The Tao of Business
Chinese takeovers: Being eaten by the dragon | The Economist:
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbqotUunToUwqT2NEUwIuIH9RVEseAf_ZLAJe4yQl1tKyUzGS3kUhUrMLprgyp72H1QPme95TExurqHQSgRncm0R2x1wewBusPb2K1h5580aHQWW2sE1ihIGj5SU17GYYUV3IL6dZDgFU/s200/dragon.png) |
Image via The Economist. |
A FEW years ago two executives of an international oil company were working late in its otherwise deserted office in England. A stunning young Chinese woman arrived at reception. “She was very attractive, decked out in Gucci,” one of them says. She delivered a letter from Sinopec, one of China’s giant, state-controlled energy firms, proposing a multibillion-dollar takeover. The executive adds, a little wistfully, that she then disappeared into the night in a car with local licence plates, never to be seen again.