The Revolutionary Rise Of The Chinese Brand

I travel to emerging markets around Asia and report on what I find.  

Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

MAY 23, 2016 @ 03:11 PM 

When China first became a global industrial epicenter it was known for contract manufacturing, OEMs, abject knock-offs, and an entire ecosystem of producers who flooded the markets of the world with low cost, no-name electronics, textiles, and other goods. However, the game has now changed for many of China’s manufacturers; it’s no longer merely about production but innovative design, signature products, and brand identity. This has caused a revolutionary change in business models as well as a monumental paradigm shift of what “made in China” now means. But how and why did this transition begin?

This picture taken on January 7, 2015 shows a member of staff waiting for customers at a Xiaomi shop in Beijing. WANG ZHAO/AFP/Getty Images

On the farthest fringes of Shenzhen, in the Laokeng Industrial Zone of Pingshan New Town, sits the speckled pink-walled factory of Gaoyu Electronics, a relatively small manufacturer of cooling technologies for electronic devices. This company doesn’t stand out from many other similar manufacturers in Shenzhen’s industrial belt, and is a good example of the transition which many are now going through.

Gaoyu Electronics got its start 15 years ago as a small producer of cooling fans for the local market. “In the beginning we just produced DC fans and heat sinks for Huaqiangbei, then they would assemble the computers together.” Aaron Yu, the company’s sales manager, told me the story of his employer’s humble origins.

However, over the years Gaoyu Electronics grew, and eventually began taking on contracts for the likes of Cisco,Google GOOGL +2.25%, and even Foxconn. As the company continued growing it began looking beyond merely producing products for other companies, and in 2014 Gaoyu Electronics unveiled its own brand: Ecotherm.

Ecotherm’s office which is adjacent to the Gaoyu Electronics factory. Image: Wade Shepard.

Ecotherm is the label that Gaoyu Electronics now markets some of its most innovative products under. These include a DC fan that can keep running even after a device is powered off and various types of smart technologies. Of the company’s 200 workers, 20 are engineers involved in research and development.

Producers in a variety of industries in China have been gradually increasing the complexity and earning potential of their operations over the past 10 or 20 years. Many started out as contract or original equipment manufacturers (OEM), producing already designed products or components for the products of other companies. Then, as many manufacturers began developing more sophistication, they began transitioning to original design manufacturers (ODM) — which means they started handling many aspects of the total manufacturing and design process, often making complete products which other companies would merely stamp their own brand names on prior to retail sale.

“It has happened in all the industries,” David Li, the founder of the Shenzhen Open Innovation Lab, a prominent Shenzhen-based makerspace, said. “The factories have been transitioning from OEM to ODM for a very long time, especially in the past ten years. It happened in the textile industry, it happened in shoes, it happened in fashion, and it has been coming to electronics.”

Then the European crisis hit, and international demand for Chinese products began decreasing, Li explained. This caused a knee-jerk reaction that rattled many of China’s manufacturers, who started finding themselves with a lack of contracts to produce their designs and gluts of unsold inventory. One solution was to start slapping their own names on their own products and unloading them on the domestic market themselves.

This was the beginning of a movement that would soon permeate through all strata of China’s manufacturing empire, from copycat factories who were once solely bent on getting their handbags to look as much like Gucci as possible to giant high-tech companies who were shipping tens of millions of no-name phones to markets all around the world.

“Traditional OEM manufacturers were seeing their margins increasingly squeezed as more manufacturers came on board and demand slowed globally,” explained Mark Tanner, the director of China Skinny, a Shanghai-based market research firm. “They are finding inspiration from the pin-up brands such as Xiaomi, Haier, and Lenovo , who are operating on much stronger margins and much more to their terms rather than taking a whipping as OEMs.”

It was a strategy that not only proved to be an adequate contingency plan in a pinch but a new business model that could be leveraged for competitive success both in China and abroad.

“The [profit] margin of self-branded products is like 10X over stuff that you sell through a channel in the United States for a Chinese factory,” said Bunnie Huang, a high-tech innovator who has worked on projects like the Novena, the world’s first open source laptop. “So at the end of the day there is a lot of value in the brand.”

This fact is evident from even a casual walk through the cellphone markets of Huaqiangbei, the commercial epicenter of Shenzhen’s electronics industry. Signs of budding new brands like Laimi, Skyhan, Umi, and NO.1 are everywhere, and each is pushing their newest feature phone, vying to become the next Huawei.

A banner for Huawei covers an entire building in Lodz, Poland. Image: Wade Shepard.

