A month before Apple Inc’s smartwatch hits the market, China’s thriving copycat manufacturers are selling lookalikes, some openly advertised as Apple copies.
“Apple Smart Watch with Bluetooth Bracelet,” one vendor on Alibaba Group Holding Ltd’s (阿里巴巴) popular Taobao (淘寶) e-commerce Web site says.
Photographs on the vendor’s page appear to be the real Apple Watch. It says features on the Chinese version include text messaging and a music player. It starts at 288 yuan (US$45), or one-eighth the US$349 price of the cheapest Apple Watch.
Alibaba, which listed on the New York Stock Exchange last year after a record initial public offering, has faced criticism in the past for hosting the sale of counterfeit goods. It says it has been taking steps to reduce the problem.
The flood of “me too” smartwatches reflects China’s mix of skilled electronics manufacturers and a growing consumer market for bargain-price style.
Most of the world’s PCs and mobile phones are assembled in China, but the country’s own companies are only starting to develop design skills and the ability to create breakthrough products.
That has led to the rise of an industry known as shanzhai (山寨), or “mountain forts” — hundreds of small, anonymous manufacturers that quickly copy the design or features of popular foreign mobile phones or other products at a fraction of the price.
At least eight vendors on Taobao advertised watches as “Apple Watch” or “Apple Watch lookalike.”
Most said they were compatible with Apple’s iOS or Google Inc’s rival Android operating system.
One vendor jokingly used Chinese slang for a vulgar rich person, offering an “All-New Apple Tyrant Gold Mobile Phone-Supporting Watch” for 288 yuan.
Eight vendors failed to respond to questions sent through their Taobao accounts.
Asked whether it had taken action against any sellers, Alibaba said in a statement: “Alibaba Group is dedicated to the fight against counterfeits. We work closely with our government partners, brands and industry associations to tackle this issue at its source. We also utilize technology like data mining and big data to scrub our platforms of counterfeits.”
In January, a Chinese government agency accused the company of lax oversight and allowing vendors to sell counterfeit goods on Taobao. The two sides settled their dispute a few days later.
The agency said its report had no legal force and Alibaba promised to tighten its oversight of vendors.
Apple, based in Cupertino, California, says buyers in China and Hong Kong can pre-order its watch beginning on April 10, the same day it takes orders in the US, Japan, Britain, France and Germany.
Most previous Apple products were released in China weeks or months after other markets. That fueled a trade in iPhones that were smuggled in for sale to gadget fans who were willing to pay a premium.
Apple lookalikes also are on sale in markets in Shenzhen, “the mainland’s best place to shop for ... hi-tech knockoffs,” according to Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post.
“Shanzhai Apple Watches in Shenzhen Less Than 1 Day After Launch,” a headline on Internet portal Sohu.com Inc (搜狐) said.
WASHINGTON’S INCENTIVES: The CHIPS Act set aside US$39 billion in direct grants to persuade the world’s top semiconductor companies to make chips on US soil The US plans to award more than US$6 billion to Samsung Electronics Co, helping the chipmaker expand beyond a project in Texas it has already announced, people familiar with the matter said. The money from the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act would be one of several major awards that the US Department of Commerce is expected to announce in the coming weeks, including a grant of more than US$5 billion to Samsung’s rival, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), people familiar with the plans said. The people spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of the official announcements. The federal funding for
HIGH DEMAND: The firm has strong capabilities of providing key components including liquid cooling technology needed for AI servers, chairman Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday revised its revenue outlook for this year to “significant” growth from a “neutral” view forecast five months ago, due to strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers from cloud service providers. Hon Hai, a major assembler of iPhones that is also known as Foxconn, expects AI server revenues to soar more than 40 percent annually this year, chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) told investors. The robust growth would uplift revenue contribution from AI servers to 40 percent of the company’s overall server revenue this year, from 30 percent last year, Liu said. In the three-year period
LONG HAUL: Largan Energy Materials’ TNO-based lithium-ion batteries are expected to charge in five minutes and last about 20 years, far surpassing conventional technology Largan Precision Co (大立光) has formed a joint venture with the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI, 工研院) to produce fast-charging, long-life lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles, mobile electronics and electric storage units, the camera lens supplier for Apple Inc’s iPhones said yesterday. Largan Energy Materials Co (萬溢能源材料), established in January, is developing high-energy, fast-charging, long-life lithium-ion batteries using titanium niobium oxide (TNO) anodes, it said. TNO-based batteries can be fully charged in five minutes and have a lifespan of 20 years, a major advantage over the two to four hours of charging time needed for conventional graphite-anode-based batteries, Largan said in a
Taiwan is one of the first countries to benefit from the artificial intelligence (AI) boom, but because that is largely down to a single company it also represents a risk, former Google Taiwan managing director Chien Lee-feng (簡立峰) said at an AI forum in Taipei yesterday. Speaking at the forum on how generative AI can generate possibilities for all walks of life, Chien said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) — currently among the world’s 10 most-valuable companies due to continued optimism about AI — ensures Taiwan is one of the economies to benefit most from AI. “This is because AI is