Well, Richard, to repeat the point: it's a business.
Chinese manufacturing is known for brazen intellectual property theft, so it's expected they will steal elements of lens design and camera design, manufacturing processes, and other patents. Remember that Chinese companies do not have to be profitable in the standard sense: unlike in the West, the CCP views full employment and complete control over business activity as political tools to remain in power. Chinese industries are heavily subsidized and gifted ridiculous advantages (like permission for extreme environmental degradation or violating international law) over their counterparts. Most Americans don't realize that Chinese labor is generally more expensive than comparable countries, not less. Higher-skilled Mexican labor, for example, is far less expensive. So is labor in most of SE Asia, Central and South America, and Africa. The Chinese make this work by edging their way into countries' individual business sectors, stealing their technologies, taking over their markets with lower prices, and finally jacking prices up when they have a monopoly. Just look at the buyer's regret that Brazil has: huge chunks of Brazilian manufacturing lie dead and Brazil may take decades to recover if it ever does. Countries in Africa and South America are slapping tariffs on Chinese goods because they don't want the Brazilian experience and China openly set its sights on gutting numerous markets there when Trump hit them with high tariffs.
If Canon is trying to protect their business from this, good for them. I wish them luck, support them by buying their products, and hope hope hope they win out. Heck, I might even buy a Sony compact camera for overseas travel (oh, the horror!). I'm not going to help kill the goose that laid the golden egg. I'd rather have Canon, Nikon and Sony gear as the majority market than Laowa or Siriu cameras and lenses that eventually put photography under a Chinese yoke.
