China Says It Remains Open to the World, but Wants to Dictate Terms - The New York Times - "It’s globalization with Communist characteristics: The Chinese government promotes the country’s openness to the world, even as it adopts increasingly aggressive and at times punitive policies that force countries to play by its rules. With the United States and others wary of its growing dominance in areas like technology, China wants to become less dependent on the world for its own needs, while making the world as dependent as possible on China. “China wants what other great powers do,” said Yun Jiang, a researcher and editor of the China Story at the Australian National University. “It wants to follow international rules and norms when it is in its interest, and disregard rules and norms when the circumstances suit it.”... Mr. Xi is aggressively pushing for greater economic self-reliance at home — in other words, at least a partial decoupling. Mr. Xi has called for protectionist policies that would “comprehensively increase technological innovation and import substitution.”... Mr. Xi wants to tether other countries ever more tightly into China’s economic and thus geopolitical orbit. In a speech to other Chinese leaders, recently published by a Communist Party journal, he called for Beijing to make sure that other countries remained dependent on China for key goods, as a way to ensure that they would not try to halt their own shipments to China. Mr. Xi’s own economic and political policies this year have been the mirror opposite. China’s plan, Mr. Xi has said, is to lessen dependence on imports, insulating the country from rising external risks, including the threat of a long, pandemic-induced global economic downturn and the severing of Chinese access to American high-tech know-how... Australia went ahead anyway with the new trade agreement on Sunday in the hope that binding China in international agreements would affect its behavior — a position that has disappointed countries over and over."
Do Western Values Threaten China? The Motives and Methods of Xi Jinping’s Ideology Campaign - "Ideology has returned as a major factor in U.S.-China relations. Chinese government warnings against the pernicious influence of “Western values” have surged under Xi Jinping and vigilance against Western influence is now a guiding component of his policies toward the Internet, traditional media, culture and entertainment, universities, think tanks, and non-governmental organizations"
From 2015
Xi’s Historic Mistake - "Even in my own day-to-day experience, I have noticed that far too many people now speak elliptically, elusively, and euphemistically about contemporary China.I could do that, too. I could subtly point out that no empire has ever had more than five good emperors in a row, and that it is important for a society to preserve a place for well-meaning critics like the sixteenth-century Chinese official Hai Rui, the early communist-era military leader Peng Dehuai, and the economic reformer Deng Xiaoping. But I prefer to speak frankly and directly about the real issues that lie behind terminological disputes over Taiwan... It is a huge mistake to ignore the benefits that come with more regional autonomy. Consider an alternative history in which the People’s Liberation Army had overrun both Hong Kong and Taiwan in 1949; Sichuan had not been allowed to pursue pilot reform programs in 1975, when Zhao Ziyang was appointed provincial party secretary; and China’s centralization had proceeded to the point that the Guangzhou Military District could not offer Deng refuge from the wrath of the Gang of Four in 1976. What would China’s economy look like today? It would be a basket case. Rather than enjoying a rapid ascent to economic superpower status, China would find itself being compared to the likes of Burma or Pakistan. When Mao Zedong died in 1976, China was impoverished and rudderless. But it learned to stand on its own two feet by drawing on Taiwan and Hong Kong’s entrepreneurial classes and financing systems, emulating Zhao’s policies in Sichuan, and opening up Special Economic Zones in places like Guangzhou and Shenzhen. At some point in the future, China will need to choose between governmental strategies and systems. It is safe to assume that relying on top-down decrees from an aging, mentally declining paramount leader who is vulnerable to careerist flattery will not produce good results. The more that China centralizes, the more it will suffer"
Alibaba’s silicon chip in the age of hypersonic missiles - "although the design of the Yitian 710 is purely Chinese, the bulk of the underlying IP used to build the chip comes mostly from the U.S. and the United Kingdom, along with a smattering of other key technologies from European and Asian companies. While the performance benchmarks and design of the Yitian show that Alibaba chip designers are already world class, there is no chance such a chip could be manufactured in China, and almost all the core elements of the chip do not originate in China."
