As the US-China trade war and dispute over Taiwan rumbles on – and relations between other liberal democracies and Beijing deteriorate due to everything from intellectual property (IP) theft to human rights violations in Xinjiang and the erosion of Hong Kong's autonomy – many globally renowned companies are deserting China.

In fact, research firm Gartner revealed that a third of supply chain leaders had plans to move at least some of their manufacturing out of China by 2023. COVID-related sales slumps and supply chain disruption, as well as rising production costs, have hastened the exodus. Read on to discover which world-famous firms are partially or completely pulling out of the People's Republic. All dollar amounts in US dollars. 

With the US-China trade war showing no sign of abating, Stanley Black & Decker is also on the move. The industrial tools and household hardware maker permanently closed its factory in Shenzhen in November 2021 after 25 years of operation. Growing competition and rising labour and land costs were cited as reasons for the closure. Stanley Black & Decker had planned to open its brand new 425,000-square-foot, $90 million (£68.5m) factory in Fort Worth, Texas by the end of 2020, but it was delayed until 2021.

As relations between the US and China worsened and the trade conflict intensified, Dell quietly moved production and supply chains away from the People's Republic. In fact, the Nikkei Asian Review reported in 2019 that the Texas-headquartered tech company was planning to shift up to 30% of its notebook production out of China.

That same Nikkei Asian Review report cited anonymous sources stating that Dell competitor HP was also planning to relocate 30% of its notebook production away from China. The reasoning behind both moves was to avoid the punishing US tariffs on tech products produced in the People's Republic for the US market. In 2021, it was also reported that HP has sold its Chinese laser printer production to Taiwanese company Foxconn. 

Nike's suppliers have been relocating production facilities to southeast Asia and Africa for some time now, and the company reviewed its supply chains in Xinjiang too following stories of the alleged mistreatment of Muslim Uyghurs in the region. Swathes of Chinese people then boycotted international brands such as Nike who chose to speak out against what was happening in Xinjiang. Sales of Nike products in the country have fallen due to this and COVID lockdowns.

American firm Hasbro moved a significant proportion of its production out of China to factories in Vietnam and India. Amid the ongoing US-China trade war, the world's number-one publicly listed toymaker expected to produce around half of goods destined for the American market in China by the end of 2020, down from just under two-thirds in 2019. 

Though Intel remains confident in the Chinese economy and is strongly committed to operating in the country, the Silicon Valley-based semiconductor chipmaker has followed many US companies by shifting the manufacturing and assembly of some of its wares from the People's Republic to Vietnam.

Intel’s former CEO Bob Swan also wrote to then-President-Elect Joe Biden in November 2020, outlining the necessity of a “national manufacturing strategy” to “ensure American companies compete on a level playing field” in response to the likely scenario of China dominating the semiconductor chip production industry in the next decade. The company’s CEO Pat Gelsinger reinforced this message in March 2021 when he announced a $20 billion (£14.4bn) plan to build two new chip manufacturing facilities in Arizona. Intel then announced that September that it would be investing up to $95 billion (£68.2bn) in producing chips in Europe as the company seeks to add production capacity during the global semiconductor shortage.

American companies aren't the only ones retreating from China. South Korea's Samsung Electronics shut its remaining smartphone factory in the country in 2019, reportedly turning the city in which it was based into a ghost town. Further closures were announced in 2020, with Samsung ceasing production at its last PC plant in China in August 2022, instead moving operations to Vietnam, and the company also shuttered its only TV factory in the country in November 2020.

Instead, Samsung will reportedly focus on chip manufacturing within the US. According to Kim Young-woo at SK Securities, the company has "been rethinking their strategies because of the US-China technology war, and they are now tilting further towards the US because of geopolitical risks". The decision is likely to have been motivated by the US CHIPS and Science Act, signed into law on 9 August 2022, which grants billions of dollars to chip manufacturers in the US on the condition they don't expand chip operations in China for the next 10 years. 

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Fellow South Korean firm LG Electronics has followed in the footsteps of Samsung and relocated the manufacturing of some of its products from China. In an effort to avert hefty US tariffs, the company shifted all production of refrigerators bound for the American market from China's Zhejiang Province to South Korea. 

