{"id":65734,"date":"2025-08-13T04:58:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T04:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/65734\/"},"modified":"2025-08-13T04:58:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-13T04:58:09","slug":"singapore-warms-to-made-in-china-label-as-stigma-fades-business-and-economy-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/65734\/","title":{"rendered":"Singapore warms to \u2018Made in China\u2019 label as stigma fades | Business and Economy News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Singapore \u2013 On a weekday afternoon in the heart of the central business district, the BYD showroom on Robinson Road is a picture of futuristic cool.<\/p>\n

Inside, sleek electric cars gleam under\u00a0bright\u00a0white lights as young professionals drift through\u00a0the space.<\/p>\n

Just a short walk away, diners mingle in a BYD-branded restaurant over craft beer and bar bites in a chic, members\u2019 club-like setting \u2013 one of several lifestyle ventures the Chinese electric vehicle giant has rolled out across Singapore.<\/p>\n

It is a scene that reflects a larger shift.<\/p>\n

Once seen as cheap and functional at best, Chinese brands are fast becoming desirable \u2013 even aspirational \u2013 among Singapore\u2019s middle class.<\/p>\n

Shenzhen-based\u00a0BYD\u00a0was by far the top-selling carmaker in the city-state in the first half of 2025.<\/p>\n

The EV maker sold almost 4,670 cars \u2013 about 20 percent of total vehicle sales \u2013 during the period, according to government data, compared with about 3,460 vehicles sold by second-ranked Toyota.<\/p>\n

Many other Chinese brands have also made major inroads, from the tea chain Chagee to toymaker Pop Mart and electronics maker Xiaomi, shaping how Singaporeans work, rest and play.<\/p>\n

Singapore and Malaysia had the biggest concentration of Chinese food and beverage brands in Southeast Asia last year, according to the research firm Momentum Works, with 32 China-based firms operating 184 outlets in the city-state as of June 2024.<\/p>\n

At the same time, Chinese tech firms, including ByteDance, Alibaba Cloud and Tencent, have chosen Singapore for their regional bases.<\/p>\n

\"BYD\"A bartender prepares a cocktail at a BYD by 1826 cafe and car dealership in Singapore on September 7, 2023 [Edgar Su\/Reuters]<\/p>\n

Healthcare worker Thahirah Silva, 28, said she used to be wary of the \u201cMade in China\u201d label, but shifted her perspective after a visit to the country last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re very self-sufficient. They have their own products and don\u2019t need to rely on international brands, and the quality was surprisingly reliable,\u201d Silva told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

These days, Silva regularly samples Chinese food brands, often after seeing particular dishes or snacks taking off on social media.<\/p>\n

Compared with Japanese or Korean brands, she said, Chinese chains are \u201ccreative, quick to innovate and set food trends\u201d, though she admits it sometimes feels like they are \u201ctaking over\u201d from local brands.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomehow, it made me feel there won\u2019t be much difference visiting China, since so many of their brands are already here\u201d, she said.<\/p>\n

For younger Singaporeans, the old stigmas around products \u201cmade in China\u201d are fading, said Samer Elhajjar, senior lecturer at the marketing department of the National University of Singapore\u2019s (NUS) Business School.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany of these brands are now perceived as cool, modern and emotionally in tune with what young consumers want. They feel local and global at the same time,\u201d Elhajjar told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can walk into a Chagee and feel like you are part of a new kind of aesthetic culture: clean design, soft lighting, calming music. It is not selling a product. It is selling a feeling.\u201d<\/p>\n

Moulded by China\u2019s hyper-competitive e-commerce landscape, Chinese companies have been especially adept at rolling out digitally savvy marketing strategies, Elhajjar said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese brands are now playing the same emotional game that legacy Western brands have mastered for decades,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"Singapore\"Pedestrians cross a street in the Chinatown district of Singapore on January 7, 2025 [Roslan Rahman\/AFP]<\/p>\n

Singapore, where about\u00a0three-quarters\u00a0of the population is\u00a0ethnic Chinese,\u00a0is an especially attractive testbed for Chinese brands looking to expand overseas, according to analysts.<\/p>\n

Doris Ho, who led a brand consultancy in Greater China from 2010 to 2022, said\u00a0that\u00a0Chinese brands\u00a0have been able to succeed in Singapore\u00a0with a\u00a0bold, creative approach\u00a0to\u00a0innovation\u00a0that appeals to local\u00a0sensibilities.<\/p>\n

This \u201cnew China edge\u201d, Ho said, shows up in BYD features, such as built-in fridges and spacious, fold-flat interiors that can be used for sleeping, and hotpot chain Haidilao\u2019s extravagant hospitality, which sees customers treated to live music performances, shoeshines, hand massages and manicures.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen they innovate, they don\u2019t follow the same lines you\u2019d expect. It\u2019s their way of looking at something and coming out with a completely surprising answer,\u201d Ho told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

