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Towngas Adopted C&T ProSmart E-procurement for a Compliant, Secure, and Efficient Digital Transformation

Hong Kong, December 31, 2024 - E-procurement provides compliance, security, and high efficiency! Since adopting C&T's ProSmart system for e-procurement in 2019, The Hong Kong and China Gas Company (Towngas) has effectively managed data for suppliers in Hong Kong, streamlining the tender approval process, significantly improving corporate governance and compliance, and meeting sustainability needs. Raymond Lee, Assistant General Manager of Corporate Supplies and Administration at The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited, stated, "E-procurement has automated, tracked, and audited the entire procurement process, ensuring fairness and justice, which helps us expand our business and establish long-term partnerships with high-quality collaborators."

 

Tommy Choi (far left), Head of Enterprise Information Management/Enterprise Procurement Management at C&T, Karen Ng, (second from left), General Manager of Enterprise Software at C&T, Raymond Lee (second from right), Assistant General Manager of Corporate Supplies and Administration at The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited, and Parry Chan (far right), Purchasing Manager of the Corporate Supplies and Administration Department at The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited.
 

C&T's Familiarity with Regulatory and Audit Requirements

With over a century of history, Towngas serves 1.9 million customers in Hong Kong, expanding its business across multiple sectors. The procurement of materials for various departments, including pipeline installation, engineering materials, gas appliances, and kitchen cabinetry, requires substantial manpower and resources. Consequently, Towngas began seeking an efficient, unified, and systematic procurement solution in 2018. After several rounds of selection, they ultimately chose C&T's ProSmart system to develop an e-tendering and management system. Raymond Lee remarked, "C&T is a provider of enterprise procurement management (EPM) software solutions in Hong Kong, well aware of local client requirements. The ProSmart system provides a comprehensive e-tendering service, with a professional technical team assisting in everything from system design and development to integration and implementation, unlocking the full functionality of the tendering system, which made it stand out."

 

Raymond Lee, Assistant General Manager of Corporate Supplies and Administration at The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited, stated, "Electronic procurement automates, tracks, and audits the entire procurement process, ensuring that all procedures are fair and just."

The standardized systems available in the market did not meet Towngas's internal supplier selection criteria. The C&T ProSmart system is customizable and comprehensive, featuring supplier registration, quotation invitations, expenditure analysis, supplier qualification reviews, tender evaluation, and document management. It also introduces automated and auditable automatic processes, eliminating cumbersome manual procedures from the past while significantly enhancing procurement efficiency and effectiveness.

 

Tracking Performance of Suppliers with Centralized Data Management

Towngas officially adopted the e-tendering system based on C&T's ProSmart in the fourth quarter of 2019. The system provides detailed quotation data, ensuring compliance, traceability, and high efficiency in managing the entire procurement process. Raymond Lee explained that as a public utility, the primary focus is to ensure corporate governance and compliance. ProSmart, built on a cloud architecture, not only features a user-friendly interface but also offers a highly flexible cloud platform that supports real-time updates and data access. The company can quickly trace transactional data and establish closer connections with more than a thousand suppliers worldwide. The system also allows management to easily review and compare various quotation details, helping to identify potential risks, such as collusion and false reporting. Additionally, the system can integrate with the company's ERP to automatically consolidate and exchange data, achieving centralized data management.

 

 

Comprehensive Automated Management: Automatic Tender Evaluation without Manual Effort

After five years of continuous updates and improvements, Towngas’s e-tendering system now has background information on thousands of suppliers. The system can automatically issue tender invitations within specified timeframes, allowing suppliers to submit tenders on time. Whether searching for material data, generating reports, or evaluating tenders, the system can quickly organize information from various suppliers, eliminating the previous cumbersome paper-based tendering processes. This effectively accelerates document organization speed and reduces manpower investment and operational costs. Parry Chan, Purchasing Manager of the Corporate Supplies and Administration Department at The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited, highlighted, "In the past, the tender evaluation process required manual organization of a large amount of data, comparing prices and details, which took more than a month. Now, the system's automation technology can efficiently analyze data, aiding future business planning."

 

Parry Chan, Purchasing Manager of the Corporate Supplies and Administration Department at The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited, stated, "Everything can now be completed automatically, and all data can be backed up and duplicated, saving a significant amount of paper and making a major contribution to environmental protection."

 

Advanced Cloud Platform: Stable and High-Performance

Towngas's use of ProSmart to build its e-tendering system is a successful example of digital transformation and is a flagship project for C&T, receiving unanimous praise from the market and customers. Tommy Choi, Head of Enterprise Information Management/Enterprise Procurement Management at C&T, pointed out that to meet Towngas's pursuit of excellence, C&T has continuously invested resources to enhance the ProSmart cloud system, ensuring that all hardware and software technologies achieve high performance and stability, thereby providing a unified and secure electronic tendering solution. He emphasized, "Historically, ProSmart's clients have largely been from public institutions; this successful commercial case with the Towngas has generated significant positive feedback, especially regarding the functionality, efficiency, scalability, and compliance of the tendering system, expanding ProSmart's commercial reach and encouraging us to continually improve."

 

Tommy Choi, Head of Enterprise Information Management/Enterprise Procurement Management at C&T, stated that to meet Towngas's pursuit of excellence, C&T has been continually investing resources to enhance the ProSmart cloud system in recent years.

Tommy Choi believes that artificial intelligence technology is driving a new wave of digital transformation. C&T is actively incorporating emerging technologies such as generative AI, large models, and big data, allowing the system to automatically extract online information, track engineering incidents, legal litigation, and other public data, eliminate human errors, and ensure strict oversight of important projects.

 

Emphasizing ESG for Sustainable Development

Towngas has signed a five-year contract with C&T, allowing the well-received ProSmart to continue supporting Towngas's long-term development in corporate material supply and administration. Raymond Lee concluded, "Product quality and service have a significant impact on the company's overall performance; therefore, choosing the right material suppliers is crucial. ProSmart's customized e-tendering system not only streamlines the automated procurement process, but also leverages big data to assess supplier performance, thereby boosting supplier management, internal and external management, and overall operational efficiency. This reflects our long-term commitment to ESG and helps achieve the company's sustainability goals."

 

(From left) Tommy Choi, Head of Enterprise Information Management/Enterprise Procurement Management at C&T, Raymond Lee, Assistant General Manager of Corporate Supplies and Administration at The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited, and Parry Chan, Purchasing Manager of the Corporate Supplies and Administration Department at The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited, collaborate to support the future development of the Gas Company.