I've not been to Qingdao for several years but it has a long hertiage of manufacturing and shipbuilding etc. I doubt this has changed and I can see it easily being home to the growing China middle class with disposable income and asirations.
In Qingdao I visited the cleanest iron foundry I have ever been to anywhere in the world (you could have eaten off the floor!). They had the most modern equipment and their R&D was mind-boggling.
