Multinationals need to change with the times

By now, everyone has heard of China's "new normal". It refers to a slowdown in the country's economic growth rate from double digits, which lasted for more than two decades, to around 7 percent in the past few years.

Media reports have stated that the "golden age" for multinational companies in China is now over. Moreover, surveys by foreign chambers of commerce, including those from the United States and the European Union, show that many of these companies complain of unfair competition, a lack of respect for intellectual property rights and corruption in China.

Yet there is another more interesting view that the country is moving from a "rising tide" to "pockets of opportunities". When China's GDP was growing at about 10 percent per annum in the 1990s, multinational companies saw huge opportunities here.