ORIGINAL: i3dm
All there is to say is that Chinese manufacturers will be Chinese manufacturers, reverse engineering (and OEM) is what they do best.
BUT, if the original manfacturer would have priced his kits close enough to the "knock off" price, nobody would buy a knock off !
Indeed, the original had to design the plane (which is at a certain cost) but at times, the original is priced at over 20 times more than the knock off (Bobcat Vs. Falcon 120) - so while the original is definitely better, its not worth 20 times more ! [:-]
Dont forget, BVM makes their planes in Thailand, not in the US, so Boomerang jets make them in China, its no suprise.
Ah yes, the modern 'informed' consumer attitude.
Rant mode ON.
First, there is NO comparison to an all-composite ARF and a balsa/cheap lite ply ARF in tooling or material costs.
Second - the knock-off mfr does not have any NRE costs to amortize - so they can sell copycat products at very close to the cost of materials and labor (slave labor wages that neither you nor I would allow in our own countries). Someone had to spend a lot of time doing market R&D, then much more on product design, development, refining, and testing the original design - and they need to spread the cost of this hard work over the projected production run. Do you think you would have the quality products that you get from a BVM or JetCat (among many others) if they had to do this development at no cost or profit?
Third - I've worked for Taiwanese and Chinese companies, believe me the business ethics over there are totally different. Just look at the Tam's/Cermark/Spark/SM/JL/FB history, just here within our own tiny community, as an example. The comment about being SOOL when you need a spare part, or have to replace a flaky/faulty part, just a few months after the kit is introduced is right on the money. BVM can usually provide parts for kits that are long out of production, or can happily help you resolve a technical issue. The cost to support carrying NOS/OOP inventory, and to keep skilled/knowledgeable staff on hand to answer the phone when you call, all costs money.
Last - As long as the consumer continues to support the clone/knock-off manufacturers, this situation will exist. So we all need to be aware of who to blame when there are no domestic manufacturers of (lead-free toys, consumer electronics, RC jet kits, whatever), no domestic manufacturing base, and only "offshored" product (good or bad) to choose from.
Rant mode OFF. Obviously the 'real world' economic environment is far more complex than this but I always find it humourous when someone *****es about the price of a 'quality' product sold by a domestic supplier, then *****es even more about the crappy knock-off (and subsequent problems) they did buy.
Barry