A capitalist welcome for Beijing's leader
By Joseph Kahn The New York Times
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 19, 2006
SEATTLE The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, has begun courting major American business leaders, kicking off a four-day U.S. tour intended to soothe qualms about China's surging trade surplus and rising political power.
Hu landed in Everett, Washington, north of Seattle on Tuesday, and plunged into meetings with local officials and business executives, including Governor Christine Gregoire and the Starbucks chairman, Howard Schultz.
"I hope my visit will strengthen dialogue, deepen cooperation," Hu said shortly after he arrived.
He later visited the Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, and his evening plans included dining with local dignitaries at the mansion of Bill Gates, the company's chairman.
On Wednesday, he was visiting the Boeing aircraft factory in Everett.
At Microsoft headquarters, Hu lavishly praised the company.
Microsoft has struggled to find a firm foothold in China, which is widely accused of pirating software on an industrial scale, but has recently signed deals with Chinese companies that could lead to a sharp increase in sales of its Windows operating system.
"I admire what you have achieved at Microsoft," Hu told Gates in front of reporters. "You, Mr. Bill Gates, are a friend of China, and I'm a friend of Microsoft."
He added, "I am dealing with the operating system produced by Microsoft every day."
The business focus follows a tradition set by China's paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, on his first visit to the United States in 1979, when he communed with U.S. capitalists just as China began to shed its Maoist legacy and opened up to the outside world.
Beijing has since treated close ties to American business leaders as vital to its overall relations with Washington, because the two countries are much more integrated economically than politically, diplomatically or culturally.
Still, direct dealings with corporate leaders is a novelty for Hu, who, unlike his predecessors, almost never meets foreign business leaders in Beijing and remains aloof from the commercial dealings of the Chinese government.
Hu, 63, has made multiple trips to Europe, Russia, East Asian neighbors and even Latin American and African countries since assuming China's top political posts, head of the Communist Party and president, in 2002 and 2003.
At least initially he put less emphasis on forging tighter links to the United States, which he has criticized in domestic speeches as a potential threat to China's ruling Communist Party.
But Chinese officials and analysts say he has since made clear that internal priorities - maintaining rapid economic growth and tamping down a wave of unrest over corruption, governmental land grabs and severe pollution - are better served if Beijing cultivates cordial relations with Washington.
He is also eager to head off a backlash in Congress over China's record $203 billion trade surplus with the United States last year.
Two proposals in Congress call for imposing sanctions against China unless it allows its tightly controlled currency to rise against the dollar, reducing the cost advantage of Chinese exports in the U.S. market.
Hu arrived amid intensive security Tuesday morning, with access to his downtown luxury hotel blocked on all sides.
Several hundred residents lined the streets along his hotel. They were divided between members of Chinese patriotic groups, many carrying paired Chinese and U.S. flags, and anti-Beijing protesters, especially members of the Falun Gong movement, which is outlawed in China, and supporters of Taiwanese independence.
Falun Gong supporters used sound trucks to blast messages into Hu's hotel, accusing China's internal security forces of torture, organ harvesting and other atrocities. They also appeared at intersections around Microsoft's sprawling campus in Redmond.
Hu's visit, brokered in part by Gary Locke, a Chinese-American lawyer and Washington state's former governor, came as a boon for Seattle's leading corporations.
Boeing, which will show Hu a production line and allow him to operate a flight simulator, earlier signed an agreement to sell 80 of its single-aisle 737 aircraft to China in a purchase valued at $4.6 billion.
Microsoft, which gave Hu a tour of its research center and its prototype of a hyper-technological home of the future, was reaping the rewards of a new regulation requiring all Chinese-made computers to preinstall a copyrighted operating system to prevent piracy.
In the past two weeks, Microsoft has signed four agreements with Chinese computer manufacturers to preinstall its Windows system. The largest came Monday, when the Lenovo Group announced that it would spend $1.2 billion over the next year on Windows, though it was not clear how that compared to the company's earlier purchases.
Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief technical officer, said he hoped the visit by Hu signaled that China now viewed protection of intellectual property, including software, as vital to its own development.
"I think Chinese leaders have now made that conceptual leap - that they need this if they are going to make the transition to a knowledge economy from a manufacturing economy," Mundie said. "It is also true that Microsoft will be a natural beneficiary."
