The 136th Canton Fair, renowned as China’s No. 1 Fair, has kicked off in Guangzhou. The familiar slogan “Made in Dongguan, Renowned Worldwide” can be seen at the venue of the Canton Fair as always. A foreign exhibitor, dressed up as the God of Wealth, has caught attention of many visitors on site. He was holding a treasure bowl to collect business cards from purchasers.
In traditional Chinese culture, the God of Wealth is a symbol of good luck and fortune. “Our foreign friend definitely understood the web traffic code in China. We’ve gotten huge peer pressure,” sighed Deng Jinsheng, chairman of Dongguan Pan American Electronics Co., Ltd. (“Pan American Electronics”).
Deng Jinsheng was a member of the Dongguan Exhibition Group participating in the 136th Canton Fair. The Dongguan Exhibition Group shown up in its strongest lineup to this session with 420 Dongguan-based enterprises opening 921 booths. Exhibitors covered a number of industries, such as the home appliances and consumer electronics, “New Trio” (Electric vehicles, lithium-ion batteries, photovoltaic products), building materials and home furnishings, textiles and apparel, etc.
Over the past few days, the reporter has interviewed the strongest Dongguan Exhibition Group in Canton Fair, recording their resistance of peer pressure by taking advantages of the Fair and their success in winning orders and transactions in the new market. Meanwhile, in order to help ‘order realisation’, a number of government departments in Dongguan have worked together and prepared an outbound strategy to help exhibitors to win orders. Industrial matchmaking activities were held during the Fair. What’s more, the “sea-air combined transport service”, the best transportation solution, has been launched.
New and senior Canton Fair exhibitors create a new situation with research and development, turning the tide against the wind
Deng Jinsheng is a senior exhibitors at the Canton Fair. Pan American Electronics, Deng’s company, has participated in the Fair for six sessions. The company once got in a dilemma as the profit was decreasing and competition was increasing in the traditional lamp sector. Deng Jinsheng, started from lamp production, decided to invest RMB 100 million in the research and development of explosion proof lamps two years ago.
Previously, foreign companies accounted for most of the market of the special explosion proof lamps. After Deng set foot in the sector, the sales have been increased greatly. He has been not only increasing investment in R&D to seize foreign market, but also upgrading the automatic production lines. The production capacity has been increased by 50% compared with before.
For Deng, setting foot in a blue ocean market that is mature in foreign countries but new in China is the key for him to turn the tide against the wind. Eventually, the sales is reaching RMB 400 million this year, hitting a record high.
Dong Guan Tedepe New Energy Co., Ltd. is a new participant for the Canton Fair. The company won orders of USD 4 million during the Spring session this year. For this session, Tedepe brought more than 20 exhibitors, including the newly-launched integrated reverse control energy storage machine. “As the single lithium battery cell is only 3.2V, but the AC voltage is 220V, we could only use a number of 3.2V cells connected in series to enhance the voltage for this problem. Now, we have added 3.2V DC voltage, which can be directly converted into 220V AC voltage output. The service life of this product exceeds 10 years, promising high performance cost ratio,” said Peng Chunlan, the person in charge of the company. She hoped for big orders as they won in last session.
Wang Weihua, who has been engaged in the sales of dough mixers since 2007, is a senior in the field of small household appliances. In 2012, she began preparing to establish Dongguan Kitchen Steward Home Appliance Co., Ltd. (“Kitchen Steward”), specializing in dough mixers. According to Wang, the global sales of dough mixers is expected to reach RMB 1 billion in 2024, while the sales volume of Kitchen Steward will be RMB 200 million. In other words, for every 5 dough mixers sold worldwide, 1 is manufactured by Kitchen Steward.
Foreign enterprises have entered the market of dough mixers much earlier than that of Chinese enterprises. Why can Kitchen Steward take the lead as a latecomer? Wang Weihua revealed that under the same product quality, the selling price of Kitchen Steward is about one-fifth to one-third of that of overseas products, which have attracted global buyers. But as more and more manufacturers join the segmented track, the competitive pressure of Kitchen Steward has sharply increased. Kitchen Steward brought new products to this session, hoping to win more customers with their strength. In just one morning of the reporter’s interview, Kitchen Steward won six potential customers, equivalent to the total transaction volume at the Canton Fair last year.
