Spring Festival is the most important festival in China, and it is also the highest spending month from consumer. According to the data released by relevant agencies, the F&B industry achieved revenue of RMB 725.1 billion during the Spring Festival in 2019, increased by 9.7% year-on-year from 2018. However, due to Covid19 pandemic, the revenue of F&B industry for Spring Festival in 2020 have been severely hit. According to the data of Evergrande Research Institute, within seven days of the Spring Festival alone, the epidemic has caused about RMB 500 billion of losses to the F&B and retail industries, which is nearly one ninth of the income of the whole domestic F&B industry in 2019. 

Under the situation of the epidemic, domestic F&B businesses became extremely "quiet" overnight. However, on the other hand, Crystal Link Technology is very "busy". Many leading F&B enterprises have asked Crystal Link to speed up the process of its overseas strategic business venture. 

Expedite the overseas presence, Southeast Asia is the first choice

There is a proverb; "don't put all the eggs in one basket". When there is a national epidemic, all the restaurants are closed. How to avoid the risk and keep the business running is a problem to F&B owners in recent weeks. "Go beyond local market" has naturally become an alternative choice for domestic F&B enterprises.

Southeast Asia has the third largest population in the world. According to market research, the annual economic growth rate will reach 5.2% in 2018-2022, and it is expected to become the fourth largest economy in the world in 2030. Therefore, the development of Southeast Asia's catering industry will also show exponential growth. In addition, the food choice and food culture are similar to those in China, so the acceptance of Chinese food in Southeast Asia is definitely high. Its geographical location is also close to China, there is no huge time difference between the countries, and furthermore the cost of logistics is still low therefore Southeast Asia has become the first choice when local company plan to go overseas.

Nevertheless, domestic F&B enterprises will still face many challenges in Southeast Asia, for instance; each country has its unique culture, living standard, business environment and etc. These are all the problems that domestic F&B enterprises may encounter when going overseas.

The customer service at front-end and management team, the back-end supply chain capability are the main operation in the F&B business. The strategic location of restaurants, the creation of dishes and restaurant menu, and the operation of outlet will directly determine the customer acquisition ability and enhance customer stickiness. Building a local team, bringing in the corporate culture, and talent development & training are the foundation of the enterprise’s growth. It is also important to have strong supply chain management and information technology capabilities as well as an efficient collaboration of upstream and downstream partners in the entire supply chain, these are the key competitive advantages for a successful enterprise.

For the vast majority of F&B enterprises, the front-end customer service and management team is the key differential factor among the enterprises. On the other hand, the back-end supply chain operation will have a high degree of similarity, therefore enterprise usually will outsource its back-end operation to the third-party professional team. Many chain F&B enterprises are able to expand its business rapidly because they have excellent capability in managing its supply chain and logistics partners.

Crystal Link Platform is a vertical supply chain operation and management platform focusing on food, chain F&B and new retail industries, Crystal Link has started its service centre in Southeast Asia a few years ago, Singapore is the regional office, from there it builds the supply chain service capability in Southeast Asia, the aim is to link businesses between Southeast Asia and China local enterprises. Southeast Asian team members are from different countries in Southeast Asia, most of them have years of experience in supply chain industry locally and overseas, this enable Crystal Link to rapidly penetrate and blend in the local.

Continuous optimizing our products and services with the support from strong technical team, our product is designed to meet local’s needs, if offers a great help for those who requires IT technical support when expanding overseas. At the same time, the Southeast Asia team continues to expand its supply chain logistics operation capability in various countries in Southeast Asia, constantly looking for local logistics partners in the region in order to provide the best logistics service to our customer.

Based on the request from customers, Crystal Link Technology provides supply chain planning and local procurement services by a dedicated team, the team helps enterprise enhancing its competence in F&B operation so that enterprise is able to seize market opportunities and the pioneer in southeast Asia market..

The epidemic has caused huge disruption to almost every enterprise. How to turn crisis into opportunity and be well prepared for future are critical for business owner. Crystal Link Technology has establish the "bridge" by connecting China and Southeast Asia, we are offering our assistance to F&B enterprise to mitigate the risk during this difficult time by helping enterprise to setup their business overseas rapidly.