The flight from Chengdu had a layover in Beijing. The journey was long, and in the latter part of the journey, there was a feeling of pressure on the eardrums caused by the high air pressure. In the middle of the journey, Cheng Ran woke up and saw Cheng Feiyang lying sideways and covering him with a blanket.
After a journey of more than 20 hours, the plane arrived at Dulles Airport. He vaguely remembered that this airport was the filming location of "Die Hard 2", but he didn't know if this movie still existed in this life.
The plane stopped steadily. When Cheng Ran stood up to get his luggage, the blood in his body seemed to finally start flowing. He felt so sore and exhausted at the same time. He decided not to travel in a business group with Cheng Feiyang and the others in the future. Cheng Feiyang would not ask for a special seat in first class, and he could not upgrade his cabin. Otherwise, his father would be living a simple and frugal life, while his son would be like a domineering CEO. So this journey was quite painful.
On second thought, Cheng Ran had experienced the situation of riding a hard seat on a green train for a whole day and a night to go to school or just start his career. He could only sigh that it is easy to go from frugality to luxury, but difficult to go from luxury to frugality.
However, his father was still his role model, just like in his previous life. After sitting for more than 20 hours, even though he still had back pain and cervical spondylosis, he did not look tired at all and was still full of energy. When he got off the plane and walked, his back and waist were straight.
There were quite a few people on the plane with them. This trip to the United States was organized in the name of the Chengdu Enterprises Association, so it also brought together some foreign trade companies in Chengdu.
There were quite a lot of people in their group, and they were obviously dressed for business rather than for tourism. When they got off the plane to get their luggage and gathered together, Cheng Ran saw many people looking at them, including several pretty American girls and mixed-race beauties.
Later, Cheng Ran found out that they didn't come to see him, a young man, but they were there to meet him. Instead, they saw female reporters in suits and ponytails, as well as media people carrying video cameras and hanging cameras around their necks, from afar at the airport reception area. There were about five or six media outlets, and they seemed to be meeting a delegation from China. They seemed to be compatible with their group, so they were just paying them a courtesy attention.
Cheng Feiyang was also surprised. The Chengdu delegation coming to Washington was very low-key. They would be contacted by a local partner company, but they did not mention such an arrangement beforehand. It should be someone else.
When they got closer, we saw a welcome sign in Chinese and English in front of this group of media people, which read "Chang'an Economic and Trade Meeting" on it.
Fu Long's Sun Guangzhen in Santa Clara was outside to greet them. After a warm handshake and greeting with Cheng Feiyang and his party, a long-planned warm atmosphere broke out in the reception hall. The reporters who were previously in the reception hall quickly became active. Another group of economic and trade teams from China appeared on the other side of the passage. They were of very high standards and levels. Flash lights were flashing one after another. These reporters from the American media had already come forward to greet them.
In comparison, the group coming from Chengdu was much less noticeable, but going to the United States meant keeping a low profile and ignoring the noise in the hall. Sun Guangzhen led the Chengdu group to the outside of the airport, where two buses had been prepared to take the Chengdu group to downtown Washington, more than 40 kilometers away.
In the first bus, Sun Guangzhen said to everyone, "Our hotel is near this Kstreet, also known as K Street. There is a certain pattern in the naming of streets in Washington. East-west streets are generally named in alphabetical order, north-south streets are mostly numbered, and diagonal streets that are neither east-west nor north-south are mostly named after the names of American states. The street runs from west to east, across the northern part of Washington. Going south is J Street, and going north is L Street."
“Everyone knows Wall Street, but in fact, the influence of this low-key street, K Street, on international politics is even greater than that of Wall Street on the financial market. The American media often likes to say that if you don’t understand K Street, you don’t understand Washington, and you don’t understand American politics.”
"You can look around, there are lobbying companies of all sizes here. Of course, the real headquarters of these lobbying companies may not be here, but they must have an office here."
Cheng Ran followed Sun Guangzhen's words and looked out. K Street looked plain from the outside. The office buildings were not tall, and they all had a cold cement wall and gray glass window style. There were indeed many dense signs on these office buildings, all with words like "some public relations consulting". He also noticed that banks were everywhere and high-end restaurants were lined up. Under the low-key appearance, this street was vaguely prosperous.
Zhao Qing smiled and said, "This is American politics, a money game."
Cheng Feiyang looked over and said, "We are about to enter."
