Revenue Increases 17.1% to HK$891.0 Million — Net Profit Rises by 16.8% to HK$21.9 Million — Strives to Provide Regional Customers with Valued-added & Diversified IT Services

News Release – August 23, 2012

(Hong Kong, 22 August 2012) – Automated Systems Holdings Limited (“ASL” or “the Group”) (SEHK stock code: 771), a leading IT services provider in Hong Kong, announced its interim results for the six months ended 30 June 2012 (the “Review Period”). During the Review Period, the revenue of the Group was HK$891.0 million, up by 17.1% compared to the same period last year. For the three months ended 30 June 2012, the revenue of the Group was HK$403.8 million, higher by 19.3% compared to the same period last year. Basic earnings per share for the Review Period were HK 7.05 cents (the corresponding period of 2011: HK 6.03 cents).

Thanks to the significant improvement in the gross profit margin of the services business, especially that in the solutions business, partly offsetting the increase in operating costs during the Review Period, gross profit margin and profit after income tax were 12.2% and HK$21.9 million, up 0.6% and 16.8% respectively compared to the corresponding period last year. For the three months ended 30 June 2012, profit after income tax was HK$8.5 million, a surge of 54.3 % compared to the corresponding period last year.

The Group maintained a healthy balance sheet and no debt was recorded during the Review Period. As of 30 June 2012, the Group’s net cash stood at approximately HK$144.7 million with a working capital ratio of 1.69:1. During the six months ended 30 June 2012, orders newly secured by the Group amounted to approximately HK$937.0 million, an increase of 7.1% as compared with the corresponding period in 2011. As of 30 June 2012, the order book balance was approximately HK$754.2 million, an increase of HK$40.5 million compared to 31 December 2011.

Mr. Henry Hui, Chief Executive Officer of Automated Systems Holdings Limited said, “We are pleased to report a satisfactory performance in the first half of 2012, with growth recorded in revenue, net profit as well as gross profit margin. Besides, we received a rise in the volume of orders, which demonstrated the continual support of our customers. During the period under review, we strived to provide various IT products and services for both the public and commercial sectors. We attained encouraging results in grasping rising business opportunities from the demand of cloud, managed service and infrastructure, as well as solutions for mobility, security and business intelligence. We also customised various kinds of applications with related services to meet the diverse needs of regional markets.”

For the six months ended 30 June 2012, the product sales and service revenue were HK$523.9 million and HK$367.1 million, up by 13.8% and 22.1% respectively as compared with the corresponding period last year. Product sales and service revenue contributed 58.8% and 41.2% of the total revenue respectively, compared to 60.5% and 39.5% with the corresponding period last year. For the three months ended 30 June 2012, the product sales and service revenue were HK$215.7 million and HK$188.1 million, up by 21.8% and 16.4% respectively compared with the same period last year.

For the six months ended 30 June 2012, commercial and public sector sales contributed 46.4% and 53.6% to revenue respectively, compared with 39.8% and 60.2% for the corresponding period in 2011. For the three months ended 30 June 2012, commercial and public sector sales contributed 49.1% and 50.9% to revenue respectively, compared to 46.6% and 53.4% for the same period last year.

In the public sector, the Group continued to play an important role in supporting the Hong Kong SAR Government in the adoption of IT services to improve its public services. In May 2012, the Group was selected as one of the Government’s Public Cloud Service Providers. In addition, the Group was awarded a number of major orders from the Government to provide applications and a cloud-enabled platform for several Government departments. These orders served as a solid foundation for the Group to capture future government projects.

In the commercial sector, the Group also embarked on developing a turnkey solution for a large retail group in Hong Kong, transforming their traditional queuing system into a digital marketing system with a key feature that enables customers to reserve seats online through various mobile devices, such as iPhones and Android handsets. This project demonstrated the Group’s capability to customize existing popular IT solutions, such as mobility solutions and its expertise to accommodate industry-specific needs.