Finally, China manufactures a ballpoint pen all by itself - The Washington Post - "China already produces 38 billion ballpoint pens a year, according to China Daily, which is about 80 percent of all ballpoint pens in the world. That's a lot of pens, but there was a catch: China had long been unable to produce a high-quality version of the most important part of the pen, its tip... Manufacturing a ballpoint pen tip that can write comfortably for a long period of time requires high-precision machinery and precisely thin steel, but for years China was unable to match those crafted by foreign companies. While there were over 3,000 companies manufacturing pens in China, none had their own high-end technology for the tip. Instead, about 90 percent of the pen tips and refills, too, were imported from Japan, Germany and Switzerland... China's inability to produce a complete, high-quality ballpoint pen came to widespread attention in 2015, when Premier Li Keqiang singled out the products at a seminar in Beijing, noting that his writing was “rough” when he used Chinese-made ballpoint pens. For Li, China's failure to manufacture a complete ballpoint pen was indicative of the Chinese economy's weaknesses. “That's the real situation facing us,” Li said at the time. “We cannot make ballpoint pens with a smooth writing function.”... The ballpoint pen innovation only took place after concerted government intervention. This is, in part, because in a country with lax intellectual property laws, spending money on research and development with little tangible benefit isn't economical. Worse still, China's powerful but notoriously overproductive steel industry, rather than the pen industry itself, controls this technology. Many observers couldn't miss the potential problems. “Long term, TISCO's standard will probably result in a de facto domestic monopoly on pen tips, thereby replacing the foreign monopoly that China was originally trying to break up,” Adam Minter noted... “mercantilist goals like pen independence” could be a signal of a broader problem between China and the rest of the world"
TikTok’s In-App Browser Includes Code That Can Monitor Your Keystrokes, Researcher Says - "When TikTok users enter a website through a link on the app, TikTok inserts code that can monitor much of their activity on those outside websites, including their keystrokes and whatever they tap on the page, according to new research shared with Forbes. The tracking would make it possible for TikTok to capture a user's credit card information or password... “This was an active choice the company made,” said Felix Krause, a software researcher based in Vienna, who published a report on his findings Thursday. “This is a non-trivial engineering task. This does not happen by mistake or randomly.” Krause is the founder of Fastlane, a service for testing and deploying apps, which Google acquired five years ago... Krause tested seven iPhone apps that use in-app browsers: TikTok, Facebook, Facebook Messenger, Instagram, Snapchat, Amazon and Robinhood. (He did not test the versions for Android, Google’s mobile operating system.) Of the seven apps Krause tested, TikTok is the only one that appears to monitor keystrokes, he said, and seemed to be monitoring more activity than the rest"
'Access to everything': Chinese can see Western TikTok users' private data - "TikTok users’ private data is routinely accessed by employees in China despite the video app’s promises to store data outside the country, an investigation has found. Staff at ByteDance, the video app’s Chinese owner, are able to see non-public data about users such as their birthdays and phone numbers, according to staff recordings"
Chinese cosplayer claims she was detained by police for wearing a kimono - "In a video that went viral on Chinese social media over the weekend, men in what looked like police uniform can be heard shouting at a young Chinese woman dressed in a Japanese kimono, who is apparently in the midst of a cosplay photoshoot in Suzhou. They then took her and her companion away... According to the woman, who later shared her experience online, her "capture" happened on Huaihai Street, Suzhou, Jiangsu... Huaihai Street is commonly referred to as Suzhou's "Japanese Street". Home to many Japanese establishments, it was remodelled after the Dotonbori area in Osaka, Japan and even used to have kimono rental shops for visitors to take photos with... It was at the street that the cosplayer said she intended to "recreate the scene of Ushio and Shinpei carrying takoyaki (Japanese octopus balls) at the end of the Summer Time Rendering manga", dressed in a casual summer version of the kimono which is better known as a yukata... In the video, a man in a blue uniform is heard yelling: "If you come here wearing hanfu (Chinese traditional clothing), I wouldn't say this. Right? But you are wearing a kimono, as a Chinese. "You are a Chinese! Are you Chinese?"... "On suspicion of picking quarrels and provoking trouble, okay?" snaps the officer. "Well then, you can both come with us." The video comes to a chaotic end as the officers grab them by the arms and lead them away. Another video taken by a passer-by shows them being escorted off by a group of about 10 men in blue uniforms... Chinese Twitter users referred to the incident as "the second Cultural Revolution", with one exclaiming: "(We) don't even have the right to choose what to wear! (It's getting) more and more scary."... one Chinese YouTube user noted: "The point is not what clothes you wear, the point is 'picking quarrels and provoking trouble' — this pocket crime can be used on anyone, for any reason." According to the South China Morning Post, the vaguely-worded criminal charge is widely known in China as a catch-all offence or a "pocket crime", used by authorities against all manner of activists and dissidents... "(They) took photos of me, confiscated my cosplay outfit, deleted the photos I had shot and even asked me to write a 500-word reflection," she wrote. "I feel like I have no dignity right now." Speaking of her love for multiculturalism, including Japanese, European and traditional Chinese cultures, she asked: "Is it wrong for me to like anything?" She said that the police also thoroughly examined the contents of her mobile phone, called her photography school to instruct them to "educate" her, and "threatened" her not to post about the incident online... she and her companion had been detained for about five hours after being escorted away and were only allowed to leave at 1am the following day... Last year, a woman was also turned away from a Covid-19 testing site in Xiamen for wearing a kimono, with volunteers telling her off and asking her to come back after changing her clothes. This woman was later found to be an employee of a nearby Japanese restaurant, where the staff dress in kimonos... Earlier in February this year, a Chinese tourist wearing a kimono in Dali city in Yunnan province was similarly berated by security guards at a tourist site, who refused to let her enter. "Have you forgotten the Nanjing Massacre?" asked one guard. Other tourists joined in, calling her "a scum of society"."
