Recording - May 2010 - 64

We enjoyed impeccable and thoughtfully arranged hospitality, with sightseeing in Hong Kong on arrival and again near Zhongshan after transferring there from Hong Kong, and with an unforgettable gala evening among a thousand or so workers. Most importantly, we spent a morning walking through the many halls on many floors of the many buildings housing the manufacturing and R&D facilities of Behringer City, a substantial complex near Zhongshan. On each floor we were welcomed by a section manager who explained what the workers in his section were doing, and we crisscrossed the halls, cameras in hand, watching the goings-on from up-close. The scale of the enterprise is impressive, with hundreds of uniformed worker bees in sight, performing their repetitive tasks under close supervision, as witnessed by the many productivity statistics and quality control

Editorial by Lorenz Rychner

My Behringer-in-China Trip
data posted on nearby walls of the bright and spotless walls. The average factory worker is young—as is the age of service workers elsewhere in the region, from hotels to shops to restaurants. I talked to Costa Lakoumentas, who recently came on board with Behringer to head up a big worldwide push in the Install market, and I asked him about the labor situation. He said that once the region had begun to develop, young people flocked there from near and far, as foreign investment kept flowing in. Of late, there had been a downturn in new jobs—Costa attributes that to the worldwide slowdown—and many young people went back to their homelands. It seems that once they’ve gone home, they’re not coming back. Costa can only speculate about the reasons why—whether the experiences gained make them eligible to go elsewhere, or go to school, or if another family member is designated to make the trip? He said that staff turnover can be rapid, a big problem for a company that insists on minute-by-minute quality checks. A young person who came here, not with a career in mind, just for the short-term wages that represent a big step up from back home where there may be no jobs, such a person may switch employers for just a tiny bit more cash. The only way to slow down such turnover, Costa said, is to offer more than just competitive wages: Dorms with free accommodation, free food, free recreation and sports, plus creating team-spirit and fostering personal pride in the work, with awards and recognition of good work and such. This entire area has undergone an enormous transformation. Being chauffeured around in our buses we could see highrise upon highrise, mostly looking very new, some downright ostentatious in their design, interspersed with what looked like middle-class (U.S.-style) residential developments. That is not to say that the average living standard approaches that of the U.S., of course—a working man’s taxi in Zhongshan is the backseat of a moped, and a rider plus two passengers on a tiny little bike is not an uncommon sight. Then again, young people with a bit of spending money are being wooed by huge posters advertising western goods like Coca Cola, Shaquille O’Neal-branded sporting clothes, fashion names, and—yes—the golden arches... It was with great interest that I saw the factories, met Uli Behringer and several of his top inner circle, and got to see the area where the company operates. An entirely new Behringer City is on the drawing board, and with big plans like the Install market expansion, with Midas Consoles having come into the Behringer fold, and with intensified distribution in many areas, Uli Behringer made it clear that the company is forging ahead. I invite you to read my extensive blog with dozens of pictures that—I hope—help in telling the story. The first of my six chapters starts at www.recordingmag.com/blogs/post/98.html. Lorenz Rychner is the Editor of Recording.

The Zhongshan Torch High-Tech Industrial Development Zone is situated in the Pearl River Delta in China’s Guangdong Province, to the west of and across open waters from Hong Kong, or directly north of Macau. The ferry from Hong Kong takes about 90 minutes. In 1991 the Chinese government decreed that the area would become a state-level development zone. Chinese industries were being developed and encouraged to follow western production methods, and foreign investment was sought and soon poured in. Not quite twenty years into this development, the area now boasts brand names like Canon, Sandoz (pharma), Thyssenkrupp (elevators), Sumitomo Electric, Minyang Group (electrical appliances), and—among many more—the company that was the reason for my recent quick trip to the region: Behringer Group. I joined a throng of about 105 visitors from the world over, with just a handful of press folk among them, the vast majority either employed by Behringer in various global locations or working for distributors of Behringer.
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RECORDING MAY 2010

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Recording - May 2010

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