After the Asian economic crisis and the dotcom bust, many application service providers (ASPs) found markets unreceptive to their solutions. This was the situation eC-LINK found itself in soon after it was formed in 1999.

Potential customers needed to be convinced about the ability of eC-LINK's solutions to meet their requirements. Gary Pow, Director (applications) at eC-LINK, gives credit to a very dedicated team with members who share the same vision of making eC-LINK a success. "Together, we showed our commitment and dedication to our customers, and convinced them to give our solutions a chance," said Pow. "Once we had proven ourselves to a few and established ourselves, it was slightly easier."

An Application Service Provider (ASP) is a third-party entity that manages and distributes software-based services and solutions to customers via a centrally managed data centre. ASPs are a way for companies to outsource some or almost all aspects of their information technology needs to a company that can provide solutions that are scalable to their needs.

What eC-LINK offers are solutions that link customers and suppliers in a complete supply chain and coordinate between different departments within a company. Its solutions also help reduce business process complexity and improves business process reliability for making better business decisions.

Gary Pow, Director (Applications), eC-LINK

It was the creation of brand awareness that eC-LINK found difficult at first. Pow found that a small Singapore company like eC-LINK really needed to work hard at differentiating itself from the rest of the field. Fortunately for the company, it was able to leverage on the name and brand of IBM by partnering with IBM under IDA's Infocomm Local Industry Upgrading Program (iLIUP) in 2005.

"We are very happy with our partnership with IBM," Pow said. "For a recent project, we were brought in from the start and worked with them to deliver a solution that suited their customer's needs and ran on IBM hardware. In all, we took three months to implement our solution and replace the customer's previous system." This partnership with IBM has been so beneficial to both parties that they have also taken it overseas to customers in Malaysia. They are also jointly exploring more markets in the region.

To succeed in a partnership, said Pow, you need all parties to share the same vision of the solutions that can be implemented worldwide. This way, all parties can work towards the same goal. He also added that working with the right partner was crucial. "For a Singapore company like ours, the network of contacts that IBM brings means that we are able to showcase our solutions to a larger market. With their technology backing, we have gained valuable help in developing our solutions for their platforms."

Pow has some words of advice for budding entrepreneurs: "If you want to become an entrepreneur, you can't just spend all your time dreaming about it. Like Nike says in their slogan, 'Just Do It!' Take the chance when it comes or you'll never know if you can make it. But remember to hang in there when things are tough and don't give up."