Continue to Site

Welcome to our site!

Electro Tech is an online community (with over 170,000 members) who enjoy talking about and building electronic circuits, projects and gadgets. To participate you need to register. Registration is free. Click here to register now.

  • Welcome to our site! Electro Tech is an online community (with over 170,000 members) who enjoy talking about and building electronic circuits, projects and gadgets. To participate you need to register. Registration is free. Click here to register now.

Should all Western Electronics companies set up a duplicate Chinese operation?

Status
Not open for further replies.

Flyback

Well-Known Member
Hi,
This concerns electronics product design/manufacture/sale in the West.
Is/was gtech.co.uk owned by Dyson.co.uk?
Gtech seems to make the same products as Dyson , but cheaper.
Does Gtech get its products and electronics designed and built in China?
If the answer is yes, then can you give one good reason why Sir James Dyson shouldnt have started up a "gtech" himself? Surely he should have done this? If he didnt , then why on earth not? It was obvious that somebody somewhere would eventually do it anyway.

Gtech appears to have been started up by Nick Grey. Nick Grey used to work for Vax. Nick Grey and Sir James Dyson worked for/with Vax, at the same time.

Shouldnt all western electronics companies set up a duplicate Chinese company and then make most of the money selling the cheaper Chinese stuff? (whether openly or secretly)
 
Last edited:
Thanks, eg The following look pretty similar.....they are both stick cordless vacuums....

** gtech stick vacuum cleaner **


** Dyson stick vacuum cleaner **

They both also make robot lawn mowers, handheld vacs, and other fairly similar vacuums........they could both be said to have products which compete for the same customers

Here are some customers that might be tempted by either a dyson or a gtech product...
(attached)
 

Attachments

  • dyson and gtech customers.jpg
    dyson and gtech customers.jpg
    692 KB · Views: 282
Last edited:
They are both vacuum cleaner manufacturers - so what?.
.......That is an extremely good question...

...the following explains the situation, and indeed how it may impact yourself and others......

In relation to a British friends British lighting company, he is currently setting up a duplicate "version" of his company in China. The China based company will actually become the main design and manufacture centre.

His "token" British company will bring forward the introductions to the UK and EU customers (by advertising and going to trade shows etc etc)....he will then gradually transfer most of the customers to his cheaper Chinese products. All of his design and manufacture in future will essentially come from China...but be branded as if it had been done in the UK part of the company....even if not every product is branded such, the existence of a seemingly knowledgeable British Electronics conmpany will "pave the way" and "Oil the wheels" of the Chinese operation. You have to be "In electronics" in order to succeed really well from a Chinese import operation....otherwise people dont think you are knowledgeable enough to import electronics from China.

The Chinese "version" of his company will actually be the main company (but it will be "hidden from view"). And he will have the Chinese company directed by an acquaintence........so that his own name will not appear on the list of directors at companies house. In other words, the director will actually be employed by him...but nobody will know this. So the director will just be a "puppet" director. ....Payed a wage with some occasional bonus's.

This "Puppeting" had to be done because he would have become unpopular with his British Engineers and Assembly staff if they found out that he was setting up "their" company in China...

...He couldnt let his staff find out that their British "token " company is now basically just a "shell".......and that their job prospects etc will be near zero....as they will not really be doing anything other than making it look like the products are all British designed and manufactured...which of course they wont be....and of course, if you want to be a sucessful Chinese importer, then you need to have "some" kind of prescence in the UK electronics sector....so you have your "token" British company.

The "puppeting" is actually a legally binding agreement, so that the "puppet" director appears to be the real director, but of course, he isnt really......but companies house will think he is....and so too will the rest of the world.
 
Last edited:
his own name will not appear on the list of directors at companies house. In other words, the director will actually be employed by him...but nobody will know this.

Hopefully that is all someone's wishful thinking or daydreaming - it would be a quick way to end up with massive fines or in prison.
Company financial or reporting offences are investigated and prosecuted by the Serious Fraud Office.

It is a legal requirement to declare anyone with a financial interest or influence in a business registered at companies house and the penalties for false declarations are severe.
eg.

Plus, any inaccurate financial reports to companies house (or on any other statutory form) class as a criminal offence: False accounting contrary to s17 (1)(a) Theft Act 1968

And they can add charges for perjury - another criminal offence - for any false information on any statutory documents, if they wish.
 
Hopefully that is all someone's wishful thinking or daydreaming
Over the years, Flyback has made several fanciful trips into the land of commercial fantasy.
Those trips can be best described as naive.

JimB
 
Company financial or reporting offences are investigated and prosecuted by the Serious Fraud Office.

It is a legal requirement to declare anyone with a financial interest or influence in a business registered at companies house and the penalties for false declarations are severe.
eg.
Thanks, i quite agree...its illegal.
Though insider dealing on the stockmarket is illegal...and happens all the time.
....there are ways round these things, and "Puppet directors" are a massive reality.
 
FRISt, This should be an inevitable trend in the development of an enterprise! Expand wherever you can make more money. Businesses are all about profit first! Secondly, each company uses repeated products to sell directly, and I feel that the design department's expenses are eliminated. Still use the same product and earn double the price.
 
FRISt, This should be an inevitable trend in the development of an enterprise! Expand wherever you can make more money. Businesses are all about profit first! Secondly, each company uses repeated products to sell directly, and I feel that the design department's expenses are eliminated. Still use the same product and earn double the price.
Thanks, i agree, but what does it mean for countries doing this, who then loose a needed skill?
 
Thanks, i agree, but what does it mean for countries doing this, who then loose a needed skill?
First of all, I am in China, so I stand on our country’s side and say that companies from other countries entering our country can promote the development of our related companies from a certain level of perspective, regardless of whether they were in the past or There will be such an impact now.
For export companies, it is the first to get more benefits than in their own country. Secondly, they will make changes to products and marketing according to consumers in China, and they still have to face more problems. This will be the case for companies that want to expand! I think.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Latest threads

New Articles From Microcontroller Tips

Back
Top