2002/9/18
Excerpted from Futong News

Futong Group has consolidated its sales and marketing system in order to cater to the consolidation on the part of clients, cement our shares of the cable market, and promote the establishment of the non-cable technology and sales system. The system is consolidated also to further shorten our response time to the market and strengthen the market management. The new system is composed of two parts: the sales management committee as an in-house management institution and Futong Sales and Marketing Corporation as a market task force, both accountable to the group CEO for their separate operations.

The general competition situation of telecommunication carriers has basically taken shape as postal services and telecommunication have been divided into two separate business sectors, China Unicom and China Mobile, have come into operation and new China Telecommunication and China Railway Telecommunication have been set up. The requirements for investment into the telecommunication industry necessitate different business patterns on the basis of different carriers' different operational strategies. The market structure that impacts manufacturers of telecommunication equipment has also experienced enormous changes. As market demand expands rapidly, manufactures and research institutes have invested huge amounts of capital into optical cable telecommunication technologies. New technologies and constant improvement of existing products and technologies are emerging endlessly without showing any sign of stagnation. With years' development, Futong Group has made great headway not only in the field of cable and wire for telecommunication but also in the field of non-cable products. The changes in the group's product mix will inevitably put forward new requirements on the marketing. Sales network is the bloodline for the company's future growth. As Futong always sticks to the principle of centering its business on sales, the consolidation of its sales and marketing system is imperative under the situation.

The group's sales and marketing system has been restructured thanks to the efforts made over a limited period of time. The ensuing operations are in full swing now. Based on the Telecommunication Sales Department, China Unicom Sales Department, China Telecommunication Sales Department, and the Key Projects Department, a unified sales and marketing organization has come into being by combining with FSO sales department. The main task of the new sales and marketing system lies in selling group's products in a planned, systematic way. The newly established CEO office is the general office of the sales management committee, handling personnel and information resources of the whole sales and marketing system. Beijing Office, General Business Office and Client Service Center support the whole system, strengthening its service functions. The General Business Office is in charge of bidding, technical support and post sales service. The Client Service Center, characterized by its openness, superposableness and CI uniform standards, provides excellent service to sales and marketing taskforce. External Cooperation and Development Office seeks cooperation and support from outside for the long-term future growth of the sales and marketing system.

In addition to coordinating the two main areas so as to adjust to the changes in markets, Futong has also restructured the sales and marketing management by diluting the management system and promoting the flat-style management. Moreover, the resources are made available to technical sales taskforce, post sales taskforce, client relation management, high-end marketing support, information and client service center which is a new investment made this year. The shared resources provide guarantee for better implementation of sales and marketing decisions, better coordination of marketing operations, and better sensitivity to market changes on the part of our sales forces. With the consolidation, the group has a perfected sales and marketing system, which reflects the foresight into the future on the part of the group management and lays an excellent foundation for future growth.