Well, it is a long and complicated story. I will tell the story and you can make your own judgment.
Stage I: Buy from everyone. (2004–2010)
Back in early 2004, when China wanted to introduce high-speed trains to the whole country, it could not design and manufacture on its own. So the Chinese railway ministry organized an international bid. Many international bidders such as Kawasaki (Japan), Siemens (Germany), Bombardier(Canada) and Alstom(France) participated in the bid. Instead of choosing a single bidder, the Chinese railway ministry asked each company to design and produce their own type of high-speed trains. The conditions are that they have to be manufactured in China and they have to accept the signal standard from China.
Those companies happily accepted the term and conditions. So they licensed their own technology and built their individual trains.
Over the decade from 2004 to 2014, the Chinese high-speed railway network runs a variety of trains from different companies.
Here is the list:
CRH1
CRH1 was bought from Bombardier Regina series. Regina (train) - Wikipedia and its maximum speed is around 200km/h. In Chinese standard, it is not called high-speed trains.
The Regina series are commonly found from the trains in Europe. Their shapes are exactly the same.
CRH2
CRH2 was licensed from Kawasaki Heavy Industries (川崎重工業車両). The Japanese were too afraid of the Chinese copying their Shinkansen technology, so they chose an older version of Shinkansen E2-1000. This version is also called Yamabiko that runs on the JR-East railway network. Its speed is around 300km/h but the CRH2 speed was limited to 250km/h.
The original Japanese E2 version:
Yes, they are exactly the same because the Chinese bought from the Japanese. It is not stealing.
On 23 July 2011, a CRH1 and CRH2 collided on a bridge that caused 40 deaths Wenzhou train collision - Wikipedia. It was said to be a control network problem.
CRH3
CRH3 was designed by Siemens in Germany and manufactured in China. The license is based on the Velaro series: Siemens Velaro - Wikipedia. This type of trains are commonly seen in Germany, Spain, and Turkey.
Germany ICE:
British Eurostar:
Turkey TCDD:
They are all the same train!
CRH4
There is no CRH4 because 4 is the unlucky number in China!
CRH5
CRH5 was designed by Alstom in France. And it is licensed based on the New Pendolino - Wikipedia series. Its maximum speed is 280km/h.
See that? The Chinese people are actually enjoying trains from Canada, Japan, Germany, and France. We are not stealing technology. But we are buying them using real dollars!
Stage II: Mimic your own through joint ventures ( 2008–2014)
After trying out many different trains, the Chinese railway ministry selected the best performing train series and their corresponding companies. It then asked them to customize the train to meet the new demand: 380km/h. And those trains have to be compatible with Chinese railway signal standard and they have to be manufactured in China.
Japanese Quit
However, the Japanese refused to provide a customized design for the 380km/h standard because they think the 380 technology was the key to their latest Shinkansen and it has to be firstly applied in Japan. Their current standard E7 or 700 still runs around 350km/h. Then they decided to withdraw further production and all subsequent cooperations with China.
At the same time, the Chinese railway ministry also demanded new trains to be manufactured by joint-venture companies in China. This was also the reason why the Japanese chose to quit. But the Siemens and Bombardier agreed because most of their revenue is in China and they can’t lose a huge market of China.
After forming joint venture companies with Siemens and Bombardier, those Chinese domestic companies are responsible for manufacturing a fraction of components as domestic alternatives. Through hybrid manufacturing, they can quietly learn and master most of the design and manufacturing processes.
CRH380-A - First domestic Design
The CRH380A development started in early 2008, originally assigned to the Japanese to design the new 380km/h train for the proposed Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway. It was supposed to be the top brand of all. However, the Japanese decided to quit the project and they withdrew all the materials and key technologies to complete the project.
However, the Chinese decided to continue the project regardless of the Japanese’s pullout. However, they faced a vast barrier because the Japanese only revealed the technology applicable for 250km/h. And the Chinese don’t even have access to the whole control system source code.
To overcome the technology barrier, since late 2008, the Chinese railway ministry and ministry of science and technology established a special team called “Project 226”. The team was used to identify key technological problems from the gap. By using “communist administrative power”, the “Project 226” has organized talents from three domestic design firms: Qingdao Sifang, CRRC, and CR Tangshan, also 25 universities, 56 key laboratories and 500 OEMs in China. This includes over 500 researchers and 10000 engineers that contributed to this project.