Cheng Ran looked through the car window at this street known as the fourth power center of the United States. This street is home to a large number of think tanks, lobbying groups, public relations companies, non-governmental organizations, international headquarters, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, etc. Every day, a large number of lobbying groups and politicians and congressmen come and go, trading politics and power.
Lobbyists in suits and ties will lobby for their corporate clients on Capitol Hill, and many policies that favor large American companies are actually formulated through lobbying in this process. The interests of many groups are also finalized in this way, and even representatives from countries around the world will participate in huge lobbying activities here for the interests of their countries, hoping that the United States will formulate policy orientations that are more favorable to them.
The most famous foreign group on K Street is Israel. The Israeli lobby is a model of foreign lobbying in the United States. Through political donations, the Israeli lobby infiltrates the U.S. Congress and members of Congress, directly influencing the formulation of the U.S. Middle East policy, and the only principle of this policy is: Israel first. The position of this group on Capitol Hill is almost unchallengeable.
If Cheng Feiyang wants to introduce technology in the United States, he will have to face various U.S. review systems against foreign countries, especially the defense and hostility against "Red China". In this case, it is simply impossible for Fulon Company to set up a presence in the United States alone. Not to mention participating in the acquisition of a company, even investing in a technology company will be difficult to pass, and it will not pass the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS).
The strategic core of Fulun is to compete for the 3G high ground. Therefore, Cheng Feiyang needs to obtain cooperation on the WCDMA chip technology, which is superior to the United States. He needs to negotiate with the United States on which ones can be jointly researched, technology shared, and cooperated, and which ones cannot be cooperated on. In this case, they can be purchased. It is just a matter of money. For this set of high-tech cooperation, if Fulun simply comes here and wants to make an exchange with this side, it is just wishful thinking and will inevitably be rejected.
But if these deals are made through K Street lobbying, it will make the impossible possible.
Cheng Ran went to the United States with Cheng Feiyang this time. Although he had just made 80 million yuan and had some savings, he did not consider investing in technology companies in the United States. For example, Google was already famous. As a foreigner, he wanted to get a piece of the pie. Then there were countless American companies that also wanted to invest in it and would suppress him in various ways. It was too easy to suppress him. Just find out where he came from and use administrative power to suppress the funds from "Red China".
Secondly, those who have not become famous but are optimistic about the future are also not safe, because they have no power and supervision in the United States. It is easy for them to end up coveting and dividing up their shares in the start-up after multiple rounds of financing, and expel them from the game.
From another perspective, this is also a weakness of human nature. First, you don't have the reputation of Masayoshi Son, who needs the support of startups. Second, you don't have local resources. Just because you invested a part of the money at the beginning, you get a large number of shares. How do entrepreneurs who have worked hard to expand the company and make the pie bigger think? Why can't they kick you out? Once this idea comes up, no matter how upright the entrepreneur or the actual controller of the company is, they will have thoughts. Once this thought comes up, it will evolve into an internal power struggle. There are already countless such cases in reality.
One of the companies that lobbied for Fulong on K Street was called LB. Its founder, Robert, ran a small company on K Street. Among the more than 3,000 registered companies on K Street, it might not even be ranked in the top 2,000. However, in Washington, a city with a population of about 1 million, there are about 40,000 to 50,000 registered and unregistered lobbyists. It is conceivable how many lobbyists a congressman often faces, and how many of them can really influence the congressman
"Many people think that lobbying is the domain of big corporations and that small businesses will eventually fail because they do not have the ability to hire permanent representatives in Washington, D.C., or the financial resources to make political donations to congressional campaigns and attract the attention of congressmen. But this is actually a misunderstanding. Small lobbying companies like Robert's are more likely to succeed if they use the right methods." Sun Guangzhen privately introduced to them the background of Robert, the representative of Fulong Lobbying.
"He dropped out of college, interned on Capitol Hill, founded a political job search website, and later moved to California, where he worked as a public relations officer for an arms dealer accused of smuggling weapons to Libya. He helped clients sell various items to the government, from flashlights to missile guidance software. Later, through this relationship, he had connections in Washington. When he was 48 years old, he made that phone call to Clinton. From then on, a new world opened up before his eyes."
Sun Guangzhen said, "If we want to reach an agreement, it may be very effective for Fu Long to maintain a long-term relationship with someone who has dual connections with the White House and even Capitol Hill."