18 ms·

GoPro to move U.S.-bound camera production out of China

114 points by petethomas 8y ago

vthallam 8y ago
Think it's a smart decision, the Chinese market is full of DJI or Xiaomi anyway, so they will not be losing any market share there.
- mrweasel 8y ago
  What? The GoPros sold in the US will just be produced in a third country, the article doesn’t say where though. You can still get a Chinese made GoPro in China The interesting bit is where GoPro will get the cameras for the US market produced.
  - ryanmercer 8y ago
    >The interesting bit is where GoPro will get the cameras for the US market produced. I'd guess Thailand or Japan. I clear international freight through customs for my primary income and see a lot of finished cameras, and even just CMOS, with the most common countries being China, Japan (e.g. Canon) and Thailand (e.g Nikon). A lot of complete digital still image AND video cameras come out of Japan and Thailand actually.
    - mrweasel 8y ago
      Interesting, because I was guess Mexico or maybe Foxconn in Brazil, but I guess it makes more sense with a country that already have camera production facilities.
    - devy 8y ago
      Japan has a much higher manufacturing cost (it defeat the purpose of GoPro's move of evading tariff to reduce manufacturing cost.) Thailand, on the other hand, has a mature digital imaging electronics manufacturing industry. Some of the lower end SONY digital cameras/electronics have been made in Thailand / Malaysia too.
  - metaphor 8y ago
    > The interesting bit is where GoPro will get the cameras for the US market produced. If silicon fab, die packaging, and rigid-flex sub-assembly of the critical camera piece were all done in China, then subsequently forwarded to another country which doesn't have a looming destination tariff threat for final assembly, would this risk still be interesting?
    - baybal2 8y ago
      The PCB + sensor, while effectively are the 90% of device value, can still be justifiably declared to American customs at 110% of their cost in China, and many companies vying for coveted "made in USA" stamp do exactly that. What comes after is easy to imagine, they are being put into a very expensive casing, and stamped with their new place of "origin." You can research yourself how "made in USA" Google Pixels were made
      - wmf 8y ago
        If you look at the price difference between GoPro and clones you really are mostly paying for the brand.
throwy67i4 8y ago
Does GoPro actually do their own development? I remember reading an article when they were starting up, snd the founder basically went to some expo in a China and purchased OEM devices and slapped his brand on there. Edit: This isn’t the article but it sheds some more light. > Once he had the strap sorted out, Woodman would need a camera to go with it. He eventually found a 35-millimeter model made in China. Woodman made an old-school prototype using a Dremel tool, plastic blocks, and glue. He mailed it to China, wired $5,000 to get started, and in September 2004 GoPro made its first sale when a Japanese distributor ordered 100 units after seeing the product at a trade show. https://www.maxim.com/gear/gopro-founder-nick-woodman-profile-2017-2 https://www.maxim.com/gear/gopro-founder-nick-woodman-profil...
- steve19 8y ago
  They do. I am not sure that question required a throwaway account.
  - throwawaytoo 8y ago
    Sure? Privately Aricent used to claim they did a bunch of their R&D
- trevyn 8y ago
  There are an infinite number of shades of grey between “slap brand on an OEM product” and “the full Apple”. Companies often shift their approach (in both directions!) over time, and it will vary for different product lines.
  - jonknee 8y ago
    And "the full Apple" is still someone else makes the product (Apple purchases iPhones from Foxconn): https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/29/technology/iphone-china-apple-stores.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/29/technology/iphone-china-a...
    - dependsontheq 8y ago
snek 8y ago
Does all this stuff lately where companies are pulling out of china or the US or the US is arresting heads of companies etc feel like thucydides trap is just getting closer and closer?
- crushcrashcrush 8y ago
  Who would be the aggressor? China? Or the US? Also - I had to look up "thucydides trap" so thanks for the new knowledge!
- microtherion 8y ago
  TIL that "Thucydides Trap" is NOT a form of hip hop featuring people cursing in Ancient Greek.
- TangoTrotFox 8y ago
  If you look at the history of the world there was an apparent (and counter intuitive) acceleration in the rate at which borders and governments were shifting, largely due to war and revolutions. Then we hit about 1945 and suddenly - it all but stopped. The only very large change being the fall of the Soviet Union, which did not involve direct war nor even revolution. Nukes have made war between major powers a thing of the past, until they can be contained. 