The Great ‘Made in China’ brand revamp

As a global manufacturing hub, China is now trying to break out into new, higher value-added product development. Is “Made in China” ready for a brand facelift? Spire Research and Consulting shared its insights, published on the US Consumer Electronics Association’s blog.

China is emerging as the largest market for tablets and personal computers. Home-grown Chinese brands such as a Lenovo and Huawei have successfully gone global. Some of these Chinese brands are breaking the old ‘Made in China’ image and taking it to a whole new level. What factors bred this success?

Several entrepreneurs have built distinct brand images to achieve global success based upon the founder’s vision of the future. Examples include Jack Ma of Alibaba Group, Robin Li of Baidu and Pony Ma of Tencent. Their zeal for excellence and innovation, as well as their colourful personalities, have helped them gain mindshare among consumers, both local and global.

Many Chinese firms have proven to be experts at vertical and horizontal integration. Take Tencent for example. What began as the launch of a simple, ICQ instant messenger has, over time, led to the addition of a new range of products like QQ Games – the largest online gaming platform in China. As a result, sales revenue increased by 34% during the first three quarters of 2014.

Chinese companies have pioneered interesting new business processes for the middle-income Chinese market and are now taking these processes to other middle-income markets world-wide. For instance, AliExpress – launched by Alibaba in 2010 – allows small Chinese sellers to connect with international consumers. AliExpress was reportedly the most commonly visited e-commerce website in Russia in July 2014.

These market players, and the innovative culture they represent, are ensuring that the “Made in China” label will continue to evolve into something that is more synonymous with innovation and quality, as the “Made in Japan” and “Made in Taiwan” labels did for previous generations of global consumers.

https://www.spireresearch.com/newsroom/media/the-great-made-in-china-brand-revamp/

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