Bridging Gaps With Art, Philosophy : Trade: O.C. lawyer says Buddhist ideology, love of Asian art has helped him in business, personal life.
Two years ago, James A. Davidson’s biggest problem was trying to break through ethnic and cultural barriers to do business in China and Vietnam. Not only has the international lawyer overcome the barriers, but he now sits on the board of directors of the Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce.
Davidson said he has still not mastered an Asian language, but has come to appreciate the culture of his Asian clients. Chinese art and artifacts scattered about his Newport Beach office serve as testimony. He speaks carefully and contemplatively about the evolution of Buddhist thought and practice as it has traveled eastward from India to China and Japan.
Though not a Buddhist, Davidson, 51, embraces much of the Buddhist ideology, which he says has helped him in his business as well as personal life. “Through understanding Buddhism I have come to understand to control my desire for things because that can hurt you to have too many expectations,” he said.
Davidson is founder and principal of the law firm of James A. Davidson & Associates Inc., which advises businesses on import-export matters. He is president of Overseas Investment Brokers Inc., which acts as a broker between companies looking for joint venture partners abroad. And in the true spirit of entrepreneurship, he founded his third business, Research Investment and Management Inc., earlier this year.
Together, the companies offer his clients a package deal on the legality of certain international transactions, marketing research and financing of international ventures.
Another important lesson Davidson said he learned from Buddhism was to be patient. “So many American companies have a difficult time understanding that business relationships in places like China are developed over the long term,” he said. “Americans just want to get in, turn a quick profit, and get out.”
Davidson said he has found that developing business relationships between companies in the United States that want contracts in China and Vietnam has not been easy. Since establishing Overseas Investment Brokers in 1992, Davidson has completed two joint ventures in China. The first was a $2-million contract to supply kitchen equipment as part of a home building project. The second was a medical surgical equipment deal valued at $1.5 million.
Local trade experts said that finishing two joint ventures in two years is actually a better-than-respectable pace. “Two in two years is great,” said Susan Thomas, president of Anaheim Hills-based Export Associates. “Negotiating these deals takes a long time because it is a new market and there are a lot of contacts to be made and groundwork to be done.”
Davidson said he is working to find joint venture partners for three other projects--a $1-billion oil refinery in China and a refinery and a cement factory in Vietnam.
Part of the problem has been to get American companies to understand that doing business in Asia is substantially different from doing business in the United States. Davidson said he also did not anticipate the increasing political problems that have made his clients in this area doubt the wisdom of getting involved in Vietnam, which had its trade embargo lifted in February by President Clinton.
Despite warming relations between Washington and Hanoi, Orange County’s Vietnamese community loudly protested a trade mission to Vietnam in September that was organized by the Asian Business League of California and the local Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce. Davidson said he did not attend the trip because he was busy organizing a seminar on international business opportunities.
The issue over whether to do business with the Communist government has divided the local Vietnamese community and caused many of Davidson’s clients to reconsider their plans. “People are nervous about even looking at business there now,” he said.
Davidson is unshaken. Though Orange County’s Vietnamese community is divided over trading with Vietnam, businesses in other countries are eager to get a foot in the door there. And being an officer of the Vietnamese chamber should be an asset for the lawyer.
“We are well known in Vietnam for the position we take about promoting business in Vietnam,” said Dr. Co Pham, chamber president.
Pham said that what Davidson may lack by not being Vietnamese can be compensated for by his involvement on the chamber’s board, because establishing business deals in Vietnam requires having contacts there.
Still, overcoming emotional and political resistance to doing business in China and Vietnam has been the greatest challenges to bringing American businesses together with opportunities there, Davidson said.
In fact, to complete his latest joint venture project--construction of a $1.2-billion oil refinery in the Shenzhen province of China--Davidson said he had to seek investors from Korea and Switzerland for financing.
His American clients, he said, were surprised to discover that most of the joint venture arrangements placed the majority of the financial risk on Western investors, who had expected joint venture partners to share the risk.
“What they supply are the resources--inexpensive labor, land--and what they want is for their joint venture partners to put up the capital,” he explained. Profit arrangements vary from deal to deal.
The learning curve for most companies beginning to do business in these Asian nations is still extensive, he said. “What they don’t realize is that the culture of doing business there is that once they have a relationship with you, they will come back to you again and again.”
