A Rubik's Cube is sold for several hundred yuan, and this company earns 300 million yuan annually. | Insight Global
Editor's Note: As globalization increasingly becomes the core strategy for many Chinese companies, how to compete in the global market has become an extremely professional topic. In the evolution of globalization, many Chinese brands have emerged at the forefront. In view of this, Hardcore氪specially launches the "Insight Global" column to explore the cutting-edge directions and opportunities of global brands from the growth and changes of brands, providing thoughts and inspirations for Chinese brand players and the industry.
This is the 34th issue of our column - Jiang Ganyuan, the founder of "GANCUBE", is the first Chinese Rubik's Cube speed-solving competition champion, and the Rubik's Cube has completely changed his destiny. He started a business with the Rubik's Cube and also sold it to the world. It ranks first in the detailed categories of multiple overseas e-commerce platforms, and achieved an annual income of 300 million yuan last year. To explore how this small Rubik's Cube goes global, we had a chat with him.
Author | Zhang Ziyi
Editor | Yuan Silai
Many Chinese people must have a common childhood memory. It comes from a toy store or a grocery store near home. It is not expensive, has a cube structure, can be twisted and the color arrangement can be disrupted. The ultimate goal is to restore each side of it to the same color.
It is the Rubik's Cube, invented by Hungarian architect Ernő Rubik in 1974. Rubik's original intention in inventing it was to use it as an auxiliary teaching tool to train students' spatial thinking ability and memory.
The Rubik's Cube has 43 quintillion scrambling methods and endless possibilities for restoration. Therefore, the Rubik's Cube, as a puzzle toy, has been popular all over the world for many years and has endured. In half a century, 500 million have been sold.
The Rubik's Cube is both a toy and more than just a toy. Some people use it to participate in Rubik's Cube competitions, and some people make it a successful business.
In 1998, on the train back to his hometown, Jiang Ganyuan's father gave him a Rubik's Cube. This infinitely rotatable Rubik's Cube aroused his infinite curiosity. From the train to the way home, he kept twisting the Rubik's Cube, referring to the English manual that he didn't quite understand. Two days after returning home, he restored the first Rubik's Cube in his life.
The Rubik's Cube that is twisted layer by layer connects Jiang Ganyuan's life. In 2006, he became the first Chinese Rubik's Cube speed-solving competition champion. He started a business with the Rubik's Cube and established Guangzhou Ganyuan Intelligent Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Ganyuan Technology") in 2014, founding the Rubik's Cube brand GANCUBE to produce speed-solving Rubik's Cubes.
In the following ten years, GANCUBE's Rubik's Cubes were sold all over the world, ranking first in the detailed categories of multiple overseas e-commerce platforms, and achieving an annual income of 300 million yuan last year.
"If I wasn't in a closed environment back then, without a mobile phone to play with, and if I didn't have a bit of a research spirit and would still think about the Rubik's Cube after getting off the train, maybe none of this would have happened today." Jiang Ganyuan told Hardcore氪.
So, what does a small Rubik's Cube go through when it goes global?
01 Opening Channels and Deepening the Industrial Chain
When Jiang Ganyuan first started making Rubik's Cubes, he took many detours.
Jiang Ganyuan described the state of making Rubik's Cubes before 2012 as "working in isolation", not understanding the needs of ordinary consumers for Rubik's Cubes. Although his background as a professional player made him know the Rubik's Cube better than ordinary people, he was not familiar with the back-end industry. This led to the company's Rubik's Cube products being unsatisfactory, with poor product sales and continuous losses. At that time, the partner decided to withdraw his shares, which hit him hard.
He wondered whether it was because he didn't do well or the market was not good. Jobs' autobiography gave him a considerable shock, making him realize that the product itself is the core. Later, with his identity as the Rubik's Cube champion, he visited the Rubik's Cube factory where his products were produced and began to understand how the Rubik's Cube was manufactured from the source.
"Before that, I found foundries to produce, and I didn't understand the various details of Rubik's Cube production at all. I was really like a frog at the bottom of a well. Later, when I started over, I was particularly careful in finding foundries. I would see how they produced molds and processed parts. At the beginning, there were few orders, and the factories used their spare time to help me produce. Sometimes at 12 midnight, they would call me and say they were available now, and I would immediately run over to the scene to see how they assembled and talk to the technical people." Jiang Ganyuan told Hardcore氪.
