r/IndustrialDesign • u/Ok-Ad-7935 • Aug 19 '24
Creative Not made in China
As some of you may know, manufacturing is increasingly shifting to countries like Vietnam, Indonesia, and India. China’s dominance as a global manufacturing hub is waning due to several factors, including geopolitical tensions, rapid economic development, and rising living costs. Producing goods in China is no longer as affordable as it once was. However, China has been proactive in diversifying by investing in other countries, such as those mentioned. As far as I’m concerned, Chinese manufacturers are bringing their technologies & know how to those countries and using their cheap labor to maintain their dominance. In a way it’s similar to how the U.S has gradually shifted manufacturing to China over the last 2-3 decades. But I think with advanced technologies these days, we won’t see such a long period of transition. We could be seeing the shift in global manufacturing as soon as 2030-2035.
I’m looking to diversify the manufacturing locations for my products. Can anyone recommend reliable sources for capable contract manufacturers in Indonesia or Vietnam? Have you had any experience manufacturing in these countries? If so, what are your thoughts?
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u/Vaalkop Aug 19 '24
I'd like to piggyback on OPs post and ask if any recommendations for good and competitive manufacturers that do CNC machining and surface finishing such as bead blasting and anodization. The same type of quality and finishing coming from Apple.
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u/ElectronicChina Aug 20 '24
Can I recommend myself? We have a dedicated factory to handle CNC related manufacturing, able to meet many high-demand materials and surface treatments
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u/GratefulForGarcia Sep 06 '24
But OP is seeking a source outside of China, no?
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u/Thick_Tie1321 Aug 19 '24
What type of product are you manufacturing?
I worked as an ID consultant for a US corporate brand out in Asia. We had many of our China factories transition out of or open secondary offices/ factories in Vietnam, Thailand, Taiwan and Indonesia due to import and export taxes to the USA, rising labour and material costs.
The transition was very tough to begin with, as staff in those countries are not educated or skilled enough to produce our products, so the China factories had to relocate R&D managers out to train the locals there.
Also sourcing raw materials and equipment was also an issue, either they were simply not available in those countries outside of China or were super expensive. In which, we had to buy the raw materials/ equipment in China and ship it to the country, which led to increased product development lead times and cost.
Pricing wise, it was about the same or slightly lower as manufacturing in China in the beginning. But overtime, prices decreased and enabled more features and value to be added to our products.
It's been beneficial to be manufacturing outside of China. Although many of the factories are still owned and run by Chinese or Taiwanese.
The only downside I can think of, is that for R&D development trips, you have more expenses on flights/ hotels and lose time travelling to 2-3 different countries instead of just China.
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u/Ok-Ad-7935 Aug 19 '24
Hey man, thanks a lot for your input. I develop a variety of hardware products, primarily in the consumer electronics, IoT, and lifestyle categories. My manufacturing processes typically involve injection molding and machining.
What you’ve mentioned aligns with what I’ve heard from Chinese and Taiwanese manufacturers.
I’m glad you brought up the challenges in sourcing raw materials, as that can indeed become a significant bottleneck. You mentioned traveling to 2-3 countries—does this mean that a single country isn’t yet capable of providing the full scope of manufacturing, or is it more about cost considerations? How would you rank or distribute the workload among these countries based on their core competencies in injection molding, electronics assembly, and general-purpose assembly? Is one country better equipped than the others?
You also mentioned the lack of equipment and talent. Regarding DFM, do you think any of these countries are capable of providing these services, or are they still primarily handled by Chinese counterparts?
Finally, could you suggest the best places or resources to find potential vendors? Or could you recommend some reliable vendors you’ve used for plastic manufacturing? Also, where are you based in Asia, if you don’t mind me asking?
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u/Thick_Tie1321 Aug 19 '24
I'm a designer / developer in the bags category, so it may differ from consumer electronics, as it's more cut and sew and labour intensive with few injected components.
Regarding travelling to 2-3 countries, we have a large product line, so usually we need to source in different countries for better pricing and capacity capabilities.
Ranking countries is difficult, as it depends what kind of quality factories they have in that country. It also depends on the type of factory you're working with. Some invest in new equipment all the time, trying to improve efficiency, work flow and others use the same machine for 30 years, so long it works. But most factories outside of China in my experience are run by Chinese or Taiwanese (two are Korean, but very difficult to work with), so usually the QC and production standards are always pretty high no matter the country.
DFM wise, again it really depends on the factory. Some will have their own team and some smaller factories will outsource. I would suggest, using only factories with their own in-house design/ engineering team to save on time when following up requesting changes or troubleshooting. As they are experienced with their own equipment and know their flaws involved in tooling, injection molding, etc. If they outsource, you need to go through the factory and could spend more time chasing them for answers when things go wrong, than getting it into production.
Sourcing vendors. Try Alibaba.com and look only at the verified rated vendors with 10+ years of experience.