Unlike its arch-rival Adidas, which has halved its Chinese manufacturing since 2010, Puma is still feeling the effects of a Chinese consumer boycott, sparked by statements it made about the treatment of Uyghur Muslims in March 2021. The company, which used to make more than a quarter of its products in the People's Republic, is keen to diversify its manufacturing base and supply chains, not to mention avoiding US tariffs. It's now producing more of its running shoes, sportswear, and other products in Bangladesh, Cambodia, Indonesia, and Vietnam.

Global accommodation giant Airbnb has stopped all its Chinese listings as COVID-19 lockdowns hit the tourism market in the country hard. Reports say the company will maintain an office in China to help Chinese tourists booking elsewhere in the world, but it's given up on a domestic market it entered in 2016.

In a bid to reduce the country's reliance on China, the Japanese government set aside 243.5 billion yen ($2.2bn/£1.7bn) in April 2020 in order to incentivise domestic companies to pivot production away from the People's Republic and into Japan and southeast Asia. Among the 87 firms that benefitted from state subsidies is world-renowned consumer electronics company Sharp, which is majority owned by Taiwan's Foxconn.

Joining other South Korean companies such as Samsung and LG that are turning their backs on China, automaker Kia Motors shut one of its key plants in the country in 2019. The Seoul-based company has put the closure down to slumping sales in the People's Republic as a result of a boycott in 2017 of South Korean companies, which was precipitated by the South Korean military's deployment of a US-made missile defence system. As of 2021, China accounted for just 5.6% of Kia vehicle sales, compared to 16.8% in Europe, 19.2% in Korea, and 21.2% in the US. 

Unsurprisingly Kia’s parent company, Hyundai Motor Group, has also taken steps to shift manufacturing away from China. With sales in the country flagging following the 2017 boycott of South Korean businesses, the company closed its Beijing plant in May 2019. The company posted operating losses of 1.152 trillion won ($1bn/£726m) in China for 2020, which was its worst performance since Hyundai Motor Group was first established in the People’s Republic in 2002. While production in China has dropped, the firm is boosting manufacturing of its vehicles in India.

Likewise, Hyundai Mobis, which supplies parts for Hyundai Motor Group and Kia, has followed their lead by closing its plant in Beijing. Having cut production in China, the company has ramped up investment in South Korea, where it is set to build a third electric vehicle components factory in the city of Pyeongtaek. The facility was scheduled to be up and running by the latter half of 2021 and is in addition to similar plants in the cities of Chungju and Ulsan.

Google is more or less blocked in China, but the search engine's parent company Alphabet still produces hardware products in the country, although perhaps not for much longer. As supply chains have become disrupted, the tech behemoth has moved manufacturing of its flagship Pixel smartphone to Vietnam and will reportedly produce various smart home products in Thailand rather than the People's Republic, while production of its Cloud motherboards and Nest products has relocated to Taiwan and Malaysia.

Shifting production away from China has been a longer process than hoped, because of outbreaks of COVID-19 in countries such as Vietnam, but some of Google's latest Pixel phones are now being made in the country, according to sources quoted in the New York Times in September 2022. 

Now owned by Microsoft, the careers networking site has closed its Chinese site. LinkedIn senior vice-president Mohak Shroff wrote: "We're facing a significantly more challenging operating environment and greater compliance requirements in China." LinkedIn had been criticised for blocking the profiles of some journalists. It launched a jobs-only version of the site, called InCareer, in December 2021.

Even before COVID-19 disrupted supply chains and the US-China trade war turned even uglier, American action camera company GoPro had relocated much of its US-bound manufacturing away from China to Mexico, a move that was announced back in December 2018.

Sony closed its smartphone plant in Beijing in 2019 and moved production to a factory near Bangkok, Thailand. However, the Japanese tech company was at pains to stress that the move was prompted by disappointing sales and rising costs in China rather than the US-China trade conflict. Sony also opted to move its regional executives from Hong Kong to Singapore in July 2020.

New York investment bank BlackRock was planning to become a major player in the Chinese market. In August 2020, the world's largest asset-managing business garnered approval from the China Securities Regulatory Commission to launch a wholly-owned mutual fund arm in Shanghai. In May 2021, the bank also received a licence for a majority-owned wealth management venture, which it planned to own in partnership with China Construction Corp and Singapore state investor Temasek Holdings. 

But in November 2022, the company announced that it had "indefinitely" postponed the launch of its exchange traded fund (ETF) in China. According to the Financial Times, BlackRock made the U-turn as a result of US-China tensions and the risk of political backlash, as well as the fact that US treasury bonds currently deliver a higher return than Chinese bonds. 

