Opportunities for foreign companies in China: Made in China 2025
MSI's Beijing accounting member Lehman Brown provides insight into the new "Made in China 2025" initiative for China's manufacturing sector and the opportunities it brings to foreign companies in China.
Background
In March 2015, Premier Li Keqiang formally announced the 'Made in China 2025' ("MIC 2025”) initiative which aligned with the 13th Five Year Plan ("FYP”), Internet Plus and outbound focused policy of the Belt & Road Initiative ("BRI”) is centred on reforming and modernising China's manufacturing sector. Influenced by the Industry 4.0 roadmap set out by Germany in 2013, Premier Li commented at the official announcement that 'Made in China 2025' will "upgrade China from a manufacturer of quantity to a manufacturer of quality”. This roadmap has been established to build a thriving innovation led economy through to 2025 and beyond.
Traditionally, China's manufacturing sector has been built up around cheap, labour intensive production which has served China well in rising to become the second most powerful global economy as of present. However faced with cheaper manufacturing labour now being sourced from South East Asia and other emerging economies, weakening demand for exports particularly in the US and Europe, overcapacity and as shown in the Global Innovation Index Report 2015, an Innovation Gap to other developed economies, China is at a crossroads as it positions itself to enable the transition from 'Big Industrial Economy' to 'Powerful Industrial Economy'.
Read more about Made in China 2025 and Internet Plus - Opportunities for foreign companies in China
