Guest Blog written for Connecicut Innovations blog site

1. China Is Setting the Bar We Need to Jump Over
Matthew Nemerson, President and CEO, Connecticut Technology Council
Special thanks to my friend Peter Longo for giving an outsider a chance to provide
commentary on the Connecticut Innovations blog. As you may know, in my role as
president and CEO of the Connecticut Technology Council (CTC), a business trade
association speaking for the 3,000 technology oriented firms in the state, I have been a
consistent supporter and fan of CI over the past five years. For more information about our
organization and position please visit our website and my regular blog at www.ct.org.
CTC has long made the recapitalization of CI’s funds a major part of our annual legislative
agenda. We have also encouraged CI leaders over the past few years to focus more of their
funding on seed and early-stage investments. So, it is with satisfaction and admiration that
we congratulate CI for securing new money from the state and for initiating a series of
programs and efforts to invest more funds in startup firms.
I write this contribution to the Connecticut Innovations blog just a few days after returning
from three weeks of touring in China. While you were wilting under the bad news of
declining stock markets, ballooning state deficits and a presidential campaign that seems to
involve partisans shouting back and forth about the cost of new wardrobes and who sat
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near whom on community not-for-profit boards, I was wandering through the gleaming
towers and new gated communities of Beijing, Shanghai and Xi’an getting a ringside seat
for the new China and its high-tech society. It is hard not to think that Connecticut, and all
of America, even in tough times, should make a greater investment in technology and
innovation-based growth as part of our national economic development strategies.
Compare the hope we have of soon completing a dedicated bus-way from New Britain to
Hartford with the Shanghai Maglev train cruis by at 275 miles per hour.
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Still, while it is easy to say how great China is and how complacent the United States has
become, we are still several generations ahead in most areas. One can’t ignore that 600
million people still live in poverty in China.
And yet, when one steps out of the gleaming Beijing Airport and into what seems like a
strange time machine that combines the late1950s American “sky-is-the-limit” attitude and
explosion of infrastructure with the space-age images and toys of the early 21st century that
surround you, it’s hard not to wish that Shanghai were Cleveland and foreigners were
gawking at our skylines again. Shanghai and Beijing both look like something out of
Futurama, especially when the lights go out and the Asian penchant for neon is evident on
all their buildings, signs and even ships.
I think about the hope and optimism of our official China tour guide as he talked about the
plans he has for educating his two-year-old daughter to be a successful, English-speaking
manager of some creative process. He spoke with nuanced knowledge of the coming
opportunities and challenges that his child’s generation will have as China shifts to become
a leader in higher value-added andservice industries and leaves low-cost manufacturing
behind. Are we ready for this shift?

2. Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of China is its governmental structures, philosophies
and core belief systems. We have been brought up around the premise that democratic
pluralism combined with free markets is the only “modern” way to manage a fully evolved
people. Even postcommunist China must be hiding authoritarian militarism behind its
consumer veneer, right? But if there, it was not evident. The Chinese look at our seeming
inability to plan for our future, political food fights in the place of policy discussions and
the power of special interests and wonder how we are going to keep building a society
strong enough to be a confident partner and a growing market for their products. They
worry about us and they are praying for a strong dollar as much as we are.
True, China does not have a democracy, and its people firmly believe that some majority
tyranny is a reasonable tradeoff to keep their society moving forward. But they are fiercely
proud that their leaders are among the smartest people in their society. In their eyes you
should graduate number one in civil engineering from Cal Tech before you even think
about running for president.
We are different from the Chinese. The closing gap of youth, culture, cars, media and
architecture notwithstanding, this will not change for many decades. Still, it behooves us to
look at the role we expect to play in the world and think about how to tune our economic
development systems – and the roles of groups like Connecticut Innovations and
Connecticut Technology Council – to make sure that America remains a worthy partner for
the giant economic dragon across the Pacific