Advertisement

Businesses driven by e-volution

Reading Time:6 minutes
Why you can trust SCMP
0

They may not have known it, but the shoppers who picked up melons at the bargain price of $1 per pound at ParknShop last weekend were enjoying the first fruits of Hong Kong's technology revolution.

For decades Wellcome and ParknShop enjoyed stable profits and a 70 per cent market share.

Then, Apple Daily entrepreneur Jimmy Lai Chee-ying launched his adMart service, which takes orders by phone and the Internet and delivers goods by van. The giants had to cut prices.

Without any conventional stores, adMart is a prototype electronic business, or 'e-business', says Cannie Tsang Wan-shun, project manager at Asia Research, an information technology market research firm.

'adMart is doing a very good job in introducing people to e-business,' she says.

'It is good to get services that really get the public involved. This year is a point of change.' Some businesses in Hong Kong have enjoyed success with technology, even in apparently traditional fields (see 'Hi-tech tailored to local needs').

But statistics show that e-business, the technology that can affect any firm irrespective of their business, has yet to hit Hong Kong with full force.

Advertisement
Select Voice
Choose your listening speed
Get through articles 2-3x faster
1.1x
220 WPM
Slow
Normal
Fast
1.1x