Background, when I was in Shanghai visiting relatives, my company
(Philips) held a high level management meeting at our sister lab in
Shanghai (Eindhoven, New York and Shanghai are the three main research
labs for Philips). Well I wasn't invited to the meeting :P but I hung
around and overheard some of the talking points. One of them is "If
you can't win in China, you won't win in the world."
Meaning... while China is not the most important, valuable or
profitable market (US and EU are). China is the most important
battleground. In US/EU, the big three (Philips/GE/Siemens) have
settled into a stable competition mode. Long term contracts and
relationships means that even if one of them come up with a superior
product, the market shares will take time to shift slightly. But in
China, everything is up for grabs. So even in the context of
corruption, government interference, unfair trade practice, weak IP
protection (personally I dispute those, but...), not to mention the
culture gap, the big Western companies are choosing China as the main
battleground (also facing off against Chinese giants like Haier and
Lenovo).
Ok what's this long winded background for? Well in my 10 days in
Shanghai and Beijing, I am seeing that Gundam is not winning in China.
I don't have time to explain why I believe that's the case, it's even
possible I am wrong. But let's just pretend I am right. That Gundam
in Mainland China went through a similar history as Gundam in USA:
Gundam became available in China long after the original UC series
(1979-1990) (in China, it's more by unlicensed VCD/DVD, but I think
Gundam Seed was shown on one of the free CCTV channels; in US it's
first distributed by unlicensed fansubs then later cable broadcast).
But after an initial period of interest, Gundam faded into a
niche/nostalgia market while kid-oriented shows like Ultraman and
Transformer are able to sustain long-term success. [One positive
thing, Ben Di and other bootleg Gunpla is doing even worse than
genuine Bandai Gunpla. The genuine gunpla is almost always more
available and more visible than the bootlegs everywhere I look. The
price level is about 20% over exchange rate. The same can be said of
Bandai/Banpresto trinkets. But what little DVDs, comics and books I
found all look like bootlegs to me]
Frankly I was a little surprised about what I saw. Around late 2002,
before I closed Newtype Asylum, I was receiving a few enthusiastic
emails from China about Gundam and Gunpla and in 2003 I saw a mix of
bootleg and licensed Gunpla, dvd and books in South China. I was
thinking, cool, in a few years Gundam should be as big in China as
it's in HK and Taiwan. I was thinking, with all the
cultural/historical similarity with HK/TW/JP/KR and difference with
US, China will understand Gundam. Now in 2006, I think I am proven
wrong. I don't see any hint that Gundam will ever make a bigger
splash than its current level now, well behind Doreamon, Hello-Kitty,
Ultraman, Transformer.
So, I'd like to discuss two points: Why? and So what?
Why? To keep this post short: because Gundam is ultimately a cultural
product of the WW2/Cold War era, it doesn't resonate with the general
public of the post-Cold War era. No matter how much it's retooled and
updated (Seed).
So what? Again to keep things short: if Gundam can't win in China,
Gundam won't win in the world. Gundam will still be successful in JP,
KR, HK and TW (and PH) but in China, US and EU, it will still be about
as niche as Thundercats.
Discuss?
--
Dr. Core
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