Expat graduates gravitate to Shanghai startups

Trial and error

Young, foreign entrepreneurs have very different ideas to their Chinese peers, according to Wang Jiaonan, a manager with Venture Valley at Shanghai's Tongji University. The valley provides free office space, company registration and support funding for business-minded students and alumni within three years of graduation.

"They are open to pursuing a trial-and-error approach when starting businesses, while their Chinese counterparts are more cautious and usually only start their businesses when a product is mature in the hope it will prove popular immediately after entering the market," she said, adding that five of the 300 projects in the valley are run by foreign students and graduates.

"Moreover, they focus more on social issues. Usually their business idea derives from a social problem they have spotted," she said.

Koh Kok Yong is the perfect example of that. The Singaporean, who spent eight years at Fudan University studying international relations at the undergraduate and graduate levels, is determined to help reduce the more than 20,000 metric tons of garbage generated in Shanghai every day.

"I have decided to settle down here, so I hope my project will not only help me, but also Shanghai and its people, now and in future generations," he said.

Recycling

In 2014, he started Shanghai Xutao Greentech, a company specializing in recycling second-hand clothes. The business has placed more than 3,000 green, iron boxes in residential neighborhoods throughout the city, and collects about 300 tons of second-hand clothes every month, he said.

The clothes are used in three ways: Those in good condition are washed and then donated to impoverished parts of inland China; some are sold to other countries; and the remainder is sold to qualified local plants that recycle the material as carpets, vehicle interiors and curtains for greenhouses.

Koh said the policies to encourage entrepreneurship have been helpful. Last year, his company received 200,000 yuan ($29,000) in support funding from the district science and technology commission, which allowed the old collection boxes to be upgraded to electronic units.

Users download an app on their smartphone, and when they put unwanted clothing in a box they earn reward points that can be exchanged for articles for daily use.

Koh now plans to expand operations: "Later this year, we will start recycling plastic and glass bottles as well as pop-top cans. We hope to reach out to more cities soon."

A growing number of foreign graduates are now making use of cultural heritage to start businesses, such as setting up apps that allow people to find language partners and establishing agencies to advise Chinese about the immigration policies of their home countries.

Alliot Aymeric, a French national who is in the second year of a master's degree at the University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, plans to develop a smartphone app that will share French culture both on and offline.

"Since I arrived in this land of opportunity, the Chinese people have been very nice to me. I want to return the favor by sharing French culture with them," the 25-year-old said.

Contact the writer at zhouwenting@chinadaily.com.cn