貿易通2019 年年報

Chairman’s Statement (Continued) 主席報告書 （續） 二零一九年年報 貿易通電子貿易有限公司 11 前景（續） 接下來談談電子商貿下的供應鏈應用方案子分部 及其他兩個業務分部，即身份管理及其他服務， 若非最近新型冠狀病毒對全球經濟極大影響，我 們對該等業務的二零二零年前景應該頗有信心。 就供應鏈應用方案子分部而言，我們手頭上已有 多名目標客戶，彼等有意實施倉庫自動化解決方 案，與我們為主要零售連鎖店佈署的大型倉庫項 目相似，但規模較小。基於主要零售連鎖商店客 戶就其乾貨倉庫設置自動解決方案的成功，彼等 計劃將香港及區內其他地方的倉庫自動化。然 而，經濟環境黯淡，該等客戶會否推遲決定投資 相對大型項目，對我們而言絕對是風險。話雖如 此，反觀來看，目前新型冠狀病毒爆發對大部分 業務正常運作造成影響，我們學到的其中一課， 是其可能帶來黃金機會，向企業推廣自動化解決 方案，使彼等毋須再承擔不斷增加的員工成本， 且更重要的是，不再依賴人手供應。我們相信， 若干企業會發覺營運自動化的理據更容易及合 理。此性質個案的銷售週期一般需時較長，我們 同時會尋求任何易於達成的目標，即規模較小及 客戶較能負擔的項目，協助彼等於不利經營環境 下更具成本效益地經營業務。 身份管理業務會繼續憑藉手上已有的熱門客戶延 續強大增長勢頭，該等客戶對身份管理產品有濃 厚興趣，特別是傳統及虛擬銀行、保險公司、股 票經紀及儲值支付工具持牌人，對電子化認識你 的客戶解決方案尤有興趣，於新型冠狀病毒爆發 前，我們對二零二零年的身份管理業務相當有信 心。但是，新型冠狀病毒於香港傳播，影響香港 眾多企業的業務及營運，包括我們於銀行及金融 業的目標客戶，我們擔心先前很可能達成的強大 前景於短期內不會實現。無論如何，我們相信， 潛在客戶仍有需求，當疫症過去及業務與經營回 復正常，彼等確認訂單只是時間問題。同時，我 們將繼續研發（「研發」）應用於身份管理產品的相 關科技，維持科技趨勢及市場需求的步伐一致。 Prospects (Continued) For our Supply Chain Solutions sub-segment under E-Commerce and the other two business segments, namely IDM and Other Services, we should have reasonable confidence of their prospects in 2020, if not because of the recent novel coronavirus epidemic affecting the global economy. As for the Supply Chain Solutions sub-segment, we already have on hand a couple of target customers who are interested in implementing warehouse automation solutions similar to the mega-warehouse project we deployed for the major retail chain store, albeit likely on a smaller scale. As for our major retail chain store customer, upon successful deployment of the automated solution for their warehouse for ambient goods, they plan to proceed to automate their other warehouses in Hong Kong and elsewhere in the region. However, whether these customers would hold back their decision to invest in relatively large scale projects due to the gloomy economic environment is certainly a risk to us. That said, on the other side of the coin, one of the lessons learned from the current novel coronavirus outbreak affecting most business’ normal operation is that it might offer us a golden opportunity to promote our automated solutions to corporates so that they no longer need to bear the ever increasing staff costs and more importantly, rely on staff availability. We believe that some corporates would find justification for automation of their operations to be easier and more logical. As the sales cycle of cases of this nature would usually take a longer time, we would at the same time look for any low-hanging fruit, that is, projects of a smaller scale and more affordable to our customers which could help them run their business more cost effectively under an adverse operating environment. Regarding our IDM business, again continuing our strong growth momentum with strong leads already on hand expressing keen interest in our IDM products, in particular eKYC solutions from traditional as well as virtual banks, insurance companies, stockbrokers and SVF licensees, prior to the novel coronavirus outbreak, we have been rather confident in our IDM business performance in 2020. However with the spreading of the novel coronavirus in Hong Kong affecting the business and operations of many corporates in Hong Kong including our target customers in the banking and financial industry, we are afraid that some of the strong prospects we previously had a high probability of winning might not materialise in the near future. In any event, we believe that the demand from our prospective customers is still there and it is only a matter of time before they would confirm their orders with us once the outbreak passes and their businesses and operations return to normal. Meanwhile we would continue our research and development (“R&D”) work on relevant technology to apply to our IDM products to keep pace with the technological trends and market demand.