Years ago, I spoke at a major technology event on how to protect IP from China. I rarely use notes when I give a speech, which and I often riff on various things. At some point during that speech, I mentioned how technology companies tended to get into more trouble when it comes to China
The title of this post comes from a terrific NPR Marketplace article of the same name. If you are doing anything related to manufacturing in China, this is the one article you should read this year. The article is based on a question Chinese Premier Li Keqiang asked in Beijing earlier this month. Li went
Renaud Anjoran over at the Quality Inspection Blog has written a post that anyone who has products made in a foreign country should read. The post is entitled, How to Protect against Copies when you Manufacture in China, and it makes for an excellent guide on how to prevent your manufacturer from copying your products.
Many of our clients that went to China years ago to have their products made there are now interested in selling those same products within China. One way to do that is to form a WFOE for selling the products, but oftentimes the cost and the hassle of doing that is not worth it, especially
The goal of this post is to start a discussion on how and why to diversify away from China. Does a China plus one strategy make sense and if so, why? Earlier this week, I wrote an article, China Plus One: How Vietnam’s Riots Help American Businesses, the theme of which is that Vietnam --
Just got off the phone with a client who asked me to provide it with a "term sheet template" for buying product from a Vietnamese manufacturer. We generally advise our clients reach agreement on "key terms" before we start drafting their Manufacturing Contract. It is not productive for us to start drafting a manufacturing contract
We have written a number of times about the need to register intellectual property in China with the appropriate authorities. And we usually put particular emphasis on registering trademarks in China, because doing so is an easy, obvious, and relatively economical first step in IP protection. But for those selling or manufacturing products in China,
Whenever I give a speech or write an article or post about what it takes to succeed in international outsourced manufacturing , I invariably list "a good partner" as item one. Perhaps not surprisingly, I am always getting asked how to find the "good partner". My initial response is usually to say "with great care."
A number of our clients manufacture products that sell for relatively high prices due in large part to distinguishing characteristics of our client's company or product. In other words, the exact kind of product counterfeiters love to copy. Not sure why, but we have been spending more time lately in helping our clients prevent counterfeiting
Renaud Anjoran over at the Quality Inspection Tips blog recently wrote on How your Chinese suppliers might become your competitors. Renaud provides excellent suggestions for preventing your foreign product supplier from competing with you, based on his notes from a talk by Paul Melkebeke, Samsonite's Vice President for Asia. Melkebeke talked of how Samsonite protects
