Frankfurt, Germany, March 2001.

Lin Zhenhua, Li Mozi of the Machinery Committee, Gu Jiahua of Xingbei Heavy Machinery and others stood outside the gate of the International Exhibition Center, looking at the colorful billboards on the square, and their hearts were full of emotion.

Lin Zhenhua pointed to the square and said to several fellow travelers: "The first time I came here to participate in the exhibition was in 1985, when the team was led by Vice Minister Gao Zuxing of the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Director Zhu Jinwen of the Machinery Committee. There are only more than 40 people in our whole group, and the booth is in a corner. At that time, we were standing in this position, looking at the billboards all over the square, all of which belonged to the Western powers, and there was not a single Chinese company. That sense of loss, I still struggle with it when I think about it. ”

"From 1985 to now, 16 years have passed, and at a glance, there are a lot of Chinese characters." Gu Jiahua said with a smile.

Indeed, from this position, you can now see more than a dozen advertisements of Chinese companies, the most eye-catching of which is the large billboard of the Hanhua Heavy Industry Group. The image used to show the corporate image of Hanhua is a female welder standing on a high steel frame under a blue sky, holding an electric welding mask in her hand, with confidence and humility in her smile. This female welder is naturally Shen Jiale, the ace of Hanhua, and she has now become the image spokesperson of the entire Hanhua Group.

Xingbei Heavy Machinery also rented an advertising space in the square, but because Gu Jiahua was reluctant to spend money, the location of the billboard was relatively partial and the area was relatively small, so it could only be regarded as better than nothing. After all, Gu Jiahua is a person from the system, and he is not as lavish as Lin Zhenhua in spending money.

Lin Zhenhua said: "You see the advertisements of so many Chinese companies now, which are gradually accumulated year by year. It was our first time to participate in the exhibition, and I was reluctant to advertise, so I wrote a sign with a pen. Hanging outside the booth is the biggest advertisement. ”

"I've heard Director Zhu talk about it." Li Mozi said with a smile, "It seems to say that 10 million US dollars can build an industrial system, right?" ”

Lin Zhenhua also laughed: "At that time, when I wrote this advertisement, Director Zhu and Minister Gao were not satisfied. Say I'm bragging. Dishonesty. ”

"That's a change in perception." Gu Jiahua said. "At that time, we didn't know anything about the market economy, any public relations propaganda, or hype. It's like now. Black dares to blow white, I don't think it's appropriate, shouldn't the country also regulate it? ”

"Uh...... Mr. Gu, this is far away, right? We don't care about advertising, let's sell products wholeheartedly. Let's go, let's go to the booth. Li Mozi laughed. Make a "please" gesture. Together with Lin Zhenhua, Gu Jiahua and others, they walked to the Chinese exhibition hall.

Since 1985, the Machinery Committee organized a delegation to participate in the Frankfurt Equipment Exhibition and broke out the unpopularity. The country's enthusiasm for participating in overseas exhibitions has gradually increased. Since then, the Machinery Committee has organized domestic equipment enterprises to participate in the exhibition in Frankfurt every year. The number of exhibitors is also increasing year by year. In the beginning, all Chinese companies shared a common exhibition area, and later, as the scale of exhibitors continued to expand and the number of exhibited products increased, large enterprises such as Hanhua Heavy Industries began to rent booths independently and separate from the country's large exhibition area. Later, more and more Chinese enterprises were separated, and gradually formed a scale, and the exhibition organizers simply set aside a separate exhibition hall and named it China Exhibition Hall.

As soon as Lin Zhenhua returned to the Hanhua exhibition area, He Fei, the director of the pavilion, greeted him with several people. Lin Zhenhua looked at it, couldn't help but smile, stretched out his hands to the person who walked in front, and shouted in English: "Harore, my old friend, we meet again." ”

The man was none other than Harorre, the Minister of Industry of the African Republic of Usan, who met Lin Zhenhua for the first time at the Frankfurt fair, where he was the first client of the Chinese Pavilion that year. In the following ten years, Haroret and Hanhua have always had business dealings, and Lin Zhenhua also privately funded the election of Nale, the boss of Haroret and the then governor of the northern province of Ussan, for the presidency of Ussan. Now that Nale has been elected president and has been re-elected, it is for him that Haroré has been transformed from Minister of Industry of the Northern Province to Minister of Industry of the entire Republic of Uzsan. …,

Haroret also stepped forward with a smile on his face, hugged Lin Zhenhua, and said: "Mr. Lin, I am so glad to see you, President Nale specially entrusted me to greet you on his behalf, and welcome you to have the opportunity to visit our Uzan country again." ”

"I also ask Mr. Hallorey to greet President Naler on my behalf, and ask him to visit Xunyang if he visits China." Lin Zhenhua also politely extended an invitation. However, he can only say that he asked Nale to go to Xunyang to have a look, after all, he is the president of a country, and going to China is a diplomatic event, which is not something that Lin Zhenhua can decide.

