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Tonny Wang Posted 13 years ago
Grammar

I got a email from a company. "In the meantime, we wanted to take this opportunity to formally introduce ourselves and let you know about our upcoming recruiting events. "

Why he uses wanted other than want. It is not happened in the past.
  

Top answer

It is in the past, relative to the time you were reading the email, which occurred sometime after their wanting to tell you. Here is the sequence of events: 1) They want to introduce themselves and give you some information. 2) They compose the email.

— AlpheccaStars

  • It is in the past, relative to the time you were reading the email, which occurred sometime after their wanting to tell you.
  • Here is the sequence of events: 1) They want to introduce themselves and give you some information.
  • 2) They compose the email.
  • 3) They send the email 4) You read the email.
  • When you read the email, step #1 is in the past.
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4 Answers
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It is in the past, relative to the time you were reading the email, which occurred sometime after their wanting to tell you.
Here is the sequence of events:

1) They want to introduce themselves and give you some information.
2) They compose the email.
3) They send the email
4) You read the email. When you read the email, step #1 is in the past.

Of course they cou
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You could think of it this way.

we wanted (in the past, eg yesterday) to take this opportunity to formally introduce ourselves so we wrote you this letter (in the past eg yesterday)

But really, this kind of use of I wanted just adds extra politeness.
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Thank you! That makes more sense to me!
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