Competitive Strengths

Our competitive strengths for our IT products and services business are as follows:
Solid ties with IT vendors and industry players: We have strong working relationships with our IT vendors as we are an established company with a good track record. This network allows us to provide a wide range of IT products to our customers. These relationships also provide us with a range of benefits such as competitive pricing terms and credit terms for payment.

Wide selection of merchandise available: We offer a diverse range of IT products and services to our customers which includes the sale of IT hardware, IT software and other IT related products. With our diverse range of IT products and services, we are a one-stop IT products and services provider and our customers may conveniently look to us to fulfil their IT needs.

We have a strong sales team who also provides customer support services: Our team of over 200 retail sales personnel as at 1 April 2007 are ably qualified to assist and advise our customers on the latest IT products and services that we offer. We send our retail sales personnel for courses conducted by our IT vendors to update them on the latest IT products and services in the market as well as other external and/or in-house training courses to upgrade their skills. Apart from our strong sales team, we also provide customer support services which include our PC Clinics and support hotline.

We have a diverse customer base: We have a large base of customers with varying needs. Whilst a majority of our customers are walk-in customers, we also provide IT products and services to corporate clients. Our membership programme has over 70,000 members as at 1 April 2007 and provides a ready pool of customers for our IT products and services business. As a result of our diverse customer base, we are not reliant on any one customer or subject to the credit risk of major customers.

We have an experienced management team: Our team is headed by our Chief Executive, Mr Loo Leong Thye, who has more than 20 years of experience in the IT industry. Our management team consisting of our Directors and Executive Officers has a sound understanding of consumer needs and trends in the IT industry and is well-positioned to steer the direction of our Group.

We have an established track record and strong brand name: We have been in the industry for more than 20 years and have an established track record and a strong brand name. Our good track record enables us to obtain more favourable credit terms from IT vendors. The goodwill in our brand name helps us to attract and retain customers. Due to the size of our operations, we are able to negotiate for more favourable pricing terms as well as lower rentals which reduce our operational costs. Due to lower costs from economies of scale, we have more flexibility in the pricing of the IT products and services that we provide and this increases our competitiveness in the market.

We are able to target various market segments through our Challenger megastore, superstores and small format outlets: We have a unique business model characterised by our Challenger stores which target high-end customers willing to pay a premium for quality IT services and small format outlets which target the budget-conscious customers. This business model allows us to capture a cross-section of the IT market by catering to both high-end and budget-conscious customers.