At its height in the nineteenth century, the British Empire controlled colonies in six continents around the world, giving rise to the phrase “the sun never sets on the British Empire.” No matter what time of day it was, somewhere among Britain’s national land or territories it was daytime, meaning the sun was always shining on the Union Jack somewhere.

Today, some Taiwanese companies aspire to becoming “enterprises on which the sun never sets.”

“We hope that wherever the sun comes up around the world, one can drink Chatime beverages!” says Wang Li-yu, executive vice president of La Kaffa International, Chatime’s parent company. The brand’s naming alone (the company’s Chinese name contains the characters for “sunrise”) gives a glimpse into the strong ambition of the husband-and-wife team of co-founders Wang Yao-hui and Wang Li-yu.

For the past 15 years, Wang Yao-hui and Wang Li-yu have expanded step by step around the world, starting from a tiny hole-in-the-wall beverage shop in the Hsinchu Science-Based Industrial Park.

“Coming late to the game, we kept that hunger every day. And that was our motivation for stepping out from Taiwan to the whole world,” says Wang Li-yu.

Today, Chatime is a multinational food and beverage chain brand with 900 outlets spanning 41 countries on six continents.

Chatime conquered the taste buds of consumers in 41 countries with pearl milk tea that originated in Taiwan. (Photo by Ming-Tang Huang/CW)

For the past 30-plus years, just like Chatime, countless Taiwanese enterprises have expanded overseas to take on the global market. Some have succeeded, and some have failed.

Why would they risk such hardship to venture to strange lands and try to win over different customers and consumers?

The Taiwan of today wouldn’t exist without companies that embrace the world.

Why? Because Taiwan is a small country. Just how small is it? Taiwan’s population of 24 million is just over 0.3 percent of the world’s entire population. With a total of 36,000 square kilometers of land, it amounts to just 0.024 percent of the planet’s land area. Lacking natural resources and surrounded by the sea, and often affected by natural disasters like typhoons and earthquakes, it is a harsh environment for economic development.

Yet it is under just such conditions that Taiwan exports US$340 billion annually, making it the world’s eighteenth-largest exporter; and its foreign reserves of US$460 billion are sixth in the world.

These factors have contributed to making Taiwan the world’s 21st largest economy, with an average per capita GDP of US$25,000, to rank alongside Europe, Japan, and the U.S. as one of the world’s 39 advanced economies.

How does Taiwan do it?

It is thanks to a group of enterprises that have bravely ventured out from Taiwan’s small market to embrace the world, bringing the world’s money back to Taiwan. They have not only given themselves opportunities to keep growing bigger and stronger, they have also helped Taiwan’s economy accumulate tremendous wealth, achieving enviable accomplishments.

From labor-intensive processing and manufacturing, capital- and skill-intensive communications manufacturing, to internationalized brands and the service industry, Taiwanese enterprises have traveled a bumpy, arduous road.

                       

First Wave: Labor-Intensive Processing, Traveling Salesmen

Taiwanese enterprises’ road to internationalization began in the 1960s and 70s, starting with a group of labor-intensive processing manufacturers taking orders for exports. 

A group of Taiwanese business owners, suitcases in hand, sold apparel, toys, umbrellas, and furniture around the globe. This earned Taiwan the moniker of the “umbrella kingdom,” giving the world its first impression of “made in Taiwan.” (Read: How Taiwan’s Small-town Factories Keep Making the World’s Money)

Second Wave: Taiwanese Business Establish Overseas Production, Market ICT Products Worldwide

By the 1980s, as the costs of labor and land rose along with environmental consciousness, this group of Taiwanese business mavens moved their factories for the first time to a China that had just opened its doors to the world. And with this, the internationalization of Taiwanese enterprises entered the era of deployment to overseas manufacturing bases.

At the same time, the information and communications (ICT) industry began to take root in Taiwan, succeeding umbrellas, toys and clothing to become the backbone “MIT” products sold to the world in the 1980s and 90s.

Third Wave: Forging the Taiwan Brand, Establishing ICT Transnational Supply Chains

Entering the twenty-first century, in response to international customer demands, the ICT industry began putting a transnational supply chain in place, with Taiwan’s imprint visible across China, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.

Meanwhile, Taiwanese business also started making new attempts at internationalization.

Having accumulated nearly 30 years of experience, many formidable enterprises, inspired by Acer founder Stan Shih’s “smile lines” theory, began developing their own original brands in the aughts, eager to prove to the world that Taiwanese enterprises were capable of doing more than making parts. (Read: Acer Group founder Stan Shih: Creating a 'Silnnovation Island')

One after the other, large corporations like Acer, ASUS, Delta Electronics, BenQ, and Giant Bicycles set out on the original brand path.

However, with powerful foes ahead and pursuers behind, Taiwanese companies found the road to establishing original brands on the global market a rocky one. From Acer to Delta to ASUS, each experienced its share of turbulence along the road to original brand development. (Read: Asus Chairman Puts off Retirement Amid Bumpy Transition)

To be sure, Taiwanese enterprises that have made steady progress in globalization and achieved relative success belong largely to the parts and components, raw materials, or machinery equipment manufacturing industries, headed by TSMC, Formosa Plastics, Eclat, Hiwin Technologies, and Tongtai Machine & Tool.

