Maxim's seized chance to set up on the mainland
Two days before Christmas in 1978, Annie Wu Suk-ching, the daughter of Maxim's founder James Tak Wu, was sitting on a train outside Wuhan railway station, on her way to Guangzhou, when the loudspeaker above her began to play a radio address from paramount leader Deng Xiaoping .
The Communist Party had just wrapped up its plenary session in Beijing, where members had resolved to clear up ideological uncertainties in the wake of the Cultural Revolution and change the direction of the nation.
'In his determined and clear voice, Mr Deng said China welcomed foreign investment, including from Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, and I thought that some big changes were going to take place on the mainland,' she said. 'I had never met Deng Xiaoping but he sounded very sincere, straightforward and trustworthy in that broadcast, and I believed that this time, China meant what it said.'
Here was the sort of opportunity Ms Wu had come looking for. Over the following two years, she would start up Beijing Air Catering - registered as 'Sino-foreign Joint Venture 001' - using her family's experience in delivering fast, inexpensive food to people in Hong Kong to create a business supplying meals to the airlines flying out of Beijing's international airport, which was set to more than double in size.
Eight days earlier, China and the United States had announced they would normalise relations on January 1, with the western power deciding to switch diplomatic recognition away from Taipei. In the coming year, Deng would go to Washington and US vice-president Walter Mondale would visit Beijing, laying the groundwork for accords covering, among other areas, civil aviation. Regular flights would soon follow.
The Chinese side knew they needed help, however, to supply food for the airline industry. The in-flight menu at that time was no more than biscuits, boiled eggs, cold luncheon meat and washed but unpeeled fruit. Deng had muttered in dissatisfaction more than once at the thin layer of crumbs on his lap when he picked up the bread served on Chinese flights.