"Chinese" as a Global Brand [2of3]

Chinese products as global brands


Unlike the West, which creates five and 10 year plans, it is common in the East to see one hundred year plans. Bear this in mind as backdrop. Add to this nearly a century of propaganda by the West and the East, graphically caricaturing each other, and we find that China is itself a kind of brand (the cover page for this document is a collage of illustrations of China's self-promoting propaganda).

As globalization began to take hold across the 1980s, China conservatively dropped back and watched what India would do. Both countries were considered third world, both countries have bottled up power, potential and aspirations. In less than a generation, we watched our outsourcing in India move from the grunt of manufacturing to knowledge based. As China watched, it began to corner the market with the low hanging fruit of manufacturing. Given its population and cultural / governmental control, this may turn out to be the larger power move. Moreover, seemingly covertly, that is not to say that China left service and knowledge on the table. When the generic Western op-ed of China has a cartoon expression, everything is “made in China”. Naturally, everything includes all the smartest of technologies (the big flat screen TV, the PDA/cell phone/whatever, all the best recording devices and all the computational devices).

For China, part of this strategy was the circumstance of language. India had English, China has Cantonese and Mandarin, but by 2030, Mandarin may have the last laugh.

It would not be surprising at all if someday history revealed that a deal was forged between the US and China, somewhere back between the 70s and 90s, that to give up all consideration of war the superpower at the time (the US) would assist in elevating the other. A further conjecture would likely include the two cultures moving toward each other, and beginning to share in each other's perspectives and values.

100-year plans may not be in our vernacular, and they are worth more than simply a pause in thought (they are a super strategy).



A selected Chinese product

To both make and argue against my own point (that a break out stand-alone brand is equally possible simultaneously in the face of increasing uniformity) this author is choosing a laptop made by Lenovo. Having recently made the purchase of a net book, this author's own research found a consensus of recommendations for the manufacturers Lenovo and Asus.

Lenovo is a marriage of sorts. Lenovo Group acquired the former IBM Personal Computing Division (which seems akin to the not so dumb after all cousin holding Baltic and Mediterranean wiping out your Boardwalk and Park Place). Lenovo group is based in the Republic of China (ROC; or as most of the US now tends simply to think of as China).

This may turn out to be a tale of two Chinas, however. Asus is located in the People's Republic of China (PRC), in Taipei, Taiwan (for what this writer wanted the purchase of a Gigabyte product occurred, also based in Taiwan).

No geo- or sociopolitical comment is here made, beyond the suppositions previously made (nor did any influence the purchase). It is striking to note, however, that none of these manufacturers was anywhere else other than a China. Also noteworthy is that while India moved to a point where it could take outsourced radiology x-rays and make diagnosis by remote, the branding of China itself began to firm its imprint. A generation ago, there were those familiar with the issues with Nepal, Taiwan, the Kiril Islands and Kamchatka (among others). Today one would be hard-pressed to find one out of 10 to tell you anything about these. The Chinese brand may turn out to be more powerful than any sword. Left to languish and atrophy, the brand that now eclipses may later simply sweep up and incorporate (quietly, without push back).

Lenovo, like Anderson Cooper being Diane Von Furstenburg’s son, may have bought its way to the red carpet, but it is still earning chops of its own.