WITH a cost-effective base to run operations from, coupled with the Government's initiatives to promote Malaysia as a logistics hub, SnT Global Sdn Bhd sees itself very much in the forefront in the coming years.

Its group chief executive officer David Wong said as a lead logistics provider, SnT Global would continue to provide solutions beyond physical logistical needs, with emphasis in Information Technology (IT).

"Our key strength is our ability to innovate solutions for our clients. Outsourcing is not about merely taking over someone's functions and doing the same thing but being able to improvise and make required changes to service them better,'' he said.

Wong who has 18 years of experience in network solutions, systems integration and software development, said SnT was targeting the Asean as a key market as well as China, where consumer power is deemed strong.

With lead logistics management as its core business, SnT has also diversified into two other areas, namely its revenue-generating contact centres and after-market service management.

Set up in 2000 during the dot.com boom, Wong said it was initially targeted at the e-commerce market, with customised software as its platform.

"During the dot.com days, one of the major issues that e-commerce operators faced was logistics fulfilment.

"In fact 40% of problems or issues raised which hampered the growth of e-commerce was related to logistics, namely long delivery cycles, high cost and damaged goods.

"All these were procurement related and I saw the opportunity in that area.

"SnT was set up to bridge the gap between the e-commerce world and logistics industry, which was fairly manual in carrying out operations,'' he said.

Wong said when the excitement died down; SnT transformed its business model to cater beyond software from an application service provider (ASP) to a logistics outsourcing company.

Today, a leading e-fulfilment business process outsourcing (BPO) solutions provider, SnT offers cost effective solutions to its clients via one single point of contact.

Presently, SnT has three contact centres (two in Malaysia, one located in Shanghai) and eight warehouses in Kuala Lumpur, Thailand, Taiwan and Singapore, with a combined space of half a million square feet.

Wong said plans were in the pipeline to set up more warehouses in two more countries and double the present workforce of 1,000.

"Our uniqueness lies in the wide spectrum of services offered, where we provide customised and flexible solutions to clients who not only outsource their logistics needs but other non-core areas as well," he said.

This is where the contact centres play a role, he said, adding that the whole supply chain started from orders.

"The contact centres basically focuses on order management from processing the order itself, linking the orders to the factories, triggering shipment and moving on to the logistics per say.

"Our contact centres are different in the sense that they generate revenue for the company and our job is to help clients close sales,'' he said, adding that this helped clients automate their supply chain functions.

Then comes the warehousing, freighting and after sales services.

Since 2000, RM30mil had been invested to get the company going, coupled with a powerful software tool termed HeLP (Hosted e-logistics Platform).

HeLP costing close to RM500,000, according to Wong, is a software developed by SnT, and is combined with shelve packages to make it complete as well as modular for its clients.

"This is the system that differentiates our services from others in the market,'' he said, adding that research and development took two years to be completed.

SnT's key clients come from sectors such as information communication and telecommunications (ICT), consumer electronics, fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) and the paper mill industry, creating a 50-50 ratio of global and local clients.

On sustaining their competitiveness, he said SnT would continue to invest in R & D and continuous manpower training, where close to RM1mil is spent on yearly.

He added that as a lead logistics provider, SnT would utilise a decentralising approach, apart from changing the process of how things were done and implementing advanced software.

"Our priorities would be customers in the mentioned sectors, which intend to outsource their supply chain functions in Asia,'' he said, adding that more multinationals were beginning to outsource and the growth of logistics outsourcing industry was between 25% t0 30%.

The company was also ranked amongst the Top 500 Deloitte Fastest Growing ICT and Services companies in Asia Pacific in 2004 and 2005.

For this year, SnT is projecting revenue of RM75mil.