Fantastic interview. The Midea-Kuka acquisition breakdown really illustrates something counterintuitive about how China approaches technology transfers. Instead of letting a foreign acquisition kill domestic players, they basically used it as a live classroom for companies like Estun and SIASUN while ensuring deployment continued. That policy mecahnism of turning acquisitions into competitive accelerators rather than monopolies is pretty instructive for how India could approach PLI schemes beyond just subsidies.
Fantastic interview. The Midea-Kuka acquisition breakdown really illustrates something counterintuitive about how China approaches technology transfers. Instead of letting a foreign acquisition kill domestic players, they basically used it as a live classroom for companies like Estun and SIASUN while ensuring deployment continued. That policy mecahnism of turning acquisitions into competitive accelerators rather than monopolies is pretty instructive for how India could approach PLI schemes beyond just subsidies.
Loved this! Such a beautiful snapshot of the life these days in China. And so many good reminders ( like "Just Ask" - of course!).
the point about 'compounding value by proximity' reminds me of a recent read on on Xiaomi’s supply chain (One inch ahead - https://open.substack.com/pub/howardyu/p/how-xiaomi-came-back-from-the-dead?r=49n3h7&selection=c664362b-1e43-4377-b9f8-1509e7c0fffa). That ability to iterate hardware rapidly because your supplier is next door (the cluster effect) is an advantage we definitely lack here.
Also thanks for the CMTI shoutout - definitely looking them, up
WeChat was the main inspiration behind Hike.
But WhatsApp simply had superior network effects and it could never reach retention levels where WeChat like services could become viable.
you are right...after reading this i am looking at travel dates already
Nice read