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since shoe manufacturer Fulgent Sun Group was founded by a Taiwanese entrepreneur in Quanzhou in China's southern Fujian Province in 1995, the company never forgot that its roots are in Taiwan. So, after Fulgent Sun Group had built its own ""shoe empire"" in China, the company enlarged its operations headquarters in Taiwan in 2011 to boost the group's development prospects on the island. Aside from sourcing, taking orders, and marketing, the operations headquarters' main task is pooling more highly skilled Taiwanese to lay the foundations for sustainable management and create another corporate miracle in the traditional industrial sector.
Not long ago, the shoe industry was believed to have had its day. Yet, today it is synonymous with the miraculous revival of a traditional manufacturing industry.
Fulgent Sun Group returned to Taiwan to invest , in augur ating anewly built operations headquarters building in April 2011. In October 2012 the company will list its shares on the Taiwan Stock Exchange (stock code: 9802), setting the best example for the renewed rise of the conventional industries. Fulgent Sun Group presently mainly manufactures professional sports shoes and highly functional outdoor shoes. It maintains production bases in China and Vietnam and boasts a total workforce of more than 10,000 employees. The operations headquarters in Taiwan are in charge of sourcing and order taking, and most importantly the cultivation of talent to actively work on an innovation-oriented blueprint for the company's future.
Banking on Technology to Become an Internationally Renowned Contract Manufacturer
Fulgent Sun Group was founded in 1995 at about the same time the Internet began to take off and the high tech industry boomed. Against this backdrop, a number of traditional industries were under pressure to transform or go bankrupt. The just-founded Fulgent Sun Group chose instead to move to Quanzhou where labor was cheap. Starting out with four production lines, the company adopted the Taiwanese investor's typical sure and slow approach, taking one step at a time in expanding business opportunities.
Although Fulgent Sun Group did not have its own brand, it was showered with orders after a few years because it had delivered excellent quality as a contract manufacturer. In 2000, Fulgent Sun Group obtained certified manufacturer status with outerwear maker Gore-Tex, the most prestigious certification in the outdoor gear business, for its ability to produce waterproof outdoor footwear. In 2003, the company gained laboratory accreditation from renowned SATRA in Britain and established development and production centers in Fujian Province and Vietnam.
Just as company founder Mark Lin says in the company's mission statement - ""With attention to detail, nothing is impossible!"" - the company managed to reach world-class technical standards and win the cooperation of more than 30 international brands, including Chinese sports shoe giant Li Ning as well as NIKE, Meindl, La Sportiva, Clarks, Decathlon, Columbia, Mammut, Salewa, Inov-8, ASG, and Crocs. Its sales network reaches as far as Europe and North America and covers a dozen countries. The company's outstanding performance has stunned industry insiders.
Executive Vice President Sunny Liao notes that over the past decade Fulgent Sun Group has worked the market with a steady and slow approach and internally managed the group with great caution and devotion. When it comes to financial affairs, the company has become a model for conventional industry entrepreneurs for its transparency and openness as it multiplied its revenue from several million to several billion New Taiwan dollars.
Developing Professional Multifunctional Shoe s for a Segmented Market
Liao attributes the group's success to technological R&D and its innovative spirit. ""In fact, in the very beginning, things didn't go smoothly for Fulgent Sun Group. The main reason was that competition was fierce in the sports shoe market and that profits weren't high. Later on, we found a way out of our predicament by supplying high-priced shoes for outdoors sports and leisure to Europe and North America."" A pair of outdoor leisure shoes costs at least NT$3,000 and can easily reach NT$10,000, Liao explains. Shoes with Gore-Tex or Vibram sole certifications in particular command higher prices than ordinary sports shoes. Therefore, Fulgent Sun Group relies on R&D and innovation to stand out among manufacturers of high-end shoes and pave the way for the company's sustainable management.
""Fulgent Sun Group regularly dispatches R&D personnel to Europe's famous makers of multifunctional shoes to learn the latest technology. We also cooperate with several professional shoe designers in Italy to strengthen our design capabilities,"" Liao points out.
Although obtaining international certification is a key to expanding market share, the shoemaking process is complex with many hurdles; therefore, procedures cannot be lax. ""It's definitely not enough to make shoes that are not only waterproof, but also insulating and breathable only depending on international technical certifications,"" posits Liao. The features that a pair of shoes needs for outdoor sports and leisure activities - ranging from river tracing to hiking and climbing in the mountains, from extreme cold to suffocating heat - go beyond most peoples' imagination.
The company mandates that a ""standard manufacturing manual"" should be written before multifunctional shoes are produced. It must be ensured that every step of the production process is precisely controlled. All kinds of needed materials, such as leathers must meet the quality requirements from customers, as a result, the latest laser cutting machines have been imported for cutting materials. In addition, within the company, the big brands such as U.S. sportswear maker Nike have their own offices. Such closeness to top brand customers guarantees the manufacture of products to meet their requirements most.
As Liao observes, the outdoor sports and leisure activities market in Europe and North America is more developed. Therefore, multifunctional leisure footwear is not much affected by economic up and down. The company makes approximately 60 percent of its revenue in Europe and North America. In other words, more than half of its market is located there. More importantly, in the hotly contested ""red ocean"" Fulgent Sun Group designed its own ""blue ocean"" strategy by successfully segmenting the market. By 2000, the company had become one of the 300 largest companies in Fujian Province. In 2008, it was ranked among the ""star enterprises"" of Quanzhou City, with exports worth more than US$27 million and tax payments in excess of 24 million renminbi. By 2010 Fulgent Sun Group owned four factories in Fujian Province, Hubei Province, and Vietnam, while its original four production lines had grown tenfold. Producing at full capacity year-round, the company churns out 10 million pairs of shoes per year. Cultivating Talent in Taiwan for Sustainable Management
Liao proudly declares, ""aside from men's dress shoes and high heels for women Fulgent Sun Group makes any kind of functional shoes."" The subsidiary Fujian LAYA Outdoor Co. Ltd. was established as an exclusive distributor of well-known European outdoor footwear and clothing brands in the Greater China market. In Fujian Province, Fujian LaSportiva Co. Ltd. was set up to distribute La Sportiva products from Italy in the Greater China region. Fulgent Sun Group's various moves - technological breakthroughs, cooperation with Italian designers, business expansion in the Asia-Pacific region - clearly show that the company has the ambition to be more than just a contract manufacturer.
""One of our major goals of returning to Taiwan and going public is to attract talent to lay the foundations for our company's sustainable management,"" remarks Liao. He emphasizes that since its founding, the company has not forgotten for a single moment that it went to China for business development from its native Taiwan. Company founder Lin prides himself of being a son of Douliou in Taiwan's Yunlin County. In recent years, Fulgent Sun Group has increased its investment in Taiwan, mainly to look for more management talent aside from sourcing, taking orders and marketing locally. Consequently, the company will not have to worry about leadership succession and corporate management as it continues to expand its markets.
""After all, we are all Taiwanese. We hope to find young Taiwanese talent that shares our goals so that all pull together for the future of the company, shaping it into a top-notch maker of multifunctional shoes,"" notes Liao, detailing the rationale behind the stock market listing and talent hunt in Taiwan. He also points out that only high-quality materials were used for the construction of the company's brand new office building and factory in Douliou. ""Now we have returned to Taiwan; our investment in infrastructure and devotion to long-term planning again highlight our resolve to grow roots in Taiwan and do business for the long run.""
Source: Department of Investment Promotion, MOEA
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