China's space group markets name, logo

By Christopher Bodeen
The Associated Press

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This is China's final frontier of modern marketing — or, at least, its most recent one.

After joining Russia and the United States last month as the only countries to send a human into space, China's space program is eagerly marketing its name and logo. Sponsorships are splashed on billboards, product packaging, and in radio and television ads.

There's "space" milk from Mengniu ("Mongol Cow"), which promises to "fortify the Chinese people" and shows a space-suited boy clutching a glass of creamy goodness. Mengniu is headquartered in Inner Mongolia, where Shenzhou 5 and astronaut Yang Liwei landed Oct. 16 after a 21-1/2-hour mission.

There's the "Chinese Inaugural Manned Space Flight Command Watch," produced in a limited run of 2,003, available by mail for 980 yuan ($120) complete with compass and pedometer.

In the United States, commercial tie-ins with NASA have produced product endorsements from Tang and Velcro to Omega watches and Parker pens.

In China, though, an odd blend of enthusiastic marketing and zealous secrecy reflects the paradox of the "socialist market economy" — Beijing's label for its current mix of rigid communist control and uncharted, freeform capitalism.

The space program is a huge source of prestige for the government and seems to be genuinely popular. A space-program endorsement is "definitely good for establishing brand name," said a director of promotions at Fiyta, which made the watch the taikonaut Yang wore in space.

China's space program is run by the military and shrouded in secrecy, so it isn't known how endorsements have been awarded.

It isn't known how much money endorsements have already earned the program or how the funds have been used. The Nongfu Spring company said it paid $1.2 million for a five-year deal as the program's exclusive drinking water supplier.

A Fiyta spokesman said his company probably got its berth because a majority stake in its parent company is held by the government's China Aviation Equipment Group.

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