'Modern' nukes make Hiroshima and Nagasaki look like a joke. The 'Tsar Bomba' [1] is a nuclear weapon that was tested by Russia in 1961. Its yield, which was not at full capability, was more than three thousand times as powerful as Little Boy [2], the nuke that practically destroyed Hiroshima. You can't win wars against WMD. A single missile that is failed to be detected or intercepted and you're looking at fatalities in the tens of millions. And there are thousands of these weapons operational and ready to fire today. Russia has even been developing a nuclear torpedo that's designed to create an artificial tsunami that would produce a devastating radioactive wave greater than 500 meters in height that would annihilate a target. The reason for a nuclear torpedo is to bypass all conventional anti-missile ballistic/laser/etc technology. In my opinion the issue is relatively simple. If China's growth and development continues at even a fraction of its current pace they're going to become the most dominant nation in the world. This will change the world in unimaginable ways. The current powers on top are pretty happy with the status quo, and aren't ready to say goodnight just yet. Traditional war is not an option so I expect we're going to see a continuing increase in aggression on the two new fronts of war: economic and information. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Boy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Boy
krn 8y ago
> GoPro has been trying to drive demand for its trademark action-cameras - once a must-have for surfers, skydivers and other action junkies — as competition ramps up. What are some better alternatives to GoPro available in Europe now? I mean original brands, not cheaper clones.
- glibgil 8y ago
  https://www.google.com/search?q=What+are+some+better+alternatives+to+GoPro%2C+which+are+available+in+Europe+now https://www.google.com/search?q=What+are+some+better+alterna...
- llampx 8y ago
  The Yi action cameras seem to get good reviews, and Sony action cameras have some of the best image stabilization around. DJI has recently gotten into the small cam battle with the Osmo Pocket as well (I hesitate to say action cam because I don't believe it is waterproof or shock proof)
baybal2 8y ago
One interesting thing to note. You might've seen countless GoPro "clones," and might've been wondering why GoPro never seemed to assert their rights. What is said in Shenzhen is that original digital GoPros themselves were an off the shelf OEM product, and GoPro never bothered to buy the design rights from their OEM. Does anybody remember Daisy Photoclip from around year 2002? Their OEM had their hand in that. And yes, Daisy Photoclip was as Bulgarian as Iphone was American
- jonknee 8y ago
  There are countless X "clones" for any popular (and even unpopular!) consumer electronics devices. Apple certainly asserts their rights and yet you can still buy knockoff iPhones and even visit knockoff physical Apple Stores.
  - baybal2 8y ago
    What do you want to say here? I don't understand.
    - jotm 8y ago
      Probably that it's a fight one can't "win". Better focus on the brand and making people aware of it and it's benefits.
      - baybal2 8y ago
        My point is that they never bought the right for the design from OEM from whom they bought their first digital cameras, and that OEM itself never bothered to limit access to the design as it makes no money to them.
        jonknee 8y ago
        And my point is that has nothing to do with why there are cheap knockoffs as there are cheap knockoffs of all well known consumer electronics (fake iPhones even come out before the real iPhones!).
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
chrisbennet 8y ago
I think GoPro has kind of doomed themselves. 1. Customer service is horrible/nonexistent. [1] 2. They made their camera app need an internet connection for no good reason (except to track their customers). [2] [1] https://community.gopro.com/t5/Cameras/On-HOLD-for-2-and-a-HALF-HOURS/td-p/53237 https://community.gopro.com/t5/Cameras/On-HOLD-for-2-and-a-H... [2] https://community.gopro.com/t5/GoPro-Apps-for-Mobile/Hey-This-is-UNBELIEVABLE-Can-t-control-GoPro-offline/td-p/24661 https://community.gopro.com/t5/GoPro-Apps-for-Mobile/Hey-Thi...
fipple 8y ago
Well you can't unlick a turd. They get all their cameras knocked off for $30 and now they want to move their production out of China?
- whoisjuan 8y ago
  They stated the reason why they are moving their US-bound production out of China is to avoid financial shortcomings from the current tariff issues. They even said that the non-US bound production is staying in China.
sytelus 8y ago
Go to Amazon and search for go pro and you will see tons of white label Chinese products at quater of the price with exact same specs. Considering Amazon accounts for half of eCommerce, I can’t imagine the impact of sales for GoPro. Another examples are headlamps, computer peripherals, cables, headphones, hardware tools, coffee makers and so on. There is a massive brand extinction in progress where Western brands which took comfort in designing at home and manufacturing in China are confronted with exact same goods much cheaper. One thing I don’t understand is why companies like Go Pro can’t stop these clones entering US markets which clearly violated their design copyrights, patents, specs and sometimes even same sounding trademarks.
Tsubasachan 8y ago
Americans consistently underestimated China out of a sense of arrogance I think. Becoming factory of the world was never the end game. Just the mid stage. Xiaoping was planning 50 years ahead. He wasn't thinking that China would always rely on low payed factory jobs. Take mobile phones as an example: Chinese brands were knockoffs a couple of years ago. Now they are innovating and setting standards.