The small overall industry of the Rubik's Cube also makes it lack a complete set of supporting facilities and relatively mature factories in the industrial chain. Currently, among the top Rubik's Cube brands, except for Ganyuan Technology located in Guangzhou, the others are basically gathered in Chenghai District, Shantou City, Guangdong Province.
The setbacks and lessons in Jiang Ganyuan's early entrepreneurial stage made him realize the importance of the supply chain and decided to build his own factory. In 2023, Ganyuan Technology moved its production and R&D base to Chencun, Shunde, launched a fully automated production line, and enabled three self-developed flexible production machines. The automatic production line can also leverage AI to achieve rapid and high-precision manufacturing and assembly, solving the problems of production capacity and product quality control.
The rapid growth of GANCUBE is also inseparable from the multi-dimensional layout of its sales channels. In 2019, Jiang Ganyuan realized the expansion of overseas distributors, but the products remained in the private domain, making GANCUBE not fully understand the needs of overseas consumers. Therefore, he decided to develop overseas TOC e-commerce channels and open an Amazon store.
In 2024, GANCUBE's target sales on Amazon reached 200 million yuan. Jiang Ganyuan believes that after going through the initial stage of exploring the platform's rules, the company's operation on Amazon has been quite smooth, and Amazon accounts for 80% of the overseas e-commerce platforms.
In the Southeast Asian market, at the end of 2021, they entered Lazada, and in just 1 month, the GMV increased by 10 times. By August, it increased by 83 times, becoming the number one in the puzzle toy category on Lazada, and second only to the Lego brand in the toy category; In the Latin American market, GANCUBE entered the Mercado Libre Mexico site and operated an official store. After the store was launched in the first week, it entered the Best Seller list.
However, the operation in the Southeast Asian market poses many challenges for GANCUBE, and it has encountered many problems such as plagiarism, counterfeiting, and infringement of intellectual property rights.
Since 2008, the global production and sales of Rubik's Cubes have been completely monopolized by Chinese manufacturers, and the well-known Rubik's Cube brands are also from China. If the Chinese did not produce Rubik's Cubes, people around the world might not have Rubik's Cubes to play with.
In this niche track of the Rubik's Cube, there are many kinds of enterprises, and the products can range from a few yuan to several hundred yuan. GANCUBE takes the latter path, which has more space for profit and growth.
And Jiang Ganyuan does not want to stop there.
02 How to Sell Rubik's Cubes at a High Price?
With his fingers turning back and forth, in about ten seconds, Jiang Ganyuan restored the Rubik's Cube in his hand. On the other end of the APP, the person competing with him was still turning the Rubik's Cube. The APP recognized the status of both Rubik's Cubes in real time and automatically timed. Jiang Ganyuan won the first round; In the second round, it was again about ten seconds, and Jiang Ganyuan finished the restoration, while the opponent was still turning. After winning two consecutive rounds, the competition ended early.
The Internet-connected and interactive Rubik's Cube in Jiang Ganyuan's hand is the intelligent Rubik's Cube he produced, which is one of the important product innovations of GANCUBE in the past five years. In his opinion, the intelligent Rubik's Cube can solve many pain points of Rubik's Cube players.
Reducing the learning threshold is an important step. Although the Rubik's Cube is promoted as a puzzle toy to the world, the entry threshold is extremely high. If you don't study it carefully, many people will give up at the beginning of playing.
In the early days of GANCUBE's establishment, Jiang Ganyuan refined the manual of the Rubik's Cube. He once posted the initial version on Weibo and invited netizens to find errors. For this, he gave away 100 Rubik's Cubes. He put the Rubik's Cube restoration formulas that he had learned and sorted out in the past in the manual. "If adults play the Rubik's Cube and carefully read the manual, they can learn to restore the Rubik's Cube in three or four hours."
In fact, the scrambled shapes of each Rubik's Cube are different. Whether it is reading the manual or watching the teaching video, it is still not easy to learn to restore.
