It’s that time of the year again when we look back at everything we’ve done in the past 12 months and what lies ahead in 2025.
ChinaTechTrip Study Tours
The ‘COVID years’, which might feel like so long ago, were difficult for us because we had to stop some of our most important activities: keynote presentations and study tours. While the keynotes picked up again as lockdowns were lifted in Europe, we had to wait until 2023 for China to reopen its borders. We did our first post-covid tour to China in 2023 and were happy to continue in 2024.
However, in 2024, we started noticing a strange trend. China is more important on the world stage and in retail, especially in cross-border e-commerce, with platforms like Shein and Temu having an enormous impact. At the same time, our lack of knowledge about the country and our new competitors is shockingly limited. You would think that professionals would be more open to learning more about the country and its internet companies that are launching platforms in ‘our’ markets. Gaining an understanding of China and competitive intelligence has never been more critical.
Still, there is a reluctance to do exactly that. It could be the geopolitical sentiment or complacency, but there isn’t the real sense of urgency that we would expect (yet). Nevertheless, we were able to do two tours in 2024. First, we took a small group of Dutch brand representatives, retailers and digital experts to China in April. It was a successful and enjoyable tour that was very well received and received a rating of 9 out of 10 from the group.
The tour gave us some ideas for improvements, and in October, we had a very fruitful cooperation with K5 Future Retail when we took 16 German CEOs and senior managers to China. Without a doubt, it has been the best of our tours so far. And much of the credit goes to the participants, who were the most eager to learn of any group we have ever taken to China. They were also the most active in sharing what they had learned with their networks, being very active with LinkedIn posts, blogs, and podcasts. They gave the tour a rating of 9.5 out of 10.
The K5 team was so enthusiastic about the tour that we have already scheduled a follow-up in October 2025.
We were also approached by a former participant from a group in 2019, asking us to create a 12-day tour that would combine our regular study tour program with more days of cultural immersion. The tour we developed for the end of October was fully booked in one week.
If you want to join our Retail Innovation study tour, that leaves one last option for 2025. We are putting together a (Dutch-speaking) group for April. Seats are limited to 19 participants and can be booked until February. More details can be found here. If you would like to join an international group for the spring of 2025, don’t hesitate to e-mail us. If there is enough interest, we’ll set up such a group.
2024 was all about Temu
The big topic of 2024 was Temu. Ed has been studying Temu’s parent company, Pinduoduo, since its launch in the mid-2010s and Temu since its launch in the US in September 2022. The platform offering super-cheap goods from China launched in Europe in mid-2023, but it wasn’t until 2024 that it truly woke up to this new Chinese player.
Ed has done almost weekly interviews with magazines and podcasts about the topic, including:
- Dutch: Parool, Telegraaf, NRC, MT/Sprout, Op naar 20 Miljoen Podcast, ING Sector Inzichten Podcast, De Technoloog Podcast, RetailTrends, China Voorbij De Muur Podcast (VRT), RTL Z, Volkskrant, BNR, Een Vandaag, Linda.
- German: Blick, Ost (Austrian television), Manager Magazine.
- English: Let’s Talk Marketplace podcast, The Negotiation podcast, Belgian Chinese Chamber of Commerce webinar, Vereniging Nederland China, CheffTreff Podcast, The Ken, Wall Street Journal, The Wire.
Temu was also the topic that Ed was invited to talk about most for keynotes and webinars. These included appearances at Focusplaza, Score! (Zürich), K5 (Berlin), Becom (Mechelen), Neuland (Bremen), RetailTrends (Leusden) and several international webinars and in-company presentations including e-commerce players and consultancy agencies.
Responses to these keynotes were overwhelmingly positive, with them often being mentioned as one of the highlights of the respective conferences and frequently containing words like ‘eye-opener’.
We have already received our first bookings for 2025. You can, for instance, meet us at Retail Reconnect in Antwerpen, Belgium.
Articles
In 2024, Ed continued his work as a research editor for Tech Buzz China. It was a productive year, with no less than 19 reports published in 12 months.
Of course, with cross-border e-commerce platforms from China being the prominent topic in 2024, many reports on Temu and Shein were published. In cooperation with Six Degrees Intelligence, we gained so many exclusive insights that we even made Temu a recurring topic in our Temu Watch series, sharing multiple updates every quarter.
Other topics, like developments in China’s domestic e-commerce and new retail and local services, were also reported.
We increased the number of Tech Buzz China subscribers by 33% in 2024. While revenue from paid subscribers grew by almost 50%, it isn’t enough to keep the lights on in the Tech Buzz China staff’s houses. Few people are willing to pay for content, even for exclusive insights. Nevertheless, our work helps us gain and maintain knowledge we can leverage in our keynotes and study tours.
Excerpts from some of our Tech Buzz China reports were also published on the ChinaTalk blog page.
Besides these long-read reports, Ed also started sharing shorter news updates about Chinese internet companies on his LinkedIn profile and X (Twitter).Together with Rabobank, Ed published a series of articles (Dutch) on China’s impact on retail.
Language lessons
While some schools have decided to phase out Chinese Language and Culture as an optional course (more geopolitical sentiments?), Jessica has grown her number of private students who learn Mandarin in online lessons. Some of her students have already been with her for several years and have reaped the benefits of speaking the language when doing business with China.
In 2024, Jessica also launched a course for Chinese migrants who want to learn Dutch, using news broadcasts to improve their vocabulary and listening skills. Chinese people might want to follow her Xiaohongshu account.
Other activities
We published explainer videos on China’s Fintech (Dutch), Temu, Shein and Instant Retail. Ed has also frequently posted short ‘ChinaTalk dumpling’ videos on his LinkedIn profile and X (Twitter). We also include these posts in our monthly newsletter.
Last but not least, Ed and Fred Sengers hosted the 9th China Knowledge Quiz in cooperation with Leiden Asia Center.
Into 2025
In 2025 we will continue our ‘labour of love’ of researching and sharing knowledge about China, its internet companies and its language and culture.
Research topics for 2025 will include instant retail, TikTok Shop (which has arrived in the European mainland) and we will also continue to follow Temu. Furthermore, some Chinese companies that you haven’t even heard of have started going abroad, so there will be lots to keep you posted on.
We will be seeing you at various events and conferences in The Netherlands, Germany and elsewhere. With multiple study tours we are happy to take more people to China to learn about the culture, digital innovations and be prepared from new competition.
We like to thank all of those who we have worked with in 2024 for their cooperation and support. Let’s do it again next year!
Merry Christmas and a happy 2025!
Ed Sander & Jessica Sun