114 points by petethomas 8y ago

Think it's a smart decision, the Chinese market is full of DJI or Xiaomi anyway, so they will not be losing any market share there.

mrweasel 8y ago
What? The GoPros sold in the US will just be produced in a third country, the article doesn’t say where though. You can still get a Chinese made GoPro in China The interesting bit is where GoPro will get the cameras for the US market produced.
- ryanmercer 8y ago
  >The interesting bit is where GoPro will get the cameras for the US market produced. I'd guess Thailand or Japan. I clear international freight through customs for my primary income and see a lot of finished cameras, and even just CMOS, with the most common countries being China, Japan (e.g. Canon) and Thailand (e.g Nikon). A lot of complete digital still image AND video cameras come out of Japan and Thailand actually.
  - mrweasel 8y ago
    Interesting, because I was guess Mexico or maybe Foxconn in Brazil, but I guess it makes more sense with a country that already have camera production facilities.
  - devy 8y ago
    Japan has a much higher manufacturing cost (it defeat the purpose of GoPro's move of evading tariff to reduce manufacturing cost.) Thailand, on the other hand, has a mature digital imaging electronics manufacturing industry. Some of the lower end SONY digital cameras/electronics have been made in Thailand / Malaysia too.
- metaphor 8y ago
  > The interesting bit is where GoPro will get the cameras for the US market produced. If silicon fab, die packaging, and rigid-flex sub-assembly of the critical camera piece were all done in China, then subsequently forwarded to another country which doesn't have a looming destination tariff threat for final assembly, would this risk still be interesting?
  - baybal2 8y ago
    The PCB + sensor, while effectively are the 90% of device value, can still be justifiably declared to American customs at 110% of their cost in China, and many companies vying for coveted "made in USA" stamp do exactly that. What comes after is easy to imagine, they are being put into a very expensive casing, and stamped with their new place of "origin." You can research yourself how "made in USA" Google Pixels were made
    - wmf 8y ago
      If you look at the price difference between GoPro and clones you really are mostly paying for the brand.

throwy67i4 8y ago

Does GoPro actually do their own development? I remember reading an article when they were starting up, snd the founder basically went to some expo in a China and purchased OEM devices and slapped his brand on there. Edit: This isn’t the article but it sheds some more light. > Once he had the strap sorted out, Woodman would need a camera to go with it. He eventually found a 35-millimeter model made in China. Woodman made an old-school prototype using a Dremel tool, plastic blocks, and glue. He mailed it to China, wired $5,000 to get started, and in September 2004 GoPro made its first sale when a Japanese distributor ordered 100 units after seeing the product at a trade show. https://www.maxim.com/gear/gopro-founder-nick-woodman-profile-2017-2 https://www.maxim.com/gear/gopro-founder-nick-woodman-profil...

steve19 8y ago
They do. I am not sure that question required a throwaway account.
- throwawaytoo 8y ago
  Sure? Privately Aricent used to claim they did a bunch of their R&D
trevyn 8y ago
There are an infinite number of shades of grey between “slap brand on an OEM product” and “the full Apple”. Companies often shift their approach (in both directions!) over time, and it will vary for different product lines.
- jonknee 8y ago
  And "the full Apple" is still someone else makes the product (Apple purchases iPhones from Foxconn): https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/29/technology/iphone-china-apple-stores.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/29/technology/iphone-china-a...
  - dependsontheq 8y ago

snek 8y ago

Does all this stuff lately where companies are pulling out of china or the US or the US is arresting heads of companies etc feel like thucydides trap is just getting closer and closer?

crushcrashcrush 8y ago
Who would be the aggressor? China? Or the US? Also - I had to look up "thucydides trap" so thanks for the new knowledge!
microtherion 8y ago
TIL that "Thucydides Trap" is NOT a form of hip hop featuring people cursing in Ancient Greek.
TangoTrotFox 8y ago
If you look at the history of the world there was an apparent (and counter intuitive) acceleration in the rate at which borders and governments were shifting, largely due to war and revolutions. Then we hit about 1945 and suddenly - it all but stopped. The only very large change being the fall of the Soviet Union, which did not involve direct war nor even revolution. Nukes have made war between major powers a thing of the past, until they can be contained. 'Modern' nukes make Hiroshima and Nagasaki look like a joke. The 'Tsar Bomba' [1] is a nuclear weapon that was tested by Russia in 1961. Its yield, which was not at full capability, was more than three thousand times as powerful as Little Boy [2], the nuke that practically destroyed Hiroshima. You can't win wars against WMD. A single missile that is failed to be detected or intercepted and you're looking at fatalities in the tens of millions. And there are thousands of these weapons operational and ready to fire today. Russia has even been developing a nuclear torpedo that's designed to create an artificial tsunami that would produce a devastating radioactive wave greater than 500 meters in height that would annihilate a target. The reason for a nuclear torpedo is to bypass all conventional anti-missile ballistic/laser/etc technology. In my opinion the issue is relatively simple. If China's growth and development continues at even a fraction of its current pace they're going to become the most dominant nation in the world. This will change the world in unimaginable ways. The current powers on top are pretty happy with the status quo, and aren't ready to say goodnight just yet. Traditional war is not an option so I expect we're going to see a continuing increase in aggression on the two new fronts of war: economic and information. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Boy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Boy

