Shanzai (Shanzhai) Ji (China "Bandit" ) Mobile Cell Phone Showroom: 2009

below article is from Forbes.com just for your refrence and information

China's Black Market Boom
Gady Epstein, 01.29.09, 05:00 PM EST Forbes Magazine dated February 16, 2009
Who needs Nokia? The spirit of shanzhai rules the phone-pirate's cove in Shenzhen.

Something was wrong with Zhao Shengli's order of 200 Nokia phones at a wholesale market in Shenzhen--the phones were missing one of the languages he needed, Thai. The good news, though, was that the phones were fakes, and in China, counterfeits come with enterprising customer service. "We have factories right here," the stall owner, Xie Qiuqing, assured Zhao. "Come back at four this afternoon and the phones will be ready. It's fast."
Regardless of the state of the global economy, one robust sector that adjusts as efficiently as any other in the world is the Chinese black market. Despite years of official rhetoric about cracking down on pirated products, the urge to make a quick buck through imitation remains so entrenched in China that it has matured into a celebrated culture of its own.

That culture now has a name, shanzhai. The phrase literally means "mountain fortress" and figuratively conjures a romantic notion of bandits in a mountain hideaway taking potshots at the established giants.

"Shanzhai culture is a rebellion against the monopoly sectors," Li Zonggui, a philosophy professor with Zhongshan University in Guangzhou, wrote in a pro-shanzhai manifesto. Shanzhai, he explained, "shows the desire by poor people for a better life and fashionable things."
Shanzhai has undoubtedly broadened the availability of modern technology to many in Asia who previously might not have been able to afford "the real thing." Mobile phones in particular represent the far-reaching influence of shanzhai. Stroll through either of Shenzhen's two sprawling multilevel wholesale phone markets and it is quickly apparent why shanzhai phones appeal both to Chinese consumers--who buy 150 million mobile phones a year--and to retailers planning to resell their hauls in places like India, Thailand or, in middleman Zhao's case, Laos.
Bandits supply these markets with phones that come with the superficial look and feel of brand-name handsets but at a fraction of the price. The posters for iPhone look-alikes invariably superimpose their product name on a screen shot of an actual iPhone, without bothering to change the cell signal in the upper left of the screen that reads "AT&T 3G." These smart phones sell for as little as $100, where a real name-brand version might sell for three to six times that much.

Is it a recession-proof business model? Not quite. Sellers say business is down 30% from a year ago, and Chinese media reports say that slowdown has been reflected recently in factory shutdowns on a similar scale. But shanzhai will survive, because in a global market racing to the bottom, shanzhai products--unencumbered by taxes and all sorts of legal registrations--rate as fastest and cheapest.

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Shanzai (Shanzhai) Ji (China "Bandit" ) Mobile Cell Phone Showroom

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