"When I go to different exhibitions, whether it's electronics or design shows or consumer shows, I rarely see Taiwan designers or developers or product planners. I just see people in execution level, top management," Chen said.

"They're good at business strategy, but this is not the way to create a good product."

Designers vs engineers

In putting technological muscle ahead of consumer taste, Taiwan designers are forced to work around what engineers want - the opposite of how Apple operates. Conflict is common in an environment where designers strive to think 'outside the box' and managers are still fixated on cost-performance ratios.

"What's odd is that when we have discussions with project managers at Asus or Acer, they say 'don't worry about our product image'," said a senior designer at a large ODM, who didn't want to be named.

"The project managers, most of whom have engineering or R&D backgrounds, don't trust their own in-house designers."

Benjamin Chia, Taiwan-born chief creative officer at elemental8, a Silicon Valley-based design consultancy whose client list includes Samsung Electronics, Microsoft and Motorola, says Taiwan designers struggle to gain respect in the corporate hierarchy.

"Upper management knows nothing about design, so they have designers over-explain and over-simplify," he said. "The product loses its design purity."

A manager at Asus said the company invests little in product design or consumer interaction, placing most emphasis on price and gadget spec. "Our strategy basically boils down to copying our competitors' products and adding one more feature or making it cheaper," said the manager, who was not authorized to speak for the company, so didn't want to be named.

Investment,control

For many, the only way for Taiwan to break from being a brand-free zone is to make the sort of deep, years-long investment in product innovation that Apple, under its design-obsessed founder Steve Jobs, did for decades.

Especially crucial, say industry experts, is gaining control over the entire user experience of a product, from hardware to software to advertising to sales outlets.

Apple, for example, designs its own chips and operating system, and has a commanding retail presence. And Samsung boasts a strong grip over its supply chain, and has a tradition of end-user products that has built a reputation among consumers.

For Taiwan companies to succeed at talking to the average customer, price, spec and tech need to take a backseat to image, design and message, the experts say.

"What they haven't realized is that they're still using a cost-performance mentality to build brand," Stocker said. "That's just not working anymore."