How China’s hubris led to a double debt crisis, despite the benefits of forging its own path - "The first debt crisis is a domestic one: the slowdown in the property sector that started about a year ago as a direct consequence of the “three red lines” to reduce the indebtedness of property developers and curb property speculation. The policy led instead to a domestic credit crunch and a sharp contraction in the property sector that, by some estimates, accounts for more than a quarter of China’s GDP. This slowdown has now metastasised into a mortgage crisis as mortgage boycotts spread to over 300 projects in nearly a hundred Chinese cities. What remains unclear is whether (and how) this mortgage crisis would imperil the health of China’s banks and undermine their ability to lend in an economy that has slowed dramatically under the strain of zero-Covid. The second crisis is overseas debt caused by too much lending to projects that the pandemic has exposed to be less than commercially viable. When Sri Lanka defaulted on its debt for the first time in its history in May this year, it was an inauspicious sign of the problems that are likely to plague China’s main overseas lending programme – the Belt and Road Initiative – in the months ahead. China’s double debt crisis not only has striking parallels with the US subprime mortgage crisis and the European sovereign debt crisis more than a decade ago, but also highlights the dangers of hubris and the delusion that China is exceptional in its ability to avoid financial crises... In the past year, 28 of the top 100 developers in China have defaulted or asked for extensions. In addition to Evergrande, which has more than US$300 billion in liabilities and has defaulted on its bonds, more defaults in the second half of this year seem likely as Chinese developers face US$13 billion in dollar-denominated bond payments. The other two members of the “iron triangle” that may be asked to take over the suspended projects – local governments and banks – are also under financial stress themselves... A faster-growing economy usually makes it easier to conceal the debt burden. But as the Chinese economy slows, not least because of China’s stubborn adherence to zero-Covid, it will become harder to contain the fallout of its double debt crisis. A high debt burden also makes it harder for China to rely on stimulating property and infrastructure development to support growth."
People Can’t Stop Playing This Game That Lets You Clap for Chinese President Xi Jinping - "China’s tech company Tencent released an app, Clap for Xi Jinping, in honor of the leader’s major speech Wednesday at the Communist Party’s 19th National Congress. The game plays clips from Xi’s three-and-a-half-hour remarks and then challenges users to see how many times they can “clap”--or tap on the screen of their phone with their fingers -- in 18 seconds"
From 2017
Meme - "Criticizing Israel is antisemitic. Fuck off I don't believe in that made up nonsense
Criticizing China is Sinophobic. So true!!!"
Meme - My Alibaba Kathy Du: *West Taiwan*
"Can you print this new map into a poster?"
"No. Cannot print. No Chinese company will print it. You don't have to spend time doing these wrong things"
Shannon Liao on Twitter - "This is a super wild story that I'm a bit late to: a Taiwanese painter saw his work being sold on Taobao without permission. He realizes arguing's no use, so he instead says he's pro-Taiwanese independence from China. The Taobao shop quickly stops selling his art and he wins."
