Blog about Virtual Assistant, Outsourcing, KPO, BPO and China

At about half past two yesterday afternoon when we were working busily in our office at 40 floor, we felt the tremor of the building, or rather tremor from the earth. The entire building started to sway to and fro, back and forth, which brought us a strong sense of dizziness. Several minutes later, we managed to get down to the ground and joined the crowd waiting for the earthquake to calm down.

Fortunately, the quake died off about ten minutes later. When we went back to our office safe and sound, our technical team manager Jerry Xu was proud to announce that none of our servers, databases or company network infrastructureor was affected even in the slightest degree. “We have always regarded stability of our servers and company network infrastructureor as the top priority for our company. Only by guarantying this can we provide our clients with the most reliable services,” he said.

Hours later, word came that the epicenter Sichuan province in Southwest China had suffered gravely from the 7.8-magnitude quake. The powerful earthquake had claimed nearly 10,000 lives till this morning and most victims are in Sichuan. Hearing this tragic news, James Huang, our CEO and founder of BPOVIA Ltd, decided immediately to donate $1000 relief money to the disaster area hit by the quake. “Companies should not concern themselves with making profits only. Do something for the society is also necessary,” said James.

Popularity: 25%

BPO, BPOVIA News, China Outsourcing, China Virtual Assistant BPOVIA, China, China Earthquake, donation, News

To cash in on the rising demand for luxury jewelry, Luk Fook Group.the Hong Kong-listed jeweler, has put more stores on its mainland expansion schedule this year.

With 335 shops on the mainland, only 9 are self-operated, six more self-operated shops will be opened in first-tier cities such as Beijing and Shanghai this year to generate more profit.

Thanks to the fast growing mainland economy and the rising purchasing power of the middle class, the demand for luxury has shot up, which made the market big enough for Jewelers like Luk Fook Group to expand the number of shops 10 times there, hoping for a 30 to 40% turnover.

On the other hand, robust economy ,increasing wages, and money flooding from mainland has all acted as major boosters to the firm’s Hong Kong business, according to William Wong, CEO of the company, half of the turnover from the retail shops comes from mainland tourists, who always look for the most expensive products.

Popularity: 14%

BPO, China Business, China Business News, China Consumer Market, China Economy China, economy, jewelry, Luk Fook, luxury

L’Oreal SA, the largest cosmetics company by revenue in the world with strong make-up product sales, technology innovation and product value enhancement, aspires to become the leader on the Chinese market in cosmetics and beauty product sales.

L’Oreal entered the Chinese market 10 years ago and now ranks second in terms of market share and sales in the country. Besides its high-end cosmetic brands such as Lancome and Biotherm, it has been focusing on tapping the middle-and low-end mass products. The company purchased Mininurse and Yue-Sai in late 2003 and early 2004, expanding its presence in the hair-care and skin-care sectors. In addition, it has set up three plants in China, producing about 96% of all cosmetics products sold in the country.

In 2007, L’Oreal China saw a strong sales volume of 5.45 billion yuan, an increase of 30% compared with the previous year. Taking up 4% of the company’s global market sales volume, China became one of its 10 most important markets worldwide.

In 2006, L’Oreal accounted for 9.6% of the country’s cosmetics products market and the figure rose to 11.2% in 2007, narrowing the gap with market leader P&G.

Paolo Gasparrini, president of L’Oreal China, has much confidence in the cosmetics sector in China due to the fast increasing per capita income of the Chinese people. “We have a reasonable goal to become the No1 over the next three to five years, if we take our future business expansion plan into consideration,” said he.

Popularity: 14%

BPO, China Business, China Business News, China Consumer Market China, cosmetics, L'Oreal