Europa Star in China

At the turn of this new millennium, two things characterize China's fundamentally modifying society.
On the one hand, the expansion of the Internet in China predicts a new, effective and powerful way to link to millions of Chinese and, thereby, to access a market that seems to suffer no limits in its development. There are already multimillions of Chinese online to date. China will count at least 50 million Internet users.
On the other hand, China's entry into the World Trade Organisation (WTO) opens up immense new possibilities to the Swiss watch industry. Over the first 4 months of 2002, the value of Swiss exports to China has doubled. Before December 01, date of China's membership of the WTO, the watches imported in China had a prohibitive duty of 80 to 100 % imposed on them and the imports had a restricted quota.
Now however this restrictive attitude has no reason to be. As a WTO-country, China's taxes do not exceed 16.6% and will eventually decrease to 11% in 2004 and quotas are suppressed. As a result, the value of Swiss watch exports (watches and pieces to be assembled) has increased by more than 100% during the first four months of this year, reaching 22 million Swiss Francs.
Meanwhile, the value of exports to Hong Kong, through which an important part of sales to China transit, has only slightly decreased by 3% to 472 million SFr. The burgeoning market of China and Hong Kong is welcome at a time when the main opportunities, the USA and Japan, have recorded 12% and 5.4% decreases over the first four months. Hong Kong is now positioned as market number one, outrunning the USA.

Europa Star is present since several years as a print edition for the China market. The recent, expansive developments of the Internet in China have induced us to complement our media strategy. The most effective and powerful manner to target this mass market consists of a business platform combining Internet and print. Internet, with its multimedia capabilities, combined with print, a valuable and respected medium in China, is the best combination to serve the watch industry.
Through our Chinese online magazine, users have constant access to detailed data on the major brands in the global watch industry. It provides manufacturers with the possibility of promoting models and information specifically targeted for this market. For these reasons, we have developed a new e-zine: www.watches-for-china.com
A Chinese team has tailored this website specifically for both mainland and Hong Kong Chinese speaking markets in traditional Chinese.
For content information contact: [email protected]
For ad information on both print and e-media, contact [email protected]

Source: Europa Star
June 2002