While rival telecommunications firms have been awaiting developments to access the China market such as the Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement, Hong Kong's smallest mobile-phone operator, Sunday Communications, has been the first to walk the fine line between leaving behind a cost culture it knows and opening a cross-border call centre in Shenzhen.
Sunday had already stolen the march on last month's Cepa announcement 16 months ago when it quietly set up a 200-man back-office team to address the prime concern of costs as revenue stagnated. All operators have been cutting costs in the past two years, but Sunday has been more aggressive with its venture into China's relative hinterland. It has paid dividends for the company controlled by telecoms veteran Rick Siemens.
Sunday had said the Shenzhen office accounted for a third of its staff, which was cited as the main reason for stemming the five-year flow of red ink and the chance of a profit this year.
But crossing the border also crossed a cultural divide. An hour's drive from the company's Quarry Bay headquarters took me to the Shenzhen Futian office, where company executives told me I was the first outside visitor to the office. At the main entrance there was a dusty, disused Karaoke bar and the only lift was out of order.
'Let's walk upstairs,' said group managing director Bruce Hicks, leading the way.
The main floor of the two-storey office houses a liquid crystal display indicating updated operating and calling statistics. The call centre handles more than 6,000 calls a day, or about 90 per cent of calls received each week.