Quality over Quantity: China's Industry in Transition – and What It Means for Europe
Chinese switches have a defect rate of 3 percent – German ones of 0.1 percent. But the price is dramatically lower. How much longer will that last?
A conversation at an industrial company in Wuhan gets to the point: German products are returned with a 0.1 percent error rate. Turkish products with 0.5 percent. Chinese products with 3 percent. But the price difference is dramatic.
„We must learn from Japan and Germany. We must achieve mastery,“ says the company leader.
That sounds modest – but it's a strategic statement. China is catching up.
From quantity to quality
China is currently experiencing a fundamental transformation. The era of cheap mass production is drawing to a close. China's high-tech industry sales rose by 16.1 percent year-on-year in the first two months of 2026. This is not growth through quantity – this is growth through quality improvement.
Siemens has 60 factories in China. Ten years ago, the machines still came from Germany. Today, Chinese companies are increasingly developing their own systems.
The consequence for Austria
Austrian mechanical engineering companies that have built their competitive strength on a quality advantage still have time – but competition from the Far East is strongly emerging. A company from Wuhan is already producing for Deutsche Bahn (DB) and meets its standards. The Austrian company Scharmüller is also one of the customers.
For decades, China copied. Now it innovates. Anyone who doesn't take this seriously underestimates the most important economic shift of our time.
