Demand Options to expand overseas presence

KUALA LUMPUR: Metal fabrication and stamping company Demand Options Sdn Bhd, whose export currently contributes over half of its revenue, plans to deepen inroads into its overseas foray.

Managing director Har Yeow Cheong said the company aims to increase export revenue contribution by 20 per cent this year.
“We have been vigorous in seeking opportunity to expand our footprints overseas like Indonesia to support our long-term growth mission,” he said.

According to Har, the company would penetrate the Indonesian market through merger and acquisition exercise, to tap the fast growing automotive market there.

The company has so far exported to markets in Singapore, the Philippines, the US and China.

Demand Options, founded in 1997 by Har and his partner, has focused on providing rapid, effective and competitive solutions to its customers in various critical industries.

The company is instrumental in helping its customers with tremendous cost-saving by its unique manufacturing method and continuous process improvement.

Its specialisation is in areas of laser cutting, metal stamping, engineering and design, tool and die, prototyping, spray painting and electronics assembly in humidity controlled environment.

Speaking to Business Times in an interview recently, Har said the company is striving to further improve the manufacturing process by upgrading the facilities with more automatic process as to cut the dependency of labour.

This would enhance the quality of the company’s products.

On the company’s biggest success, Har said in 2006, the factory floor had grown tremendously in size from a mere 30,000 sq ft to 110,000 sq ft. “Our sales revenues have been consistently enjoying double-digit growth since then.”

Har said the firm is anticipating a 10 per cent growth for this year despite the uncertainties surrounding the European and US markets.

Last year, the company was ranked 16th in the prestigious Enterprise 50 Award.

Despite the success, Demand Options is still facing some challenges. The major challenges faced by the company are the shortage of highly creative knowledge workers, apart from a higher raw material cost, which would erode profit.

“To overcome these challenges, we will continue to improve our productivity through innovative ideas from constant brain storming and provide a continuous job training to existing employees to ensure the company is not overly affected by job hopping,” Har said.