The road has been difficult for original brands, yet the service industry’s international competitiveness is even weaker, while the financial industry’s internationalization remains limited to China and Southeast Asia.

This situation is reflected in the rapid concentration of Taiwan’s export structure over nearly the past 20 years in electronic parts and components, petrochemical products, and electromechanical equipment. From 2001 to 2018, the combined proportion of Taiwan’s total export value generated by these three primary industries rose from 41 to 62 percent.

Taiwan’s economic growth is dependent on exports. In other words, these three big industries are the lifeblood of Taiwanese economic growth. Over the past 30-odd years, these industries have enthusiastically embraced the world, powering Taiwan’s economic growth and progress, making them the biggest winner as well as the sector with the highest concentration of wealth.

On the flip side is the service industry, which accounts for 60 percent of Taiwan’s GDP and employment opportunities. Yet, due to weak international competitiveness, most enterprises can only vie against each other in Taiwan’s highly competitive small market, where it is not only difficult to grow in scale, but where profit margins are also smaller. As a result, those employed in the broader service industries naturally have more difficulty accumulating wealth.

Taiwanese enterprises’ road to internationalization should be imbued with greater imagination and possibility. Regardless of size, industries of all kinds can stand on the foundation of the past, absorbing experience and employing different, innovative methods to boldly step out into the world. Only in this way can it give industries, along with Taiwan’s economy and everyone it employs, new opportunities, and a better income and life.

Kymco is already Europe’s fourth-largest scooter brand. The company’s scooters are a frequent sight on the streets of Italy. (Photo: kymco.com)

(Read: Kymco Announces New Battery System for E-scooters)

Fourth Wave: Internationalization of Service, Soft Export Power

Fortunately, over the last decade, Taiwanese enterprises taking the road to internationalization have become increasingly well-rounded. They are currently trying more innovative methods than in the past and making inroads into the international market, and are no longer restricted to selling Made-in-Taiwan abroad, deploying along the multinational supply chain.

Taiwanese brands today are no longer limited to just the manufacturing industry or consumer electronics brands.

Some enterprises are working hard to export Taiwanese food, lifestyle, content, and culture internationally, to present a different Taiwan to the world.

Chatime is conquering the taste buds of consumers worldwide with an authentic flavor that originated in Taiwan - pearl milk tea. Last year, the company even opened up a shop inside the citadel of world-class arts and culture, the Louvre Museum plaza.

                       

The pride of the Taiwanese culture creative industry, Eslite Books, having already come to Hong Kong and China, is set to open a new store in the cultural hotbed of Tokyo towards the end of this year. This will mark a new milestone in the export of Taiwanese culture and lifestyle, as well as the internationalization of Taiwan’s service industries. (Read: The Rise of the Eslite Nanxi Commercial District)

From Wake Up, to The Teenage Psychic, and The World Between Us, the Program Department at Taiwan Public Television Service (PTS) has exported a succession of quality original Taiwanese content to the international arena, giving Taiwanese dramas the chance to leap over cultural boundaries, break free of the restraints of the Chinese-language market, and meet the rest of the world on equal terms. (Read: Taiwan’s Catchplay Beats Netflix in Indonesia)

The World Between Us (Source: Taiwan Public Television Service)

Even Familiar Old Faces Can Forge New Paths

Even some of Taiwan’s household name brand enterprises, not settling for the status quo, are intent on forging new paths on the global market.

Taiwan’s first publicly listed enterprise, Taiwan Cement Corporation, having become Taiwan’s largest and China’s sixth-biggest cement company, is currently working at venturing outside of the Greater China market, using a co-invested company with a Turkish conglomerate as a springboard for taking on the markets of southeastern Europe, Central Asia, and Africa with a combined population of US$1.2 billion. (Read: The Clocks Have Stopped, but Business Is Moving for Taiwan Cement)

“Taiwan Cement is undoubtedly a Taiwanese company, but more than that, we’re a global corporation,” stresses company chairman Nelson Chang.

“Taiwan is surrounded by the sea, and what it needs most is open thinking. So might it be possible to give everyone something different to think about?”

Not to be outdone in the boldness department, another long-standing Taiwanese enterprise - beverage maker King Car - stuck to its guns against almost everyone’s counsel and set out to distill its own whiskey in Taiwan.

Today, it markets its whiskey to the European and American markets, even selling it in Scotland, the home of whiskey. King Car’s actions are as crazy as a Western food and beverage maker coming to Taiwan and selling beef noodles or pearl milk tea.

However, these corporations are not crazy at all, because they know that, as long as they keep challenging themselves and take on the global market in the maritime spirit, enterprises have a chance to keep making their mark around the world, for the betterment of all Taiwanese people’.

Translated by David Toman
Edited by TC Lin, Sharon Tseng