{
  "id": 7271556,
  "title": "Companies left China to dodge tariffs. Now some are heading back",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/14/companies-left-china-to-dodge-tariffs-now-some-are-heading-back",
  "topic": "finance",
  "section": "Finance & Markets",
  "published": "2026-09-14T07:54:56.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Investing.com",
    "slug": "investing-com",
    "url": "https://www.investing.com/news/economy-news/companies-left-china-to-dodge-tariffs-now-some-are-heading-back-4898910"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "A year after shifting production and sourcing out of China due to higher U.S. tariffs, some companies are discovering the challenges of replicating China's factory ecosystem and are bringing manufacturing back. Heather Kuang, vice president of Dawang Metals, a family-owned metal casting company in Dandong, China, explained that a major U.S. customer recently shifted some orders to India and has since returned after struggling with that market. Kuang noted that China's supply-chain advantage remains too significant to replicate elsewhere. While companies continue to invest in Southeast Asia, the \"China plus one\" strategy, which involves hedging China exposure with operations in other lower-tariff countries, has proven more difficult to execute. Despite no hard data on the return of sourcing to China, buyers who shifted production elsewhere say they are keeping or restoring Chinese suppliers due to difficulties in matching China's skilled labor, supplier networks, and reliable power. Some companies, like Jin Chaofeng in Hangzhou, China, who shut a workshop in Vietnam and moved production back to China, attribute the shift to difficulties in sourcing equipment in Vietnam. The decision to move production abroad was initially driven by differences in U.S. tariff rates, with China facing an effective tariff rate of about 20% compared to 6.1% for Vietnam, 13.4% for Indonesia, and 4.5% for Thailand. However, this advantage has diminished as the U.S. extended tariffs to a wider range of countries. Access to power has also become a decisive factor, and some companies prefer Chinese production plants for their stability during crises. Lawyers and exporters also highlight the unstable electricity supply in Vietnam and Indonesia. While not all exporters expect the U.S.-China summit to solve their problems, some, like Guan Baokui, believe they may return to Vietnam if the tariffs spike.",
  "summary": null,
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 3,
    "also_reported_by": [
      {
        "outlet": "SCMP Business",
        "title": "How one company’s choice – resignation or the factory – left China’s young workers floored",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/14/how-one-companys-choice-resignation-or-the-factory-left-chinas-young",
        "published": "2026-09-14T04:00:06.000Z"
      },
      {
        "outlet": "Yahoo Finance",
        "title": "Companies left China to dodge tariffs. Now some are heading back",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/14/companies-left-china-to-dodge-tariffs-now-some-are-heading-back-7289001",
        "published": "2026-09-14T08:17:43.000Z"
      }
    ]
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}