What's Wrong With That Picture: Besturn B70 Wins Top Chinese Design Award

Bertel Schmitt
by Bertel Schmitt

And the winner is (left.)

China’s 11th Five-Year Plan (they still have one of those) encourages industrial design as one of the six key modern service sectors that will receive priority support from the central government.

One of these support measures was the creation of a government-sponsored patent award, which “ aims to boost the nation’s intellectual property strategy and accelerate creation of proprietary intellectual property,” as Gasgoo put it.

FAW’s Besturn B70 was the only design patent to win a gold medal at the 11th China Patent Awards in Beijing. There is just a small niggling problem:

The Besturn B70 is based on the Mazda 6 (properly licensed by FAW). The car is hardly original, save for its front headlight array, which “broke the old design model and perfectly complemented the whole”, the awards appraisal said. Maybe they should have left the headlights alone. Wouldn’t have won any gold medals, but possibly more customers. “Chinese industrial design began in the 1980s and is still in an early stage of development, lagging far behind many developed nations,” says Gasgoo in its infinite wisdom. Onward to the next 5 year plan, due out in 2011.

Bertel Schmitt
Bertel Schmitt

Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.

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  • 50merc 50merc on Feb 15, 2010

    Well, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Actually, I prefer the B70's look to the current Mazda6, which is too squashed and gimmicky, as well as a bit oversized in my opinion. FAW's website is all in Chinese (duh) except, curiously, a few English words like "NEW" and "Service Idea". I recall getting into a taxi in Tokyo years ago and wondering why the labels on the domestic market Toyota's instrument panel were in English.

  • Sajeev Mehta Sajeev Mehta on Feb 15, 2010

    I wonder if design schools like Art Center or CCS have plans for a branch in China anytime soon. Because they sure as heck need it.

  • Billy Bobb 2 Billy Bobb 2 on Feb 15, 2010

    "Sinophobic". LOL! How should we define this new word?

  • Niky Niky on Feb 15, 2010

    The previous Mazda6 isn't a bad car to base your design on. Only real issue is the lack of sound insulation, and if you're designing a shell from the ground up, then that's not a problem... not unless you make the same design choices as Mazda. Sinophobe? I'd say Bertel is a Sinophile.

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