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Proudly made in China: A Chinese Gadget Round-up

Every time we publish a review on this site, we normally get comments pointing to the “issue” that the device is made in China, implying that it’s of poor or sub-standard quality. While we try to have an open mind and make the case, we thought of just doing a round-up of our top gadgets “made in China“.

Apple iPhone. Since the first generation of the iPhone, it has always been manufactured and assembled in China. Apple has contracted Taiwanese company Foxconn to build the iPhone from ground up. Foxconn employs over 1.23 million workers, mostly based in Longhua, Shenzhen (China) to work on the iPhone. Their largest factory there is even fondly called the iPod City. The factory is so big it even has its own TV station, Foxconn TV. This list also includes the iPad, iPod and many other Apple mobile products.

Sony PlayStation 3. As one of the most popular game consoles, the PlayStation 3 was jointly developed by Sony, Asus and Foxconn and manufactured in China. Since its first release in 2006, over 75 million units have been sold worldwide. Its successor, the PlayStation 4 is set for release by Q4 of this year. Prior to PS3 in 2006, Sony was relying on Asus/Pegatron to produce its gaming consoles.

Kindle. Introduced by Amazon in 2007, the Kindle is probably the most successful eBook reader ever. And though Amazon does not reveal their sales figures, estimates put the Kindle Fire at about 17.4 million units by 2012. Again, Foxconn is the sole official device manufacturer of the Amazon Kindle.

Alienware. Widely known as a brand for gaming laptops and desktops with obvious X-Files inspiration. In 2006, Alienware was bought out by Dell but allowed it to retain the brand and maintain usual operations. Alienware laptops are manufactured by Quanta, a Taiwan-based ODM considered to be the largest laptop manufacturer in the world. Its manufacturing branch in China has over 300,000 workers. Other models of Alienware are also made by Compal, a rival and second biggest ODM to Quanta.

Google Nexus 7. The first Android tablet to be introduced and labeled under the Google Nexus brand, the Nexus 7 is a joint project by Google and Asus of Taiwan. Asus does not have its own manufacturing plant so it outsources majority of the job to Pegatron (once a subsidiary of Asustek but separated from parent company in 2010). Pegatron has over 100,000 employees worldwide but almost 90% of it is based in China where all its manufacturing plants are located.

BlackBerry Q10/Z10. BlackBerry’s latest handsets gained some attention this year and though the company is actually headquartered in Canada, all of the manufacturing and assembly are done in China. It outsources the job to Quanta Computer, the same ODM used by Alienware.

Macbook Air/Macbook Pro. Apple’s growing PC business is actually powered by Quanta Computer Incorporated, the same manufacturer as Alienware which handles the assembly of the aluminum-bodied Macbook out of China.

Lenovo ThinkPad. Lenovo Group Limited is a Chinese multi-national company based in Beijing, China. It bought the ThinkPad brand from IBM in 2005. By 2013, Lenovo became the biggest laptop producer in the world, surpassing HP. The company now has 16.7% market share, shipping more than 12.6 million laptops in Q2 of 2013. Its latest flagship laptop is the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Touch is manufactured jointly by Compal and Lenovo in China.

Foxconn is also responsible for manufacturing the Nintendo Wii U, as well as some parts for the XBox 360 and the PlayStation 2. Foxconn has the largest client-base which includes Nokia, Sony, Acer, Motorola, Microsoft, Toshiba, Vizio, HP, Google, Cisco, Amazon, Apple and Dell.

Almost every gadget nowadays are either completely manufactured or assembled in China, if not just the parts/components. It only means that China can produce really great and affordable products. It’s really up to the ODM clients, like Apple or Amazon, how much attention to detail, R&D and quality control they put on these devices before they roll out of the factories.

This coming first week of September, we’ll be flying to the city of Shenzen in the Guangdong Province of China to visit one of the factories of Huawei. We’re interested to see and share what we’ll learn from that trip.

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Avatar for Abe Olandres

Abe is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of YugaTech with over 20 years of experience in the technology industry. He is one of the pioneers of blogging in the country and considered by many as the Father of Tech Blogging in the Philippines. He is also a technology consultant, a tech columnist with several national publications, resource speaker and mentor/advisor to several start-up companies.

