Chamber Annual Report 2003

The Operations Division is responsible for maintaining the smooth running of the information technology services of the Chamber, and overseeing the administration & finances of the organisation. It is also responsible for the e-Committee.

Information Technology

The Chamber's IT unit continued to build on the success of the Chamber's Web site during the year under review. As a result, the number of page views doubled from 500,000 per month in 2002, to just over 1 million per month in 2003. New products introduced included a CEPA page, Corporate Daily, Webcasting, and Faces & Places.

As CEPA is reported in detail in the International Business Division report, we will not repeat it here. Corporate Daily is an online newspaper dedicated to news that companies issue through press releases. Just six months after its inception, Corporate Daily had become one of the most popular sections of our Web site.

Webcasting allows online visitors to listen to most of our in-house roundtable luncheons alongside a synchronised PowerPoint presentation of the speaker. Faces and Places is the Chamber's online photo album presenting visually interesting Chamber events, such as out-going missions, social activities, inspection tours and conferences. These two new products allow members to keep abreast of most Chamber events even if they are unable to attend in person.

The substantial increase in page views of the Web site has translated into more trade inquires being sent to members by potential overseas traders. Inevitably, this has also generated more spam email. A higher hit rate has also generated greater demand for paid online advertisements, which is a proxy of the success of the Web site. All these developments have been achieved through the efforts of the IT unit, with no increase in manpower.

e-Committee

With IT applications now widely used in all business sectors, promotional work of the e-Committee was scaled back in 2003. Despite this, the committee held 14 roundtable luncheons and workshops during the year to keep members abreast of the latest IT developments. Three study tours during the year were also organised for members to visit an intelligent home showroom at Hong Kong Polytechnic University, IT operations at Modern Terminals, and also the IT operations of the Hong Kong Jockey Club.

Under the auspices of the e-Committee, the government funded "E-Commerce Adoption Campaign" was launched in early 2003. Seven focus group sessions with around 80 business owners from different sectors -- manufacturing, trading and wholesale, travel and tourism, professional services, transport and logistics, financial services, and e-commerce/IT vendors -- were conducted at the start of the year-long campaign to identify companies' problems and concerns.

A report documenting these findings was used as the basis for a half-day symposium in September for the 300 participants who attended. In the fourth quarter of 2003, three "e-Commerce in Real Life" roadshows were organised at New Town Plaza, Telford Plaza and Olympian City to give the public hands-on experience of online services that they can use. The top-three winners of Miss Hong Kong 2003 opened the roadshows with Hong Kong SAR Government officials. An estimated 4,000 people took part in the roadshows and 1,779 questionnaires were collected, the findings from which were incorporated into a campaign report which can be found on the Chamber's Web site, www.chamber.org.hk/ecac.

Administration and Finances

The general business environment remained tough throughout much of 2003. However, we were able to uphold membership, and its income dropped by only 2 percent. Due to the successful implementation of CEPA at the end of the year, we experienced a general upswing in business confidence, which may translate into better CO and membership income for 2004.

Despite a loss in income of over $700,000 due to a discount on CO fees offered for three months as a relief measure to help members ride out the SARS epidemic in the spring, the Chamber's income from trade documentation services performed better than expected, registering a 1 percent increase over 2002's figure.

Normal operation income for the year under review was 1.7% higher than that of 2002 while operational expenses were reduced by 3 percent, resulting in an operational surplus of $9.17 million for the year.

As the investment climate improved considerably in the second half of the year, the Chamber General Fund, which performed very poorly over the three consecutive years prior to 2003, turned around last year with a gain of 19.6 percent. The Chamber decided to write-back an investment of $5.8 million in an unlisted company, which was written off in 1996, as it was able to pay dividends for the last two years. The gain on the sale of the Chamber's last residential property resulted in an additional non-operational surplus of $4.37 million before tax.

Much of the administration work conducted by the Division goes unnoticed by members. Yet its efforts ensure the smooth running of the 443 events that the Chamber held in 2003, in addition to the Chamber race box at Shatin, the printing and mailing of Chamber publications and circulars, and the management of Chamber facilities.

Chairman's Review   l  CEO's Report  l   International Business Division Report
Business Policy Division Report  l  Economic & Legal Affairs Division Report 
Certification Division Report  l  Business Development Division Report 
Human Resources Division Report  l  Operations Division Report  l  Chamber Services Limited Report