At the end of the first millennium, around 1000 AD, China was definitively the most powerful
country in the world.
More than a third of the world lived within its borders, it’s technology was the most
advanced in existence, and its economy accounted for an astronomical 50% of the worlds GDP.
The west paled in comparison to China, but eventually, Europe arose from its dark ages,
the importance of China diminished, and the west came to rule the world.
Today that is still largely the case, but China is rising again.
In 1978 China had a GDP of only $200 billion, only about 4% of the world’s GDP, but nowadays
that GDP has risen to $11 trillion and accounts for 15% of all economic activity in the world.
This economic renaissance of the last 40 years is largely thanks to one industry—manufacturing.
We’ve come to accept that China is the world’s factory, but it wasn’t always this way.
In the early 20th century goods were often just produced right near where they were sold.
America made American goods, Europe made European goods.
It wasn’t until cheap, worldwide shipping became available that the production side
of a company could be relocated to the other side of the world, but why did China win?
How did this country become the manufacturing giant it is today?
In 1978, Deng Xiaoping took power in the People’s Republic of China.
He quickly visited Bangkok, Singapore, and other flourishing Asian cities and was convinced
that, in order to succeed, China needed to open itself up to the outside world, at least
to an extent.
He gave people control of their farms, privatized businesses, and, most importantly, allowed
foreign investment in the country for the first time in decades.
He opened up four special economic zones with tax incentives and exemption from the oversight
that the rest of the country saw on its investments and trade activity.
These four zones were essentially the free market portions of China, but none was more
successful than this one—Shenzhen in the Guangdong Province so I went there to see
what it was like.
Before its designation as a special economic zone in 1980, Shenzhen was a tiny town with
about 30,000 inhabitants but today that’s grown to nearly 18 million people.
That means its size rivals that of New York and London.
It’s believed that Shenzhen might have been the single fastest growing city in human history.
Every other Special Economic Zone was an established area before its designation, but Shenzhen
made sense as a spot where China could embrace the west as it lay just north of the border
of Hong Kong—what was at the time a British territory.
Today Shenzhen is the electronics manufacturing capital of the world.
“Shenzhen as a city is really known for two things.
One is manufacturing capabilities especially for consumer electronics products and second,
its gravitation for talents or human resources especially on the product development or research
and development disciplines.”
Apple, Samsung, Microsoft, Sony, Canon—they all manufacture products here in Shenzhen.
In fact, 90% of the world’s electronics are made at least in part in this city.
Everything just costs less in China so labor costs less too.
Where a factory in the United States might pay upwards of $10-15 an hour, a Chinese laborer
would happily accept $3 or $4 an hour in Shenzhen.
When I was there I withdrew the equivalent of $80 from the ATM upon arrival and left
four days later with cash leftover.
A 30 minute taxi ride cost about $7 US dollars.
A full meal at a local place was about $3.
But China isn’t cheap entirely naturally.
China has artificially depressed the value of their currency.
Up until 2005, the Chinese government just said that the exchange rate was 8.27 yuan
per dollar and that was that.
They then went a few years allowing it to increase in value within a margin, but in
2008 they pegged its value again to make Chinese exports more attractive during the financial
crisis.
Nowadays, the government just picks a exchange rate daily and lets the currency fluctuate
from it by up to 2%.
This just makes it so western companies can buy more for less.
China also doesn’t charge taxes on exports while the US doesn’t charge taxes on imports.
The US doesn’t even charge customs fees for some products like tablet PC’s so some
products can make it all the way from their factory in China to stores in the US completely
tax free.
When I was in Shenzhen I visited a company called Anker.
They make all sorts of consumer electronics but chances are if you have something from
them, it’s one of their portable batteries.
I asked their CEO why so many electronics companies are now based in Shenzhen.
“So the advantage is that, you know, we’re close to the supply chain so everything is
faster.
Right, so, instead of like, you know, you do a mock up and you see it two weeks later
here you send design to mockup and you receive it, like, three days later.”
In Shenzhen there are markets where you can buy every part imaginable, there are factories
ready to build prototypes in a matter of days, there are engineers ready to work at the drop
of a hat.
Development just happens faster in Shenzhen.
A US company might use the same factories as one based in Shenzhen but the geographical
distance makes production slower.
In addition, word travels fast in Shenzhen.
A few years ago Anker was first-to-market with a technology called PowerIQ that allows
for faster device charging.
The engineers from Anker told me that a big reason they were able to go to market before
the western companies was because they heard about it first thanks to their proximity to
other engineers and companies.
Shenzhen just produces things better and faster, but a product isn’t just a physical item.
