Huge opportunities await Australian ICT vendors who are serious about partnering with the Chinese, according to Steve Bridges, CEO of Mid-Comp International, who has returned recently from a three-week business mission to China.
Negotiations are continuing with Chinese educational institutions for the use of Mid-Comp’s Odyssey intelligent supply chain solution, commercial organisations have expressed keen interest in the product, and Government agencies in using Mid-Comp in an advisory capacity.
The Australian business mission, organised by Multi-Media Victoria, attended CeBIT Asia in Shanghai, run in conjunction with CeMat Asia (materials handling).
Delegates then went on tour around China holding talks with high level Government ICT officials, education institutions, and ICT business groups in several provinces.
As an example of the type of exposure achieved, several days were spent in Kunming, the capital of Yunnan Province, meeting with Government officials, discussions with entrepreneurs and technical people from National 863 Software Speciality Incubator Kunming Base, Kunming University of Science and Technology, and Kunming Logistics & Information Co (CSIC).
This combination of government, education, and commercial business groups meetings was repeated throughout the 21 day tour.
Describing a video demonstration of robotics warehousing equipment supplied by CSIC, Bridges said: “They use incredibly sophisticated, state-of-the-art technology in many enterprise level industrial complexes.
The scale of these robotics implementations and the simply awesome complexities they were performing had to be seen to be believed.”
According to Bridges, the technology makes most Australian automated warehousing look primitive, an assessment based on his industry experience over three decades.
CSIC has 20% of the entire Chinese market on automated warehouse management systems (WMS) & warehouse control systems (WCS) solutions, is a major supplier of solutions to the Chinese military, and have serious expansion plans to dominate the domestic market within five years.
He says: “They have been concentrating heavily on the WMS & WCS aspects of supply chain, and their clients have been seeking an ERP solution to complement the automation. They are enthusiastic that Mid-Comp International has exactly what they have been looking for.”
Outlining his overall impressions of the tour, Bridges said: “We formed the startling impression that very few Western nations have a solid business foothold in provincial China. Most have concentrated on industrial cities clustered on the east coast.
Our mission was in the right places at the right time: things are exploding throughout China, and early participants venturing beyond the traditional industrial export centres will have a clear advantage.”