SEATTLE The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, has begun courting major American business leaders, kicking off a four-day U.S. tour intended to soothe qualms about China's surging trade surplus and rising political power.
Hu landed in Everett, Washington, north of Seattle on Tuesday, and plunged into meetings with local officials and business executives, including Governor Christine Gregoire and the Starbucks chairman, Howard Schultz.
"I hope my visit will strengthen dialogue, deepen cooperation," Hu said shortly after he arrived.
He later visited the Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, and his evening plans included dining with local dignitaries at the mansion of Bill Gates, the company's chairman.
On Wednesday, he was visiting the Boeing aircraft factory in Everett.
At Microsoft headquarters, Hu lavishly praised the company.
Microsoft has struggled to find a firm foothold in China, which is widely accused of pirating software on an industrial scale, but has recently signed deals with Chinese companies that could lead to a sharp increase in sales of its Windows operating system.
"I admire what you have achieved at Microsoft," Hu told Gates in front of reporters. "You, Mr. Bill Gates, are a friend of China, and I'm a friend of Microsoft."
He added, "I am dealing with the operating system produced by Microsoft every day."
The business focus follows a tradition set by China's paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, on his first visit to the United States in 1979, when he communed with U.S. capitalists just as China began to shed its Maoist legacy and opened up to the outside world.
Beijing has since treated close ties to American business leaders as vital to its overall relations with Washington, because the two countries are much more integrated economically than politically, diplomatically or culturally.
Still, direct dealings with corporate leaders is a novelty for Hu, who, unlike his predecessors, almost never meets foreign business leaders in Beijing and remains aloof from the commercial dealings of the Chinese government.
Hu, 63, has made multiple trips to Europe, Russia, East Asian neighbors and even Latin American and African countries since assuming China's top political posts, head of the Communist Party and president, in 2002 and 2003.
At least initially he put less emphasis on forging tighter links to the United States, which he has criticized in domestic speeches as a potential threat to China's ruling Communist Party.
But Chinese officials and analysts say he has since made clear that internal priorities - maintaining rapid economic growth and tamping down a wave of unrest over corruption, governmental land grabs and severe pollution - are better served if Beijing cultivates cordial relations with Washington.
He is also eager to head off a backlash in Congress over China's record $203 billion trade surplus with the United States last year.
Two proposals in Congress call for imposing sanctions against China unless it allows its tightly controlled currency to rise against the dollar, reducing the cost advantage of Chinese exports in the U.S. market.
Hu arrived amid intensive security Tuesday morning, with access to his downtown luxury hotel blocked on all sides.
Several hundred residents lined the streets along his hotel. They were divided between members of Chinese patriotic groups, many carrying paired Chinese and U.S. flags, and anti-Beijing protesters, especially members of the Falun Gong movement, which is outlawed in China, and supporters of Taiwanese independence.
Falun Gong supporters used sound trucks to blast messages into Hu's hotel, accusing China's internal security forces of torture, organ harvesting and other atrocities. They also appeared at intersections around Microsoft's sprawling campus in Redmond.
Hu's visit, brokered in part by Gary Locke, a Chinese-American lawyer and Washington state's former governor, came as a boon for Seattle's leading corporations.
Boeing, which will show Hu a production line and allow him to operate a flight simulator, earlier signed an agreement to sell 80 of its single-aisle 737 aircraft to China in a purchase valued at $4.6 billion.
Microsoft, which gave Hu a tour of its research center and its prototype of a hyper-technological home of the future, was reaping the rewards of a new regulation requiring all Chinese-made computers to preinstall a copyrighted operating system to prevent piracy.
In the past two weeks, Microsoft has signed four agreements with Chinese computer manufacturers to preinstall its Windows system. The largest came Monday, when the Lenovo Group announced that it would spend $1.2 billion over the next year on Windows, though it was not clear how that compared to the company's earlier purchases.
Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief technical officer, said he hoped the visit by Hu signaled that China now viewed protection of intellectual property, including software, as vital to its own development.
"I think Chinese leaders have now made that conceptual leap - that they need this if they are going to make the transition to a knowledge economy from a manufacturing economy," Mundie said. "It is also true that Microsoft will be a natural beneficiary."
SEATTLE The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, has begun courting major American business leaders, kicking off a four-day U.S. tour intended to soothe qualms about China's surging trade surplus and rising political power.
