Also, when you order PCBs from China, you're doing all the CAD work yourself, and they're building those parts exactly according to the engineering drawings (ca

Also, when you order PCBs from China, you're doing all the CAD work yourself, and they're building those parts exactly according to the engineering drawings (called "gerbers"). With glassware, the chemist isn't using AutoCAD to create detailed engineering drawings of what he wants. The glassblower is taking on much of the design role. I suppose you could just get the university to hire a mechanical engineer to do the CAD work, and send CAD drawings to China to manufacture the glassware according to spec, but that's not going to be cheap.