I have been in the electronics business in the Southern California for the last 20 years, and am wondering about exporting to China. My inspiration came from a visit to a company in Portland, OR the other day that manufactures dynamic balancing units, most of which it exports to China. These are used with rotating machinery to ensure vibration free running. It occurred to me that each machine that uses a dynamic balancer also needs a motor control unit, indicating a substantial demand. I have been involved with motor control units for electric sports cars and electric aircraft, and know how to design and manufacture them. For the Chinese market, we are likely talking about 2kW, 400Hz class commutatorless motor controller/inverters. My unit would have the advantage of being a combined inverter and motor controller, greatly simplifying the installation. It would also be suitable for machinery that must run continuously for years at a time, with automatic health monitoring and status reporting over a LAN. An available integrated Uninterruptible Power Supply deals with transient power outages, for example as an auxiliary generator comes on line. (Ordinarily a separate inverter and motor controller, each quite expensive, is required).

My question is how should I go about locating a suitable contact in China who would be prepared to provide some capital for setting up a production line, and then import some of these units? I have in mind around 1000 units per month or so, with a product lifetime of around 5 years. I could also raise the capital myself, the critical part is lining up a suitable Chinese middleman who is prepared to commit to purchasing a particular number of units per month.

Duncan Cumming