China shut down health platform Dingxiangyuan for challenging traditional medicine on WeChat - "Dingxiangyuan (or DXY, shorthand for “lilac garden” in Chinese), an influential health information provider widely trusted by China’s medical community. DXY’s social accounts, with followers totalling at least 30 million, address everyday health issues and fact-check popular myths with animations, pictures, and conversational writings... regulators did not specify any reason for the suspension, but it came after the site hosted accounts that challenged traditional Chinese medicine, especially its use in combating Covid-19 — something the Chinese government is promoting. Until its accounts were shuttered, DXY had been a rare, authoritative voice that criticized traditional medical practices, such as treating colds with ginger drink, avoiding cold food during periods, and not taking showers for a month following childbirth. In April this year, its account published an article cautioning that Lianhua Qingwen — a traditional Chinese remedy recommended by the government — has not been proven effective in preventing illness from Covid-19. The article was later deleted. Chinese nationalists have cited these posts in attacking the company as unpatriotic. Chinese President Xi Jinping is a powerful advocate of traditional Chinese medicine, and the remedies are increasingly viewed as key parts of Chinese culture. “The tension between Western medicine and traditional Chinese medicine has been there since the introduction of modern medicine in the 19th century. That is not surprising,” said Yanzhong Huang, senior fellow for Global Health at the Council on Foreign Relations. “What is surprising is this issue has been redefined as a war between this effort to defend and carry forward Chinese culture and worshiping foreign things.” Public health issues have been further politicized during the pandemic in the country, as blaming the outbreak on the United States and rejecting Western vaccines became symbols of patriotism in China. Some critics of DXY have also accused it of supporting LGBTQIA rights and feminism — which they regard as dangerous Western ideology — because its accounts criticized conversion therapy and recommended vasectomy as a reliable contraceptive method... Although DXY’s services are ubiquitously used among Chinese doctors, few have spoken up in public after its accounts were suspended. A doctor influencer, who requested anonymity because he feared he’d be identified by online critics, said Weibo suspended his own account for 15 days after he defended DXY in a recent post. “It has caused a fear around promoting and recognizing science”"
Interference in China’s media industry: Even Global Times editor Hu Xijin ‘cannot stand it’ - "on Journalists’ Day itself, state media Global Times editor Hu Xijin posted a 1,600 word essay on Weibo, saying that it is “becoming more and more difficult to do media”. He also admitted that “media practitioners have been subject to increasing restrictions for some time”. Hu said that government departments and local governments, as well as various influential institutions, “require the media to closely cooperate with their work and constantly ask what the media should and should not report”. In particular, when they encounter negative public opinion, they “hope the media can keep silent and help cool the situation”. He claimed that “such specific requirements are on the rise” and has formed “an increasing force of intervention in the work of the media”... Hu said that if the media “indulges in serving localities and departments”, the media’s function as news outlets would be affected and it would lose credibility and combat effectiveness. And the actual result of this would be the “loss of the country’s systemic functions”. With increasing interference, the pressure of “making mistakes” would be greater, and the enthusiasm of media practitioners would in turn be dampened. Some journalists would also become “more conservative” and “only seek their own safety” as they become influenced by the mentality of certain departments and localities to avoid trouble... As for the various restrictions on those in the Chinese media industry, it has been heard of in regular interactions with industry colleagues, and it is no secret within the industry. But in comparison to rueful comments by news industry workers used to a free media, it is somewhat surprising for Hu to openly criticise the authorities for interfering with public opinion. After all, the vocal Hu has always been thought to be “pro-left”, and the Global Times that he heads has also been seen as a leftist bastion within state media. No wonder some Chinese industry colleagues privately lament: “Even Hu cannot stand it.” The role played by China’s media environment and media is very different from that in the West. In the West, the media is called the “fourth estate”, an independent force apart from the government’s legislative, executive, and judicial branches. It monitors and regulates, based on the premise of a free space for public opinion. While Western media is not totally free of political influence, for example, a lot of media have political leanings even when there is rotation of political power. However, one fundamental principle that Western media holds to is to keep questioning the government. In contrast, the main role of the media in China is to engage in publicity for the ruling party and government, and not to check authority. The function of Chinese media as a mouthpiece is strongly emphasised, where the authorities require state media to figuratively “be married to the party” and those in the media to be politically correct, to “automatically” toe the official line in thought and deed, and not to question the authorities... Besides serving national interests, the media also works for the good of the country and people, preventing the will of officials and administrative agencies from encroaching on the interests of the people, and ensuring that people have the right to pursue the truth and the facts. If the media can only engage in publicity and lose the independence that it ought to have, would Journalists’ Day have to be called “Mouthpiece Day” instead?"
