Some of the key home players to watch out for are Changan, Geely and Chery They vary in size but share the same global ambitions. The company's philosophy, says vice-chairman Ma Yun, is to, "outperform foreign nations by [gaining] experience from them".Changan, a state-owned concern, already has dealings with Ford, Suzuki and Mazda for its Chinese operations, but the rest of Asia, the US and Europe are on its radar. To achieve their goals they are religiously picking up as much technological know-how as possible from the West.The largest of the three, Changan, is the third biggest car-maker after First Automobile Works and Shanghai Auto. Analysts at Goldman Sachs have predicted that China's economy will overtake Japan's by 2015 and the USA's by 2039, while experts believe China will be producing more cars than both by 2020. That's as many people as there are in the whole of South Korea," says Richard Chung, who heads up the Asian operation of Johnson Controls, the global interior design specialist.But while everyone is keen to sell cars to China, the Chinese, it seems, want to export their own goods. China's car-buying middle class is predicted to grow from around 60 million to 160 million in the next five years."There are over 40 million millionaires in China.

There could be serious trouble if these start pouring onto the roads as well.Me? I've already cancelled my two week break in Phuket and will instead be tuk-tukking my way around Chinatown in Soho. The girlfriend's delighted.The Tukshop is on 02380 388440 . SPECIFICATIONS The car industry is confused about China. It's a country that has been closed off for some time, and although companies are approaching with caution, anyone with global ambitions knows that it has to gain a presence there The car industry is confused about China. These iconic vehicles were clearly 'people's champions' in their respective countries, much as the Mini was in the UK or the Citro?2CV was in France. Might some aspire to a tuk-tuk? London's cabbies already despise the rickshaws. This usually meant opening the tuk-tuk's bonnet, which doubles as the driving seat, and undertaking repairs while lying in the gutter.

I've been there myself, but some of us were staring at the stars....Steve assures me that the troublesome component, a cable that operated the gear change, has been replaced by a much sturdier bar, and that reliability has been restored.As someone who lives in London, I do wonder whether there is another tuk-tuk market - those chaps who go around the capital in pedal-powered tricycle rickshaws. Things became very unbalanced indeed and I almost ended up on the pavement as I overcorrected the steering and forgot where the brake was. I had sort of noticed it before, but it was only when my life stopped running before my eyes that I truly came to terms with the level of crash protection one of these contraptions offers Nil. Tukking hell, you might say.When car-makers get chastised, as they do, for not fitting even their more basic vehicles with side as well as front airbags as standard, they should insist everyone has a near-death experience in a tuk-tuk to realise how we Westerners are pampered. Life and limb are valued quite a bit cheaper in Asia.At least I was moving when I almost mowed down a bus queue on the Isle of Dogs (so equalling Bangkok's annual tuk-tuk accident rate rate in a single afternoon).