In early-1990s China, a games console usually came disguised as homework. Subor, known in Chinese as Xiaobawang (小霸王, “Little Tyrant”), sold copies of Nintendo’s Famicom with a typewriter keyboard attached and called them “learning machines” (学习机). Parents bought them for typing practice, English vocabulary and BASIC programming; the children also played Famicom games on them. The company grew from a small, loss-making factory in Zhongshan, Guangdong, into the market leader in a few years, and the man who built it, Duan Yongping, went on to found BBK, the electronics company whose communications business later became the phone maker vivo.
Fast facts
- Chinese name: 小霸王 (Xiǎobàwáng, “Little Tyrant”); Subor is the English brand.
- Base: Zhongshan, Guangdong province.
- Origins: the Rihua Electronics Factory (日华电子厂), taken over in 1989 by Duan Yongping; the Xiaobawang console appeared in 1991.
- Products: famiclones, then from 1993 keyboard “learning machines” with educational cartridges, a mouse and, on later models, a floppy disk drive.
- Advertising: Jackie Chan, by 1994.
- Duan’s departure: 1995, to found BBK (步步高) in Dongguan.
- Later: a PC-based games console announced in 2016–2018; a bankruptcy application against a Subor subsidiary in 2020.
Copying the Famicom
Chinese press histories agree on the outline. In 1989 Duan Yongping, who had a master’s degree in economics from Renmin University in Beijing, became director of the Rihua Electronics Factory in Zhongshan, a small works owned by a local group that had lost about two million yuan. He moved it into home video games. According to the games site Gamersky, the factory spent two years copying Nintendo’s Famicom before its first console, and The Paper dates the Xiaobawang games console to June 1991, the year the factory was renamed the Xiaobawang Electronics Industry Company.
The machines were famiclones: unlicensed copies of the Famicom that played its cartridges, and the pirated multi-game cartridges sold with them. Chinese Wikipedia’s article on the company says plainly that its consoles and learning machines of the late 1980s and early 1990s infringed others’ intellectual property.
The learning machine
In 1993, The Paper records, Subor added a keyboard and educational programs to the console: typing practice, English vocabulary drills and introductory programming. It called the result a 电脑学习机, a “computer learning machine”, and advertised it with a clapping rhyme: “你拍一，我拍一，小霸王出了学习机” (“You clap one, I clap one, Xiaobawang’s made a learning machine”).
Jackie Chan followed. Subor hired him for an advertisement, by 1994 according to the technology site ifanr, with the line “同是天下父母心，望子成龙小霸王”: “All parents share the same heart: hoping their child becomes a dragon, Xiaobawang.” Wang zi cheng long, to hope one’s son “becomes a dragon”, is a stock phrase for wanting a child to succeed, and Cheng Long (成龙) is Jackie Chan’s Chinese name.
Inside, the learning machines were still Famicom hardware, extended with custom cartridges that the NESdev community has since documented. A Subor BASIC cartridge reused programs from Nintendo’s own Family BASIC and added a way to show Chinese characters, extending the Famicom’s 8-bit tile numbers to 14 bits so that the screen could draw on thousands of different tiles. Subor also made a LOGO cartridge, cartridges with speech synthesis chips, a karaoke cartridge and a mouse, which other companies’ educational cartridges also used. Its SB-97 model built in a 3.5-inch floppy disk drive and an extra 128K of memory. Subor learning machines were sold in Russia too, as the “Сюбор Обучающий Компьютер” (Subor Educational Computer).
Market leader, then BBK
The figures in Chinese press histories vary, but they describe fast growth. The Paper gives Subor’s sales as more than 100 million yuan in 1992, 200 million in 1993, 400 million in 1994 and a billion in 1995; ifanr puts its 1995 output at 800 million yuan and its share of the learning-machine market close to 80 per cent.
Duan Yongping left in August 1995. The Paper reports that he could take only six people with him. On 18 September 1995 he founded BBK (步步高) in Dongguan, according to IT Home, and ifanr reports that 24 of Subor’s distributors followed him. IT Home traces the phone maker vivo back to BBK’s communications business.
The Z+ console and the bankruptcy application
Subor tried to return to games two decades later. In 2016, The Paper and Gamersky report, it merged five subsidiaries into the Zhongshan Xiaobawang Cultural Industry Company and paid AMD about 400 million yuan to design a custom processor for a games console. The result, the Z+, billed as a “new games computer”, was shown at China’s ChinaJoy games show in 2018 with a launch price of 4,998 yuan, then went quiet. On 8 November 2020 an application was made to put Subor’s cultural development subsidiary (小霸王文化发展有限公司) into bankruptcy reorganisation.
Sources
- 金融八卦女频道, “8个亿万大佬出走后，它是怎样苟延残喘了25年？” (“After eight billionaires left, how did it struggle on for 25 years?”), The Paper (澎湃新闻), 12 November 2020 (web, secondary, in Chinese): the 1991 renaming and first console; Duan’s arrival and his departure in August 1995 with six people; the 1993 keyboard and programs; the Jackie Chan slogan; sales from 1992 to 1995; the 2016 merger, the AMD chip and the Z+ price; the bankruptcy application. https://www.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_9957953
- 深夜诗人老阿吽, “小霸王的失败，可以缅怀，无需遗憾” (“Subor’s failure: remember it, no need for regret”), Gamersky (游民星空), 24 November 2020 (web, secondary, in Chinese): Duan’s arrival in 1989; two years copying the Famicom; 1995 output; the AMD processor; the Z+ at ChinaJoy 2018. https://www.gamersky.com/zl/202011/1340402.shtml
- 换新言, “小霸王被申请破产，为什么国产游戏机很难站起来？” (“Subor faces bankruptcy: why do Chinese consoles struggle?”), ifanr (爱范儿), November 2020, republished by Digitaling, 10 November 2020 (web, secondary, in Chinese): the Rihua factory and its losses; the 1993 learning machine and its jingle; Jackie Chan in 1994; 1995 output and market share; Duan’s departure and BBK’s distributors. https://www.digitaling.com/articles/369453.html
- “一文看懂 vivo 发展史” (“vivo’s history”), IT Home (IT之家), 6 October 2021 (web, secondary, in Chinese): Duan’s arrival in March 1989; the company established in 1992; BBK founded on 18 September 1995; vivo’s origins in BBK’s communications business. https://www.ithome.com/0/579/234.htm
- Chinese Wikipedia, “小霸王 (公司)” (consulted October 2026; web, secondary): Zhongshan; the infringement of intellectual property. https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/小霸王_(公司)
- NESdev Wiki, “iNES Mapper 167”, “NES 2.0 Mapper 497”, “NES 2.0 Mapper 514”, “NES 2.0 Mapper 518”, “NES 2.0 Mapper 560” and “Subor Mouse” (consulted October 2026; web, secondary): the learning-machine, LOGO, karaoke and BASIC cartridges, the SB-97, the Russian Subor Educational Computer and the mouse. https://www.nesdev.org/wiki/INES_Mapper_167