Low International R & D Capability Makes International Buyers Despise Chinese Textiles

In August 25th, at the meeting of a high-end buyer of China International Home Textiles and Accessories Expo, Jessica looked tired.

Jessica comes from the largest furniture supermarket in the world and is responsible for the procurement of home textiles in China.

After contact with many manufacturers, Jessica admitted that China's R & D capability has been improved, but it is far from enough.

"Their production capacity is still strong, stronger and faster, but the design capability has not yet come up."

"I feel that these suppliers in China have become very embarrassed," she said. "The competitiveness of high-end Turkey, Italy, low-end South Asia and India is also growing.

The remaining part of the middle is also fiercely competitive among domestic enterprises.

A similar view is prevalent among international buyers attending the conference.

Some changes are taking place in Chinese factories, but this change has not yet been approved by foreign buyers.

On the road from low end to high end, China's manufacturing is difficult.

R & D is far from enough.

In Jessica's view, many domestic enterprises are not sure what the international buyers are looking for.

"In general, we value factory capacity, equipment, social responsibility and price.

On the basis of these satisfactorily, we will go to the factory for further investigation.

Jessica said.

Jes-sica, who is working with a Anhui company, said: "I personally feel that the factories in the Chinese mainland are developing, but the gap is still quite large compared with those in the coastal areas."

After the financial crisis, the rise of costs, especially the cost of labour, led to the relocation of coastal factories to the mainland.

Is the multinational buyer going to the mainland after the enterprise has turned inward? Jes-sica says it seems quite uncertain now.

This gap is not reflected in productivity and quality, but mainly in soft power.

Jessica example, for example, communication, coastal enterprises do very well, their English is excellent.

But businesses in the mainland should be slightly worse.

If there are problems in this area, it is easy to cause great losses.

The subjective initiative in social responsibility is slightly worse, such as child labor, overtime work and sewage treatment. This is a gap in consciousness.

"The price of mainland factories is lower than that of coastal enterprises, but the gap is not as big as expected."

Jes-sica analysis.

"As you can see, they are all doing it, but progress is not as fast and as big as everyone imagined."

Jessica is a bit of a surprise.

"I feel that their pressure on R & D and quality control is getting bigger and bigger," Jessica said.

Why is it so expensive?

Andy, another big buyer, shares the same view that he comes from the largest in the US.

"China

After huge fluctuations in the financial crisis, many foreign trade companies have been thinking hard and unwilling to "dress" for others. They have launched a self created brand "wind", but this trend has not been recognized by international buyers.

"I know that Chinese enterprises are also making their own brands, but our purchases are still familiar with brands in Europe and the United States.

This area is still mainly processed and manufactured in China.

Andy said.

The attitude of buyers reflects that China's manufacturing strength is not enough, and highlights the difficulty of Chinese enterprises going to the high-end of the industrial chain.

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Huatex is a high-end enterprise in Hangzhou. Before it was a design company, R & D and design were the advantages of this company.

Xu Bohua, chairman of the board, said that there were so many purchasers in the exhibition booth in the past two days. They said the most frequently: "why is China made so expensive?"

Xu Bohua will ask them why China's products are cheap. You can see that our designs, patterns and quality are comparable to those made in Turkey.

Xu Bohua, who persists in the high-end line, has gone through a lot of difficulties on this road.

Xu Bohua said: "although our profits are much higher than those of the same industry, others are 10%, we can achieve 30%-50%, but our annual investment in R & D and intellectual property protection is not comparable to that of peers.

Copyright protection is going to be millions every year. "

If these are normal inputs, they are overseas.

"They will take our products back and then crowned MadeinTurkey (made in Turkey) orMadeinItaly (made in Italy), which will lead to greater profits. In fact, we have nothing to do with them in terms of indicators."

Xu Bohua said, "we will also talk with some buyers about our own logo, which is very difficult, especially our non terminal products."

Some of Huatex's purchasers asked whether they would deliberately produce the product in other countries, and some said it was true.

Faced with this embarrassment, Yang Zhaohua, President of China Household Textile Industry Association, said: "no change is achieved overnight."

He said that a phenomenon of this exhibition is that some relatively small and low tech enterprises say that they will not come to the exhibition next time because there is nothing to gain.

"This is change, which proves that the differentiation of enterprises will also force enterprises to go to the high end."

Yang Zhaohua said.