Hu landed in Everett, Washington, north of Seattle on Tuesday, and plunged into meetings with local officials and business executives, including Governor Christine Gregoire and the Starbucks chairman, Howard Schultz.
"I hope my visit will strengthen dialogue, deepen cooperation," Hu said shortly after he arrived.
He later visited the Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, and his evening plans included dining with local dignitaries at the mansion of Bill Gates, the company's chairman.
On Wednesday, he was visiting the Boeing aircraft factory in Everett.
At Microsoft headquarters, Hu lavishly praised the company.
Microsoft has struggled to find a firm foothold in China, which is widely accused of pirating software on an industrial scale, but has recently signed deals with Chinese companies that could lead to a sharp increase in sales of its Windows operating system.
"I admire what you have achieved at Microsoft," Hu told Gates in front of reporters. "You, Mr. Bill Gates, are a friend of China, and I'm a friend of Microsoft."
He added, "I am dealing with the operating system produced by Microsoft every day."
The business focus follows a tradition set by China's paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, on his first visit to the United States in 1979, when he communed with U.S. capitalists just as China began to shed its Maoist legacy and opened up to the outside world.
Beijing has since treated close ties to American business leaders as vital to its overall relations with Washington, because the two countries are much more integrated economically than politically, diplomatically or culturally.
Still, direct dealings with corporate leaders is a novelty for Hu, who, unlike his predecessors, almost never meets foreign business leaders in Beijing and remains aloof from the commercial dealings of the Chinese government.
Hu, 63, has made multiple trips to Europe, Russia, East Asian neighbors and even Latin American and African countries since assuming China's top political posts, head of the Communist Party and president, in 2002 and 2003.
At least initially he put less emphasis on forging tighter links to the United States, which he has criticized in domestic speeches as a potential threat to China's ruling Communist Party.
But Chinese officials and analysts say he has since made clear that internal priorities - maintaining rapid economic growth and tamping down a wave of unrest over corruption, governmental land grabs and severe pollution - are better served if Beijing cultivates cordial relations with Washington.
He is also eager to head off a backlash in Congress over China's record $203 billion trade surplus with the United States last year.
Two proposals in Congress call for imposing sanctions against China unless it allows its tightly controlled currency to rise against the dollar, reducing the cost advantage of Chinese exports in the U.S. market.
Hu arrived amid intensive security Tuesday morning, with access to his downtown luxury hotel blocked on all sides.
Several hundred residents lined the streets along his hotel. They were divided between members of Chinese patriotic groups, many carrying paired Chinese and U.S. flags, and anti-Beijing protesters, especially members of the Falun Gong movement, which is outlawed in China, and supporters of Taiwanese independence.
Falun Gong supporters used sound trucks to blast messages into Hu's hotel, accusing China's internal security forces of torture, organ harvesting and other atrocities. They also appeared at intersections around Microsoft's sprawling campus in Redmond.
Hu's visit, brokered in part by Gary Locke, a Chinese-American lawyer and Washington state's former governor, came as a boon for Seattle's leading corporations.
Boeing, which will show Hu a production line and allow him to operate a flight simulator, earlier signed an agreement to sell 80 of its single-aisle 737 aircraft to China in a purchase valued at $4.6 billion.
Microsoft, which gave Hu a tour of its research center and its prototype of a hyper-technological home of the future, was reaping the rewards of a new regulation requiring all Chinese-made computers to preinstall a copyrighted operating system to prevent piracy.
In the past two weeks, Microsoft has signed four agreements with Chinese computer manufacturers to preinstall its Windows system. The largest came Monday, when the Lenovo Group announced that it would spend $1.2 billion over the next year on Windows, though it was not clear how that compared to the company's earlier purchases.
Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief technical officer, said he hoped the visit by Hu signaled that China now viewed protection of intellectual property, including software, as vital to its own development.
"I think Chinese leaders have now made that conceptual leap - that they need this if they are going to make the transition to a knowledge economy from a manufacturing economy," Mundie said. "It is also true that Microsoft will be a natural beneficiary."
SEATTLE The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, has begun courting major American business leaders, kicking off a four-day U.S. tour intended to soothe qualms about China's surging trade surplus and rising political power.