After the two finished greetings, Harorey turned to the side, pointed to the two black men behind him and said to Lin Zhenhua: "Mr. Lin, I came here today to bring two friends to ask for your help." Let me introduce you to Mr. Mubila, Deputy Governor of the National Bank of the Republic of Goma, and Mr. Nuzama, Deputy Minister of Industry, who have come to tender for the equipment of their second thermal power plant in Equateur province. Both of them are good friends of mine, so I suggest they first consider choosing a Chinese company as a supplier of equipment. ”

Mubila and Nuzama hurriedly stepped forward and shook hands with Lin Zhenhua. When Lin Zhenhua heard that there was business, he naturally didn't dare to slack off, and hurriedly instructed He Fei to prepare a negotiation room, and asked people to invite Shao Fengwei, the chief engineer of Xingbei Heavy Machinery. Hanhua Heavy Industries does not produce large-scale thermal power equipment, and among the companies that come to the exhibition, only Xingbei Heavy Machinery provides this equipment.

After the guests and hosts were seated, Lin Zhenhua introduced each other, and then Mubila began to introduce the details of their bidding.

The Republic of Goma is a country located in central Africa, with a land area of 1.5 million square kilometers and a population of more than 60 million. Since its founding in 1960, the country has been in turmoil and its economy has been underdeveloped for a long time, making it one of the least developed countries declared by the United Nations. In 1997, the new President of the Republic of Goma took office, and he made great efforts to stabilize the domestic situation and at the same time put forward a three-year plan for economic development. By last year, the first three-year plan had been successfully completed, and the domestic economy had developed to a great extent, and the new president immediately put forward a second three-year plan to prepare for the construction of a number of new industrial projects in the country.

The development achievements of the Republic of Goma have been appreciated by international organizations such as the United Nations, and the World Bank has promised to provide low-interest loans to the Republic of Goma to support several projects in the second three-year plan of the Republic of Goma. The second thermal power plant project in Equateur Province, which Mubila and Nuzama invited to bid for at the Frankfurt Equipment Exhibition, is one of the projects financed by the World Bank.

The World Bank was founded in 1945 to finance the reconstruction of war-torn Europe and restore the global economy. With the recovery of the European economy, the World Bank has gradually shifted its service to third world countries, focusing on providing project financing support to less developed countries to help them develop their own economies.

The Bank's loans are popular with cash-strapped third world countries due to their very low interest rates and not harsh terms. However, the World Bank loans are not easy to obtain, in order to prevent borrowers from abusing these low-interest loans, the World Bank has set a very strict set of procedures, one of the most important is to require the use of loans to build projects must be subject to international bidding, to do business around, to avoid the use of inefficient loans and **.

After Mubila introduced the project, Nuzama took over and said: "We in the Republic of Goma have always had a lot of technical exchanges with your country, we have two fertilizer factories and one pharmaceutical factory built by your country's enterprises, and the main equipment used in the two machinery factories is also from your country, so we have always been very satisfied with the quality and service of your country's products." "Thank you, Mr. Nuzama, for your affirmation." Lin Zhenhua smiled faintly and responded. He knew that it was not a good thing for Nuzama to start with such a word, because after this kind of praise, it must be the legendary "but", and he did not know what kind of "but" Nuzama was going to say.

"But......" Nuzama unsurprisingly popped up the word "but", he said: "The main advantage of your products is that the price is low, and in terms of technical level, there is still a considerable gap with Western countries." Our Equateur Province No. 2 Thermal Power Plant project, as a World Bank-funded project, has certain requirements in terms of the technical level of the equipment, so it ......"

When he said this, Nuzama dragged out a long speech and stopped talking, and the subtext naturally was: you know.

Harory's face was a little unbearable, and he said to Nuzama: "Minister Nuzama, what do you mean by that? Didn't we already say before this that we would give Chinese companies a chance to bid? Although the product technology of Chinese companies is slightly inferior to that of Western countries, the price of their products is very low, and it is not very important for you in the Republic of Goma to be able to save some money? ”

Nuzama shrugged his shoulders and said, "Harore, I'm very sorry, I said it, after all, this is a World Bank project, so the technical requirements are very high. The funds provided by the World Bank are sufficient, and our economy in the Republic of Goma is only relatively backward at present, and our economy will develop in the future, and we do not want to build a technical ...... Uh, not modern enough power plants. ”

"So, what kind of technology does Mr. Nuzama think is modern?" Lin Zhenhua smiled very brightly, as if Nuzama's words just now did not offend him. He knew that Chinese products had indeed always given the impression of being low-end and cheap, and that the Western-educated Nuzama must have seen it that way, and that it was time to change the image of Chinese products.