Success story: Mohd Zaki successfully grew the BertamBest brand by participating in the CGC Developmental Programme.
OBTAINING proper financing to expand one’s business venture is one of the common obstacles faced by many micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs).
In addition, some might not have the necessary knowledge on financial literacy and finding new markets, as well as the ability to stay viable and sustainable.
Providing comprehensive advisory services, the CGC Developmental Programme by the Credit Guarantee Corporation Malaysia Bhd (CGC) addresses just that.
CGC provides aid to those in need of assistance or advisory workshops, especially those with no collateral, to access financing and find potential markets for their products and services.
Among the services offered include financial advisory and market access advisory.
Assistance to MSMEs: CGC provides aid to those in need of assistance or advisory workshops, especially those with no collateral, to access financing and find potential markets for their products and services.
The Financial Advisory Team starts by conducting a comprehensive review and diagnosis to provide one-to-one personalised financial advisory services to MSMEs to improve their eligibility for financing in the future.
Their four-step approach includes reviewing unsuccessful applications, providing financial advisory, recommending alternate financing, as well as improving eligibility for financing.
Meanwhile, market access advisory takes a step-by-step approach for MSMEs to identify their business gaps, improve and scale, so that they can thus succeed in their entrepreneurial venture.
The four-step approach involves assessing the current situations of MSMEs, enhancing their knowledge through workshops, facilitating their growth by assessing new markets for both local and international via online and offline platforms, as well as continuous engagement through business sustainability throughout 24 months.
Those who participate in the advisory workshops will benefit from knowledge sharing sessions by industry experts, as well as business matching sessions with potential market channel owners.
Comprehensive review and diagnosis: The FA Team provides one-to-one personalised financial advisory services to MSMes to improve their eligibility for future financing.
To date, there are three different types of advisory workshops, which are digital marketing, e-commerce and branding.
One of the many MSMEs who benefitted from the CGC Developmental Programme is Mohd Zaki Zakaria, who has been involved in the food and beverage business since 2008.
He started the production of goat milk-based products for original equipment manufacturing customers, as well as started his brand BertamBest in 2016.
“I got to know about CGC’s financing products and services when participating in the International Expo in Nanning, China, and signed up with BizMaju in 2019.
“Through the CGC Developmental Programme, I was guided to identify and access new markets resulting in the successful marketing of my premixed coffee products in Singapore now.
“CGC provides very hands-on information about the CGC Developmental Programme. It was very well-organised, from the Singapore market briefing, business matching and selection stages until the listing of our products,” he shared.
Eye on SME pain points: CGC provides comprehensive advisory services, the CGC Developmental Programme.
Since October 2020, Bertambest has been available at Eccellente Hao Mart in Singapore and is a top product range among the 10 MSMEs placed there.
It is garnering high sales and Zaki already has repeat orders. He is proud to say: “If it wasn’t for the pandemic, we could be there ourselves promoting our products aggressively.”
“I also had the opportunity to attend the dedicated workshops and further grow my brand presence on e-commerce platforms such as Shopee, Lazada, Agrobazaar Online, Ourshop and Hayib.com to make it easier for customers to obtain products through online purchases,” he added.
Currently, Bertambest is available in Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore. Zaki has travelled to China, Qatar, Turkey and New Zealand to market his brand and initial responses have been very encouraging.
His plans in the pipeline include increasing production capacity, as well as expanding to other countries such as the Philippines, Thailand, Lebanon and some provinces in China.
“Entrepreneurs out there need to take the opportunity by participating in programmes provided by various agencies such as those managed by CGC, which will help grow your business.
“But you also need to be self-disciplined, committed and always look for opportunities to gain knowledge and improve your marketing-related skills to keep up with the needs of today’s consumers,” he advised.
The CGC Developmental Prog-ramme has promoted the exponential growth and development of Malaysian MSMEs, both locally and internationally.
Since its inception, the CGC Developmental Programme has assisted more than 46,000 MSMEs, as of Oct 31, 2021.
For more details on the CGC Developmental Programme, visit https://imsme.com.my/portal/cgc-developmental-programme/ or call 03-7880 0088 (CGC Client Service Centre) or email csc@cgc.com.my.
