After a year of travel in search of overseas venues for his water equipment business, William Hong came away with two words at top of mind: “localisation” and “altruism”.
The denizen of Dongguan – China’s southern manufacturing hub – has been on a journey spanning continents, with stops in Africa, Central Asia, South Asia and South America. But no matter where he went, even countries with warm official relations, worries over Chinese investment and products were omnipresent.
“Export value alone can no longer make overseas markets open to such a large number of Chinese companies and products,” said Hong, who began his career as an emigrant labourer before starting Dongguan Aimeike Valve, a producer of technologically enabled water and electricity meters.
“We need to change our thinking and bring an ‘altruistic’ approach to foreign trade,” he added. “It used to be an empty slogan, but after spending time on the ground, I have come to realise its truth.”
And on their adventures abroad, they are realising the importance of integrating into local ecosystems. This requires letting go of a big slice of profits to keep things running smoothly – a lesson from their Japanese peers, learned in that country’s expansion wave beginning in the 1980s.
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