Medical dressings are medical supplies classified as sanitary materials, and they have always held a significant share in China's export trade. Currently, China's export volume of medical dressings accounts for more than 20% of the global total.
　　"Although exports continue to maintain a high growth rate, it is important to note that China's medical dressing exports to the European and American markets have shown signs of saturation. Coupled with fierce competition within the industry, a considerable number of export companies have shifted their target markets to emerging markets such as Saudi Arabia, Brazil, and Russia. It is foreseeable that in the future, China's medical dressing industry will face more difficulties and more intense market competition," Professor Xi Tingfei from the Frontier Interdisciplinary Research Institute of Peking University analyzed at the "2015 Tuoren·8th China Medical Consumables Conference" held in Henan recently.
　　New difficulties continuously emerge
　　"It can be said that over the past 30 years, the development status of the medical dressing industry in China's manufacturing sector has been relatively good. Currently, the global medical dressing industry is still mainly concentrated in China," said Cui Jinhai, President of Aomei Medical, who has over 30 years of experience in the medical dressing industry.
　　According to him, China's medical dressing industry has generally gone through four stages. The first stage began in the mid-1980s, when the industry's product supply was relatively simple—mainly raw gauze; the second stage was in the 1990s, when companies began purchasing large quantities of raw materials for deep processing and then shipping products to Europe, North America, and other regions for packaging. During this stage, raw material supply and enterprises developed diversely, and the industry gradually grew stronger; the third stage began in the early 21st century, with the industry developing into deep processing and packaging production. During this stage, the industry benefited from China's market and demographic dividends. Many companies began to transform and upgrade, evolving from producing primary raw materials to integrated design of products, equipment, and factories, making products more refined, controlling costs to the "extreme," and pushing the industry to a peak, resulting in leading companies such as Wenjian, Aomei, and Zhende.
　　"However, when the industry reaches the fourth stage, you will find that the market's 'tailwind' is not as easy to catch. The original population and market dividends are diminishing, and the industry faces many new difficulties," Cui Jinhai shifted his tone, saying that currently China's medical dressing industry faces obvious challenges in six areas: order pressure, raw material prices, company funds, labor costs, environmental responsibilities, and risk control.
　　The impact of fluctuations in raw material prices for medical dressings on manufacturing companies has long caused significant reactions within the industry. Cui Jinhai has repeatedly commented on this issue in public. At this conference, he pointed out that the main raw material for medical dressings is cotton; however, in recent years, cotton prices in China have fluctuated dramatically, reaching as high as 27,000 yuan per ton and as low as just over 10,000 yuan per ton.
　　Regarding funding, the industry's cash flow used to be very good, with many companies serving developed markets. Now, some companies have grown in scale, and with fluctuations in raw and auxiliary material prices, funds are becoming increasingly tight. In terms of labor costs, initially, the average monthly wage of ordinary workers in medical dressing manufacturing companies was no more than 200 yuan; now it is 2,500 to 2,600 yuan, excluding social insurance. Today, companies face rising costs for low-end talent and difficulties in attracting high-end talent.
　　"Currently, demand in traditional export markets such as Europe, America, and Japan is approaching saturation. Domestic prices are rising rapidly, and costs for labor, raw materials, and freight have increased accordingly, leading to higher export trade quotations. The cost-effective domestic medical dressings are losing their competitive advantage in the international market. Additionally, Southeast Asian countries' currencies are gradually depreciating, and with their lower labor and raw material costs, their product price advantages are becoming apparent, capturing some market share. At the same time, international trade protectionism is rising, with Europe and America imposing non-tariff barriers such as higher quality thresholds, anti-dumping, and countervailing measures to restrict China's medical dressing exports," Xi Tingfei also pointed out.
　　In recent years, domestic manufacturing has generally faced new issues of increased energy-saving and environmental protection responsibilities. According to Cui Jinhai, although the medical dressing industry faces less pressure on energy consumption and environmental protection than other manufacturing sectors, it encounters significant problems regarding energy. "Electricity prices are too high, and unstable power quality greatly affects production equipment. We invested hundreds of thousands of yuan to introduce foreign equipment to control voltage instability." He also noted that domestic companies currently face new challenges in risk control capabilities. Some companies have aspirations to enter the capital market, but it should be understood that listing is a "double-edged sword" for companies. Companies appear very weak in the capital market, and financing outcomes may cause some good companies to become less healthy.
　　"Due to relatively low industry entry barriers, domestic medical dressing products suffer from serious homogenization, forming a vicious cycle of low-price competition. Additionally, exported medical dressing products are mainly OEM exports, with few domestic companies establishing their own brands in the international market. Some export companies lack their own export sales channels, relying mainly on foreign distributors," Xi Tingfei analyzed.
　　Seizing opportunities to reshape fundamentals
　　Although the medical dressing manufacturing industry faces complex situations and difficulties, many experts attending the conference remain optimistic about the prospects of the international medical dressing market. Professionals from the Medical Insurance Chamber of Commerce believe that there are still huge business opportunities in the current medical dressing market, and domestic companies should actively respond to difficulties and take strong measures to "break the ice."
　　"With the increasingly prominent global aging population problem and the resulting increase in patients with ulcers, pressure sores, and other conditions, international demand for medical dressings will continue to grow. With the advancement of China's medical reform, the development of personalized treatment, and changes in population structure, China's medical dressing manufacturing industry will usher in a period of rapid development," Xi Tingfei pointed out. The State Council announced "Made in China 2025" on May 8 this year, proposing a three-step strategy for building China into a manufacturing powerhouse over three decades.
　　Moreover, among the "Ten Key Development Areas," it clearly states the need to improve innovation capabilities and industrialization levels of medical devices, focusing on developing high-performance diagnostic and treatment equipment such as imaging devices and medical robots, high-value medical consumables like fully degradable vascular stents, wearable and remote medical products, and achieving breakthroughs and applications in new technologies such as biological 3D printing and induced pluripotent stem cells. This will greatly promote the development of China's medical device and medical dressing fields.
　　"From Industry 1.0 to Industry 4.0, the change in production methods results from the continuous interaction between productivity and production relations. Its manifestation is the continuous growth of all elements such as people, machines, enterprises, customers, and suppliers, continuously eliminating non-value-added processes between elements, ultimately forming a value chain. Its core is value upgrading and direct connection. The development history of China's medical dressing industry is the evolution process of value upgrading and direct connection in the dressing industry," Cui Jinhai believes. On the path of transformation and upgrading of the medical dressing industry, some companies can adopt development strategies such as shifting from export to domestic sales, from OEM to brand, from low-end to high-end, from extensive to refined, and extending the industrial chain. Through continuous innovation in strategic management, business models, products, processes, and equipment, they can reshape their corporate fundamentals.