Hu landed in Everett, Washington, north of Seattle on Tuesday, and plunged into meetings with local officials and business executives, including Governor Christine Gregoire and the Starbucks chairman, Howard Schultz.
"I hope my visit will strengthen dialogue, deepen cooperation," Hu said shortly after he arrived.
He later visited the Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, and his evening plans included dining with local dignitaries at the mansion of Bill Gates, the company's chairman.
On Wednesday, he was visiting the Boeing aircraft factory in Everett.
At Microsoft headquarters, Hu lavishly
SEATTLE The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, has begun courting major American business leaders, kicking off a four-day U.S. tour intended to soothe qualms about China's surging trade surplus and rising political power.
Hu landed in Everett, Washington, north of Seattle on Tuesday, and plunged into meetings with local officials and business executives, including Governor Christine Gregoire and the Starbucks chairman, Howard Schultz.
"I hope my visit will strengthen dialogue, deepen cooperation," Hu said shortly after he arrived.
He later visited the Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, and his evening plans included dining with local dignitaries at the mansion of Bill Gates, the company's chairman.
On Wednesday, he was visiting the Boeing aircraft factory in Everett.
At Microsoft headquarters, Hu lavishly praised the company.
Microsoft has struggled to find a firm foothold in China, which is widely accused of pirating software on an industrial scale, but has recently signed deals with Chinese companies that could lead to a sharp increase in sales of its Windows operating system.
"I admire what you have achieved at Microsoft," Hu told Gates in front of reporters. "You, Mr. Bill Gates, are a friend of China, and I'm a friend of Microsoft."
He added, "I am dealing with the operating system produced by Microsoft every day."
The business focus follows a tradition set by China's paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, on his first visit to the United States in 1979, when he communed with U.S. capitalists just as China began to shed its Maoist legacy and opened up to the outside world.
Beijing has since treated close ties to American business leaders as vital to its overall relations with Washington, because the two countries are much more integrated economically than politically, diplomatically or culturally.
Still, direct dealings with corporate leaders is a novelty for Hu, who, unlike his predecessors, almost never meets foreign business leaders in Beijing and remains aloof from the commercial dealings of the Chinese government.
Hu, 63, has made multiple trips to Europe, Russia, East Asian neighbors and even Latin American and African countries since assuming China's top political posts, head of the Communist Party and president, in 2002 and 2003.
At least initially he put less emphasis on forging tighter links to the United States, which he has criticized in domestic speeches as a potential threat to China's ruling Communist Party.
But Chinese officials and analysts say he has since made clear that internal priorities - maintaining rapid economic growth and tamping down a wave of unrest over corruption, governmental land grabs and severe pollution - are better served if Beijing cultivates cordial relations with Washington.
He is also eager to head off a backlash in Congress over China's record $203 billion trade surplus with the United States last year.
Two proposals in Congress call for imposing sanctions against China unless it allows its tightly controlled currency to rise against the dollar, reducing the cost advantage of Chinese exports in the U.S. market.
Hu arrived amid intensive security Tuesday morning, with access to his downtown luxury hotel blocked on all sides.
Several hundred residents lined the streets along his hotel. They were divided between members of Chinese patriotic groups, many carrying paired Chinese and U.S. flags, and anti-Beijing protesters, especially members of the Falun Gong movement, which is outlawed in China, and supporters of Taiwanese independence.
Falun Gong supporters used sound trucks to blast messages into Hu's hotel, accusing China's internal security forces of torture, organ harvesting and other atrocities. They also appeared at intersections around Microsoft's sprawling campus in Redmond.
Hu's visit, brokered in part by Gary Locke, a Chinese-American lawyer and Washington state's former governor, came as a boon for Seattle's leading corporations.
Boeing, which will show Hu a production line and allow him to operate a flight simulator, earlier signed an agreement to sell 80 of its single-aisle 737 aircraft to China in a purchase valued at $4.6 billion.
Microsoft, which gave Hu a tour of its research center and its prototype of a hyper-technological home of the future, was reaping the rewards of a new regulation requiring all Chinese-made computers to preinstall a copyrighted operating system to prevent piracy.
In the past two weeks, Microsoft has signed four agreements with Chinese computer manufacturers to preinstall its Windows system. The largest came Monday, when the Lenovo Group announced that it would spend $1.2 billion over the next year on Windows, though it was not clear how that compared to the company's earlier purchases.
Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief technical officer, said he hoped the visit by Hu signaled that China now viewed protection of intellectual property, including software, as vital to its own development.
"I think Chinese leaders have now made that conceptual leap - that they need this if they are going to make the transition to a knowledge economy from a manufacturing economy," Mundie said. "It is also true that Microsoft will be a natural beneficiary."
SEATTLE The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, has begun courting major American business leaders, kicking off a four-day U.S. tour intended to soothe qualms about China's surging trade surplus and rising political power.
Hu landed in Everett, Washington, north of Seattle on Tuesday, and plunged into meetings with local officials and business executives, including Governor Christine Gregoire and the Starbucks chairman, Howard Schultz.
"I hope my visit will strengthen dialogue, deepen cooperation," Hu said shortly after he arrived.
He later visited the Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, and his evening plans included dining with local dignitaries at the mansion of Bill Gates, the company's chairman.
On Wednesday, he was visiting the Boeing aircraft factory in Everett.
At Microsoft headquarters, Hu lavishly praised the company.
Microsoft has struggled to find a firm foothold in China, which is widely accused of pirating software on an industrial scale, but has recently signed deals with Chinese companies that could lead to a sharp increase in sales of its Windows operating system.
"I admire what you have achieved at Microsoft," Hu told Gates in front of reporters. "You, Mr. Bill Gates, are a friend of China, and I'm a friend of Microsoft."
He added, "I am dealing with the operating system produced by Microsoft every day."
The business focus follows a tradition set by China's paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, on his first visit to the United States in 1979, when he communed with U.S. capitalists just as China began to shed its Maoist legacy and opened up to the outside world.
Beijing has since treated close ties to American business leaders as vital to its overall relations with Washington, because the two countries are much more integrated economically than politically, diplomatically or culturally.
Still, direct dealings with corporate leaders is a novelty for Hu, who, unlike his predecessors, almost never meets foreign business leaders in Beijing and remains aloof from the commercial dealings of the Chinese government.
Hu, 63, has made multiple trips to Europe, Russia, East Asian neighbors and even Latin American and African countries since assuming China's top political posts, head of the Communist Party and president, in 2002 and 2003.
At least initially he put less emphasis on forging tighter links to the United States, which he has criticized in domestic speeches as a potential threat to China's ruling Communist Party.
But Chinese officials and analysts say he has since made clear that internal priorities - maintaining rapid economic growth and tamping down a wave of unrest over corruption, governmental land grabs and severe pollution - are better served if Beijing cultivates cordial relations with Washington.
He is also eager to head off a backlash in Congress over China's record $203 billion trade surplus with the United States last year.
Two proposals in Congress call for imposing sanctions against China unless it allows its tightly controlled currency to rise against the dollar, reducing the cost advantage of Chinese exports in the U.S. market.
Hu arrived amid intensive security Tuesday morning, with access to his downtown luxury hotel blocked on all sides.
Several hundred residents lined the streets along his hotel. They were divided between members of Chinese patriotic groups, many carrying paired Chinese and U.S. flags, and anti-Beijing protesters, especially members of the Falun Gong movement, which is outlawed in China, and supporters of Taiwanese independence.
Falun Gong supporters used sound trucks to blast messages into Hu's hotel, accusing China's internal security forces of torture, organ harvesting and other atrocities. They also appeared at intersections around Microsoft's sprawling campus in Redmond.
Hu's visit, brokered in part by Gary Locke, a Chinese-American lawyer and Washington state's former governor, came as a boon for Seattle's leading corporations.
Boeing, which will show Hu a production line and allow him to operate a flight simulator, earlier signed an agreement to sell 80 of its single-aisle 737 aircraft to China in a purchase valued at $4.6 billion.
Microsoft, which gave Hu a tour of its research center and its prototype of a hyper-technological home of the future, was reaping the rewards of a new regulation requiring all Chinese-made computers to preinstall a copyrighted operating system to prevent piracy.
In the past two weeks, Microsoft has signed four agreements with Chinese computer manufacturers to preinstall its Windows system. The largest came Monday, when the Lenovo Group announced that it would spend $1.2 billion over the next year on Windows, though it was not clear how that compared to the company's earlier purchases.
Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief technical officer, said he hoped the visit by Hu signaled that China now viewed protection of intellectual property, including software, as vital to its own development.
