Business Pacific Rim Nations

A group of Pacific Rim business leaders has issued a "road map" to free trade and secure investment that calls for exempting business travelers from visa requirements, putting investment protections into law and creating ombudsmen to smooth over trade problems. The recommendations come from Pacific Business Forum, created two years ago to advise the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation, a group of 18 Pacific nations from Canada to Australia.

A group of Pacific Rim business leaders has issued a "road map" to free trade and secure investment that calls for exempting business travelers from visa requirements, putting investment protections into law and creating ombudsmen to smooth over trade problems. The recommendations come from Pacific Business Forum, created two years ago to advise the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation, a group of 18 Pacific nations from Canada to Australia.

In an extraordinary marketing move, Estee Lauder Inc. has created a men's toiletry line specifically for Californians. It is called New West. "The New York cosmetic industry is too inbred," said Leonard Lauder, president and chief executive officer of the firm founded by his mother, Estee. "There's not enough new thinking and new blood. That's why we're branching out." In this case, "branching out" means thinking small by Lauder standards.

With developing countries in the Pacific Rim expected to spend $1 billion on infrastructure projects through the year 2000, small wonder that Irvine-based Fluor Corp. Chairman Les McCraw is playing a role in this year's Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings. Roughly half of the company's $8 billion now come from Asia and other developing regions such as Latin America, Eastern Europe and Africa. Fluor is the parent of Fluor Daniel, an engineering and construction company, and A.T.

One-Stop Expo: Ten Pacific Rim nations will be among the 350 exhibitors expected to participate in the International Asian Expo next month at the Anaheim Convention Center. "Previously, individual Asian governments have held trade fairs to facilitate business exchange between their countries and U.S. firms," said Vickie Roddcharoen, an expo organizer.

Taking advantage of growing American interest in the Pacific Rim, more organizations are sponsoring seminars on business opportunities in Asia. The economies of the Pacific Rim are growing--as a subject for conferences. With the growth in conferencing comes a spate of speakers-for-hire, a growing number of "Pac Rimmers" ready and willing to tell companies how to ride the Asian economic tide.

Few places on Earth have been described in such rich statistical detail. But then, the Pacific Rim is an idea in search of a definition, and it needs something tangible to glue it together. That's why anyone with a stomach for numbers can discover the growth rate of its aggregate GNP, the output in megawatts of its new power plants or the purchasing power of its emerging middle class.

Three years ago, Sergio Regalado was a dentist. Today, he is wrapping up a four-month business trip to Asia to look for products for his Van Nuys-based import-export business. "I decided I was more of an outdoors person, not an indoors person," Regalado explained from the Taiwan office of Inter-Global Import-Export. Regalado's career change may be more dramatic than most, but it underscores the continuing lure of the Pacific Rim.

With developing countries in the Pacific Rim expected to spend $1 billion on infrastructure projects through the year 2000, small wonder that Irvine-based Fluor Corp. Chairman Les McCraw is playing a role in this year's Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings. Roughly half of the company's $8 billion now come from Asia and other developing regions such as Latin America, Eastern Europe and Africa. Fluor is the parent of Fluor Daniel, an engineering and construction company, and A.T.

When Business Tokyo hits the newsstands this week, the magazine's editors hope that its new look, with cover girl Yumi Nakajima, will help attract new readers and signal a new direction for the 3-year-old monthly. Meanwhile, Venture Japan's fall quarterly is hot off the press and the San Francisco publication is looking to find a niche with U.S.-Japan business people.

Few places on Earth have been described in such rich statistical detail. But then, the Pacific Rim is an idea in search of a definition, and it needs something tangible to glue it together. That's why anyone with a stomach for numbers can discover the growth rate of its aggregate GNP, the output in megawatts of its new power plants or the purchasing power of its emerging middle class.

One-Stop Expo: Ten Pacific Rim nations will be among the 350 exhibitors expected to participate in the International Asian Expo next month at the Anaheim Convention Center. "Previously, individual Asian governments have held trade fairs to facilitate business exchange between their countries and U.S. firms," said Vickie Roddcharoen, an expo organizer.

Americans are generous and the Japanese are selfish. The Japanese are polite and Americans are brash. Americans are impatient and the Japanese persevere. Americans may be more well-liked than the Japanese, who still stir black and bitter memories among many Asians for the wartime conquest of their countries. Americans are also viewed as better teachers, both by virtue of the U.S.

For 15 years, John L. Graham has studied American business practices and compared them to those in Asia. His findings: Americans tend to be too blabby, too impatient and too informal for Asian tastes. Graham, a professor of marketing and international business at UC Irvine, first examined differences between Americans and Japanese for a doctoral dissertation in 1976. Since then, Graham has studied Korea, China, Taiwan and Hong Kong as well as a number of European and Latin American nations.

Three years ago, Sergio Regalado was a dentist. Today, he is wrapping up a four-month business trip to Asia to look for products for his Van Nuys-based import-export business. "I decided I was more of an outdoors person, not an indoors person," Regalado explained from the Taiwan office of Inter-Global Import-Export. Regalado's career change may be more dramatic than most, but it underscores the continuing lure of the Pacific Rim.

When Business Tokyo hits the newsstands this week, the magazine's editors hope that its new look, with cover girl Yumi Nakajima, will help attract new readers and signal a new direction for the 3-year-old monthly. Meanwhile, Venture Japan's fall quarterly is hot off the press and the San Francisco publication is looking to find a niche with U.S.-Japan business people.

Americans are generous and the Japanese are selfish. The Japanese are polite and Americans are brash. Americans are impatient and the Japanese persevere. Americans may be more well-liked than the Japanese, who still stir black and bitter memories among many Asians for the wartime conquest of their countries. Americans are also viewed as better teachers, both by virtue of the U.S.

For 15 years, John L. Graham has studied American business practices and compared them to those in Asia. His findings: Americans tend to be too blabby, too impatient and too informal for Asian tastes. Graham, a professor of marketing and international business at UC Irvine, first examined differences between Americans and Japanese for a doctoral dissertation in 1976. Since then, Graham has studied Korea, China, Taiwan and Hong Kong as well as a number of European and Latin American nations.

Taking advantage of growing American interest in the Pacific Rim, more organizations are sponsoring seminars on business opportunities in Asia. The economies of the Pacific Rim are growing--as a subject for conferences. With the growth in conferencing comes a spate of speakers-for-hire, a growing number of "Pac Rimmers" ready and willing to tell companies how to ride the Asian economic tide.

In an extraordinary marketing move, Estee Lauder Inc. has created a men's toiletry line specifically for Californians. It is called New West. "The New York cosmetic industry is too inbred," said Leonard Lauder, president and chief executive officer of the firm founded by his mother, Estee. "There's not enough new thinking and new blood. That's why we're branching out." In this case, "branching out" means thinking small by Lauder standards.