Fu Hwa's Glass Furniture: Survival Through Innovation

In the business for 60 years, Fu Hwa Mirror Co., LTD. Still concentrates on developing and manufacturing glass and mirrors for automotive and household use, but now it is using its well-established technology to turn out exquisite furniture as well.

The company was established in 1945, starting out by processing glass supplied by Taiwan Glass Corp. It has accumulated a rich store of experience in making both mirrors for general purposes and bathroom mirrors that require sophisticated grinding skills.

Fu Hwa currently has three major business units: conventional mirrors for the construction industry, rear-view mirrors for automobiles, and export-oriented products including furniture, sanitary products, and bathroom accessories. The export products are sold under the "Eurome" brand.

An in-house design department handles the development of innovative products, including both furniture and mirrors. Heading the department is Jerry Huang, executive assistant to the president, who is also in charge of launching design and product promotion activities.

Huang has shown off his latest successes at five or six international exhibitions abroad over the past several years.

In Taiwan, Huang says, "We manufacturers in conventional industries have to rely on research and development to beef up our international competitiveness, since we've lost ground to competitors from the developing countries which enjoy cheaper labor."

The company boasts three well trained and richly experienced designers, but to speed up the design of innovative products to meet the needs of foreign customers, it also cooperates with five design houses. "Some of the design houses are specialized in such areas as automobile parts and the 3C (computers, communications, and consumer electronics) industries," Huang notes. "The designs that they work out have really helped us to extend our design vision so that we can apply more sophisticated designs to our products."

Recognized Excellence

The company's long-term product-development efforts were recognized by the presentation to it of a "Product of Excellence" award by the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) in 2003.

If Taiwan's manufacturing sector wants to survive in the international marketplace, Huang stresses, it has to rely on special designs. "For instance," he explains, "Taiwan's 3C industries are famed for their special skills in making unique designs. If high-tech industries have to rely on special designs, conventional industries have to do the same thing-and devote more perspiration to the task."

In the early years of its life, Fu Hwa concentrated on the domestic market, but the domestic environment changed and the company began developing exports about 25 years ago. Today, its domestic sales are limited to interior decoration products and large construction projects. More than 90% of total production is exported, mostly to Europe.

Furniture accounts for only 15% to 20% of total exports. "We've only been in the furniture business for five or six years," Huang comments. "To boost our furniture exports, we're now making an all-out effort to increase the added value of our products via R&D. I'm confident that our furniture venture will succeed, because we have a strong advantage in our glass processing skills and well-established design capability."

To boost sales of its own-design furniture, Fu Hwa is promoting its products in upscale markets such as the U.S. and industrialized European countries. "Although the economic outlook is not very clear," Huang states, "we still have to upgrade our R&D so that we can develop furniture products full swing in preparation for the coming recovery."

"Over the past several years, the domestic furniture industry has developed a lot of unique and sophisticated designs thanks to the popularity of information technology. A lot of fancy furniture made by local manufacturers has been designed with help from that advanced technology."