Haier

A Competitive Partnership Not every one is in a position to enter a competitive partnership, a match in which each partner should have the same status. Upon their strong demands, Zhang Ruimin, CEO of Hair Group, was interviewed by reporters for the Asahi and Nikkei newspaper in the afternoon of January 9th, two days after Haier-Sanyo's joint news conference, which had arisen the interests of their readers. They thought it was necessary to make in-depth report on the events. We were indeed surprised at the news. This peer-to-peer cooperation is ever first for Japan, and the Japanese public are most interested in why Haier chose Sanyo rather than some other Japanese company, including, for example the Panasonic. These words were included in the questions asked by the reporters from both news media during the interview. While Zhang was visiting NEC, Mr. Suzuki, vice president, after the lively atmosphere at an evening banquet, raised the same question:"Who makes the first sheep's eyes at the other, Haier or Sanyo?" "It's neither the question who makes eyes at whom, nor does Haier choose Sanyo for a special purpose," Zhang answered."But what matters is that in the network era Haier and Sanyo are similar in their outlook and values in terms of market competition. Establishment of the competitive cooperation relation between big companies to achieve win-win results is a trend in the development of the world economy. It's only that the two companies run ahead in this trend." "Sanyo president Satoshi Iue is an entrepreneur who has a far-sighted strategic vision. He has the courage to overtake himself, and the courage to break through the hedge formed in Japanese companies in many years. He surpassed others by making a move, a historical move for the development of the company. Beside Sanyo, other Japanese companies contact Haier for cooperation. But it's president Satoshi Iue who is outstanding in innovation. We never imagined that conclusion of this joint venture agreement had taken only less than three months. The innovation in strategy must be that of the top management of a company. Otherwise it will fail," said Zhang. He then defined "competitive cooperation" as follows: Its foundation ¡ª complementary advantages Its method ¡ª interchange of resources Its result ¡ª win-win development Suzuki agreed with these points and said:"It's not possible to for one to do all things well. This is a trend for all to collaborate together and exploit each other's advantages." President of Toshiba made his congratulation on the Haier-Sanyo partnership and expected Toshiba and Haier have cooperation in more fields. Several leaders of the Toshiba company expressed their great excitement when learned that Haier has set up his export production base in Dalian and the local point of the Toshiba logistics network could be used for shipping of Haier's export goods. It is apparent that interchange of market resources is possible only when both sides have advantages and win-win results can be achieved only when exchange of resources has been realized.