Suppliers working hard to stay ahead of outbreak

His idea soon won support from his wife and they decided to restart the assembly lines immediately.

"I called up all the staff members still in Shanghai. All the management team, cleaners and even the woman who cooks in the canteen－altogether about 10 of us joined in the work on the assembly line making masks," he said.

Wu and his staff worked around the clock for two days straight before the head of Songjiang district came for a visit and asked the company to produce protective gear for medical staff and the general public.

"We accepted the order with confidence, and had our products delivered to the market on that day," he said.

By Friday, when a group of journalists from home and abroad visited the company, Shanghai Dasheng had been manufacturing nonstop for 11 days.

"At first we made a daily output of no more than 40,000, and now we're at more than 70,000," Wu told the visiting media. "In the coming two weeks, we will be able to further increase daily output to 200,000."

To meet mounting domestic demand, Dasheng has also suspended its supply to overseas clients, Wu said.

"Usually after the Spring Festival, we would be making prompt international deliveries to our clients," Wu said. "However, now that we have this crisis at home, I had my daughter contact our international clients one after another, asking to delay delivering their ordered goods so that we can focus on the urgent demand at home."