Tod Daniel wrote:

Excellent arguement and points made by Dkatz. Im with him all the way.

There 'ya go.  With an endorsement like that, how can you go wrong?   

symmes wrote:

Tod Daniel wrote:

Excellent arguement and points made by Dkatz. Im with him all the way.

There 'ya go.  With an endorsement like that, how can you go wrong?   

😂😂😂😂😂 that's one way to have all you've said undone in one line

Dkatz wrote:

 

P.S. Britain has HAD a huge car manufacturing industry for your information. How can you even ask a question of whether it is existent? Even if many companies are foreign owned nearly all British cars (NOTE THESE ARE NOT BRITISH CARS, SEE BELOW) are manufactured in Britain. They make some of the worlds best luxury and sports cars:

Lotus -MALAYSIAN,

Rolls Royce - GERMAN,

Bentley - GERMAN,

Jaguar - INDIAN,

McLaren to name but a few... TVR went bust a few years ago for your information. I have yet to see anything from China with the offerings that Britain has in terms of car manufacture. - I CLEARLY STATED THE BEST CARS IN THE WORLD COME FROM EITHER GERMANY OR JAPAN

 

 

waltoninn wrote:

1.  The Czech Republic is located in that part of Europe that has a long history of electronics innovation, i.e. think Tesla, to name just one.  As such, electronics is imbued in their culture.  Experience, a long history and an integrity towards manufacturing is much more a part of the basic manufacturing philsophy in Europe, and to some extent in other industrialized countries, than it is in China.  These are qualities that sometimes are just not easily trained, so it may be quite a number of years before that takes place in countries like China, sorry to say.

2.  With all due respect, I look to China for fine ceramic antiquities, think Ming dynasty porcelain.  Most any such items produced before the Cultural Revolution (CR) were of very high quality without a doubt.  That is because of the history, and a long developed experience, by the Chinese in certain fields.  Look at their pen and ink works of art.  They are beautiful and refined.  Look at the jade work, before the CR. 

While your historical views may be true (and Dkatz thinks they are an endorsement of his views on modern day outsourcing) I find the implication that it somehow means that the Czech Rupublic is now (almost genetically) more disposed to light engineering than China somewhat hard to believe. If that were so then would we expect most folk in the UK to have some sort of inate ability to design and build steam engines? - I think not.

With regard to training, I'm always amazed at the Chinese headcount on under & postgraduate engineering courses in the UK, I can hardly guess how many there are in similar positions in China. I deal with Czech and Chinese manufacturing plants on a daily basis, the Czech Republic is ideally positioned in central Europe which is a major logistical advantage (which shouldn't be underestimated as a real reason to manufacture there) , other than that I could not separate them on quality or abilities.

Somebody wake me up when this thread dies.

In the meantime, I am going back to my reading...

Dkatz wrote:

I doubt that anyone from executive positions at B&O are reading this forum

You would be surprised then - and a number contribute. Whether anyone has actually bothered to read the 20 pages of this thread is another matter but B&O do read  Beoworld. If they have any sense they will regard the vast majority as light entertainment but I know that the odd snippet is acted upon!

Jonathan wrote:

Rolls Royce - GERMAN,

Bentley - GERMAN,

Jonathan,

Obviously the RR and Bentley marques are now, since 1998, owned by German companies. They are 'owned' by German companies. That does not make them German cars however, since they are made at Goodwood and Crewe, by an overwhelmingly British workforce.

So, Rolls Royce was formed in 1904 in Manchester and 94 (ninety four) years later, a large german owned conglomerate bought them out. (This means financially and 'on paper') They keep production wholly within the UK with a predominantly british born workforce. So they have been assembling cars continuously (apart from during the World Wars I + II) for 108 years to date in England. Absolutely no hint of outsourcing involved.

Does that make a Rolls-Royce a german car now? Hardly. Same applies to Bentley.

I presume you are an Australian. As an Australian, if you had moved to say, China, 14 years ago to live/work would that mean that you are now Chinese? RR and Bentley cars have never been assembled outside of the UK, so I think your stretching it somewhat by claiming they are 'German Cars'.

Puncher – My point about Czech wasn't just about ability. Although they currently have a successful and thriving manufacturing industry of their own with their own cars such as Skoda as well as very high quality bohemian paper products and Czech crystal. My point was about fair wages, benefits, EU labour laws, and of course proximity as you mentioned. Although the biggest difference in quality would be the fact that companies are opening up THEIR OWN factories in Czech as B&O did. So it is NOT outsourcing. They are not asking another company to build to their specs, they are building to their own specs with their own workers that they trained themselves!

