William Bao Bean reckons China’s creativity rivals Silicon Valley, while Vivek Wadhwa argues China is full of copycats.

Elliot Ng‘s take: China has strong adaptive creativity.

This means that Chinese companies show tremendous amounts of creativity in adapting concepts developed in other markets to the particularities of China, whether they are government restrictions or market limitations.

One example he cites is a company that developed a cheap point of sale device that attaches to mobile phones and allows small retail stores have a point of sale device managing inventory and keeping accounts. These stores would otherwise be unable to buy a cash register. (Very interesting concept. Be great to get the name of the company, Elliott!)