It's no secret that China and the United States are worlds apart. The two countries have vastly different languages, histories, cultures and customs. One thing they do have in common is a desire to do business with one another.

Yet the path to commercial cooperation is often beset by obstacles, as each nation acclimates to the other's way of working, and more often than not, enterprises fail as a result of miscommunication and misunderstanding.

Enter Dynasty Resources, a small company with big ambitions for reshaping the way China and the US do business.

Less than a year old, Dynasty Resources is a new type of consulting firm in New York that seeks to aid Chinese businesses in the US and help American companies in China.

By acting as a middleman and interpreter, Dynasty works to provide firms from both nations a soft landing when attempting to penetrate each other's markets.

For Chinese companies that want to do business in the US, that often means helping them understand the US mentality.

"It's adjusting to the American mindsetand dealing with the branding and marketing," says Dynasty marketing head Ken Meyers, a veteran international consultant.

"I describe it as teaching them the language of the natives."

In the case of Evermore, a Chinese firm that makes accounting software, one of the first things Dynasty recommended the company to do was change its name to Kwailex, a moniker Dynasty thought Americans would find far more appropriate for a software company.

"We're helping them assimilate to this culture," says Josh Bobley, Dynasty's seasoned China hand.

To assist Chinese companies gain a foothold in the US market, Dynasty created a program that consolidates many services such firms would need under one roof.

Through its attempt to serve as a one-stop resource for legal and financial services, marketing advice and even office space, Dynasty aims to spare companies the pain that beginning in a new country generally entails. Within six months, Meyers says, Dynasty should be able to tell a Chinese firm whether its business will work.

By reducing the costs and risks normally associated with start-up ventures, Dynasty has "set aside an obstacle that has prevented a lot of these (business) relationships from being formed," Meyers says.

Recognizing that Chinese companies are unaccustomed, and sometimes unwilling, to paying consulting fees, Dynasty also works with its clients to find different modes of payment, such as "success fees".

"Tell us about your business and we'll see if we can help," Meyers says. "Not just here's a fee, see you later. Instead, we grow together with our clients."

In addition to its efforts to help integrate Chinese companies into the American market, Dynasty also works to aid US businesses in China, particularly in the clean energy and clean technology sectors, where the firm thinks there is enormous potential for growth.

One way in which Dynasty aids both US and Chinese businesses in China is by helping secure investment capital from overseas sources.

The firm is now working to broker a deal between a Hong Kong company that has found a cheaper, more environmentally friendly way to produce particleboard. Dynasty has paired the company with US and British investors.

The Hong Kong firm sought out Dynasty to find a way to secure financing for it and after taking a look at the company's business plan, Dynasty agreed to help.

"We are trying to engineer a deal so that it's not only palatable to the Chinese, but it's equally acceptable to our group," Meyers said.

Yet as much as Dynasty wants to improve commercial ties between China and the US, it hopes that in doing so it will strengthen the two nations' relationship as well. By helping more Chinese and Americans work together, the company is looking to leave a lasting impression on links between the two countries.

As Dynasty financial guru Diana Glassman says, "I think the business relationship is ahead of the political relationship".

(China Daily 10/15/2007 page6)