Grundig has been a Chinese brand for decades, but it was slapped on multiband portables for years.(Maybe still is. I'm no longer using a radio for shortwave reception, preferring the SDRs on the web.) Some of those receivers were low-end junk, but I'm sure more than a few SWLs bought them on the promise of German craftsmanship implied in the name on the radio.Very true. Many “classic” brand names for companies that essentially no longer exist (or whose consumer electronics divisions have been closed) have been bought up by other entities, then licensed out, then sub-licensed out again, with design further outsourced, and actual manufacturing contracted amongst many different factories.
We’re at the point where the nameplate is meaningless.