Per capita GDP has risen to 158,000 yuan ($24,334), on a par with Portugal. Shenzhen’s economy expanded at an 8.9 percent pace last year, while nationwide growth slowed to a 25-year low of 6.9 percent. The company gets 80 percent of its sales, all online, outside of China and is expanding in Europe, India and the United States. The three-year-old company scored a surprise hit with its first device, the OnePlus One, selling more than 1 million units in a marketing campaign that relied on social media buzz.Īt OnePlus, the vibe is definitely more Silicon Valley than southern China, as staff glide around on skateboards and tend to the office dog. It just made natural sense to start here,” said Carl Pei, the 26-year-old co-founder of Android smartphone maker OnePlus. All your suppliers are here, all your spare parts are here. “For us, everything is made here in Shenzhen or in the surrounding areas. BGI, the world’s biggest gene research center, and Kuangchi Science, the main investor in New Zealand jetpack maker Martin Aircraft, are also based here.Įmerging industries such as information technology, biotech, green energy and new materials now account for about 40 percent of Shenzhen’s economic output, Mayor Xu Qin said last month, according to state media. 1 supplier of civilian drones, inspiring local rivals such as Xenosky and Flypro. So do rising stars like DJI Technology Co., the world’s No. I think that’s the fundamental difference from other cities in China,” Pan said.Įstablished tech giants such as telecom gear makers Huawei and ZTE and internet company Tencent call Shenzhen home. They are young, they are reckless and they shape the city. Shenzhen’s event last year drew 190,000 people. He helped foster the city’s “maker faire” movement, festivals that celebrate arts, crafts, engineering and open-source technology that have been spreading around the world over the past decade. Pan quit a job at Intel in Beijing and moved to Shenzhen seven years ago. “Shenzhen is becoming the new frontier for technology because it has the infrastructure for whoever wants to turn their ideas into products,” said Eric Pan, founder of Seeed Technology, a contract manufacturer for “makers” - tinkerers, hackers and inventors. Innovative new companies are drawn by Shenzhen’s well-established manufacturing supply chains and transport links, proximity to Hong Kong’s banking and financial expertise, and better traffic, milder weather and less air pollution than Beijing and Shanghai. Now the focus is on higher value-added, homegrown technology. But low cost manufacturers like Apple supplier Foxconn have been moving inland or out of China as labor costs increased. Now a sprawling megacity of 11 million people, its fortunes were made churning out cheap clothes, electronics and toys for big foreign brands. Many are led by a new wave of young Chinese entrepreneurs hoping to build global brand recognition.ĭivided from the former British colony of Hong Kong by a river, Shenzhen has been the preferred laboratory for experiments by China’s communist leaders since reformist Deng Xiaoping designated the tranquil area as the country’s first “special economic zone” in 1979. The metropolis teeming with millions of migrant workers is home to some of China’s biggest and hottest companies.
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