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Everything You Need To Know About Sourcing From China. (Well Almost Everything)

By Dan Harris and Steve Dickinson

David Dayton over at the Silk Road International Blog has a great post on sourcing from China, entitled, "Smart Steps for Effective Sourcing in Tough Economic Times." It is an outline of a presentation he gives at Global Sources China Sourcing Shows. My biggest complaint is that David leaves his most important comment for last: "Get your lawyers involved early (just to be safe)." The highlights: -- Chinese factories have been stiffed for payments. "Don?t go into China with the attitude that 'hey, they should trust me, I?m from the developed country, I?m the one that doesn?t trust you.' The roles have been reversed. Dramatically." -- The economy has led to consolidation. "Lots of smaller, borderline quality factories have gone out of business." I would add that lots of smaller, borderline factories are still in business and you have to be very careful not to do hook up with one of these. -- "Money from the banks is mostly pushed through local governments and their connections. The money is targeted to specific industries/areas (e.g. Western China and green and higher tech products)." This is so true. Greentech and hightech in China is going great guns right now and there are all kinds of subsidies offered in these industries, both for domestic and foreign companies. David sees the following opportunities (as do I): -- Factories that are still in business have employees and need to pay for them so they will be aggressively looking for new orders." -- Well-connected factories have access to cash. -- Factories and equipment are for sale/rent at rock bottom prices. -- There are lots of opportunities for joint ventures. -- Factories are willing to do projects with creative terms?so long as they have some financial guarantees. -- Factories are willing to do smaller production runs than in the past. I have seen all of the above and I have also seen something else that David does not mention and that is declining prices both for new contracts and even on existing contracts. We just worked on a renegotiated contract that had another eight months to run on it. Our client signed up for another year and by doing so received a double digit price reduction.

Full post as published by China Law Blog on May 08, 2009 (boomark / email).