Business Advisory & Consultancy, SME Bank

In Malaysia, more than 90% of our establishments are small or medium sized enterprises with annual revenues of less than RM25 million. As the stability of any growing economy depends on the structured and sustainable expansion of these small and medium enterprises, sound business management practices and governance are important milestones to entrepreneurial success. From the ability to master simple cash flow to the management of debt repayments, to the creative and operational knowledge required in the development of marketable products and services, sustaining SME growth will continue to be challenging for all SMEs operating in markets already populated by regional and global competitors.

Through the strengthening of collaborative efforts with Malaysian and international SME development agencies and partners, we are developing a wide spectrum of business support services (“Intervention”) in response to customer needs across industries and phases of business growth/life-cycle (i.e. start-up, growth, maturity & declining). With different intervention approaches and strategies, the Bank wishes to achieve the following objectives: -

	To support the Bank’s core business activities (i.e. lending);
	To manage/reduce risks of the Bank at the point of origination/entry;
	To build business capabilities and to increase customers’ business values; and
	To strengthen and improve business performance of the Bank’s customers to a higher level (e.g. from micro to small to medium classifications.

The Business Intervention and Packages are devised after taking into account the proposed New Business Model where financing and advisory services are embedded together in total SME Bank’s offerings.  The Business Advisory Service Intervention and Packages are summarized as follows: -

Brief description of proposed intervention packages and approaches across industries, phases of business growth/life-cycle and credit risk rating is as shown below.

Your Business

Starting up... 

Although many entrepreneurs start with strong capabilities and personal instincts on how to succeed, there are also many who start businesses with limited knowledge and resources on how to grow a business. The will to become an entrepreneur often stems from a business idea or the development of new product or service. However, a high percentage of businesses in the SME category tend to fail each year, frequently within the first two years of operations where numerous factors contribute towards the success or failure of a new business.

Within any field of business endeavor, there are opportunities as well as limitations in being a smaller company or start-up where the willingness to work hard sometimes is just not enough to sustain business growth in competitive marketplaces. Getting the business model right is important not only at the start of a business, but through the whole business lifecycle where ready access to market-critical knowledge, relationships and work experience determines how fast or how slow a company grows. The business route they take usually travels through the following four stages of development. 

Growing the Business

The journey between Start-up to Maturity can be any number of years depending on the cumulative skills of the SME, the industry in which it operates and the market competitiveness of industry players. SMEs succeed when products and services are competitively positioned, have strong business models, read markets better than their rivals, have stable distribution channels, competent management teams and have strong market reputations to generate timely financial and market support. On the other hand, businesses start to decline when one or more of business drivers have been overlooked or not accessible to the entrepreneur.

How are the services delivered? 

Services offered are delivered through our Business Counselors (SME Bank’s employees) and External Service Providers (strategic partners, third party experts, consultants and professionals) made available nationwide throughout our 18 branches and head office. 

Note: 

As the above services are being offered in phases, please check with the Business Advisory & Consultancy (Call the BAC direct line at: 03-2615 2888 during office hours) on the intervention services currently available for the different customer groups. The Bank will however post schedules on services to be offered on a regular basis and will communicate directly with targeted customers on the availability of the various intervention programmes. Special purpose support services will occasionally be developed to respond to the needs of SMEs by classification or industry groups either at branches or at Head Office in Kuala Lumpur. Notice and information on these special programmes are posted on our website at www.smebank.com.my