In front of the booth of Guangdong Unique Electrical Co., Ltd. (“Unique Electrical”), many buyers stopped to watch the circulating fan that can rotate 360 degrees. Chen Longwei, deputy general manager of the company, introduced that the new fan only needs one charging wire for power supply in addition to its feature of 360 degree radial rotation. Even a power bank can become a mobile power source for the product. These new products are very popular in the Japanese, Korean, and American markets.
As a senior participant, Unique Electrical has accumulated experience for ten sessions. Compared to previous years, they were receiving more orders this year, with an expected increase of 50% in order volume year-on-year. Although the company has won considerable orders, Chen Longwei still felt the fierce competition in the market and stated that the company would make more innovation to cope with the new market.
Government and enterprises work together for an outbound strategy to get more orders
It’s noticed that the “Guangdong Quality, Made in Dongguan” slogans were used by special green enterprises to showcase the image of “Made in Dongguan”.
Many provinces and cities have organized enterprises to participate in the Canton Fair over the years. Governments have organized press conferences to help enterprises expand market and grab orders. Governments and enterprises have worked together for the goal of “winning orders and transactions”.
In the afternoon of October 17th, the Guangdong (Dongguan) - Russia Economic and Trade Matchmaking and Exchange was held, with the participation by and exchange among 14 Russian enterprises and institutions and 20 Dongguan-based enterprises. The Bureau of Commerce of Dongguan revealed that Dongguan planned to hold about 10 investment promotion activities during the Canton Fair, including a visit to Dongguan by a group of Chilean buyers and the Guangdong (Dongguan) - Chile Economic and Trade Exchange Forum.
In order to increase investment attraction, relevant departments such as the Bureau of Commerce of Dongguan and the Dongguan Investment Promotion Bureau have dispatched special staff to conduct investment promotion activities and negotiations at the Canton Fair, aiming to attract high-quality enterprises to pay investigation visit to Dongguan. On October 15th, the Guangdong Electronic, Electrical and Smart Home Appliance Industrial Investment Promotion Conference was held, with the Investment Promotion Bureau making a themed promotion around Dongguan’s electronic information industry. Attendees mainly include exhibitors in the sectors of electronics, electrical products and smart home appliance. At the conference, the organizer have introduced the advantages for the development of electronic information industry, the business environment and investment policies of Dongguan.
With the joint efforts of the government and enterprises, the Dongguan Exhibition Group has gained a lot during each session. According to the Bureau of Commerce of Dongguan, exhibitors from Dongguan are attracting a large number of overseas buyers with increasingly advanced technology and intelligent products. Currently, many overseas customers have made reservations for orders.
However, how to quickly monetize orders and bridge the “last mile” of going global has become particularly important.
It is understood that the bulk commodity orders concluded at the Canton Fair are mainly exported by water transportation. Low cost, large volume and short distance are the advantages of waterway transportation, which saves transportation time and logistics costs for enterprises. Therefore, many exhibitors have directly turned the Canton Fair into their “stores”, with their factories providing supports back in Dongguan. The government departments have also launched the “strongest strategy” to help enterprises go global.
It’s learned that as electronic products are featured with small size, high added value and fast transportation efficiency, relevant departments in Dongguan have created the best transportation route for enterprises’ “order monetization”. It’s called the “sea-air combined transport service”. Ordered products will be shipped directly to Hong Kong International Airport via short sea shipping, and then exported to the destination countries at the fastest speed. In Dongguan Port, the “sea-air combined transport service” project has achieved import and export of goods worth RMB 10 billion since its operation one year ago.
The project is called HKIA Dongguan Logistics Park. It’s the world’s first cross-border sea-air combined transportation project that directly connects to the airside of an airport. The goods are loaded at the Park, delivered to the dedicated port in Dongguan Port, and then shipped by sea to Hong Kong International Airport for global flights. It will provide a strong support for Dongguan enterprises at the Canton Fair to achieve “order monetization”.
