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Slide 1: ==== ==== Information on Shenzhen factories and manufacturing in China. http://www.new-shenzhen-business.com/shenzhen-factory.html ==== ==== Shenzhen is a megacity situated on China's south coast opposite Hong Kong - unofficial estimates place the population at 37 million people. What makes the city truly remarkable is that 30 years ago it was a small fishing village. In 1979, the Chinese government announced that Shenzhen would become a "special economic zone" an experiment to see if the economic success of Hong Kong could be emulated in mainland China. The rest is, as they say, history. People came from all across the country to participate in the miracle of development, businesses found themselves with a highly skilled workforce and much in the way of financial incentives to begin developing a second manufacturing centre to rival the megacity of Guangzhou (also in Guangdong province and only an hour further inland by train). Tens of thousands of factories were built in the surrounding environment and with excellent access to local transportation hubs; Shenzhen has become a firm favourite with businesses around the world looking to outsource their production and manufacturing. Today the city is a thriving success story a vindication of the government's decision to experiment with capitalism and a guide to many other Tier 2, 3 & 4 cities currently looking at inward investment and capacity building. Shenzhen is very appealing to Western businesses as it is one of the more multi-cultural locations in the country, and proximity to Hong Kong means that it is often more easy to access than the rest of the mainland. This doesn't mean that doing business here is without difficulty, language barriers are often the first stumbling block for the newly arrived executive. It can come as a nasty surprise to learn that English is not a skill prized by the Chinese workforce and even basic functional literacy is rare. It can be very difficult if not impossible to find a manufacturing partner that speaks your language, and even if there is a suitable individual at the factory it is usually only the salesperson who will have any skills in communicating in English. The language spoken in the majority of Shenzhen is Mandarin, not as you might expect Cantonese (which is the language of the rest of the Guangdong province) this is because nearly everyone living in the city has immigrated from the rest of China as part of the economic program. In fact it is estimated that there are only 30,000 people who could consider themselves "native" to the city. Then there's the problem of middle men, everywhere you find a manufacturer in China you'll find dozens of middle men eager to make a deal on their behalf. While there's nothing intrinsically wrong with the concept of a broker, who may be able to save you time and effort locating the right factory for your product, there are huge problems that can result later on in your relationship.
Slide 2: Chinese middle men rarely have any control over the output quality, delivery timescales, or indeed much of anything at all with the companies they "represent". Nor do they have the best interests of a "long-term" relationship at heart as they are paid a commission on the first order, as many Western businesses have found to their cost. Because of this, it's vital that when you look to outsource production to Shenzhen that you are dealing direct with the vendor themselves and not an endless chain of middle men. It's important to inspect the factory of your choice, and it's important to get it right. Middle men will almost never allow you access to the manufacturing facilities (because they worry, correctly, that you and the supplier will choose to work directly without including them) and even if they do, they won't be able to answer in depth questions about the facilities. But inspection should serve a bigger purpose than that, you need to be able to determine with your potential partner is ethical, environmentally friendly, safe, reliable and has some form of quality control (another major drawback of outsourcing in China is that production runs may differ massively from samples provided). You should build up a checklist of questions you need answering during your inspections and work to ensure that no stone goes unturned. It can be difficult to conduct your own inspection in Shenzhen, language barriers, cultural barriers and a lack of easily accessible information can make the task overwhelming and massively time consuming. It's not an impossible task but many outsourcers choose to cut the workload and save time and money by working with a local quality firm to conduct their inspections for them. The best of these firms tend to be Western owned and managed with a bi-cultural workforce who can easily overcome culture and language barriers as well as having access to the local community to be able to compile a more complete picture than it may be possible to do through your own efforts. If you do decide that you want to outsource to Shenzhen make sure you inspect the facility very carefully, in the long run it may save your reputation and protect your customers and market share. Here you can find a reliable China Inspection company as well keep up on all the latest China Quality Control news. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Andrew_Reich
Slide 3: ==== ==== Information on Shenzhen factories and manufacturing in China. http://www.new-shenzhen-business.com/shenzhen-factory.html ==== ====