China will continue to present new business opportunities as a market for electrical goods and as a location for manufacturing, according to one industry executive.
In an article in ElectroIndustry, published by the National Electrical Manufacturers Association, (NEMA) Rosslyn, Va., Ralph Jackson, COO, Cooper Industries, Houston, and NEMA chairman, said China is “hugely important” to NEMA manufacturers and to Cooper Industries, which started doing business in China with a small joint venture in 1995. It now has 3,000 employees and 50 employees in the country.
While many companies are flocking to China because of inexpensive labor and other favorable business conditions, Jackson believes India may one day become an important market for the electrical industry, too.
“It has a huge educated middle class, not much of a language barrier, an inexpensive work force and a burgeoning number of engineers,” he said in the article. “National boundaries have become relatively less important in the past few decades when it comes to making and selling product. You have to think globally and act globally to be successful.”
Jackson is not very concerned about potential political destabilization in China because the economies of the United States and China are now so interdependent, he said.
“We learned from Russia that instant democracy can create unanticipated problems,” he said. “China, while moving slowly toward democracy, is doing it surely and has a lot of accountability built into its existing bureaucracy. China's seven or eight percent growth would not be possible without our presence there.”
Unfortunately, Jackson does not see any great improvement in conditions for electrical manufacturing in the short run, particularly the industrial side of the business, which he says is “very flat.”
“There may be some upturn, but I doubt it will be massive,” he said. “The recession in our business has been longer and tougher than any other in my entire career. Given the moribund conditions, we, like many others, are trying to grow through new products and new markets.”