China’s central government has also been very much at the helm of this transition, pushing its manufacturers to be more innovative and to start their own brands. With strategies that include top-level officials talking up innovation via public speeches, pronoucements, and prominent visits to factories and makerspaces, creating preferential economic policies for domestic companies, using state media to shift public sentiment away from foreign brands, and, especially, providing large amounts of funding for innovative initiatives.

“There are many incentives for brands who are in the categories they [the central government] are backing, which will bring high value jobs and build the China Inc. brand globally,” Tanner said. “Many in Beijing aren’t happy about purchases of Japanese toilet seats and rice cookers, with the ‘Supply-Side Reform’ buzzword in the capital hoping to address this.”

Two stores for domestic Chinese brands, Oppo and Xiaomi, flanking an authorized Apple re-seller in Huaqiangbei, Shenzhen.

Li Na, a fashion designer by trade who is currently working for the Shenzhen Institute of Industrial Design (SIDA), has seen this transition directly. She told me that she was once approached by a large contract manufacturer and offered a position to design their clothing. At first she was confused, as this factory was making millions each year simply producing designs for big Western brands. “We have to change our model,” the factory explained.

“Now, the local community, the local government was saying no more of this, you need to have your own brand,” Li Na said. “You can’t just use the designs that came from abroad, from Zara or from H&M, and just copy them and sell them for a cheaper price here. You can’t do that anymore, you have to set up a new brand.”

While there are currently not any policies requiring factories to start their own brands, the influence of the government is particularly strong. “There is no law, but they are pushing,” Li Na said. “And when the government pushes, trust me, the industry will listen.”

There are now many models for Ecotherm’s ambitions. Huawei is also the world’s largest telecom infrastructure provider, Lenovo is the world’s top selling laptop brand, Haier is one of the world’s most dynamic producers of home appliances, and seven of the top ten smartphone brands in the world are Chinese.

Wade Shepard is the author of Ghost Cities of China.

福布斯：赞！中国制造从山寨到自主品牌林立 

2016-05-24 09:33:37  福布斯网  

　　5月23日，美国福布斯网站发表了一篇题为《中国品牌的变革性崛起》的评论文章，称一大批曾经是贴牌厂家的中国制造商，通过加强研发力度，引进优秀人才等措施，现已成为拥有独立品牌和自主创新能力的新型高科技企业。

　　除了这些厂商自身看到了市场的风向以外，以欧洲经济危机为代表的国际市场的日趋狭窄，也是推动这些厂商变革的一个原因。在分析这些企业转型的原因时，文章还给中国政府的角色点赞，令人颇感意外。

The Revolutionary Rise of the Chinese Brand 

　　全文翻译如下：

　　在中国刚刚成为世界工厂的时候，制造商们只能做些贴牌生产、来料加工或者品牌代工的贸易。当时，世界市场中充斥着来自中国的拙劣仿冒品、无名小家电以及低价纺织品。

　　然而，如今的中国制造业却是另外一番光景。在不断提高生产效率的同时，制造商们选择将更多的心思放在推动产品创新、研发拳头产品和打造自主品牌上面。

　　这样的转变不仅促成了中国在商业模式和发展理念上的飞跃，也对“中国制造”进行了重新定义。

　　那么，这样的转变究竟是怎样发生的？

北京的小米体验店，服务人员正在等待顾客

　　老坑工业区坐落于深圳最远郊的坪山新城，那里有一幢亮粉色的小楼，是电子冷却设备制造商——深圳市高昱电子科技有限公司的厂房。

　　高昱电子在周围一堆规模差不多的小公司中并不起眼，但它目前正在经历的变革，可以被视作周围无数小企业的缩影。

　　15年前，高昱电子刚刚成立的时候规模很小，主要为本土市场生产冷却风扇。

　　“起初，我们为华强北组装的电脑生产DC风扇和加热槽。”高昱的销售经理于先生在向我讲述他老板的创业家史时这样说道。

　　后来，高昱电子不断成长，开始为思科、谷歌和富士康供货。随着产品实力越来越强，高昱电子开始不满足于仅仅在产品质量上超越其他厂商，而是选择在2014年发布自己的独立品牌Ecotherm。

Ecotherm的办公场所就在高昱电子的工厂旁

　　目前，高昱电子自主研发的一些高科技产品会贴Ecotherm商标，包括断电时依然会持续运转的DC风扇等多种智能产品。

　　此外，高昱电子的200名员工中，有20位都是专注于研发的资深工程师。

　　在过去的10到20年里，中国各个制造业部门都在挖潜增效，逐步提高产品的科技含量。其中，大多数制造商都是从代工贸易起家的。后来，他们开始研发更为复杂的技术，成为原始设计制造商。这意味着他们开始独立把控设计和制造的全过程，并将自主品牌的名称印在用于零售的产品上面。

