Hearted Youtube comments on Asianometry (@Asianometry) channel.
-
85
-
85
-
As someone who's family is half Thai I'd wager geography, urbanization, cultural ties, and price are all big contributors:
Thailand is located near the South China Sea which has one of the most valuable shipping corridors on Earth with trade passing between Africa, Europe, India, East Asia, and the Western half of the Americas, plus Thailand is only a short distance from China and Vietnam, both large manufactures of Automobile parts. They're near Japan and South Korea, both major manufacturers. This means its easier to ship parts in and vehicles out and also means they're likely to farm out very labor intensive tasks to nearby Thailand.
Thailand is also a highly urbanized country with a massive 14 million people (over 20% of the country) living in the Bangkok metro zone which is also right on the water allowing easy importing and exporting of goods, and a highly urbanized population also means much easier manufacturing and having most of the country in 1 giant city means its easy to have multiple different companies making and assembling parts, sections, or entire vehicles. You dont need to make the chassis in Chicago, the engine in Houston, and send them to Detroit for assembly, you can keep different jobs in one city if it has most of the population there. That city also being a massive port on a massive shipping lane makes things even easier. Urbanized populations are also more well educated then more rural ones making things easier.
Thailand also has very close ties to the US and they have close business/trading ties to China, South Korea, and Japan. This makes it even easier to get contracts to assemble vehicles for them or manufacture parts. The fact Thailand has close ties to China and the US also means they have large markets to sell to as well as import parts from. The cultural ties also means that there are more personal relationships and business is easier, plus tons of Thai people speak English or Chinese as a second language which makes doing business even more attractive.
Another important factor is that costs are low in Thailand. Thanks to the shipping lanes transport costs are low, their location near resources like Chinese or Australian coal, locally made rubber, oil from the South China Sea, and Chinese and Japanese steel means resources are cheap as well. The fact that cost of living is very low and wages are also fairly low means that its cheap to do business in Thailand. Countries like South Korea and Japan can hire fairly well educated Thai people to do jobs for much less then doing it locally, and they have the benefits i already mentioned rolled in. They dont need to go to Africa where wages are low but geography makes business more difficult and where politics makes things less stable.
A less important, but still important factor is also stability. Thailand despite all their coups is still fairly stable for doing business. New regimes dont like to "rock the boat" or institute wide ranging changes to society. The new regimes arent revolutionary and they dont want to radically change the countries allegiances or become isolated. New regimes usually just want to be the new leaders of the same basic government, they keep doing business with the same nations, keep local business going as normal, they dont try to nationalize tons of companies or force out certain businesses, and they dont demand radical changes to existing contracts or relationships. They also try to keep corruption manageable as well and try to keep Thailand an attractive trading partner. Compare this to some Arab or African nations where new regimes institute massive changes to their relationships or try to nationalize tons of business, or compare it to communist and socialist revolutionaries where the new regime seizes control of businesses and radically change society. Unpredictable politics like that make doing business less attractive and in complicated, global, heavily integrated industries like automotive
84
-
84
-
84
-
84
-
84
-
83
-
83
-
83
-
83
-
83
-
83
-
82
-
81
-
81
-
80
-
80
-
79
-
79
-
79
-
78
-
78
-
78
-
78
-
77
-
76
-
75
-
75
-
75
-
75
-
75
-
75
-
First off, thank you for your hard work and cogent perspectives from your part of the world.
I feel like this is missing a second half, since when covid hit, auto companies began slowing or canceling orders. This led the chip manufacturers to close their least profitable and older chip production lines, and ramp up their more profitable lines to supply companies who did not cancel orders, like Tesla, BYD, and other Chinese EV manufacturers. This is also happening when there is a major shift in automotive computer architecture, as separate control units supplied by parts manufacturers with their component systems are being brought in house, and are using fewer more centralized controllers to connect to many different systems. Since the chip manufacturers need at least a decade of sales to pay for chip design and production development, they are reluctant to risk making new lines for legacy systems that they do not see a future for. Many of the old lines that were closed had parts cannibalized to increase production for consumer electronics sold during lock-down, and these production lines are unlikely to be restarted.
P.S. I believe that you were slightly off with the first electronics in cars, as the magneto and spark systems were the first, like pull start lawn mowers.
74
-
74
-
74
-
74
-
74
-
73
-
72
-
72
-
72
-
72
-
72
-
72
-
72
-
72
-
72
-
71
-
71