Exactly six centuries after China's most famous sailor, Cheng Ho, embarked on an epic series of maritime expeditions, the country's modern-day corporate flagships made waves, too, overseas.
If last year was the year that China's internal demand for everything from aluminium to zinc made it the accidental determinant of global commodity prices, this year saw a more deliberate effort by the mainland to project its economic muscle abroad.
As with the adventures of Admiral Cheng, which began in 1405 and purportedly carried him as far afield as Australia and East Africa, China Inc's foreign forays met with mixed results.
Cheng's journeys came to an abrupt end in 1433. During this year's summer, China's highest profile attempts to acquire overseas assets also came to a halt, though these were partially compensated by a handful of smaller but successfully executed takeovers later in the year.
On August 2, CNOOC's belated US$18.5 billion bid for California-based Unocal, charted by chairman Fu Chengyu, foundered on the shoals of political opposition in Washington - allowing Chevron to claim victory with a lower US$17.3 billion bid. Mr Fu had earlier invoked Cheng's memory, by christening CNOOC's campaign 'Operation Treasure Ship'. But the captain did his company no favours by failing to secure his board's approval for a run at Unocal in the spring when he might have sailed away with the prize.
The similar frustration of Citic Resources' proposed investment in Thai Petrochemical Industry which fell foul of Bangkok's politicians, also demonstrated that US congressmen were not alone in their paranoia about China's growing economic clout. A more tame effort by Qingdao-based Haier to acquire US home appliance giant Maytag was at least beaten fair-and-square after Whirlpool nipped in at the 11th hour with a higher offer.
China Inc fared better by targeting either more questionable assets or lower profile markets. Nanjing Automobile Group paid #51 million ($685.8 million) for Britain's bankrupt MG Rover in July while China National Petroleum Corp walked away with Canada-based but Central Asia-focused PetroKazakhstan after paying US$4.2 billion in October. Though less than 25 per cent of what CNOOC was prepared to pay for Unocal, CNPC's deal ranks as the mainland's largest overseas acquisition, exceeding Lenovo's US$1.75 billion purchase of IBM's personal computer business in December last year.
