I find it hard to believe that the Chinese swans compare to the JML Utopias - however, you say you were there, I cannot say that. I am more than happy to judge a product without object knowledge: if you look at wharfedales and swan, they use the same drivers- and they are made at the same factory in China. I personally try to buy as little as possible from repressive communist China (especially items over $500!!), so I don't need to listen to them- in that instance, that is where my "object knowledge" ends. For the price/performance ratio, Axioms are clearly the better choice. For many people, such as myself, it is simply unfathomable to purchase Chinese speakers for $1300 when there are better choices out there like Axiom and other Canadian, German, American, French, Italian, etc. brands to support.
