Look at the statistics first. The bulk of the IT spend will be on boosting infrastructure, and the biggest increases in IT budgets will come in 2007 and 2008. In 2007, China's IT spend, excluding telecom spend, will grow 19 percent. In 2008, it may grow by 20 percent with a huge infrastructure push coming from the Olympic Games and Beijing's rush to showcase the city as one of the most developed capitals of the world.

The biggest spenders will be medium businesses. These will account for over 70 percent of the total spend, with the bulk of investments coming from manufacturing, according to the latest study by Access Markets International (AMI) Partners. Spending on IT services will rise to 20 percent of total IT spending in the medium business space this year. If your company is in IT services, think about taking your business either directly or indirectly (via partners) to China.

Where in China? Forget Beijing and Shanghai. Look at tier-2 cities like Guangzhou, Hangzhou, Chengdu, and Wuhan. These four cities are set to ride the growth wave in areas such as formation of new businesses and expansion of current businesses.

SMBs in these six cities alone will spend $2.9 bn by 2010 (up 80 percent over 2005) on such areas as high-speed Internet access deployment and on corporate websites and e-commerce facilities. Are you geared to take advantage and offer your wares?

What do you need to do to be able to get your finger in the Chinese pie? Five things:

Be there: You need to set up an office, even if it is a small office, with a China address, a Chinese website, and Mandarin speaking sales and support staff.

Differentiate: Many Chinese don't quite trust their own homegrown brands in high-tech. They will make comparisons between your product and a MNC counterpart, not a local brand.

Tie up: You can't be in all 25 tier-1 and tier-2 China cities. You need partners who will act on your behalf across the vast landscape.

Tail retail: If your product or solution has no presence in retail and your logo is not recognized, you may be at a disadvantage. Get your channel partners to pick up that end, as most of them have cozy relationships with retail chains and smaller SIs and VARs.

Develop patience: You may find it takes a long time to get the first few orders, the first few referrals, the first few case studies. But, if you persist, your rewards will be huge.

China is very much like India in many respects - huge size, huge population, millions of entrepreneurs, surging capitalism, bothersome bureaucracy, and utterly unpredictable. If you could succeed in India, you already know what to expect when you get to China. Your chances of success could therefore be high.

Raju Chellam - The writer, a former Dataquest editor, is currently vice president (Asia-Pacific) with Access Markets International (AMI) Partners, based in Singapore.