TNAG-2679-FCO40-3876-British-Trade-Commission--Hong-Kong--and-China-Trade-Unit-re-1993 — Page 133

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DEVIETOS TRADE CUMMISSION

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Reference

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Mr Smith o/r

CC: Jean Gray, XAAA2D, DTI

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by fax

HKD, FCO

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FED, FCO

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Mr Kerfoot, Peking

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PA

P.02

BTC Commercial Work & Report)

17

World International (Holdings) Ltd/Wheelock Marden & Co Ltd

1. I was lunched on 22 July by Mr John Hung who has just been appointed Managing Director of Wheelock Marden, one of the wholly-owned companies under World International, of the Y K Pao Group. John Hung was until recently with Wharf. The purpose of the lunch was to brief me on what the group have in mind for Wheelock Marden in the future. I had already been given an inkling of this by Peter Woo when I met him at a reception on 21 July.

2. Wheelock Marden is of course a very long-established trading house with its roots in Hong Kong but with historical links also with places in China including Shanghai. It was taken over by the Y K Pao Group some years ago and has been jogging along in recent years without making much impact. Peter Woo has decided that the time has come to regenerate it as a trading group in order to take advantage of its name in the region, perhaps particularly in China. John Hung has been given the task of putting Wheelock Marden back on the map. Hung told me, without any modesty, that he had done the same for Wharf over the last three years and Peter Woo had decided that on his record, he would be able to perform the same turnaround with wheelock Marden.

3. Hung said that he would now be seeking out companies who needed assistance in penetrating China. He was looking principally for what he called chains, both in the retail and in the fast food areas. He was already in touch with a number of American companies and would be looking for German clients. Because of his long-standing connections with the U. K., he very much hoped that he could also find a number of U. K. companies which fell into this category who could piggyback on the contacts which World International and Wharf have within China. He claimed, as I think Peter Woo has done, that Wharf/World International have considerably wider coverage of the PRC than most companies in Hong Kong, taking five "poles" within the country: Hong Kong/Canton; Shanghai/Ningbo; Wuhan; Peking/Tianjin; and Chengdu/Chongging, They were in the process of developing a number of large scale property conglomerations in several of these places.

4. I explained my short tenure of this job and gave a strong puff to Francis Cornish and to you. I said that what he was proposing fitted in very well with my own view and what I

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