Factory Five was a Shanghai based company. They didn't make the stem themselves. They bought it from a factory and sold it to the western market with a markup.
The stem is still being made. The factory never stopped making them. If you'd like to make some money, you too can invent a brand logo, email the same factory and ask for your logo to be laser etched, and then resell the thing in the west for middleman profit.
Velo Orange is another company that does the same type of business. I'm assuming you've heard of them. All these guys are middleman merchants. Go to a trade show conference in Asia, sign some contracts with factories, resell the stuff in the west with a markup.
Nowadays the Chinese factories are getting smart and started to sell the stuff direct, so the middlemen are getting squeezed.
By the way the Aliexpress price is way higher than the price on the domestic Chinese market. They're still charging a westerner markup. For the real Chinese price search on Taobao.com, Chinese equivalent of Amazon. Same ownership as AliExpress.
https://a.aliexpress.com/_msdl9qv
They were, that is correct. I don't know how they came to the stem but like most of the world people design something and likely they have a factory build it that is super common. Some have their own factories some do not. You miss the R+D and just assume it falls from the sky. Sure Velo Orange has products made overseas but it is not like they aren't putting in R+D time which is the crucial element. Just saying well they signed a contract and bought some stuff and sell it at a different price is part of the story and glosses over how the product initially came to be.
Sure you can go to a factory somewhere and say build me whatever and if they can do it, they might do it but you don't get far like that but if you say "we have this design and would like you to produce it" and then they are working with them long term to make sure QC is good and everything is working well then you have a good product and can stay in business for a while.
Grocery stores don't can all their own corn in house.