I think the problem is bigger than this.
I'm not a manager. I don't make big decisions. At work, I'm a small fish in a very BIG sea.
But I do work for some large international customers who have plants/divisions in China.
What I see is a lot of experience, knowledge & machinery going to China. The chinese are not stupid, the look at, study, learn & copy everything.
(BTW a recent study , in Germany, shows that 2/5 companies that "expand" into China, give up, close the Chinese plant & come home again within 2 years - rumours are that the management at most of the other firms would rather make a loss & hide the problems, rather than admit they made a mistake)
Currently in the watch world they are basically happy to "learn" & practice by copying any watch they can. Eventually they will have enough experience & know-how to be able to make a watch everybit as good as most swiss watches.
What will be "missing" is the name or reputation, But lets say, for the sake of arguement, they buy a large Swiss manufacturer, close down the Swiss plant & then start selling the watches that are made in China, using the same name. Do you think that most end customers will know/care/boycott them ?
Some of the mighty Swiss names almost disappeared in the 70's during the quartz crisis. Imagine what could happen if somehow the Chinese found enough money to start buying swiss companies ( I'm sure it is in the Chinese governments interest to do this ) & force a kind of mini-Quartz crisis. eg by selling very higfh quality & highend watches at low-end prices.
You don't think this is possible ? Who owns IBM PC's now ? - Yep they are Chinese owned.
IMHO the Chinese fakes are a problem that will only get a lot worse in the future.
S.