S-E Asia views China's rise with caution: Survey - "While China is seen as exerting the most economic influence in South-east Asia, and is expected to vie for political leadership in the region as the United States becomes more indifferent, few view the Asian giant as a "benign and benevolent power", a survey has found. Trust in China to do the "right thing" in contributing to global peace, security, prosperity and governance is also low... It polled more than 1,000 South-east Asians, comprising experts and stakeholders from the policy, research, business, civil society, and media communities... "China's actions in the South China Sea have unnerved the region on how China might use its growing political and military might at the expense of its smaller neighbours.""
From 2019
Why Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei’s new memo has gone viral on China’s internet - "Ren’s new warnings come amid fresh challenges, as Beijing carries on with draconian Covid-19 controls despite the Chinese economy being in its worst shape in decades... Ren’s memo has sparked heated discussions on Chinese social media because it offered a realistic reading of the country’s economic prospects and came up with a business strategy accordingly, in a display of honesty that is uncommon in the country, according to Ivan Lam, a senior analyst at Counterpoint Research. “It’s rare for companies to point directly to the problem, and people have been waiting for an influential figure who is willing to [break the silence],” Lam said. “Many company executives have touched on the macro environment in their earnings calls, but they usually focused on their business performance and their optimism for an impending recovery. Apparently people didn’t think that was enough.”... “The economic downturn has imposed an unprecedented challenge on most ordinary people and private companies in China,” said one of the most popular comments on Weibo. “When a giant like Huawei is raising this issue, it speaks volumes about the severity of the problem.”... Ren, who remains the undisputed leader of the world’s largest telecommunications equipment maker, joins a small number of Chinese tycoons who have spoken about their business struggles and views of the economy. Pony Ma Huateng, the reticent founder of Chinese internet giant Tencent Holdings, sparked online discussion about the country’s economic difficulties under Beijing’s dynamic zero-Covid-19 policy in May, after he shared a viral article that touched on the Chinese tech industry’s struggles. Lei Jun, founder of smartphone giant Xiaomi, gave a motivational speech earlier this month during a product launch event, in which he recounted his past struggles and encouraged people to face future challenges with resilience. Wang Xing, founder of online delivery service platform Meituan, posted a widely quoted line on his social media account in late 2018, which said that year would be the worst of the previous decade but the best of the next decade. However, the billionaire has remained silent since last summer, when he posted an ancient poem criticising the book-burning exercise by China’s first emperor, which was interpreted by some observers as a complaint against the government’s regulatory crackdown on the tech sector. Wang later denied that the poem was meant to be a metaphor about business."
Tencent chief causes stir with repost of article on China's economy - "In the past couple years, Chinese tech company founders have avoided posting on social media or making comments that could be perceived as critical of government policy, reflecting a broader trend of tightening censorship, and self-censorship, in China. Beijing, meanwhile, has become particularly sensitive to suggestions that its strict policies to contain COVID-19 outbreaks may be excessive given their harm to the economy... Some tech tycoons have come under pressure in the past for expressing criticism or publishing commentary interpreted as critical, amid a nearly two-year regulatory crackdown that has hit most of the sector's biggest names."
Huawei founder sparks alarm in China with warning of ‘painful’ next decade - "China’s economy is under pressure from factors including pandemic restrictions, a property industry crisis and plummeting international relations. The country is not expected to reach its economic growth target of 5.5% this year. Huawei, routinely listed as China’s largest firm, is working to manage big falls in revenue and profit. Revenue declined 14% in the first three months of 2022 and its net profit margin narrowed to 4.3%, from 11.1% a year earlier, in the three months through March... Several blamed the US, with one commenter saying Huawei’s expansion “came to an abrupt end under the frenzied suppression of the United States”. Linghao Bao, an analyst at Trivium China, said the global economy was in bad shape and it was not unusual to be cutting costs in a recession. “The reason why Ren Zhengfei’s words stood out is the way he said it. He sounded like he was in panic mode,” he said. “In addition, it’s a politically sensitive time right now. We’re just a couple of months away from the 20th party congress. As you know, economic performance is tied up with the party’s legitimacy.” Professor Steve Tsang, director of the SOAS China Institute, said Ren enjoyed a status that might allow him to speak more freely than others, and should be taken seriously... Extensive and unpredictable lockdowns have disrupted factory production, supply chains and general economic activity, particularly among small businesses. The private sector provides a third of all jobs in China and creates 90% of new urban jobs, according to state media. Youth unemployment reached an all-time high of 19.9% in July and the general urban jobless rate remained at a relatively high rate of 5.4%. Unemployment insurance payouts also hit a record high in June."
