Here at GFAVIP, we want to recognize and feature certain members of the community. In doing so, we bring these people to the spotlight and give an opportunity for them and their business to be known.
For our GFAVIP Featured Member of September, we’ve chosen Chance Jiang.
Chance is the founder and CEO of Chatek LLC. It is a technology company that specializes in building sensors and applications for 5G wireless networks.
Chance was kind enough to talk more about his business. He has also shared some insights and wisdom on business and even what led him to join GFAVIP.
Let’s get to know him a bit more and what he does, from Chance himself.
On Chatek LLC
Tell us about your company.
Chatek LLC is an IoT product design and development firm based in Guangzhou China. We specialized in building APIs for sensors and applications, particularly those on 5G/wireless networks.
Your company’s mission and vision.
We make machines part of services.
When did you start the business?
Chatek was founded in 2016 and we’ve been working all-remote since then, with team members from around the world on client projects.
What made you get into this industry?
My choice back in 2009 after I quit my day job and worked on my 1st product, a receipt printer with a Web API. The product and technologies went on to be sold and transferred to other firms and subsequently ended up in a USD128 million equity deal.
Opportunities seen in the Cross Border Business Industry
There are a few key elements of change that are reshaping cross border businesses, which I believe, will ask for more innovations to make it work for all.
Firstly, the new China-US relation factor. It’s been increasingly segregating the world into two types of markets (or worlds). The one that’s been led by the ‘Neo-Communist’ and ‘market economics smart’ China will continue to grow, and will continue to be fueled by the tech regime that China’s accumulated over the years.
China for sure is and will be facing sustained technology and political boycott. The other world is led by the US, leading all the Judah-Christian population and countries. Regardless which world we are talking about, people around the world will continue to trade, but will need to get through more geo-political barriers.
Luckily, we as a human collective have invented the Internet and made it an essential infrastructure for trade. Technologies are in fact counteracting the geo-political obstacles, as always. If we look into the new segregation and obstacles, new opportunities will arise.
For example, China Vietnam trade will increase for those commodities that are seeking lower tariffs in order to get around the political boycott. In China, we’ve been taught since school days to look at a market not just from ‘free market’ theories, but also from domestic and world politics perspectives.
Such sophistication in world view helps a lot in hard times like now. And I wish I can share more on this with my Western country friends.
Secondly, we shall stay vigilant about conflicts or political boycotts that will result in lost opportunities or sea change in your industry. Try to see them well in advance and prepare yourself and your business accordingly.
For example, is this seemingly lucrative PPE business your choice of trade? It may or may not be.
Finally, since we have Covid19 and it’ll stay with us for a while, all businesses need to transition their value creation to more virtual and digital, over the networks as software or as remote human-to-human interactions.
Even manufacturing can be digitized in some ways, if you look at my partner company Wikifactory did, with viralresponse.io initiatives. And their innovation with wikifactory.com will be proven as the way to go for a new world where we have more localized manufacturing, and where the designs and the trading of physical goods have to be digital-first.
This Internet-of-Production trend alone will help bring up new generations of successful entrepreneurs and businesses who specialize in this new model of manufacturing world-wide.
Facing and overcoming challenges
I had a share-holders breakup back in the end of 2014, after I ran my 1st successful startup for 3 years. The breakup worked out not-so-bad but taught me key lessons in how to pick partners and ‘my own battle’.
I went on to build other startups after 2014 but ended up with a burn-out period until late 2017. Then I did what I advised above, and eventually my health, life and work came out well again. Finally, I came to the conclusion of how I shall manage my life, proactively changing the way I have lived and worked every 8 years.
The inspiration is from the an ancient China’s book called 皇帝内经 / Yellow Emperor’s Life Book. In it I learned that everyone’s life is made up of 7 or 8 year long stages, major changes happen near the end of each stage. If you don’t change yourself proactively, mother nature will force big change upon yourself, regardless you like it or not.
Words of advice to business newbies
The default state of an independent business person’s life is being stuck in debt. Take that as a given, admit it as early in life as possible. You can try staying frugal. But you can only stay that way for only so much until you feel totally hopeless.
So the default mindset of a business person shall be never stop trying and working to help others everyday. By focusing on helping others, your mind will eventually lead your actions into financial independence or freedom.
Start with what you have and what you can do. Build on top of what you’ve got. Make a 10 years plan for yourself first, so that you can enjoy the ‘compound interest’ of your own life. Then work backward to work out your 3 years/1 year plan, so that you are sure your path will eventually lead to the goals of your 10 year plan.
Never stick to ONE formula of life and work if your past/current one doesn’t work anymore. You’ll see signs. Financial issues, health issues and emotional/personal relationship issues. These are all signs that you NEED a big change.
Carefully pick the city where you shall be living and working in. It’s the No. 1 choice of life and work because the city you’re living in is the immediate and innermost circle of social network you can leverage.
It’s the tier 1 physical social network of your life that can push you to your next level of work and life. The rest of your social networks are either virtual or too far away to cast any impacts on your life and wealth.
To sustain basic performance of a business person, there are only a few key skills, reading, writing, speaking, and accounting/financial planning/management. Never stop practicing them on a daily basis.
ON GFA
Where did you hear about GFA?
I’ve known Mike since 2007 and been keeping an eye on what he’s been doing. Since 2017, I started my participation with GFA and found it nurturing a community of non-tech business people. From GFA, I broke apart my ‘tech cocoon’ thinking and expanded my views about the larger world. I am grateful for GFA and the changes it brought to myself.
Why did you join GFAVIP?
I think by sharing useful stuff and helping others will eventually reward myself in many (unexpected) ways, in either material or non-material terms.
What are you most looking forward to when joining GFA?
Since SEA countries are increasingly frequenting my business, I’m looking forward to engaging with folks with similar interests, and seeing how I can contribute my company’s service to people and businesses from SEA countries.
What do you want to achieve in your business and how can GFA help you?
I’ll keep following up on GFA events and activities. I’ll see how I can contribute and help grow the GFA brand and the communities. I guess I’ll figure out the rewards to my business along the way.
If you’d like to learn more about him, visit Chance Jiang’s profile for more information. And if you want to reward yourself in unexpected ways as well, we invite you to join GFAVIP and enjoy the community.
