Ask HN: Do US companies regret entering China?

For a holistic overview it's useful to read Chamber of Commerce surveys, there's a recent one by CGCC (China General Chamber of Commerce - US). The basic gist is that growing market and financial motives play biggest role in something like 85% of respondents. Kind of no-shit take away. Don't rely on cherry picked anecdotes of XYZ failed ventures or attributing "regret" because some IP got stolen. There was an interview covering a recent American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai poll of US data on top priorities for current trade talks and 0.4% of respondents think force tech transfer is an important issue. Which should be obvious since the vast majority of foreign businesses operating in China don't have extremely technical IP that can't be easily replicated, or have very well funded and vocal lobbying groups state side, or is an legitimate intersection of commerce and security with respect to dual use technology, or even that the cost of stolen IP is not factored into these business decisions in the first place. Many US companies are not in China as supply chain operators, they're there to meet demands of Chinese consumers and serve Chinese market to the point where China is a significant share of their revenue. Another example, latest U.S. China Business Council's (USCBC) survey tldr was basically US companies overwhelmingly convinced Chinese companies receive (alledged) unfair state subsidies but they literally don't care because even with the tradewar, 97% of respondents said their China operations were profitable which is UP from 85% in 2015. There's also good podcasts like The Trade Guys (CSIS), Sinica / ChinaEconTalk that covers these topics by actual subject matter experts.

E: I think it's important to highlight that while that data suggests profit seeking US companies overwhelmingly do not regret entering China, that doesn't mean it's beneficial to long term US interests. You have to understand that on paper, China - US trade accounts for a few percentage points of each other's GDP, and indeed both economies are actually not very trade dependent. Many companies and people will still get hurt, the pain will be disproportionately applied, but this tradewar is mostly political theater that both leaders are exploiting since there is no existential risk.

I read the article you linked, and don't see where that is incongruent to what I said.

Micron has stated they regret the situation and how they were forced to do business in China (which many other companies have expressed too, e.g. forced JV's etc). China is a substantial amount of Micron's sales, so they cannot walk away and they have to find a way to mange the situation and still protect the company. They are a business, having regret doesn't mean you take your balls and go home, they need to make money for their shareholders so they will do what is required.

To be clear, the US opened a trade investigation last year into it [1], and China opened it's own anti-trust style investigation as retaliation [2].

[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-justice-china-espiona...

[2] https://www.investors.com/news/technology/micron-technology-...

Is this a Volvo joke?