New Sony E 35mm f/1.8 (SEL35F18) made in...

Its no secret that that Japanese optical technology and manufacturing methods are top-notch, but I think it's strange to think that Japanese companies might invest hundreds of millions in overseas factories just to use overseas optical technologies and manufacturing methods, and throw that all to local/native management.

More likely, the Japanese have reserved manufacturing of prestige products for their own factories because they are cognizant of consumer bias ("the best engineering come from Germany!", "the best electronics are from Japan!")... and know it's to their advantage to leverage it. Better yet, to their long-term advantage if they can perpetuate it.

I think it is naive to hold the blanket perception that Chinese manufacturing is shoddy. This is because it totally misses the reality that there's quite a few ways of outsourcing.

The type in question, in which a foreign entity goes to Chinese shores and invests money to build ground-up or significantly upgrade manufacturing facilities, is for all intents and purposes an extension of the mother entity. Things can be built to as-high (or even potentially higher) standards as the mother entity, as labor costs are lower (and so many more workers willing to fight for the job) and the company can easily incentivize quality. This is the model of tech companies such as Apple, many cellphone makers, and Sony.

The other, more prevalent type (of which my father knows well as he owned a trading company that was effectively an outsourcing middleman for US brands) utilize existing Chinese manufacturing facilities. This is of course generally limited to relatively low-tech stuff like general, lower-tech consumer goods. The customer (US Co.) just provides specs, and it's up to the Chinese to find a way to meet those specs at a price the US Co. is willing to accept. And many US Co, being the modern-business-minded-fellows that they are (read: more interested in short-term profit than long-term development), will pit different Chinese manufacturing facilities against each other so that they can get what they want at the lowest cost/highest margin. And so the Chinese entities will find ways (i.e. cut corners) to out-compete each other on price. Ultimately, it's the US Co. that bears responsibility for accepting the shoddiest level they can tolerate to be associated with their brand-name.

(Yet one more type is when a US Co. just outright imports existing Chinese goods, which are necessarily built cheaply as the Chinese per capita income is ~$5K/annually.)

So there's my daily attempted contribution against the darkness.

Edit: back on topic...

There is no surprise that Sony reserved the production of Zeiss-branded lenses for Japan.  Do also remember that the black-colored SEL1855 for the NEX-7 kit were also Japan-built, and they didn't seem to be any better than the Thai-built ones (in fact, my recollection of my impression was just the opposite).  I have to suspect this might simply be due to the limited production volumes.

Between Thai and Chinese manufacturing, there is no reason (i.e. leveraging/perpetuation of consumer bias) for Sony to favor one over the other, except for projected capacities and other issues pertinent for manufacturing (local policies, incentives, etc.).  So of course I'm not dinging either place-of-manufacturer.  I'm just trying to divine what Sony's unexpressed business decisions might be.