Fair opens the door to transformation and success
At the 135th Canton Fair, which ran from mid-April to early May, Yang Hancheng, chairman of Shaanxi Succeed Trading Co Ltd, was busy receiving an inflow of visitors from home and abroad and answering his phones one after another.
His company provides essential international trade services, financial services and supply chain solutions to small and medium-sized enterprises and microbusinesses involved in foreign trade. For years, it has been dedicated to assisting businesses in facilitating international trade on such fronts as customs clearance, tax rebates, financing and sales, thus reducing their operating costs and enhancing their comprehensive strength and competitiveness in the international market.
Of thousands of overseas buyers and domestic suppliers that the company serves, many participated in the 135th edition of the Canton Fair, where Succeed Trading, headquartered in Shaanxi province in Northwest China, had reserved more than 50 exhibition booths. That partially explains why he found himself swept up in the business whirl.
That was quite different from what it was like when the company made its first appearance at the Canton Fair more than 20 years ago.
The past two decades also witnessed significant changes in Yang’s role at the fair, from initially as an “observer” from a State-owned enterprise, and then as an exhibitor from a private business to finally as a foreign trade service provider.
With concrete steps toward his dreams and a series of successful transformations, Yang, thanks to the Canton Fair, has carved out a niche for himself in the trade by “being a first mover and pursuing innovation”.
Switching tracks
Back in 2003, Yang, who had majored in finance and accounting in college, was working for an SOE in Shaanxi. As the company needed to expand its foreign trade business, he was transferred to the foreign trade department and dispatched to the reputed Canton Fair to gain experience.
“The company sent me to the fair and expected me to combine my business savvy with foreign trade operations and to open up international trade channels for it,” Yang recalled. At the sight of frenetic trading at the fair, he was confident in engaging himself in foreign trade.
His experience at the Canton Fair planted the seed of foreign trade in his mind. Riding the wave of restructuring SOEs, Yang ventured into entrepreneurship by founding Succeed Trading.
He managed to secure a half-booth at the Canton Fair, embarking on his foreign trade career. In his first attendance in the fair as a private business exhibitor, he tasted success, reaping rewards far beyond his expectations.
By conventional thinking, one should continue down that path and build on the success. Yet Yang tore up the rulebook and took a different path.
After he participated in several Canton Fair editions where he observed countless exhibitors and buyers, his financial acumen gave him a light-bulb moment when he realized that SMEs and microbusinesses in foreign trade face various post-transaction issues like customs clearance, logistics and financing.
If his company could transform into a professional service provider to help them address these concerns, it would undoubtedly generate massive demand, he told himself.
Without hesitation, Yang began recruiting a large number of professionals to form an efficient team, and reaching out to his suppliers one by one, selling them a simple yet convincing concept: every aspect of a company’s foreign trade business requires dedicated professionals, which incurs labor costs; any mistake in any aspect will result in losses borne by the company, which is an economic cost; each error requires a significant amount of effort to rectify, which translate to time cost. By outsourcing these basic services to a professional agency like Succeed Trading, companies can streamline vertical tasks and save substantial manpower, resources and finances.
After Succeed Trading switched tracks, Yang found there were opportunities aplenty. Thus the company’s transformation journey was quite smooth, quickly carving out a niche for itself.
Its business revenue exceeded$13 million in 2005; today, this figure has soared to $600 million, with the company’s business spanning over 130 countries and regions worldwide.
Improved service chain
The company’s success is not a result of a single day’s work. Yang said his company’s service system has continually improved through “filling the gaps”, and in this process, the Canton Fair has been playing a pivotal role.
“Initially, we only provided basic services for SMEs in foreign trade,” Yang said. “During our participation in the Canton Fair, we found that many companies urgently needed solutions to issues such as financing difficulties and sales challenges. Therefore, we expanded our services to finance, credit insurance, and trade promotion, striving to excel in every aspect.
“This is a self-reinforcing process. The closer our service chain comes to perfection, the more companies will need our services, amplifying the snowball effect.”
The Canton Fair has not only offered his company developmental insights and business opportunities but also stands unmatched in resource concentration, according to Yang.
A large proportion of his company’s clients are from the Canton Fair, he said. “A multitude of businesses I serve are attending the fair. They come from all over the world. It’s out of the question for a single person to gather them all.
“Only the Canton Fair can bring so many entrepreneurs together, facilitating idea exchanges and creating new opportunities. Moreover, the expanding scale and improving quality of exhibitors present numerous potential clients,” he said.
Yang revealed that he is now focused on creating a core aggregation area for foreign trade enterprises, linking the efficiency of large platforms with the flexibility of SMEs, coupled with his company’s comprehensive trade services, forming a triad of a new foreign trade model.
“Looking at the bigger picture, this benefits high-quality development of China’s foreign trade; for our company itself, our service chain has extended once again,” he said. “Building on such a big platform as the Canton Fai, our company’s services are sure to generate more and more innovations.”
