BITE for SMEs offered by homegrown ABI Asia

Story from ITSingapore

April 2000 - Homegrown end-to-end IT solution provider, ABi Asia Pte Ltd recently announced the availability of BITE or Business IT Empowerment solution package. Designed to help SMEs leverage on IT and compete on par with larger companies, BITE features Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), e-commerce and Knowledge Management capabilities. BITE is modular in design, enabling companies to start with the ERP package and progress to other modules when required.

As the basic tier of the package, the ERP module facilitates the business operation functions such as E-Connect. Retail, E-Connect.Distribution and E-Connect.Finance. While the e-commerce module enables B2B and B2C transactions, the KM module builds a data warehouse and provides a knowledge base for sharing within the enterprise and customers through the Intranet.

David Tan, chief executive officer of ABi Asia Pte Ltd explained: Our mission is to help SMEs embrace the IT revolution at an affordable cost. In the long run, we aim to form a global SME community where SMEs can engage in win-win business exchange and the sharing of ideas. BITE is a strategic necessity for SMEs to stay competitive and become regional or even global players.

As a one-stop solution, it comes with a training package, a suite of online Web services and technical support services. The solution is also offered on a subscription-based to SMEs.

BITE has also been successfully implemented in PageOne, a bookshop with operations in Hong Kong and Singapore. ABi Asia has plans to roll out BITE in Hong Kong and Malaysia through its local offices.

The company received $2 million in seed money in its first round of financing. This was used for product roll outs and marketing. ABi Asia has plans to expand its operations to Australia, Japan and Taiwan. According to Tan, the company has plans to set up a research centre in Silicon Valley by end of the year.