At a Korean customer I once had been presented a problem: a curious phenomenon (associated with a potentially very large, multi-million impact damage) that came up in a large meeting without any preparation, and I could not define it. Of course we were accused that our process had caused the problem, even though it was entirely unclear what was actually happening. While still at the meeting, I sent the image files via Skype from Korea to China, to SunLi. She asked a former colleague from the time of their first job. He was technically closer to the subject, but not familiar with this strange phenomenon, either.
He knew someone who was, but alas, working for one of our competitors who is not our biggest nor our strongest competitor, but just in Korea makes us some trouble
– not a good precondition from our perspective, after all, the competitor can only be delighted if we have problems in Korea.
The meeting in Korea was interrupted for a ninety minutes lunch-break, also because I asked for some time to consider. Shortly before the end of the break, I got response from China: The friend of SunLi’s former colleague had a perfect explanation for the phenomenon, I even got some internet links to sites discussing similar symptoms and explanations how the damage may be caused. Nothing of this had anything remotely to do with the performance of our process.
Armed with these competent arguments and files that I got out of our Chinese network in no time and with the aid of a competitor’s valuable assistance I joined the second part of the meeting, in which about 20 people took part including top management, as well as the customer of our customer. I blocked the first attack against us for now, impressing the circle with speed and competency so that our customer’s client (a huge international corporation) was delighted, but a damning light cast on our customer.
At the end I got samples of the defective products and was discharged on the condition to submit of a report on the examination of the parts within latest three days.
Under normal circumstances we would make such studies in our laboratories in Germany, because at least at that time we did not have our own laboratories in China. What was there left to do? The network knew: When I arrived late at the airport in ShenZhen, a messenger was waiting for me who brought the parts within the same night to another friend of SunLi’s former colleague, he immediately set out, outside of the working hours, to examine in the lab of the company for which he was working as a laboratory manager.
Late at night he sent the findings to us, we sent them to the helpful expert of our competitor. He gave us more very useful explanations for the now much clearer examination results, which kept well on the originally chosen line of argument. On the afternoon of the same day, i. e. about 24 hours after the meeting in Korea, I had prepared a full report, including data, facts and background, and sent it to Korea.
At the same time I asked SunLi to make sure in what way ever that our volunteers from the network of her former colleagues would receive my gratitude, at least in the form of a dinner that she should arrange for with her colleague and his friends. This was appointed a few days later, I was invited and able to notice: the network is alive.
The event in Korea illustrates which problems and time constraints we have to cope with in Asia. The affairs at ChangGuang, ShuXin and in Korea are certainly extreme examples, but many other less dramatic events together will produce as many worries. About once a week we have to solve a technical problem: the customer’s product, made with our process, does not meet the specifications – trace the cause; the process itself is on the edge or outside of our specifications – trace the cause, remedy it; an existing or a new customer wants to get a certain sample for testing, but either we just have no staff available for all are busy, or the process line in which we can manufacture samples is occupied with other tasks, but the customer will need the sample RIGHT NOW – find a solution. Everything must be done in breakneck speed, other than in Europe or the USA, and our German team has to comply with the Chinese pace, too.
One example of the incredible pace is, in my view, the construction and extension of the rail network for high-speed trains. Mid-2010 the line ShangHai-NanJing was put into service, after only a little more than two years of construction. 120 trains per day are now running on this track, some of them at intervals of five minutes only, transferring more than 100,000 passengers daily. Occasionally I am also among them, for now I can reach customers outside of ShangHai without extended car rides. The trains run at up to 350 km/h, for a ticket fee that is only slightly higher than it was fifteen years ago on the much longer and much slower track that SunLi took to BeiJing. Even First Class, you pay for the overall distance the equivalent of just under 30 ?, and in a little more than an hour you will have passed along 300 kilometres. In contrast to the First Class in German ICE trains, which is used mainly by business people, it is here full of young people, couples who are moving with or without children, students, grandparents with grandchildren, just “ordinary folk”.
Of course, in relative terms, i. e. per capita, China still is far behind Europe and the
U.S. with regard to the development of the rail network. But the growth is rapid. China focuses on high-speed lines, i. e. on tracks which allow an average speed of at least 200 km/h. Today, China features more than 7,000 km of high-speed tracks, enjoying the longest rail network of this kind, the only tracks in the world that match a speed of at least 350 km/h; in two years, in 2012, the high-speed network of at least 250 km/h will extend along 13,000 km, making it longer than any other high-speed networks in the world added up. By 2020, there will be 50,000 km.
China is developing dramatically fast, and in all areas, including in our market, and we have to accommodate with that. And in our market, we can keep up, as we have learnt a tremendous lot.