"I think Chinese leaders have now made that conceptual leap - that they need this if they are going to make the transition to a knowledge economy from a manufacturing economy," Mundie said. "It is also true that Microsoft will be a natural beneficiary."
SEATTLE The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, has begun courting major American business leaders, kicking off a four-day U.S. tour intended to soothe qualms about China's surging trade surplus and rising political power.
Hu landed in Everett, Washington, north of Seattle on Tuesday, and plunged into meetings with local officials and business executives, including Governor Christine Gregoire and the Starbucks chairman, Howard Schultz.
"I hope my visit will strengthen dialogue, deepen cooperation," Hu said shortly after he arrived.
He later visited the Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, and his evening plans included dining with local dignitaries at the mansion of Bill Gates, the company's chairman.
On Wednesday, he was visiting the Boeing aircraft factory in Everett.
At Microsoft headquarters, Hu lavishly praised the company.
Microsoft has struggled to find a firm foothold in China, which is widely accused of pirating software on an industrial scale, but has recently signed deals with Chinese companies that could lead to a sharp increase in sales of its Windows operating system.
"I admire what you have achieved at Microsoft," Hu told Gates in front of reporters. "You, Mr. Bill Gates, are a friend of China, and I'm a friend of Microsoft."
He added, "I am dealing with the operating system produced by Microsoft every day."
The business focus follows a tradition set by China's paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, on his first visit to the United States in 1979, when he communed with U.S. capitalists just as China began to shed its Maoist legacy and opened up to the outside world.
Beijing has since treated close ties to American business leaders as vital to its overall relations with Washington, because the two countries are much more integrated economically than politically, diplomatically or culturally.
Still, direct dealings with corporate leaders is a novelty for Hu, who, unlike his predecessors, almost never meets foreign business leaders in Beijing and remains aloof from the commercial dealings of the Chinese government.
Hu, 63, has made multiple trips to Europe, Russia, East Asian neighbors and even Latin American and African countries since assuming China's top political posts, head of the Communist Party and president, in 2002 and 2003.
At least initially he put less emphasis on forging tighter links to the United States, which he has criticized in domestic speeches as a potential threat to China's ruling Communist Party.
But Chinese officials and analysts say he has since made clear that internal priorities - maintaining rapid economic growth and tamping down a wave of unrest over corruption, governmental land grabs and severe pollution - are better served if Beijing cultivates cordial relations with Washington.
He is also eager to head off a backlash in Congress over China's record $203 billion trade surplus with the United States last year.
Two proposals in Congress call for imposing sanctions against China unless it allows its tightly controlled currency to rise against the dollar, reducing the cost advantage of Chinese exports in the U.S. market.
Hu arrived amid intensive security Tuesday morning, with access to his downtown luxury hotel blocked on all sides.
Several hundred residents lined the streets along his hotel. They were divided between members of Chinese patriotic groups, many carrying paired Chinese and U.S. flags, and anti-Beijing protesters, especially members of the Falun Gong movement, which is outlawed in China, and supporters of Taiwanese independence.
Falun Gong supporters used sound trucks to blast messages into Hu's hotel, accusing China's internal security forces of torture, organ harvesting and other atrocities. They also appeared at intersections around Microsoft's sprawling campus in Redmond.
Hu's visit, brokered in part by Gary Locke, a Chinese-American lawyer and Washington state's former governor, came as a boon for Seattle's leading corporations.
Boeing, which will show Hu a production line and allow him to operate a flight simulator, earlier signed an agreement to sell 80 of its single-aisle 737 aircraft to China in a purchase valued at $4.6 billion.
Microsoft, which gave Hu a tour of its research center and its prototype of a hyper-technological home of the future, was reaping the rewards of a new regulation requiring all Chinese-made computers to preinstall a copyrighted operating system to prevent piracy.
In the past two weeks, Microsoft has signed four agreements with Chinese computer manufacturers to preinstall its Windows system. The largest came Monday, when the Lenovo Group announced that it would spend $1.2 billion over the next year on Windows, though it was not clear how that compared to the company's earlier purchases.
Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief technical officer, said he hoped the visit by Hu signaled that China now viewed protection of intellectual property, including software, as vital to its own development.
