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Druckdenker - Austrian cross-media company serves Asian business from Hong Kong
| Founded in Austria, Druckdenker is a cross media production agency. Concentrating solely on the B-to-B market, Druckdenker adopts a 100% client focus and custom makes all their cross media products and services to order. |
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Not to be confused with a marketing agency, Druckdenker aims to complement the services of those agencies and marketing departments by providing cost effective production. This lets marketing agencies and departments stick to their core strengths, while Druckdenker capitalises on its production expertise, bringing creative ideas to life in a cost effective way. As the production needs become more complex, and the range of channels more diverse, Druckdenker are confident this approach will continue to serve clients best.
The privately owned group comprises about 55 people worldwide, in offices in Austria, Germany, South America, Boston and Hong Kong. Currently serving clients in 16 Asian countries from their Hong Kong office, Michael Mayr, Managing Director in Hong Kong, spoke about their experience since arriving in the city in February 2003.
Why Hong Kong?
We first set up our representative office in Hong Kong to serve a key global client, a multi-national sports equipment and apparel brand. This decision made good financial sense - it was much cheaper to serve this client's needs in Asia by making things in locally and cheaper and thereby also saving the cost of shipping goods from our previous production centres in Europe to Asia.
Hong Kong had all the key facets we were looking for: security and protection afforded by a mature legal system and no barriers to foreign businesses setting up in the city. Also, Hong Kong's volume of trade presented many opportunities. With many of our suppliers already having offices in Hong Kong, the location made good sense for easy management of these relationships, as well as co-ordination of our alliances in the Mainland.
Priorities and challenges
We started small and continue to take things a step at a time. Now, having been in the city for over 2 years, we have changed our Hong Kong operation to be a limited company and we are now targeting to win more clients locally. Depending on workflow we will increase the headcount of our Hong Kong office.
Our goal is to stay in the area of production and maintain high standards of quality. We will build our supplier network to ensure we have good partners to handle aspects like logistics, warehousing etc., while we stick to our core strength of production.
In the short time we have been here, we have built up good relations with our partners in factories mostly in the Pearl River Delta area. It is an interesting aspect of business in this part of the world – business partnerships are learned and earned over time; once parties have mutual confidence in the other, then the working relationship is very robust. At first there is great skepticism!
Meeting expectations
In Hong Kong, it is almost a village system because so much of business is run from contacts and networks. For example, our freight forwarders know who to contact about each destinations customs requirements, and have contacts here to undertake the appropriate tests and compile the documentation. This represents great proactivity and teamwork.
Add to this the simple government procedures for setting up and operating a business (much easier than Austria) and the service orientation of the business community in general, it has been remarkably straightforward and easy to achieve our goals.
How did InvestHK help?
InvestHK got in touch with us once we had arrived in the city. They helped us find our local professional advisers, like an accountant and company secretary, and also pointed us in the right direction for contacts in the premium industry.
Tips for investors?
Contact your country's trade commission in Hong Kong. They have useful information tailored to your nation's perspective. They charge fees; however, it is money well spent.
Talk to others who have taken this step before. Any foreign company in Hong Kong will have some practical insights. Hong Kong's community of expatriates is really open and willing to share their experiences.
Recruit local people with language skills and market knowledge. In Hong Kong, there are many well educated graduates who have strong language skills available at a very reasonable price.
www.druckdenker.com
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