Xu, whose firm was founded in 2000 and has 1,200 consultants, says the growth of the new technology sector to some extent provides opportunities for Chinese firms."Both Chinese and foreign firms need to adapt to this new era and

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to a certain extent we stand on the same starting line. It gives us a chance to catch up with the foreign ones."

Liu Di, 44, a partner with Alliance PKU Management Consultants, insists, however, it is not all about competing head on with the international consultancies. "Sometimes we cooperate with the bigger firms and share each other's expertise," she says.

Xu at Hejun believes that China will one day produce a major international consultancy to rival McKinsey or Bain. His company aims to have 2,000 consultants by 2015 and to operate internationally by 2020.

"Japan might not have been able to do this but I think it is different from China. Japan's economy was quite connected with the global economy from the beginning and foreign management consultancies penetrated the market very fast," he says.

"China has not been open for so long and this has given Chinese consultancies the opportunity to develop their own strengths. The Chinese market is so big anyway, and there are many opportunities."

Lv at Alliance PKU, which was formed in 1996 under the auspices of Peking University, believes one of the strengths of the Chinese firms is being able to interpret and predict government policy.

"I have been working with a company in Guangzhou recently and its sales revenue fell by 50 percent as a result of a policy change. We have been able to help it adapt its product offerings in such a way that it won't be hit by future policy changes and might even benefit from them."

The Shanghai-born consultant, who has a gree in engineering from Cambridge University, says that most of its clients are foreign companies.

"One recent client was an a major cruise holiday company and they came to us because of our knowledge of the Chinese market. They felt international firms might just give them standard advice they would have been able to get in their home market," she says.

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