　　“整个行业都在发生着这样的变革，”深圳著名的创客空间开放创实验室的创始人David Li如是说，“这些工厂从代工贴牌生产商转变成原始设计制造商已经有很长一段时间了，尤其是在过去的十年时间里，从纺织到鞋履，再从时装到电子产品，每一个行业都在发生着天翻地覆的变化。

　　此前，因受到欧洲经济危机的影响，国际市场对中国产品的需求在一定程度上有所减少。按照David Li的说法，这事实上是对中国制造厂商的一次刺激。这些厂商们在这次危机中觉醒，发现产能过剩问题严重，依赖外部设计弊端明显。于是，他们开始求变，其中的一种解决方法便是开始披着自己的品牌的铠甲在本土市场上厮杀竞争。

　　这是中国制造商们创新运动的开始。很快，有着制造业王国之称的中国，在各个工业细分行业中都开始了变革。曾经的山寨工厂一心只想让自己生产出来的包包更像Gucci真品，现如今，那些曾经每天向全球运送数百万部无名手机的生产厂商都摇身一变，成为了科技园区中的创新龙头。

　　“传统的的代工厂商看到了世界市场需求的下降和利润的降低，”Mark Tanner，一位总部设在上海的市场调研公司主管解释到，“这些转变中的制造厂商从小米、海尔、或者联想的成功故事中寻找灵感，希望可以获得如这些成功企业一般的利润和市场。”

　　作为一种制造业的发展战略，这样的转变除了成功证明它是危急关头的正确应急方案，还可以在国际市场和本土市场获得双赢。

　　“拥有自主品牌的产品可以获得十倍于代工美国品牌的利润，”，Bunnie Huang，一位做计算机源代码开发的研发工程师如是说，“所以，自主研发产品的品牌价值是非常重大的。”

　　当我走在深圳最大的电子产品生产中心华强北时，随处可见各种各样的创新品牌，例如Laimi, Skyhan, Umi, 和NO.1等，它们都在摩拳擦掌，力争成为下一个华为。

波兰罗兹：华为手机的广告几乎占据了一座大楼的一面

　　中国的中央政府在这一变革过程中也起到了非常积极正面的作用。具体的措施包括，高级官员在发表公开讲话的时候对这样的创新变革予以肯定、鼓励并为这些创新型小企业发声，国家领导人对创业基地和制造工厂进行视察和探望，为企业制定优惠的财税政策，通过国有媒体引导公众支持国货，远离同类型的外国产品，此外，中央政府还会直接向创新企业批发创业经费。

　　“中央政府支持国货品牌创新的原因非常多，其中，最主要的是，它能为中国人带来高质量的就业，并且使中国品牌扬名海外，”Tanner说，“北京方面对于民众购买日本马桶盖和电饭煲的行为感到非常不开心，所以他们希望本国的品牌壮大，用最近提出的流行语来说，就是推进‘供给侧’改革。”

深圳华强北：中国本土品牌OPPO和小米的零售店与苹果授权店毗邻

　　Li Na，是一名在深圳工业设计院工作的时装设计师。作为贴牌企业改革创新的直接见证者，她告诉我，一个曾经规模很大的贴牌厂商向她发出了邀约，希望她可以为这个厂家设计自己品牌的服装。起初，她对此感到十分不解，因为这家工厂每年会为西方大牌生产数百万件服装。

　　对此，这家厂商解释说：“我们必须改变自己的模式。”

　　“现在，当地政府说，你需要有自己的品牌，”李娜说，“你不能使用来自国外的设计，从Zara到H&M，你所做的，只是复制，并以更低的价格在这儿出售，继续这样做是不允许的，你必须要建立自己的品牌。”

　　虽然，目前在中国，政府还没有出台任何的政策要求工厂一定要拥有自己的独立品牌，但中国政府的影响力和引导能力特别强。“虽然没有法律，但政府正在推动此事的发展，”李娜说，“如果政府推动，相信我，相关行业和产业就一定会听。”

　　对于和Ecotherm类似的这些有野心的小品牌来说，现在有太多成功的例子可供参考。例如，华为是世界上最大的电信基础设置供应商，联想是全球最为畅销的笔记本电脑品牌，海尔是全球最具活力的家电生产厂商之一，而全球十大智能手机品牌中的七个都来自于中国。