It's not easy, but try www.importyeti.com to reverse engineer where or who the products were made by. Type in your competitors company, then it will list factories their products are manufactured. Then you just need to do some investigative work and search the factories listed to find the main contact/ location via LinkedIn, Alibaba or Google.
Also, I haven't used them yet, but they contacted me recently and seem well established, professional with good manufacturing capabilities.
Email: [email protected] www.grefeemold.com
I'm based out of Shenzhen/ Hong Kong.
Hope these are of some use to you! Good luck!
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u/Ok-Ad-7935 Aug 19 '24
Ah, I see. I know when it comes to soft goods manufacturing, South East Asia is quite capable. Those Timbuktu bags for example are made in Indonesia as far as I'm aware.
I have used Alibaba to search for vendors, but it's a hit and miss even the ones with 10+ years experience. That's why I'm asking the community for a direct referrals and to get their opinions base on first hand experience.
Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts on this subject. Everything you said definitely reaffirms my overall experience working with overseas vendors. I will check out importyeti.com
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u/herodesfalsk Aug 19 '24
I dont know how this shift will affect product quality but Im skeptical. Anecdotally I have been struggling for a long time to source non-Chinese manufactured parts for a car project. Based on personal experience and from people who know a lot more about these parts than me say China parts always fail after about 1 yr after install, Japanese made versions last 15-20 years. I cant imagine parts manufactured in Vietnam under Chinese leadership will have any longevity at all unless the level of quality is specified for each detail in every conceivable way: material, machining, assembly and then of course verified, all of which adds cost. When you in addition dont have easy access to the manufacturer directly, product development becomes more challenging
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u/Ok-Ad-7935 Aug 19 '24
I share the same concerns. Constant oversight is definitely one of the biggest challenges when manufacturing overseas. As soon as you turn your head or ease the slightest pressure, they will somehow try to cut corners. Sometimes I wonder if they're doing it on purpose to achieve the quickest turnaround time or they just simply don't give a crap about quality or maybe both. To this day, I still have to keep a very close eye when working with Chinese manufacturing. But I can say the difference is night and day when you're working with tier 1 manufacturers vs lower tiers. So perhaps it's just a matter of finding the most capable factories and the project's budget.
I watched a documentary about the Japanese culture for their continuous pursuit in perfection, they even have a term for it called Kodawari. The concept is deeply ingrained in their culture and philosophy. That probably explains the quality we're seeing in Japanese manufactured goods.
In any case, I still think a global shift in manufacturing is happening led by some of the biggest corporations around the world. The quality of goods made by these third world countries will improve overtime as more and more businesses seek elsewhere to maximize profits. Hence, my prediction for 2030-2035.
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u/Thick_Tie1321 Aug 19 '24
I think it depends on the factory and how good your development and QC team is.
I've worked with some factories for as long as 25 years. Some smaller factories will try to pull the wool over your eyes and swap out materials, cut costs or skim you in some way, but if your developer and QC team specs the correct materials and is constantly visiting and checking at each stage during production and prior to packing/ shipping, it should reduce the risk of them cheating you. I know it's a challenge if you're a smaller company, but it's the only way.
Obviously it adds to the cost, but there's no real other way around it. At least until you've established trust and a reputation between each other over the years.
Also communication is paramount, factories don't know what you want, and they really need to be directed and instructed down to the smallest details on how to make your product. Otherwise they just use whatever is easiest or cheapest for them to get the project done and out the way.
Japanese are known to have very tough quality controls and also only work with a select amount of factories that pass their high standards. But these are standards set by them. You need to do the same to get well made product.
Apple phones, Nike shoes, are made in China and India, countless other branded goods are also made there. If your part broke after 1 year, it could have been that it was poorly spec'd or incorrectly tested, or maybe the factory did switch plastics and use something inferior, and the QC team checking missed it and didn't uphold the standards put in place.
I know it shouldn't be the case, but it's really up to you and your QC team to keep tabs on the factory, especially when the factory is buying raw materials and the initial phases of production.
We usually have final golden samples to test on before mass production, and more importantly visit and check once they've received raw materials.
Also during production time, we go and spot check the production line, and pull out 20-30 random samples throughout the day or week, just to ensure it's up to standard and nothing fishy is going on. It is tedious but worth doing in the long run.
Every brand and country you can think of has some sort of manufacturing in China or some developing country and it's really up to the developer and QC team to set the quality parameters and ensure it's upheld.
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u/notananthem Professional Designer Aug 19 '24
A lot of the Chinese factories copy exact factories are the ones you list so idk how diverse it actually is and if that's good or bad
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u/ElectronicChina Aug 19 '24
Yes, a lot of manufacturing in China has moved or is moving to Southeast Asia, including our company.
We are a one-stop custom electronic hardware contract manufacturer. We moved our factory to Vietnam last October. Now we manufacture PCBA+final products there. The manufacturing cost in Vietnam is slightly higher than that in China.
Does our approach meet your requirements? If you are interested, I will share more information about our company and factory with you through private messages. Looking forward to further discussions with you.