"It is difficult for Chinese companies," said Wang Shouqing, a professor at the International Engineering research department at the elite Tsinghua university. "They are not familiar with Western culture, law or standards. What happened in Poland was a very bad example for other Chinese companies. It could take another decade or even 20 years to put our footprint on Europe and the US." The embarrassment in Poland led China's State Council to publish a notice on Monday warning the heads of China's state-owned companies that they would be "punished" if their companies negligently lost money on overseas projects.