“Honestly being in Shenzhen for this company is an advantage for the supply chain that
we can develop good products with a competitive price but for the brand its also a kind of
a challenge.”
What Shenzhen can’t build as well is brands.
Certain companies like Anker have been able to to an extent thanks to smart PR and marketing,
but some other companies just don’t bother.
Lucrative western consumers want familiar and approachable feeling brands but cultural
differences and geographic distance often make China based companies just seem different.
All across Shenzhen I saw these boxes filled with rentable portable chargers and as it
turns out, it was an Anker product but the Chinese designed product didn’t really succeed
in the western market.
“Talking about AnkerBox, the product is initially designed for the western market,
however, actually, our trial in Seattle wasn’t that successful so we realized that, first
of all, that US people actually, when they go to a bar they actually really go there
drinking instead of looking at their phones.
Well if you walk into a bar in China you’ll find that actually, like 20 tables of people
standing around looking at their phones.”
When the designers are thousands of miles away from the consumer they might not be as
knowledgeable of their wants.
Some companies have sprung up in Shenzhen whose whole business is to develop and produce
products without a brand.
They’re called “white label companies.”
They might produce earphones, for example, then sell them to a western audio company
who will attach their brand and sell the product at a mark-up.
Despite it’s enormous role in increasing the GDP of China 30-fold in the last 30 years,
manufacturing is not an entirely sustainable industry for the country long-term.
The problem is that, rather ironically, the economic growth that manufacturing spurred
in China has increased labor prices to a point where their manufacturing is less competitive.
Before manufacturing came in China was a country of poor, rural farmers but today China has
a real middle class and cities that are expensive to live in.
It used to be that workers like the ones at Anker’s factory moved to the city for a
few years when they were young to make money for their family back home but nowadays people
are moving to cities permanently and want to be able to set up solid, middle class,
urban lives.
The average cost for real-estate in central Shenzhen is almost $1,200 per square foot.
That’s even higher than San Francisco and New York.
Even when workers live outside the city center, higher wages are necessary even just to pay
for housing.
At the same time manufacturing is becoming less labor intensive every day as robots and
automation are becoming increasingly advanced and inexpensive.
In 2015 China launched a initiative spending hundreds of billions of dollars each year
to upgrade and automate factories in order to keep prices low, but this will likely do
little to keep companies from packing up shop and moving elsewhere.
Manufacturing lines that can be automated are likely to move back to the United States
and the rest of the western market.
Robots cost the same whether they’re in the United States or China so manufacturing
products in the US helps save on shipping costs and certainly is good for PR.
At the same time, the labor intensive jobs that China prospered on in past decades are
moving to less developed and less expensive countries like Vietnam, Bangladesh, and India.
Chinese manufacturing firms are responding to this by opening up their own factories
all across the world—everywhere from Africa to the United States itself.
The model that might work for China in the future is that of Anker—Chinese based firms
that can take advantage of their proximity to the production lines to cut down on development
cost and time.
Shenzhen based start-ups like Anker, DJI, and OnePlus have already succeeded in taking
advantages of this proximity, but more are being established each day.
If you see a hardware-based Kickstarter campaign, there’s a good chance it comes from Shenzhen.
10 years ago a company would be hard-pressed to succeed in Shenzhen as its own brand because
historically the retailer has acted as a barrier in between the manufacturer and consumer,
but with the rise of Amazon and other e-commerce sites its now possible for eastern companies
to sell directly to the western consumer in a system that rewards for quality over price.
The time really is ripe for Chinese entrepreneurship.
While Silicon Valley might be the dominant area for software start-ups, its hard to rival
Shenzhen as an ecosystem for hardware development and manufacturing.
I have to give a huge thanks to Anker for bringing me out to Shenzhen to research and
film this video.
It truly would not have been possible without them and they gave me complete creative control
over the video.
I’ve actually owned and used an Anker battery for over five years thats never broken down
even when it’s been accidentally submerged twice and dropped countless times but luckily
they upgraded me to one of their newest ones which I love.
The main thing I want to plug for them is their “Power it Up” contest going on right
now.
10 winners will each get $2,000 in cash and a bunch of free Anker products.
To enter you make a video up to 1 minute long about an unpleasant or awkward situation caused
by running out of power, upload it to youtube, then share it on their page and the 10 highest
voted ones at the end of the contest win.
The link to enter is in the description so good luck!
Aside from that, please be sure to check out my podcast Showmakers and subscribe to this
channel to get all my future videos right when they come out.
Thanks again for watching and I’ll see you next week for another Wendover Productions
video.