For Chinese brands, Singapore offers \u201ca sandbox with real stakes\u201d as a compact, ethically diverse and globally-connected market, Elhajjar said.<\/p>\n

Because Singapore is seen as sophisticated, efficient and forward-looking, success in the city-state \u201csends a powerful message\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n

The rise of Chinese brands has coincided with Singapore\u2019s growing reliance on China\u2019s economy.<\/p>\n

China has been Singapore\u2019s largest trading partner since 2013, with bilateral trade in goods last year reaching $170.2bn.<\/p>\n

As Western firms scaled back or paused expansion, Chinese brands moved in, with many effectively propping up Singapore\u2019s property sector and entrenching themselves in the country, said Alan Chong, senior fellow at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS).<\/p>\n

Singapore\u2019s government has also actively courted Chinese firms amid the uncertainty from US President Donald Trump\u2019s arrival on the geopolitical scene, Chong said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou see the positive image of the United States slipping quite consistently,\u201d Chong told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe US has acted in a miserly, resentful sort of way with ongoing trade tariffs, whereas China remains a factory of the world \u2013 seen as an economic benefactor \u2013 so there will be a swing in terms of looking at China favourably.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chong said that Singapore has\u00a0also\u00a0become a virtual second home for some\u00a0middle-class Chinese\u00a0nationals, many of whom own property in the city-state.<\/p>\n

\"Singapore\"High-rise private condominiums in Singapore [File: Roslan Rahman\/AFP]<\/p>\n

Singaporean universities have also made a concerted effort to attract Chinese students, with some even introducing programmes taught in Mandarin Chinese.<\/p>\n

In a report released earlier this year by China\u2019s Ministry of Education and the Beijing-based Center for China and Globalization, Singapore was ranked the second-most popular destination for Chinese students after the United Kingdom.<\/p>\n

Some analysts have observed the rise of \u201cborn-again Chinese\u201d (BAC) \u2013 people of Chinese descent outside China, especially in Singapore and Malaysia, who embrace a strong pro-China identity, despite limited cultural or linguistic ties.<\/p>\n

Donald Low, a lecturer at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, has defined so-called BACs as those who adopt an \u201cidealised, romanticised\u201d idea of a China that is \u201cinevitably rising\u201d and \u201cstands heroically against a hegemonic West\u201d.<\/p>\n

The success of Chinese brands in Singapore has not been without some pushback.<\/p>\n

Some Singapore residents have felt alienated by stores that operate mainly in Mandarin Chinese, Elhajjar said, given that the city-state has one of the world\u2019s largest immigrant populations, as well as large minorities of native-born Malays and Indians.<\/p>\n

There have also been concerns raised about\u00a0homegrown brands\u00a0being\u00a0priced out\u00a0of the market\u00a0by the arrival of large firms with deep pockets.<\/p>\n

Rising rents resulted in the closure of 3,000 F&B businesses in 2024, the highest number since 2005, Channel NewsAsia reported in January.<\/p>\n

In a recent white paper, the Singapore Tenants United for Fairness, a cooperative representing more than 700 business owners, called for curbs on \u201cnew and foreign players\u201d.<\/p>\n

Leong Chan-Hoong, the head of the RSIS Social Cohesion Research programme, cautioned against blaming Chinese enterprises for social tensions or rising rents, describing the inroads made by some brands as part of the natural cycle of a market-driven economy.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a global city-state, we are always at the forefront of such transitions,\u201d Leong told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

\"Labubu\"A woman sells Labubu plush toys to visitors during the China Digital Entertainment Expo and Conference, known as ChinaJoy, at the Shanghai New International Expo Centre in Shanghai, China, on August 4, 2025 [Hector Retamal\/AFP]<\/p>\n

Indeed, for many\u00a0residents in\u00a0Singapore, the growing presence of Chinese brands is simply\u00a0an unremarkable part of\u00a0daily life.<\/p>\n

Ly Nguyen, a 29-year-old Vietnamese migrant working in tech sales, said she started collecting Labubu, the globally popular gremlin-like toys created by Pop Mart, after being captivated by their \u201cugly but fun\u201d aesthetic.<\/p>\n

\u201cLabubu represents independent creativity and a newfound confidence in Chinese-designed memorabilia,\u201d Nguyen told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

For Nguyen, the popularity of Labubu dolls, which have been spotted with celebrities such as Rihanna and BLACKPINK\u2019s Lisa, points to a generational shift in how Chinese cultural exports are viewed.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe more familiar people become with these brands, the more likely younger generations will have a new, much more favourable perception towards China as a cultural power,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Singapore \u2013 On a weekday afternoon in the heart of the central business district, the BYD showroom on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":65735,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[6109,45,1686,49,48,1376,46,1687,44,3849,1689],"class_list":["post-65734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-asia-pacific","tag-business","tag-business-and-economy","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-donald-trump","tag-economy","tag-international-trade","tag-news","tag-singapore","tag-trade-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65734\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}