krn 8y ago

> GoPro has been trying to drive demand for its trademark action-cameras - once a must-have for surfers, skydivers and other action junkies — as competition ramps up. What are some better alternatives to GoPro available in Europe now? I mean original brands, not cheaper clones.

glibgil 8y ago
https://www.google.com/search?q=What+are+some+better+alternatives+to+GoPro%2C+which+are+available+in+Europe+now https://www.google.com/search?q=What+are+some+better+alterna...
llampx 8y ago
The Yi action cameras seem to get good reviews, and Sony action cameras have some of the best image stabilization around. DJI has recently gotten into the small cam battle with the Osmo Pocket as well (I hesitate to say action cam because I don't believe it is waterproof or shock proof)

baybal2 8y ago

One interesting thing to note. You might've seen countless GoPro "clones," and might've been wondering why GoPro never seemed to assert their rights. What is said in Shenzhen is that original digital GoPros themselves were an off the shelf OEM product, and GoPro never bothered to buy the design rights from their OEM. Does anybody remember Daisy Photoclip from around year 2002? Their OEM had their hand in that. And yes, Daisy Photoclip was as Bulgarian as Iphone was American

jonknee 8y ago
There are countless X "clones" for any popular (and even unpopular!) consumer electronics devices. Apple certainly asserts their rights and yet you can still buy knockoff iPhones and even visit knockoff physical Apple Stores.
- baybal2 8y ago
  What do you want to say here? I don't understand.
  - jotm 8y ago
    Probably that it's a fight one can't "win". Better focus on the brand and making people aware of it and it's benefits.
    - baybal2 8y ago
      My point is that they never bought the right for the design from OEM from whom they bought their first digital cameras, and that OEM itself never bothered to limit access to the design as it makes no money to them.
      - jonknee 8y ago
        And my point is that has nothing to do with why there are cheap knockoffs as there are cheap knockoffs of all well known consumer electronics (fake iPhones even come out before the real iPhones!).

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

chrisbennet 8y ago

I think GoPro has kind of doomed themselves. 1. Customer service is horrible/nonexistent. [1] 2. They made their camera app need an internet connection for no good reason (except to track their customers). [2] [1] https://community.gopro.com/t5/Cameras/On-HOLD-for-2-and-a-HALF-HOURS/td-p/53237 https://community.gopro.com/t5/Cameras/On-HOLD-for-2-and-a-H... [2] https://community.gopro.com/t5/GoPro-Apps-for-Mobile/Hey-This-is-UNBELIEVABLE-Can-t-control-GoPro-offline/td-p/24661 https://community.gopro.com/t5/GoPro-Apps-for-Mobile/Hey-Thi...

fipple 8y ago

Well you can't unlick a turd. They get all their cameras knocked off for $30 and now they want to move their production out of China?

whoisjuan 8y ago
They stated the reason why they are moving their US-bound production out of China is to avoid financial shortcomings from the current tariff issues. They even said that the non-US bound production is staying in China.

sytelus 8y ago

Go to Amazon and search for go pro and you will see tons of white label Chinese products at quater of the price with exact same specs. Considering Amazon accounts for half of eCommerce, I can’t imagine the impact of sales for GoPro. Another examples are headlamps, computer peripherals, cables, headphones, hardware tools, coffee makers and so on. There is a massive brand extinction in progress where Western brands which took comfort in designing at home and manufacturing in China are confronted with exact same goods much cheaper. One thing I don’t understand is why companies like Go Pro can’t stop these clones entering US markets which clearly violated their design copyrights, patents, specs and sometimes even same sounding trademarks.

Tsubasachan 8y ago

Americans consistently underestimated China out of a sense of arrogance I think. Becoming factory of the world was never the end game. Just the mid stage. Xiaoping was planning 50 years ahead. He wasn't thinking that China would always rely on low payed factory jobs. Take mobile phones as an example: Chinese brands were knockoffs a couple of years ago. Now they are innovating and setting standards.