67 Responses

  1. Avatar for Loki Loki says:

    Pano kaya kung matanggalan ng trabaho ang mga chinese from big companies :3

  2. Avatar for Ged Ged says:

    Karamihan kasi halos ng tao, kapag sinabing “China Phone”, ang naiisip nila yung literal na china phone na may dual sim, low cam, for media purposes, text, etc. (If you know what I mean), in short walang quality. Kaya pag may nakitang gadget ang tao ngayon na made in China, low quality na. just saying :)

  3. Avatar for ChinaHeart ChinaHeart says:

    there is a saying “God made the WORLD and the rest is made in CHINA…”

  4. Avatar for Cuaki Cuaki says:

    OT: Apple will announce IPhone 5S & 5C on September 10
    I’m sorry pero medyo late na kayo nag post IMO.

  5. Avatar for Diorarat Diorarat says:

    Hindi ako sure sa source ko pero sa alam ko mga local brands natin made in China din. Mga generic na phones na pwede irebrand for a small fee.

  6. Avatar for switcher switcher says:

    Iba naman kasi yung gawang China ng mga kilalang companies na may maayos na quality control compared dun sa mga rebranded na products ng local companies. Tsambahan na nga kung maayos ang unit mo, marami pa horror stories sa mga service centers nila.

  7. Avatar for jdGONEMAD jdGONEMAD says:

    Made in China vs Manufactured in China.

  8. Avatar for anon anon says:

    all sm malls, made in china haha

  9. Avatar for paul e. paul e. says:

    naalala ko nung kasikatan ng nokia dati… hanap lagi ng mga tao yung units na “made in finland.” ayaw bilhin o kaya magdadalawang-isip kunin pag nakalagay made in hungary/germany/china or “made by nokia.”

    hanggang ngayon madami pa din na mga misinformed.

  10. Avatar for teng teng says:

    The world was made by God, the rest are made in China. Peace ^_^ V

  11. Avatar for Aqua Aqua says:

    Almost all are made in china. The only difference is that name brand have better quality control. Also, Lenovo is a Chinese company not a multi national company. It is rumored to be partly owned by the Chinese military.

  12. Avatar for MidnightGamer MidnightGamer says:

    This might be out of the topic, pero hihingi lang po ako ng advise sa inyo people. Bibili na sana ako ng cherry mobile flare,pero upon reading some (i mean lot of) negative comments, nag dalawang isip ako. may nag sasabi din ok daw.. ano po ang mas wise choice on the same price range? galaxy star, asha 501 or shoul I risk buying flare? thanks

    • Avatar for john john says:

      flare? wag ka na bumili nun. ang pangit ng display. sabi ng cherrymobile na IPS display daw yun pero hindi, TN TFT lang ang display niya, very limited ang viewing angle at di mo magagamit outdoors kasi sobrang reflective ng screen. tapos ang build quality, alam mong kapag mahulog mababasag talaga ang screen at masisira kasi sobrang low quality ng device. mas maganda na you add 500 pesos and buy the huawei y400. it has an 4″ vivid IPS display at may dual core CPU din running on Jellybean OS. an it is made from Huawei, a more trusted brand. :D

    • Avatar for john john says:

      sorry for the typo. you should buy huawei Y300 instead. its not huawei y400 hehe

    • Avatar for to john to john says:

      Kung maka-indorse Sa huawei WAGAS! Bigyan Ng jacket , made in china!

    • Avatar for john john says:

      flarenatic detected. haha. nagrecommend lang ako ng isang high quality smartphone na pasok sa budget. and for me , Cherry mobile’s Flare is not recommended. sorry if nasaktan kita. parang diappointed lang kasi ako marketing strategy ng CM. yung ibang specs ng smartphone nila ay peke.

      FYI . CM Flares OEM is also a Chinese manufaturer. pero ang OEM na yan di natin kilala. Huawei is a giant chinese company and is one of the top smartphones makers wordwide :P

  13. Avatar for jm jm says:

    nice yugatech.. nglabas ka ng ganitong article para sa mga ayaw sa chinese product, at pingmamayabang ang iphone.. im using huawei ascend p6, at mas maganda pa to sa kahit anung phone.. no to chinese product pa sila?? mukha nila

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