."

Wu's roasted eggs, with a chewy texture but fresh taste, sold so well at the market that he not only paid off the debt quickly, but also bought a flat in town and a car. Now he has 310 franchised partners nationwide, and is still growing.

The roasted egg king's story may never be recorded in a textbook used in a master of business administration (MBA) program. Neither is he, at age 39, likely to have a Nasdaq initial public offering in the near term. But he does represent many entrepreneurial Chinese who, from humble beginnings, achieve success by relying on creativity, perseverance and, perhaps, a little bit of luck.

According to a joint survey by the MBA center of China Agricultural University (CAU) and the National Entrepreneurship Research Center of Tsinghua University, 48 percent of new Chinese businesses have start-up funds of less than 100,000 yuan (US$12,400), and 19 percent of them have less than 300,000 yuan (US$37,300).

"Many people who want to start their own businesses don't have much money, and that is one reason they would favor small products that don't incur too much financial strain," said Fu Wenge, director of the MBA Center of CAU.

"But if you look at the small businesses in east China's Zhejiang Province that are making a big share of the world's buttons, lighters and shoes, it's obvious that small products generate tremendous business opportunities."

The survey, which sampled nearly 1,000 entrepreneurs in 26 provinces, indicated the most favored start-up trades are low-cost and labor-intensive restaurants, wholesale or retail businesses, and processing business. Seventy respondents said their business idea came from familiar things in their work and lives.

Most people starting up businesses live hand-to-mouth lives, as the survey indicated 41.6 percent of those starting up a new business are employees in enterprises and 25 percent are farmers. The average education level of the surveyed entrepreneurs was senior middle school.

Another survey, released by Shanghai's labor and social security administration last November, made a sharper point that most people who start up businesses are motivated by the need for survival.

About 56 percent of the surveyed start-up business founders in Shanghai said they chose to take the plunge because they needed to feed the family, couldn't find a job, or were unhappy with prior jobs. Only 27.5 percent said they wanted to do something they enjoy, and 5.7 percent said they saw a precious opportunity that they could not afford to miss.

Fewer than 20 percent of the start-up businesses have more than 10 employees or annual revenue above 500,000 yuan (US$62,500), according to the survey in Shanghai.

"To a certain extent, people in financial difficulties may have stronger desire to change the status quo," said Gao Jian, vice director of Tsinghua University's National Entrepreneurship Center.

"But regardless of financial situations and education backgrounds, business founders have one motivation in common: To manifest their personal value and be better-off."

David Zou is an example of those able to live well working for others but obsessed with being their own bosses. After graduating from the business school of Renmin University of China three years ago, he got a job in a major State-owned real estate company. But a year later, after he had familiarized himself with the workflow of project planning and preparing documents, he felt bored with 9-to-5 office life and quit.

"As a major in marketing and management, I often had some new and interesting business ideas, and I realized it's impossible to put all the new ideas into practice considering the competitive atmosphere and red tape in a big company," he said.

After leaving a couple of other jobs, Zou opened a small company with several partners a year ago offering service in organizing expos, seminars and fairs. Although the business is just breaking even at present, he believes he has made the right choice.

"In the past when I applied for new jobs, it usually took some mumbo jumbo formalities and then a face-to-face interview with stereotype questions to answer, and that all made me feel bored," he said.

"To someone who has strong business ambitions, starting up his or her own entity is a step that should be taken before it is too late."

Twenty-five years ago, when almost all Chinese worked for State-owned businesses, entrepreneurs like Zou might be viewed as eccentric. But today they are, in a sense, darlings of a society that is facing mounting pressure in employment.

According to the forecast made by the Ministry of Labor and Social Security last year, about 10 million new laborers will flood the job market each year in the next five years, compared with 9 million new jobs the economy can generate annually.

"A key solution to China's employment issue is to foster freelance practioners, and small or even mini-enterprises," said Zhou Tianyong, vice director of the research center of the Central Party School.

"In that way one who used to need a job may create several jobs."

Central and local administrations have issued a host of policies in recent years, including tax breaks and streamlined administrative formalities, to encourage start-up businesses.

The National People's Congress (NPC) also revised the company law last year, lowering the minimum registered capital requirement for a limited company to 30,000 yuan (US$3,700) from 100,000 yuan (US$12,500), to make it easier to form a corporation.

Even so, there are no guarantees. According to the Tsinghua-CAU survey, 48 percent of start-up business founders reported failures and frustrations. The top three factors for failed businesses were a lack of liquid funding, bad choice of start-up projects and poor management, according to the survey.

"Many people choose to start up their own businesses because they're thrilled by the seemingly infinite opportunities in our rapid-growing economy," Zou said. "But the real business world is full of risks and hardships, and even a small lapse in the start-up period could cost the whole game.

"One should understand both sides of the coin before he takes the plunge."

(China Daily April 29, 2006)