GANCUBE's intelligent Rubik's Cube can provide a teaching section through the app to guide users in real time on how to correctly turn the Rubik's Cube, and even if they make mistakes, they can be corrected in time.
Data shows that the success rate of traditional self-taught Rubik's Cube is less than 5%, while the success rate of using the intelligent Rubik's Cube can be increased to about 30%.
The intelligent sensing components used in GANCUBE's intelligent Rubik's Cube can not only make the Rubik's Cube automatically restored, but also digitize the restoration trajectory. "We can present a real thing in the digital space. This is an ability of digital twinning, and this is our core."
This means that the intelligent Rubik's Cube can realize the linkage of hardware and software. The trajectory of the user's practice is recorded, and the data feedback through the app can improve the restoration speed.
The intelligent Rubik's Cube can also realize real-time battles among global users; The networking function enables automatic timing, eliminating the need for manual starting and timing in traditional competitions, making the competition process more convenient and efficient.
The technology used in the intelligent Rubik's Cube also feeds back into other Rubik's Cube products of GANCUBE, such as automatic return. There are more than 100 magnets installed in the Rubik's Cube, and it can be completely returned by a slight turn.
Due to the medium to high unit price, with the most expensive one costing about 600 yuan, the intelligent Rubik's Cube accounts for less than 20% of GANCUBE's revenue. GANCUBE also launched magnetic Rubik's Cubes, lightweight Rubik's Cubes, Rubik's Cube robots and other products. Players can choose different Rubik's Cube series such as beginner, advanced training, and intellectual competition according to their own levels.
Jiang Ganyuan emphasizes the technicality of GANCUBE's Rubik's Cube, and the product will be continuously adjusted in terms of feel and weight. Through providing different structural components such as corner block magnetism, edge block magnetism, wheelbase, and elasticity inside the Rubik's Cube, players can adjust the Rubik's Cube independently to achieve the best feel.
In Jiang Ganyuan's view, the product value of the Rubik's Cube is that it is not just a toy, but also a sports equipment.
"If it is just a toy, as long as it is beautiful and safe, no one will pay for these improvements we have made. But when the Rubik's Cube is used as a competitive sport, the technology we develop is able to make professional players progress. Even if it makes him improve by 0.5 seconds, it is very important." Jiang Ganyuan said.
The Rubik's Cube is not a very popular category in toys, but as a competitive game tool, it has many fans all over the world. The WCA (World Cube Association) is the world's highest-level Rubik's Cube speed-solving championship event. Since 2003, the event has been held every two years. In addition to the WCA, there are many types of Rubik's Cube competitions held globally, and there are also many provincial, municipal, and university club Rubik's Cube competitions in China.
Many Rubik's Cube manufacturers will sponsor Rubik's Cube competitions, establish Rubik's Cube teams, and sign Rubik's Cube players. The Rubik's Cube as a competitive sport gives manufacturers the space and potential to improve the performance and price range of products, and is conducive to building brand influence.
Jiang Ganyuan believes that since the establishment of GANCUBE in 2014, the sales revenue has increased from less than one million yuan to 70 to 80 million yuan in 2019. One of the major reasons is that it has taken advantage of the global popularity of the Rubik's Cube competitive sport. During the epidemic, home restrictions led to a significant increase in Rubik's Cube players.
The data from the WCA found that since 2003, the number of new Rubik's Cube players has increased by about 40% - 50% each year. Hardcore氪learned that currently, 8 of the top 10 players in the world in the Rubik's Cube competition (referring to the world average ranking of the 3x3x3 Rubik's Cube) are signed players of GANCUBE. Before GANCUBE launches a new product, the product will be used by the above-mentioned signed players and feedback will be adjusted before it is launched. Jiang Ganyuan has been in close communication with the core players of the Rubik's Cube for many years to understand product needs.
"The entire market is growing. Even if you just lie there, you can earn a growth of more than 40%. Moreover, we are very dedicated in making products, and we treat it as a competitive product." Jiang Ganyuan said.
China's industrial belts supply toys to the world. After manufacturing cheap products for decades, they have also reached a point of upgrading. GANCUBE has fought out a high value-added path in a niche track, which may bring inspiration to toy manufacturers trapped in low-price competition.