A remarkable achievement was the Group’s success in capturing surging regional demand for data centers, gaining traction by satisfying relevant needs arising from managed services and infrastructure for IT services. In addition to its earlier success in winning orders in Hong Kong, Macau and Thailand, the Group has expanded the business of its managed services work portfolio to the mainland by securing several contracts from customers in the entertainment, transportation and financial sectors to participate in setting up a data center to support these customers’ cross-territories business and development in mainland.

Being vendor-neutral, the Group has been able to seize upon the ample opportunities generated by the demand for various kinds of solutions, such as security and business intelligence, by offering a wide range of IT and associated products. Driven by rising awareness of stringent IT security requirements and demands among both private and public organizations, the Group secured orders from a top 10 bank in Hong Kong to enhance its Internet banking services, as well as from a financial institution which provides credit card information services to all banks in Taiwan. It is also actively involved in discussions with customers in the transportation sector to satisfy their IT requirements for managing and analysing huge volumes of data.

For infrastructure services, the Group secured an infrastructure services project from an international clothing company which covered seven countries in the Asia-Pacific region and three cities in mainland China, demonstrating its regional service capabilities.

The promotion of Intellectual Property (IP)-based products achieved encouraging results during the first half of 2012. Following the introduction into organisations in Hong Kong in 2011 of a Geographical Information System (GIS) product by Beijing Teamsun Technology Co., Ltd. (“Teamsun”), the Group’s ultimate holding company, the Group also achieved its first-of-its-kind success in customising the Teamsun system monitoring tool in Taiwan by offering Wonderland Nurserygoods Co. Ltd., the world’s largest original design manufacturer of nursery products, a system monitoring solution for its operations in Dongguan and Taipei. The Group is keen to closely monitor any potential business opportunities by working closely with Teamsun in order to replicate its success in other regions with similar strategy.

Moving forward, the Group will continue to focus on providing the high value-added services demanded by its customers. It will incorporate its industry-specific knowledge into IP-based products by making further investments in research & development. It will also continue to develop more localized products by leveraging the capabilities of i-Sprint Innovations Pte. Ltd. (“i-Sprint”) and collaborate closely with Teamsun. Its aim is to continue to build up a wide portfolio of self-owned products, such as its human resources management systems being deployed in the Government and other IP-based products for the retail, education and the property sectors, making these self-owned products compatible with cloud computing and suitable for use in various industries.

The Group also plans to further invest in its data center business in Greater China. The success of its data center service will be based on the availability of IT infrastructure, the proven processes in managed services, security management and a track record for delivering excellent IT services. By capitalising on the above capabilities, the Group expects that this service will strengthen its competitive edge in serving its customers.

The Group will continue to focus on solutions that can move up its value chain. With a particular surge being observed in regional demand for security, the Group launched its Security Operations Center in April this year to strengthen its competitive edge in this market. Based on its current expertise and achievements, the Group will actively explore new security opportunities by enhancing its security portfolio and bundling it together with other service offerings, such as data center services.

The Group anticipated the rapid development of cloud computing. To capitalise on this burgeoning trends, the Group has positioned itself as a trusted technology advisor and enabler of customers’ cloud-computing strategies. It will focus in particular on helping customers to define their IT strategy, design and build the platform that meets their business needs. The Group will also strive to provide high-valued services to customers by providing them with professional consultancy services and setting up private cloud solutions.

Considering the challenge of a shortage in IT professionals, the Group will utilise its ISO-certified Outsourcing Delivery Excellence Center in Zhuhai, which has a group of well-trained and experienced application development professionals to ensure the quality of the Group’s services. Furthermore, it will continue to work closely in partnership with local universities to create a pool of highly talented IT professionals who can meet its operational needs.

Mr. Hui concluded, “Looking ahead, as we are in a service-oriented business which relies greatly on high-quality individuals, we will develop our professional talent by increasing our training budget so as to maintain our competitive edge. We also aim to attain the highest possible levels of customer satisfaction by enhancing our service quality ensuring that our work is up to international standards. We will also continue to implement cost-effective measures, and fully utilise the Group’s and Teamsun’s capabilities. With the above initiatives in place, we remain optimistic about our business prospects.”

 
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