China

China’s economic and demographic change forces the country to take action in its health care system. AI, Big Data and Robotics play a vital role in bringing the quality of health care to a new level and the country to the politically desired world leadership in key technologies. The abundance of data, limited privacy laws, vast amounts of venture capital and strategic partnerships between AI-industry and the government have fueled the fast AI-development in China to which Germany and Europe have yet to find an answer.

In Germany, Big-Data is frequently associated with Industry 4.0. With regard to China, some publications focused upon the legal and ethical issues of the so-called social credit system, but offered little overview concerning the general aspects of Big-Data. This paper aims to deliver a more comprehensive outline of the Big-Data developments, which have been observed for the last seven years in China. In particular, the contribution delineates the application scenarios and governmental politics related to Big-Data and further deepens the insights by providing two concise case studies, one on mechanical engineering manufacturers and the other on Big-Data activities in the province of Guizhou. At the economic level, this article compares the recent Big-Data revenues in Germany and China.

Success factors that had long driven China’s economic boom have lost their legitimacy gradually. The emergence of the competitive indigenous technology houses in IT, telecommunications and software industries in the past two decades has made China’s industrial digitalisation feasible, which the nation would urgently need to base its further growth more on technology and innovation. Consequently, China’s economic performance would become more solid and sustainable. Internet+ predicts the general direction of digitalisation in China’s industries and represents the concept that is currently enthusiastically debated by the economists, politicians and in the media. The integration of information technology with other manufacturing industries is particularly emphasised in this context. The article examines the background and the terminology, takes a look at the market model and some technical issues of Internet+. A case study accompanies the “excursion” to China, in order to give ...

After three years of living in one of China’s booming cities, the answer seems easy: In China! Even during the crisis in 2009 construction was ongoing in Dalian: Roads, apartments, plants. At the same time in Europe workers were dismissed and factories closed. That is why a discussion of the advantages of a location seems unreasonable at this point. The decision has already been taken by companies. The remaining question is: Where to go from here? And again the answer seems easy.

The regional and economical policies of the Chinese government in the past few decades have led to marked regional economic imbalances. In order to implement initiative in China successfully, a valid location planning is a great challenge for foreign logistics companies. They need different qualitative and quantitative criteria for location decision. In this article was showed an overview of the major logistics hubs in China and analyzed their characteristics and location quality from the perspective of the western logistics companies.

The increasing globalization gives western companies great new opportunities. Especially China gained increasing importance as a sourcing market in the last years. Despite these opportunities, a retreat of many companies from China could be witnessed recently. Among other factors, this is due to the fact that western companies cannot exert enough influence on the performance and price of their suppliers. This article presents tools and processes to successfully face this challenge and improve the own position of power as a customer.

Consumergoods but also technical products, pharmaceuticals etc. are increasingly counterfeid. Production and global sales are often controlled by organised crime. The local confiscation of counterfeits does not impress the fraudsters. Effective countermeasures must include the closure of their production facilities.

Confronted with intensive product price competition in China, industrial firms are forced to invest in extending the service business. Extending the service business is far from easy. Chinese competitors offer faked spare parts. Local service skills are very poor and service requirements force industrial firms to invest in logistic infrastructure. This article offers a guideline for managers seeking to professionalize the human resource management in the service organization, to adapt service offerings to the local customer needs, and to set-up a logistic infrastructure.

Due to sales and cost motives and ongoing globalisation, low-cost procurement markets are increasingly opened up by small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). These enterprises’ long-term success is directly linked to their success on these procurement markets. A procurement strategy which takes local market characteristics into account and fully integrates them will lead to success. The procurement process focuses on the selection of required components and the choice, support and further development of suppliers. The following article presents the “SiLu“ project approach (Sino-German cooperation for the support and further development of suppliers). The SiLu project comprises four SMEs that came together in order to elaborate a joint procurement strategy and to implement it on the Chinese market using their concerted buying power. Besides presenting this project the article focuses on the first project phase, the methodical selection of components and the identification of ...

The increasing competitive pressure leads to a reduction of the depth of value creation and therefore to a rising importance of suppliers. Additionally, globalization is the cause for a tighter international network in production. Asymmetries in interests can obstruct a cooperation between companies and may endanger the commercial success. The article describes asymmetries in interests in the cooperation with local as well as Chinese suppliers.