Swimming with Asian Sharks - Business Secrets from the Pacific Rim

Learn a Trade at the Trade Show

The fastest way to get into a field is to go to where the experts of that field gather.  After our meeting with the Malaysian loyalty program, Mr. Physics and I had a free day to explore Malaysia.  I had already started looking into the creation of a renewable energy company, and it just so happens that Malaysia was having a Green technology trade show.

Mr. Physics and I went to this show and were amazed to find the massive convention center packed with companies pushing their technologies.  It turned out that Malaysia, like Germany and many other countries, has implemented a plugin tariff that was stimulating the Green technology sector.  A plugin tariff is a program that lets individuals and companies create renewable energy systems and sell that energy back to the government at a premium.  For example, for every 1 Kilowatt hour (KWh) the government of Canada gives you about 30 cents, they will even sign a contract to give you this price for 20 years.  This gives the developer time to recuperate the cost of the development.  The only tricky bit is that the tariff goes down depending on the size of your power plant; the larger your plant, the fewer cents you get per kWh.

While wandering the trade show, I met a Malaysian engineer who was pushing a biofuel device to be used by chicken farms.  Chicken farms use a massive amount of energy and this device would take advantage of the chicken manure to power the farm, resulting in tens of thousands of dollars in savings a year.  His company would go in and install the equipment to make this happen, and the farmers would pay a part of the savings to them over the course of the engagement.  The only problem with biofuel is that the plugin tariff the government would provide is much smaller than solar.  The lower tariff is maybe due to the fact that although biofuels are renewable, they still generate similar emissions to that of regular fuel.

There were presenters from all over the world. The conference center was actually separated into the different countries.  The majority of exhibitors were small to medium-size companies.  The bigger companies like Toyota and Honda all had booth babes.  This helped create a healthy amount of traffic for them to showcase their cars.  While exploring the Japanese section of the conference, I discovered an amazing nanotechnology liquid that allows light in but reflects over 20 degrees Celsius of heat away.  This could be applied to the many windows of an office building and drastically lower the cooling cost during summer.

The largest section of the conference comprised Singapore and Malaysia companies.  Another unique invention from Singapore was an on-demand flood sack.  The flood sack could replace sandbags during a flood.  When the weather warms up, the sacks dry so you can easily remove them.

Many Chinese companies were there offering products ranging from knock-off Segways to advanced thermal cooling systems.

An event like this really helps get you going on your own inventions.  The inspiration and energy from these entrepreneurial companies is infectious.  It really got me going for my next venture in plastic to oil.

To conclude this section, Malaysian sharks are a lot less aggressive than the sharks found in Hong Kong.  Malaysian business happens at more relaxed pace, and is more geared towards win-win situations.  Out of the business meetings I attended and my interaction with the Malaysian people, I find them friendly and easygoing.  Doing business here requires patience, but once you are in, competition is slow to follow.