In 2010, the Chinese have successfully designed their own vehicle integration, aerodynamics topology, load-bearing system, dynamic transmission, and braking system, train control operating system, traction power supply, key materials, and components etc.
Therefore, CRH380A was the first domestic design of the Chinese high-speed train. When it was released in 2010, the Japanese was so angry that they thought their technology was stolen by the Chinese. And the appearance of 380A was kind of similar to Shinkansen E2 series. What they didn’t understand is that if the technology was indeed stolen, how come the Chinese can improve the speed from 250km/h to 380km/h by themselves?
CRH380-B continues to use Siemens customized technology and the top speed was improved to 380km/h.
CRH380-C Changchun Railway Vehicle released a redesigned nose fitted onto a CRH380B body on 6 December 2010. It is called CRH380CL.
CRH380-D continues to use Bombardier’s technology. And it is specially designed for China for 380km/h and it was manufactured by Bombardier's joint venture Sifang (Qingdao) in China.
Stage III: Fully Domestic Design and Manufacture (2014–2018)
After 15 years of cultivation of talents and technology accumulation, the Chinese are finally starting to innovate and build their own high-speed trains, although some parts of the train component still need to be imported.
CRH6
CRH6 is a new generation of regional/commuter high-speed train designed by CSR Qingdao Sifang Locomotive & Rolling Stock. This train is targeted for low speed intercity commuting around 200km/h. China Railways CRH6 - Wikipedia
Fuxing
“Fuxing” is the first ever train series that are seriously considered as a high-standard Chinese brand. Fuxing means “Great rejuvenation of the Chinese” so that it would carry the desire and wishes of the Chinese.
Fuxing is designed and optimized based on the running data collected from 600,000-km of the existing high-speed train operations over the past 10 years, thanks to the large scale of Chinese railway networks, even Japan does not have this scale of data.
On 15 July 2016, two Fuxing trains in opposite directions passed each other at 420 km/h (relative speed to one another of 840 km/h) during test runs on Zhengzhou–Xuzhou high-speed railway. Nowadays, Fuxing trains operate on 350km/h along the most of high-speed railways, which is the world’s fastest non-maglev trains in commercial uses.
On 24th Dec 2018, the Christmas Eve, the CRRC just released four new types of Fuxing trains:
Beijing Winter Olympic Express - Fuxing type not yet revealed
And its interiors are the one of the best I’ve ever seen
Another new Fuxing train is the CR200J that runs up to 160km/h. This train will be very cheap to manufacture and it can also run on conventional railways.
This train will be replacing all the old green carriage trains in China and it will run along the poor regions that do not yet have high-speed trains.
From this:
To this:
In the future, we believe more and more types of domestic trains would be designed and manufactured. This has already created a lot of employment opportunities for the young Chinese. My younger brother majored in electrical engineering from one of the top universities in Beijing. He was just recruited as a graduate engineer in CRRC in Qingdao, which is the organization that designs and manufactures most of the bullet trains in China.
And guess how many interview candidates were attending CRRC interviews in 2018 from his university? 200 candidates! And they are all having a master degree! And CRRC is only selecting 10 people from them. Then you can imagine the extremely competitive interviews he went through. This is obviously more competitive than Google interviews. After hearing from him, I’ve sent him a big congratulation to this achievement.
Every year, the CRRC has amassed hundreds of best talents from all over China. Those people are not only smart but also hard working. Considering so many talents in CRRC, we should not under-estimate the engineering and innovation from them in the future. The company represents the new high-level Made-in-China brand just like the DJI in drone area.
Btw I’ve traveled many times to Japan. And I’ve bought the JR railway pass each time I traveled. And I also took the fastest Nozomi class from Hakata to Tokyo. Although the experience in Nozomi was pleasant especially with delicious bento, the train was shaking constantly when it enters in tunnels. In contrast, I felt that the experience in Fuxing was much smoother. Balancing a coin is not an issue.
And also the total trip from Fukuoka to Tokyo is around 1069km and it took me 5 hours and cost me 23,000 yen ($210). In contrast, the distance from Beijing to Shanghai is 1318km and it took me 4 hours 18 minutes in Fuxing and cost me 550RMB ($80). Given the fact I’ve listed, I think the Japanese do need to face up to the fact that the Chinese have done better.
Whether the Chinese steals from Japan or not, you can then make your judgment now.
And thanks for reading this long post.