国际贸易第1章(经济全球化英文版)

International Trade

Chapter I. Globalization

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After you have read this chapter you should:

LO1 Understand what is meant by the term globalization. LO2 Be familiar with the main drivers of globalization.

LO3 Appreciate the changing nature of the global economy.

LO4 Understand the main arguments in the debate over the impact of globalization.

LO5 Appreciate have the process of globalization is creating opportunities and challenges far business managers.

Flat Panel Televisions and the Global Economy

They begin as glass panels that are manufactured in high-technology fabrication centers in South Korea, Taiwan, and Japan. Operating sophisticated tooling in environments that must be kept absolutely clean, these factories produce sheets of glass twice as large as king size beds to exacting specifications. From there, the glass panels travel to Mexican plants located alongside the U.S. border. There they are cut to size, combined with electronic components shipped in from Asia and the United States, assembled into finished TVs, and loaded onto trucks bound for

retail stores in the United States.

It's a huge business. In 2006, U.S. consumers spent some $26.4 billion on flat panel TVs, a 63 percent increase over the amount spent in 2005. Projections call for U.S. sales to hit $37 billion by 2008-despite the fact that due to intense competition, prices for flat panel displays have been tumbling and are projected to continue doing so. During 2006 alone, prices for 40-inch flat panel TVs fell from $3,000 to $1,600, bringing them within the reach of many more consumers. In 200? half of all TVs sold in the United States will be flat panel TVs.

The underlying technology for flat panel displays was invented in the United States in the late 1960s by RCA. But after RCA and rivals Westinghouse and Xerox opted not to pursue the technology, the Japanese company Sharp made aggressive investments in flat panel displays. By the early 1990s Sharp was selling the first flat panel screens, but as the Japanese economy plunged into a decade-long recession, investment leadership shifted to South Korean companies such as Samsung. Then the 1997 Asian crisis hit Korea hard, and Taiwanese companies seized leadership. Today, Chinese companies are starting to elbow their way into the flat panel display manufacturing business.

As production for flat panel displays migrates its way around the

globe to low-cost locations, clear winners and losers have emerged. One obvious winner has been U. S. consumers, who have benefited from the falling prices of flat panel TVs and are snapping them up Other winners include efficient manufacturers who have taken advantage of globally dispersed supply chains to make and sell low-cost, high-quality flat panel TVs. Foremost among these has been the California-based company, Vizio. Founded by a Taiwanese immigrant, in just four years sales of Vizio flat panel TVs ballooned from nothing to $700 million in 2006. The company is forecasting sales as high as $2 billion for 2007. Vizio, however, has only 75 employees. These employees focus on final product design, sales. and customer service, while Vizio outsources most of its engineering work, all of its manufacturing, and much of its logistics. For each of its models, Vizio assembles a team of supplier partners strung across the globe. Its 42-inch flat panel TV, for example, contains a panel from South Korea, electronic components from China, and processors from the United States, and it is assembled in Mexico. Vizio's managers scour the globe continually for the cheapest manufacturers of flat panel displays and electronic components. They sell most of their TVs to large discount retailers such as Costco and Sam's Club. Good order visibility from retailers, coupled with tight management of global logistics, allows Vizio to

turn over its inventory every three weeks, twice as fast as many of its competitors which is a major source of cost saving in a business where prices are falling continually.

If Vizio exemplifies the winners in this global industry, the losers include the employees of manufacturers who make traditional cathode ray TVs in high-cost locations. In 2006, for example, Japanese electronics manufacturer Sanyo laid off 300 employees at its U.S. factory, and another Japanese company, Hitachi, closed its TV manufacturing plant in South Carolina, laying off 200 employees. Both Sony and Hitachi, of course, still make TVs, but they are flat panel TVs assembled in Mexico from components manufactured in Asia.

Introduction

A fundamental shift is occurring, in the world economy. We are moving away from a world in which national economies were relatively self-contained entities, isolated from each other by barriers to cross-border trade and investment; by distance, time zones, and language; ard by national differences in government regulation, culture, and business systems. And we are moving toward a world in which harriers to cross-border trade and

investment are declining; perceived distance is shrinking, due to advances in transportation and telecommunications technology; material culture is starting to look similar the world over; and national economies are merging into an interdependent, integrated global economic system. The process by which this is occurring is commonly referred to as globalization.

What is happening, in the fiat panel TV Industry, which was profiled in the Opening Case, is a classic illustration of the impact of globalization. Production of flat panel TVs is migrating around the globe to low-cost locations. TVs that Vizio sells in the United States, for example, ale assembled in Mexico from flat panels manufactured in South Korea, electronic components made in China, and microprocessors made in the United States. By dispersing different activities around the globe to where they can be performed most efficiently, and then coordinating, the entire production process, companies like Vizio can deliver flat panel TVs to American consumers at much lower prices than would otherwise be possible. American consumers benefit from the lower price, as doe; Vizio and its strategic partners in South Korea, China, the United States. and Mexico. The process of globalization also has losers, however, and the losers in this case are workers in high cost locations who have lost their jobs. As we will see in this book

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