Project-i airs every Monday on Channel 8 from 10.30 pm to 11 pm, till 10 December 2012.

From spas to owner-operated retail stalls, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are discovering the benefits of infocomm in helping them to raise productivity and operate more efficiently in an increasingly competitive business environment.

Tangerine Toufu and Lil’ Cloud Fleur are two retailers located at Bugis Street. Like many of the other shops in Bugis Street, the two retailers are run by owner-operators who had been recording their sales in notebooks and transacting only in cash.

About a year ago, Bugis Street Development Pte Ltd, which manages the complex, decided to facilitate its tenants in ICT adoption by helping to source for a Point of Sale (POS) system and a cashless payment solution. The ICT makeover involved installing the system for about 800 retail shops at Bugis Street. This started with the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) and Bugis Street's management establishing common user requirements, identifying suitable technology vendors and then persuading individual shop owners to come on board.

Launched in July this year, the POS system now enables the retailers to save time and effort in inventory management by automatically recording the stock level of various items. It also gives them a clearer picture of which items are more popular. At the same time, the cashless payment solution is "tourist-friendly" as it allows the retailers to accept credit cards and other modes of payment such as EZlink. A third deliverable is a rewards programme which provides customers with loyalty points that they can redeem at Bugis Street outlets. Collectively, the participating shop owners also enjoyed economies of scale through the lower subscription cost of just S$150 a month. This is further subsidised by IDA's iSPRINT grant, which provides up to 70 per cent support for the ICT adoption cost for each business.

Tangerine Toufu is one of the Bugis Street retailers featured in the info-educational series.

Bugis Street Development and its tenants are featured in the info-educational series Project-i, which is being aired on four consecutive Monday nights from 19 November.  Supported by IDA and SPRING Singapore, Project-i showcases how SMEs can operate more effectively and position themselves for growth through the use of infocomm. The feedback for the first season of the series, aired in November last year, was very positive as business owners found the case studies useful in demonstrating to them how ICT can be used to overcome today's business challenges.

Beyond looking at the success of individual SMEs, the second season of the series also provides insights into the benefits of collective sector-wide ICT adoption. An example of this is how the Spa & Wellness Association (SWAS) spearheaded the development of an infocomm solution to benefit its members. The result was Wellness ERP Software as a Service (WESS), an ICT solution catering to the needs of the spa and wellness industry.
WESS provides functionalities such as appointment management, customer management, inventory management, membership management, marketing management, payroll and leave management, and accounting management. One of its adopters is EdeS Spa, which started using WESS at its centre in Changi Road a few months ago.

A few months ago, EdeS Spa deployed Wellness ERP Software as a Service (WESS), an ICT solution catering to the needs of the spa and wellness industry.

According to EdeS Spa, one of the immediate benefits of WESS was the introduction of a more efficient appointment management system which gives staff access to information they need to deliver a more personalised customer service experience. WESS also enables EdeS Spa to operate more efficiently by capturing activities such as sales, product promotions and overtime work for accounting purposes, and automatically computing the purchase price, discount, service charge and GST when generating invoices.

Another attractive aspect of WESS is the Software as a Service model, which allows a business to rent only the modules that it needs for its existing outlets, and to increase this as the company expands. "We hope more industry associations will emulate the leadership demonstrated by SWAS and Bugis Street Development in taking the initiative to rally their SME stakeholders for impactful sector projects," said Mr Edwin Low, Director of SME Infocomm Enabler Division and Strategic Capability Division in IDA. "Going forward, IDA will continue to work in close collaboration with such sector champions across various industries, to bring about more ICT projects that can lift an entire sector's productivity."

Besides the spa and retail industry success stories, the Project-i series also features ICT adoption by SMEs in other industries including food and beverage, services and logistics. It airs every Monday on Channel 8 from 10.30 pm to 11 pm, till 10 December 2012. Viewers can also catch a replay of the weekly episodes on IDA’s YouTube Channel and Xinmsn.com/8.

* To find out more about iSPRINT, visit /sme or call 6211 1212.