--- title: "Negotiating M&A with Chinese Buyers | Kai Seikku | Negotiator 120" titleOriginal: "Kiinalaiset yrityskauppaneuvottelut | Kai Seikku | Neuvottelija 120" episodeNumber: "120" guest: "Kai Seikku" datePublished: 2022-02-03 duration: "43:06" youtube: "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87VU4SdQYBU" originalLanguage: "fi" topics: ["ma_exits","negotiation","geopolitics"] subtitleMethod: "none" provenance: "Owner page assembled from YouTube metadata and the neuvottelija.fi episode record. The publisher published no chapter marks for this episode, so none are listed here. No transcript is published either — the channel has no English caption track for this episode and the Finnish one is YouTube's automatic track. The guest leads a Finnish company owned by a Shanghai-listed buyer and is also deputy chief executive of that owner, so his account of how the acquisition has gone is given from inside it and with an obvious interest in how it is received. The generalisations about Chinese negotiating culture are one executive's experience of specific counterparties, not a finding about a country. Recorded 3 February 2022." fiCanonical: "https://www.neuvottelija.fi/fi/episodes/155-kiinalaiset-yrityskauppaneuvottelut-kai-seikku-neuvottelija" canonical: https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep120-kiinalaiset-yrityskauppaneuvottelut-kai-seikku/ --- # Negotiating M&A with Chinese Buyers | Kai Seikku | Negotiator 120 English subtitles are not available on this page. This is an episode summary, not a curated transcript. ## Summary Okmetic's chief executive Kai Seikku runs a Finnish silicon wafer maker owned by the Shanghai-listed NSIG, and serves as deputy chief executive of the owner as well. The episode opens up what surprised an investment banker: why the Chinese buyer did not replace management but treated it as an asset rather than a cost line, and why plans to move the plant to China were buried. Seikku also explains how the global component shortage began with the car industry slamming on the brakes in spring 2020, and why building new capacity takes years. The sharpest section is on Chinese negotiating culture: a letter of intent is not a deal, a non-disclosure agreement spreads information more effectively than anything else, the real decision-maker does not sit in the middle of the table, and a ganbei contest can only be won with a Finnish counter-move. ## The management was the asset The expectation an adviser brings to a cross-border acquisition is that the buyer will replace the leadership and take out the cost. NSIG did neither, because what it had paid for was capability rather than capacity — and the plan to move the plant to China was dropped for the same reason. ## A letter of intent is not momentum Seikku's most practical warning: the document a Western team treats as the point of no return is read very differently on the other side. Everything that follows has to be built on something else, and mistaking the signature for commitment is the standard error. ## Who is actually deciding The person seated centrally is often not the decision-maker, and a team that addresses its case to the wrong chair will have a pleasant meeting and no outcome. This is cheap to get right and expensive to get wrong, which makes it the highest-value paragraph in the episode. ## Watch The recording lives on the Neuvottelija channel: [Kiinalaiset yrityskauppaneuvottelut | Kai Seikku | Neuvottelija 120](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87VU4SdQYBU). A Finnish edition of this episode is published at [www.neuvottelija.fi](https://www.neuvottelija.fi/fi/episodes/155-kiinalaiset-yrityskauppaneuvottelut-kai-seikku-neuvottelija). ## In depth The Neuvottelija AI editions carry a long-form write-up of this episode: [English](https://www.neuvottelija.com/ai/ep120-kiinalaiset-yrityskauppaneuvottelut-kai-seikku/) · [suomeksi](https://www.neuvottelija.fi/economy/ep120-kiinalaiset-yrityskauppaneuvottelut-kai-seikku/). ## Explore the ideas in depth - [Negotiation Strategy, Leverage and Power: Reading the Counterparty You Actually Have](https://www.neuvottelija.com/guides/negotiation-strategy-leverage-and-power/): A negotiation guide from the co-author of Neuvotteluvalta — the sources of leverage, BATNA and anchoring in practice, using information asymmetry, breaking deadlocks, and what to do when the counterparty negotiates on power rather than consensus. Grounded in Neuvottelija conversations and two decades of negotiation writing. - [How to Sell a Company in Finland: An M&A Banker's Guide to a Clean Exit](https://www.neuvottelija.com/guides/how-to-sell-a-company-in-finland/): A practical guide to selling a company in Finland and the Nordics — the process phase by phase, share deal vs asset deal, valuation, due diligence, buyer types, deal structures, taxes on the sale, minority squeeze-outs and the ownership context that shapes every exit. Grounded in Neuvottelija conversations and Translink M&A practice. - [New Negotiation Power: The Definitive English Framework](https://www.neuvottelija.com/guides/new-negotiation-power-framework/): The authoritative English presentation of Sami Miettinen and Juhana Torkki's New Negotiation Power framework: Power, Analytics, Interaction and Principles; preparation, roles, team design, trust and long-term negotiation performance. --- Cite as: Sami Miettinen, Neuvottelija — Negotiating M&A with Chinese Buyers | Kai Seikku | Negotiator 120, https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep120-kiinalaiset-yrityskauppaneuvottelut-kai-seikku/, 2022-02-03. For quotes include episode 120 and timestamp.