DCNF Reporter Discusses Venture Capital Firms’ Participating In Chinese Gov’t ‘Technology Transfer’ Contests
Harold Hutchison on October 20, 2023
A Daily Caller News Foundation reporter discussed venture capital (VC) firms participating in Chinese government-backed entrepreneurial contests that play into Beijing’s “technology transfer” strategy.
DCNF Investigative Reporter Philip Lenczycki described how five VC firms participated in the Chinese Communist Party’s “Thousand Talents” program during his appearance on Bannon’s War Room. GGV Capital, GSR Ventures, IDG Capital, Sequoia Capital and Walden International reportedly serve as “angel investors” for start-up project contests that support the Chinese government’s Thousand Talents plan.
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“In order to understand this, I would ask you and your audience to go back to 2009, what was going on? We have Barack Obama taking office… Avatar premiering, Michael Jackson dying and in the summer there, right about the same time, we had the premiere of the ABC show ‘Shark Tank,’” Lenczycki said. “Now, the reason I bring this up is that the Chinese Communist Party several years later launched a program that is suspiciously similar to sort of the core premise of Shark Tank.”
The House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party launched a probe into American venture capital firms it said were “funding problematic PRC companies” in July.
“It’s really a combination of the Chinese Communist Party getting these individuals to come back and bring their information,” Lenczycki said. “You’ve got the individuals who are incentivized to take part in these contests and capitalize or commercialize their ideas. Then you have these venture capital firms that are putting forth the money and will then get first crack at investing in Chinese government-backed projects.”
“This has been going on now for a decade,” Lenczycki added.
None of the VC firms Congress is looking into have been charged with any crimes, nor have they been charged with any illegal activities.
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