Our Meeting started in the cold and wintry Munich at the campus of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität. The weather outside was soon forgotten by the lively discussion which erupted during our first presentation about Chinese foreign policy. In his speech, SPAIR member Christian Rieck revealed the historic roots of today’s Chinese foreign policy. Christian addressed the fact that certain public announcements and reactions by the Chinese government are misinterpreted by Western countries. In his view these statements may only be understood correctly when considering China’s loss of sovereignty in the 19th century and its attempt to gain superpower status again.

We then returned to the hotel for check-in and afterwards enjoyed Munich nightlife. After a short sightseeing walk through the historical city center we had Bavarian dinner with Weißbier and Hax’n while continuing our discussion. After filling our stomachs with traditional Bavarian cuisine we tested various bars and beers.

Having started the next day with a delicious breakfast, our board started Saturday’s seminar program with a presentation of the development of SPAIR in general, its financial status and the upcoming conferences. We discussed about the HPAIR decision to hold both the academic and the business conference in Kuala Lumpur. Another important note was the facilitation of a close collaboration between the HPAIR staff and SPAIR. In the eyes of the HPAIR organization, SPAIR shall be a role model for other regions and countries to build their own communities. We as SPAIR are happy to assist them through the process.

Still before lunch we were joined by Mr. Henne who is chief controller of our main sponsor. ZF made this Munich seminar possible. In his introduction Mr. Henne explained the history of ZF to the audience. In his eyes, the sustainable company growth with a focus on the long-term business development is a key characteric of ZF, only possible because of its comparably small dependance on the capital markets. Mr. Henne outlined ZF’s main scheme to diversify the company’s development strategy especially in Asia. He expressed the company’s appreciation for SPAIR projects and efforts while encouraging new potential fields of cooperation.

In the afternoon Dr. Xiao Juan Ma addressed the SPAIR audience in her speech about „Doing Business with Chinese“. Dr. Ma, who is working as a consultant, trainer and coach for German companies expanding to China, revealed the „secrets“ of the Chinese business world to us. In a very comprehensible way Dr. Ma illustrated the particularities which have to be considered when dealing with Chinese business partners and explained which cultural, historical and economic backgrounds one has to acknowledge.

After coffee break, Johannes Weiler of Weiler & Partner Attorneys, lectured on the topic “Protection of Intellectual Property in China”. He demonstrated that the Chinese legal system is actually based on the German civil law code in opposition to the Anglo-American common law system. As a consequence the main legal foundations of German commercial law have been implemented into the Chinese legal framework. However Mr. Weiler argued that in spite of the existing statutes, law enforcement is still weak and therefore a great issue for foreign countries. He also examined various possibilities for companies to protect their intellectual property rights. It also became obvious that the use of existing measures is not sufficient in many companies.

With this, the official part of the program of the post conference seminar ended. The participants not yet having left Munich for their home towns yet, met at the Chinese restaurant “Mao” for the sociable part of the day. During a nice dinner and in relaxed atmosphere, the participants had the chance for a few more discussions about the topics that we had heard about during the day and, more importantly, to get to know each other better. At the very end of the day, a small group delved into the nightlife of Munich and rumor has it that some of them only returned during the wee hours of the next day.

After the discussion, the official part of the program of the post conference seminar ended. We believe for all of us this was an extraordinary weekend in a pleasant group with exciting speeches, discussions and activities. We would like to thank all speakers and organizers who made this weekend possible.

Review of the SPAIR Post-Conference Seminar in Munich