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China scrambles to stem manufacturing exodus as companies leave

asia.nikkei.com

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Re: China scrambles to stem manufacturing exodus as companies leave

#41

Post by toasterlovin »

ETHisso2017 wrote: post #19

Nikkei and Bloomberg seem to have an ideological axe to grind. From someone who's on the ground here, China's manufacturing base is shifting up the value chain pretty rapidly, which naturally shifts its relative attractiveness to foreign companies as a source of contract manufacturing.

On the other hand, pretending like the tariffs haven’t been a bloodbath for Chinese manufacturing seems unrealistic. I’m the CFO of a small company. Last year, 100% of our products came from China. This year only 20% are coming from China. And we’re trying our hardest to shift the remainder. Every other company in our market has either made the same shift or is planning to.

Re: China scrambles to stem manufacturing exodus as companies leave

#42

Post by toasterlovin »

sambroner wrote: post #13
panpanna wrote: post #12

Out of curiosity, how much of this is due to import tarifs and how much due to rising wages?

It feels like a lot of it is due to the publicity around the tariffs. The cost alone isn’t enough to make corps shift, but assuring the stock market that the Corp is robust against continued tariffs and possible unrest appears to be worthwhile. There seems to be some combined anti-China, pro-anywhere-else marketing involved as well.

You’re joking, right? 25% increase in cost of goods sold is the only reason needed to move. I’m the CFO of a small company. We moved production out of China and into Taiwan and Vietnam. Despite labor being cheaper in Vietnam, our costs went up by 10%. We moved anyway because 10% < 25%.

Re: China scrambles to stem manufacturing exodus as companies leave

#43

Post by mikorym »

loyukfai wrote: post #32
mikorym wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would hope that Africa would be, too, but it seems like that is a hope for the future.

The infrastructure seems much less developed in Africa?

Yes, I think that is the main limiting factor.

Re: China scrambles to stem manufacturing exodus as companies leave

#45

Post by baybal2 »

panpanna wrote: post #12

Out of curiosity, how much of this is due to import tarifs and how much due to rising wages?

Chinese manufacturing industry is already the most automated and robotised in the world.

Chinese factories did not stand still for the last 10 years when accommodating the rising wages was their biggest trouble.

This is very obvious to anybody working in the industry. The popular image of the industry being all about "sweatshops" is completely wrong.

Re: China scrambles to stem manufacturing exodus as companies leave

#47

Post by baybal2 »

naltun wrote: post #46
baybal2 wrote: post #44

A man in manufacturing here. Lets do a mini-AMA

What exactly do you _do_?

Develop software, some times web dev of backends for IOT stuff, some times closer to firmware.

And as of recently, I am an involuntary salesperson as we began gaining clients in ex-USSR, and India/Pakistan/Bangladesh.

Over the past 12 years, I did work almost solely with either small OEMs or companies buying from them. And I did a short dash with dotcoms. Wasn't able to cope with PHBism there.

I'm very glad that my scope of work drifted towards something with a more narrow scope over the years. Work with small OEMs is all about being a "do everything man."

Previously I did simple circuit engineering, simple mechanical work, worked as an interpreter, did commercial negotiations on behalf of clients, did parts and product logistics, sourcing, even done package design and making up adhoc brands few times.

Re: China scrambles to stem manufacturing exodus as companies leave

#48

Post by dang »

PavlovsCat wrote: post #26
dang wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has become absolute reflex and is therefore off topic here. So has the "but Saudi Arabia" response. This is not a site for incessant repetition. If that's what you guys want to do, there are other places on the internet to do it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

If that wasn't so utterly arbitrarily enforced it would pass the smell test.

If you see things we haven't moderated that should be moderated, the likeliest explanation is that we didn't see it. We don't come close to reading everything that gets posted to HN. There's far too much.

Re: China scrambles to stem manufacturing exodus as companies leave

#49

Post by cercatrova »

loyukfai wrote: post #32
mikorym wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would hope that Africa would be, too, but it seems like that is a hope for the future.

The infrastructure seems much less developed in Africa?

Good thing China is loaning out their infrastructure there! /s

Re: China scrambles to stem manufacturing exodus as companies leave

#50

Post by the_resistence »

baybal2 wrote: post #45
panpanna wrote: post #12

Out of curiosity, how much of this is due to import tarifs and how much due to rising wages?

Chinese manufacturing industry is already the most automated and robotised in the world. Chinese factories did not stand still for the last 10 years when accommodating the rising wages was their biggest trouble. This is very obvious to anybody working in the industry. The popular image of the industry being all about "sweatshops" is completely wrong.

Not from my vantage point, I have many young contacts at companies in Shanghai. Lot of job cuts and putting 3 workers' efforts onto the head of the last remaining 1. Plenty of manual labor left...
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