Networking China & Hong Kong to U.S.

–– I was hired on with Marquee Corporation to create brand identity for Marquee’s Chinese endeavors in 2005, before the Beijing Olympics and have remained with the company and it’s subsidiaries ever since.  At the time, Marquee had won several major contracts with the Chinese government that included retooling and modernizing all of the major University dining halls across the country, the creation of Chinese University Basketball, Badminton and Track and Field leagues and consulting the government on how to utilize and make profitable the newly-built Olympic facilities after completion of the 2008 Summer Games.

Little did I know that because of my background, I would soon be responsible for how our Beijing, Hong Kong, San Diego offices communicated with one another.  This involved setting up VPN’s, encrypting file servers, encrypting exchange email servers, video conferencing, mobile phones and dealing with the Chinese ISP regulations (with a translator of course).  On top of this, I was creating fresh corporate branding, web presence and brick & mortar “accoutrement” that comes with a U.S. company doing business in China.

As a company, we were mostly excited about the would-be University-Level Basketball League because of my employer’s background with owning an ABA team that eventually merged with the NBA in the 1970’s.  I would have been in charge of team branding and live-scoring updates from China over our website.

Ultimately, the Chinese government decided that they should be in complete control of their own University engagements and pulled our contract.  I was bummed out, but very happy with my experience and accomplishments there.