In 2019, Nintendo moved some production of its Switch console from China to Vietnam. Like Sony, however, the Japanese video games company said the move has nothing to do with the US-China trade war and was more about diversifying its manufacturing options and avoiding putting all its eggs in one basket.

Steve Madden shoes and handbags will no longer be produced in China. The New York-based fashion company was hit by Trump administration-imposed tariffs and plans to gradually move production of its footwear and accessories to Cambodia, Brazil, Mexico and Vietnam in order to keep costs for its US customers on an even keel. After suspending the process because of the pandemic, Steve Madden began shifting production away from China in 2021.

Companies are not only relocating their manufacturing operations away from China, but many foreign retailers have decided to bow out of the country altogether. They include Gap sub-brand Old Navy, which shuttered all of its 10 stores and concessions in China in March 2020, planning to focus its attention on the North American market instead.

In light of the US-China trade War, American sportswear and casual apparel company Under Armour mapped out a plan to reduce its reliance on manufacturing in China in favour of countries such as Vietnam, Jordan, the Philippines and Indonesia. The company had a plan to source just 7% of its products from China by 2023, down from 18% in 2018. 

British fashion retailer Superdry, which is known the world over for its coats, T-shirts and other clothing that fuse classic Americana with Japanese-inspired graphics, is also bowing out of the mainland Chinese market following a strategic review. Amid lacklustre sales, the firm decided to close 25 company-owned stores and 41 franchise locations. Like many companies, Superdry is also increasingly importing clothing from Indian suppliers instead of China. 

Space NK has also struggled in China. Founded in London's Covent Garden in 1993, the luxury beauty retailer entered the Chinese market in 2018 but decided to exit the country in 2020, shutting its eight active locations. 

The New York Times decided to move part of its Hong Kong office to Seoul, South Korea, in response to Beijing's controversial security law which came into effect in June 2020. The law curtails freedom of speech in the Special Administrative Region. According to the US news outlet, the law "unsettled news organisations and created uncertainty about [Hong Kong's] prospects as a hub for journalism". 

The move came hot on the heels of Naver's announced withdrawal from Hong Kong. The South Korean web services firm, which owns a majority of Line, Japan's answer to WhatsApp, was the first major foreign company to leave the Special Administrative Region due to privacy concerns. The business planned to relocate its data back-up centre to Singapore.

Taiwan's Quanta Computer is the world's third-biggest electronics manufacturing services company and a major supplier of data centre servers to US tech firms such as Google and Facebook. The company opted to pivot production away from China and moved some of its manufacturing from the country to a new $500 million (£383m) plant in the Taiwanese municipality of Taoyuan in 2019.

California-based Blizzard Entertainment, the business behind hit video games such as World of Warcraft, officially left China in January this year after ending its agreement with Chinese technology company NetEase. In November 2022 Blizzard announced that it had been unable to reach a deal that was “consistent with Blizzard’s operating principles and commitments to players and employees", while NetEase said the firms couldn't agree on key terms. 

NetEase is the second largest gaming company in China, but shares plummeted by around 11% in the wake of the announcement. Attempts by Blizzard to extend the contract by six months reportedly fell flat, and when the deal finally expired on 23 January, big-name games that had been available in the country since 2008 were removed from servers. Simon Zhu, president of global investments and partnerships at NetEase, described the server shutdown as "such a sad moment to witness."

Dentons, the world's biggest law firm by number of employees, has chosen to separate from its Chinese arm. From August this year, Dentons' branch in China has operated as a standalone business using its current local name Dacheng, although it will continue to partner with Dentons as the law company's "preferred firm."

In a statement, Dentons said it was siphoning off its Chinese business because of "new mandates and requirements relating to data privacy, cybersecurity, capital control, and governance."

In January this year, Texas-based company Dell Technologies announced it will be phasing out its use of China-made chips, as well as telling its suppliers to reduce the number of Chinese components they provide. 

"We continuously explore supply-chain diversification across the globe that makes sense for our customers and our business," Dell said in a statement. Its shift away from China came shortly after the Biden administration imposed controls that limited the export of US semiconductor chips to the People's Republic, while also blacklisting Chinese chipmaker YMTC and 21 "major" AI companies.

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