China has overtaken Japan, South Korea and Malaysia in exporting high-tech products, which have now become a key driver of the Chinese economy, according to a Dec. 2015 report from the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
China Daily reported that based on the ADB report, China had become the largest exporter of high-tech products in Asia in 2014, taking up a 43.7-percent share, surpassing Japan with only a 30-percent share, followed by South Korea and Malaysia.
About one-third of the exports from China were high-tech products and Chinese technologies are now popular overseas, particularly those related to railways, shipbuilding, nuclear power and telecommunications.
The report said that China's manufacturing expertise leads in the following fields:
- Information technology
The report said that Chinese manufacturers earn mainly from telecom equipment exports to Asia as companies (like Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd.) help phone companies in Asia to build networks, while selling smartphones and smartwatches in developed markets.
Li Jin'ge, president of Huawei Asia Pacific, said that telecom technologies, particularly broadband, cloud computing and big data, are driving the digitization of all industries that make Asian economies vibrant.
"These technologies are also promoting improvements in planning and construction, management and operations, livable environments, giving a human touch to cities around the world," Li said.
The report added that Huawei is also providing products and services to some oil and gas companies in Central Asia, including Beineu Bozoi Shymkent Gas Pipeline in Kazakhstan, Asia Trans Gas in Uzbekistan and Amu Darya in Turkmenistan. The area is considered as the world's third-largest oilfield and plays an important role in the global oil and gas industry.
Huawei's key projects include the Kazakhstan-China natural gas pipeline, called the AB line, which is the world's first and longest digital natural gas pipeline.
Smaller vendors like Xiaomi Corp. also contribute by selling their own smartphones in India, Indonesia and other Asian countries via local shopping websites.
Lenovo Group Ltd., which started to assemble devices, is planning to tap into the high-end smartphone markets such as Singapore, Japan and South Korea.
Fiberhome Technology Group, on the other hand, is set to take advantage of expanding demand for optical fiber cables in overseas market.
- Machinery
Some Chinese heavy equipment manufacturers are also seeking to enter Asian markets which are yet to open up, the report said.
LiuGong Machinery Co. said that its products, such as cranes and excavators, have been exported to Southeast Asia a decade ago and are largely used in government projects in the fields of transportation, hydraulic engineering and infrastructure.
"Countries in Southeast Asia such as Thailand and Cambodia are our target market and we have been in Thailand for more than a decade, because those markets have huge potential for growth with increasing demand for infrastructure construction," said Zeng Guang'an, president of LiuGong.
The report said that the Chinese heavy machinery market had started to pick up around 2000 and saw its golden era after 2008 when the government rolled out a 4-trillion-yuan stimulus package.
The company said that 178 excavators and cranes from LiuGong worth $14 million were exported to Uzbekistan and Cambodia last year.
Some other companies have switched to the farming industry, rolling out tractors, according to the report.
Zoomlion Heavy Industry Science and Technology Development Co. said it is also expanding in the farming machinery industry overseas, targeting Southeast Asian and Central Asian countries such as Cambodia, Vietnam, Pakistan and Kazakhstan.
- Shipbuilding
Chinese shipyards have reportedly received orders for new vessels with a total capacity of 11.19 million dead weight tons in the first half of 2015, which account for 27.6 percent of global market share, as statistics from the China Association of the National Shipbuilding Industry showed.
- Light rail systems
CRRC Zhuzhou Electric Locomotive, which operates in Malaysia, has built a manufacturing and maintenance plant in the state of Perak. The plant makes trains for the entire ASEAN region. It has an annual production capacity of 100 rakes, including locomotives and light rail cars.
CRRC ZELC, a subsidiary of China Railway Rolling Stock Corp., also got the 8-billion-yuan worth of deals in five rail equipment and service projects in Malaysia, including a 200-kilometer high-speed rail line between Kuala Lumpur and the northern city of Ipoh.
The Chinese company now owns three subsidiaries in Malaysia, the report said. The Chinese subsidiaries form the biggest rail transportation equipment provider in Malaysia, which account for 85 percent of market share.