"I think Chinese leaders have now made that conceptual leap - that they need this if they are going to make the transition to a knowledge economy from a manufacturing economy," Mundie said. "It is also true that Microsoft will be a natural beneficiary."
SEATTLE The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, has begun courting major American business leaders, kicking off a four-day U.S. tour intended to soothe qualms about China's surging trade surplus and rising political power.
Hu landed in Everett, Washington, north of Seattle on Tuesday, and plunged into meetings with local officials and business executives, including Governor Christine Gregoire and the Starbucks chairman, Howard Schultz.
"I hope my visit will strengthen dialogue, deepen cooperation," Hu said shortly after he arrived.
He later visited the Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, and his evening plans included dining with local dignitaries at the mansion of Bill Gates, the company's chairman.
On Wednesday, he was visiting the Boeing aircraft factory in Everett.
At Microsoft headquarters, Hu lavishly praised the company.
Microsoft has struggled to find a firm foothold in China, which is widely accused of pirating software on an industrial scale, but has recently signed deals with Chinese companies that could lead to a sharp increase in sales of its Windows operating system.
"I admire what you have achieved at Microsoft," Hu told Gates in front of reporters. "You, Mr. Bill Gates, are a friend of China, and I'm a friend of Microsoft."
He added, "I am dealing with the operating system produced by Microsoft every day."
The business focus follows a tradition set by China's paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, on his first visit to the United States in 1979, when he communed with U.S. capitalists just as China began to shed its Maoist legacy and opened up to the outside world.
Beijing has since treated close ties to American business leaders as vital to its overall relations with Washington, because the two countries are much more integrated economically than politically, diplomatically or culturally.
Still, direct dealings with corporate leaders is a novelty for Hu, who, unlike his predecessors, almost never meets foreign business leaders in Beijing and remains aloof from the commercial dealings of the Chinese government.
Hu, 63, has made multiple trips to Europe, Russia, East Asian neighbors and even Latin American and African countries since assuming China's top political posts, head of the Communist Party and president, in 2002 and 2003.
At least initially he put less emphasis on forging tighter links to the United States, which he has criticized in domestic speeches as a potential threat to China's ruling Communist Party.
But Chinese officials and analysts say he has since made clear that internal priorities - maintaining rapid economic growth and tamping down a wave of unrest over corruption, governmental land grabs and severe pollution - are better served if Beijing cultivates cordial relations with Washington.
He is also eager to head off a backlash in Congress over China's record $203 billion trade surplus with the United States last year.
Two proposals in Congress call for imposing sanctions against China unless it allows its tightly controlled currency to rise against the dollar, reducing the cost advantage of Chinese exports in the U.S. market.
Hu arrived amid intensive security Tuesday morning, with access to his downtown luxury hotel blocked on all sides.
Several hundred residents lined the streets along his hotel. They were divided between members of Chinese patriotic groups, many carrying paired Chinese and U.S. flags, and anti-Beijing protesters, especially members of the Falun Gong movement, which is outlawed in China, and supporters of Taiwanese independence.
Falun Gong supporters used sound trucks to blast messages into Hu's hotel, accusing China's internal security forces of torture, organ harvesting and other atrocities. They also appeared at intersections around Microsoft's sprawling campus in Redmond.
Hu's visit, brokered in part by Gary Locke, a Chinese-American lawyer and Washington state's former governor, came as a boon for Seattle's leading corporations.
Boeing, which will show Hu a production line and allow him to operate a flight simulator, earlier signed an agreement to sell 80 of its single-aisle 737 aircraft to China in a purchase valued at $4.6 billion.
Microsoft, which gave Hu a tour of its research center and its prototype of a hyper-technological home of the future, was reaping the rewards of a new regulation requiring all Chinese-made computers to preinstall a copyrighted operating system to prevent piracy.
In the past two weeks, Microsoft has signed four agreements with Chinese computer manufacturers to preinstall its Windows system. The largest came Monday, when the Lenovo Group announced that it would spend $1.2 billion over the next year on Windows, though it was not clear how that compared to the company's earlier purchases.
Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief technical officer, said he hoped the visit by Hu signaled that China now viewed protection of intellectual property, including software, as vital to its own development.
"I think Chinese leaders have now made that conceptual leap - that they need this if they are going to make the transition to a knowledge economy from a manufacturing economy," Mundie said. "It is also true that Microsoft will be a natural beneficiary."
