It's not a simple manner of translation, it has to be culturally localized. Burger King can't just sell beef burgers in India by translating their menu language.
It's a lot easier for a Western business to translate their UI to German or French, than it is to Chinese or Japanese. Input methods alone are an issue that calls for interaction UX to be designed differently.
I'm talking about the fact that the cultural difference between the US and Europe is smaller, so US services can be easily consumed by Europeans with just language localization.
The same is not true for China. It is easy for US firms to serve Europeans by localizing language, ergo European firms face global competition from US firms with a lower barrier.
It is more difficult for US firms to serve the Chinese market, even if you have perfect language localization. The cultural differences are larger than US<->Europe. Even before the Chinese government got protectionist, US firms had trouble competing in China.
We've seen lots of tech companies launched from the UK, Germany, and Scandinavia, but less so from other regions. Perhaps it would be better to ask what is it about say, Italy, or France's internal markets that makes tech harder to find investment for locally.
Chinese government before being protectionist it was communist and closed: there never was a period without protectionism in China. Chinese economy has always been fully regulated, especially in the 90s. In other words, there is not much sense in your post, and it signals you don't know what you are talking about…
It's a lot easier for a Western business to translate their UI to German or French, than it is to Chinese or Japanese. Input methods alone are an issue that calls for interaction UX to be designed differently.