Your supply chain probably looks like a spider web with China sitting right in the middle. Most companies built this way because it worked. Cheap labour, solid infrastructure, everything you needed under one roof.
Then 2020 happened. Trade wars got nastier. Shipping containers disappeared. Factories shut down for months. Suddenly, that spider web started looking more like a death trap.
China Plus One strategy sounds simple on paper - keep some operations in China, spread the rest around. Reality check, though? Companies have been trying to crack this code since 2014, when labour costs started climbing. Most attempts failed spectacularly because they treated it like moving furniture instead of rewiring their entire operation.
The difference between companies that nail this strategy and those that burn cash trying comes down to understanding what you're actually solving for. This isn't about finding China's cheaper cousin. It's about building antifragile supply chains that get stronger when things go sideways.