In regards to engineers working on the factory floor, yes it's important and there are just as many (probably more) qualified engineers in China. This is not what I was talking about. I am talking about the hard labour of working assembling the products. The apprenticeship and training schemes I was talking about were ones they would have in Struer, Czech and other places in Europe to train factory workers to assemble the products. Something Engineers with a Masters or PHD would never do for $1.68 an hour in China or $11 an hour in Czech. They often hire people for this kind of work straight from school or sometimes with an undergraduate and train them from the ground up. I am very familiar myself with such schemes they have in the Leica, Lotus, and Hasselblad factories to name a few. I know they wouldn't have such lengthy personalised schemes of training for labour when they need hundreds of thousands of people in the factory and don't have time to take months to train them in China. If you have your own factory and you don't outsource, your workers grow to know your companies products alone inside out and even make suggestions to the engineers and even company execs in many cases. My friends who are engineers love the fact that they can sit down and talk to the factory workers and have them assemble something to be tested that the CEO for example can see that day. In the case of western engineered-chinese made products it's not the case. These are all reasons why I thinik the quality is better in developed countries is that they have such extensive training, extreme daily quality control, proximity to the engineers and management of their own company, etc...

Jonathan – I completely agree with Bentleyman in regards to cars. It does not matter who owns the company on paper but who makes the cars and where it is made. The same goes with Lotus, they might be owned by Proton but they have no Proton parts in the car and they produce it in Hethel, Norfolk. Holden is still an Australian car company even though it is owned by GM!

Bentleyman wrote:

Jonathan wrote:

Rolls Royce - GERMAN,

Bentley - GERMAN,

 

 

Jonathan,

Obviously the RR and Bentley marques are now, since 1998, owned by German companies. They are 'owned' by German companies. That does not make them German cars however, since they are made at Goodwood and Crewe, by an overwhelmingly British workforce.

So, Rolls Royce was formed in 1904 in Manchester and 94 (ninety four) years later, a large german owned conglomerate bought them out. (This means financially and 'on paper') They keep production wholly within the UK with a predominantly british born workforce. So they have been assembling cars continuously (apart from during the World Wars I + II) for 108 years to date in England. Absolutely no hint of outsourcing involved.

Does that make a Rolls-Royce a german car now? Hardly. Same applies to Bentley.

I presume you are an Australian. As an Australian, if you had moved to say, China, 14 years ago to live/work would that mean that you are now Chinese? RR and Bentley cars have never been assembled outside of the UK, so I think your stretching it somewhat by claiming they are 'German Cars'.

I thought there had, at times,  been Bentleys builts in Germany due to capacity issues in the UK - does that make these models "lesser" Bentleys? Also a Continental is reputed to be "just" a re-bodied Volkswagen Phaeton - how English is that?

Puncher wrote:

Bentleyman wrote:

Jonathan wrote:

Rolls Royce - GERMAN,

Bentley - GERMAN,

 

 

Jonathan,

Obviously the RR and Bentley marques are now, since 1998, owned by German companies. They are 'owned' by German companies. That does not make them German cars however, since they are made at Goodwood and Crewe, by an overwhelmingly British workforce.

So, Rolls Royce was formed in 1904 in Manchester and 94 (ninety four) years later, a large german owned conglomerate bought them out. (This means financially and 'on paper') They keep production wholly within the UK with a predominantly british born workforce. So they have been assembling cars continuously (apart from during the World Wars I + II) for 108 years to date in England. Absolutely no hint of outsourcing involved.

Does that make a Rolls-Royce a german car now? Hardly. Same applies to Bentley.

I presume you are an Australian. As an Australian, if you had moved to say, China, 14 years ago to live/work would that mean that you are now Chinese? RR and Bentley cars have never been assembled outside of the UK, so I think your stretching it somewhat by claiming they are 'German Cars'.

 

I thought there had, at times,  been Bentleys builts in Germany due to capacity issues in the UK - does that make these models "lesser" Bentleys? Also a Continental is reputed to be "just" a re-bodied Volkswagen Phaeton - how English is that?

and BMW engines in Rolls??

Skoda is now German

Holden is American

If your arguement is to where it is manufactured, then the Beosound 8 and Beolit 12 makes B&O a Chinese company!