Forum: Key events of the past decade offer perspective on US-China ties - "I wish to provide an alternative view to the article by Professor Kishore Mahbubani... Prof Mahbubani quoted former US secretary of state Henry Kissinger as stating that the United States should stop its "endless confrontations" with China. He also implied that the visit to Taiwan by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi may have brought us to the brink of World War III. To validate these statements, we need to review some of the key events of the past decade. Prof Mahbubani quoted former US secretary of state Henry Kissinger as stating that the United States should stop its "endless confrontations" with China. He also implied that the visit to Taiwan by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi may have brought us to the brink of World War III. To validate these statements, we need to review some of the key events of the past decade. Many people in Asia and around the world do not trust China. A survey by the ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute published in February found that 58 per cent of South-east Asians did not have confidence in China to do the right thing in the wider interests of the global community. The survey found that 53 per cent had confidence in the US to do the right thing. And a Pew Research Centre survey released in June found that a median of 68 per cent across 19 countries had an unfavourable view of China, whereas a majority in most countries had a favourable view of the US. On Mrs Pelosi's recent visit to Taiwan, I would suggest that China has overreacted. This is not the first time a House speaker had visited the island. However, China had to react in this way, given that it is facing many internal challenges and Mr Xi needs to galvanise nationalist sentiments to gain support for his re-election to a third term as leader of the party. We must not ignore China's behaviour. At this point, we must make it clear that while it may be acceptable to many of us for China to be the No. 1 economy or military power, the issue is the approach it has taken to achieve this aim. Its recent behaviour and actions do not give assurance that it will be a benign power, but rather, that it may continue to bully its neighbours and selectively bulldoze through international norms and rules to achieve its objectives."
How does two-dollar store MiniSo from China succeed? - "From the appearance of the store, MiniSo looks like a combination of three Japanese brands, MUJI, UNIQLO and DAISO, but many of the Japanese texts on its products have grammatical errors"
Chinese retailer Miniso beats Uniqlo and Muji at their game - Nikkei Asia - "Miniso's Japan website says the company was founded jointly by Ye and a Japanese designer, Junya Miyake. The company says it launched its business in Tokyo and later made inroads into China. This contradicts information on its Chinese website. The listed address of Miniso's Japan unit is nonexistent... The dispute was quickly settled in China, where it was found that the trademark MiniSo was registered in 2013 in China and 2014 in Japan. And, according to public industrial and commercial equity information, the ultimate controller of MiniSo is Ye Guofu, a Guangdong businessman, not a Japanese. In MiniSo’s official profile, its main founder, Ye Guofu, was hidden, highlighted by a Japanese designer named Miyake Junya. But in fact, Miyake is only involved in the design of some miniso products as co-founder... MiniSo uses a strict data-driven strategy to improve the product category, launching 2 or 3 new products in all stores every week, which also means that 2 or 3 old products will be removed from the shelves... Compared with other grocery stores and even MUJI, MiniSo has greatly increased the number of “repeat customers” through this update strategy... It is neither the cheapest “made in China”, because you know that the cheapest Chinese goods are often sold through unsecured networks. Nor it is the best quality “made in China”, because the best factories in China tend to produce orders from the United States, Europe and Japan company, which will be affixed with the Logo of internationally renowned brands and high prices. But you can imagine two curves, one is the rising quality, the other is the declining price, and the MiniSo is right where the two curves meet."
From 2020
Meet MINISO: The Japanese Lifestyle Brand That’s Taking Over India’s Retail Scene | Miniso
From Miniso India, 2018
Chinese retailer Miniso to ditch Japanese styling after backlash - "China's Miniso Group has apologised for promoting itself as a Japanese-style brand and said it would make changes across its stores to rectify this, becoming the latest retailer to respond to a surge in patriotism among Chinese shoppers... Miniso issued a long apology, saying the company in its early days had "taken the wrong path" with its brand positioning and marketing strategy, having hired a Japanese designer as its chief designer between the end of 2015 and 2018. It said it had since late 2019 started to remove Japanese elements from its stores and shopping bags, saying it had already done so across its 3,100 shops in China. It also vowed to start changing the signboards and interior decoration in its more than 1,900 stores abroad, adding it would complete the moves by the end of March 2023. The company also said it would punish senior executives involved with the previous strategy and that its headquarters would be responsible for all its overseas social media accounts in the future. "We will strictly examine the content and do a good job of Chinese culture and values' exportation"... Chinese consumers have in recent years more closely monitored the behaviour of big brands and become increasingly critical of foreign companies or local businesses seen as insufficiently patriotic"
