Strategic brand management of Swiss MedTech companies in China

Master's Thesis from the year 2015 in the subject Business economics - Offline Marketing and Online Marketing University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland course: International Management language: English abstract: This study aims to explore how strategic brand management can be conducted to successfully establish a brand in the Chinese market to which - in seeking growth opportunities - various medium-sized Swiss MedTech companies have expanded in recent years. To date little consideration has been given in branding literature to this specific research context.A qualitative exploratory multiple-case study was conducted that followed an abductive research approach.The study focused on three medium-sized Swiss MedTech companies which expanded into China over the last ten years. Data was collected through secondary data analysis observations and 14 in-depth semistructured interviews withbrand or marketing managers brand experts and industry experts from Switzerland and China based on a conceptual framework developed upon Western branding theories. To file propositions as the study's final objective within-case and cross-case comparative thematic analyses were conducted.The data revealed the prevailing macro-contextual conditions in the Chinese MedTech industry and the major challenges that medium-sized Swiss MedTech companies are facing: namely bribery practise distribution structure and regulations. The study furthermore explicates the origin as a crucial dimension of a Swiss brand and evaluates to what extend branding strategies should be adjusted to a given environment.For a purposeful positioning in order to survive in the Chinese competitive marketplace strategic brand management needs to be taken into consideration. The challenge lays in the optimal trade-off between standardisation and localisation; some measures must some should some could but also some shouldn't be adapted. The developed proposals can be used as a guideli