By CHEN HUIFEN

MICRO-ENTERPRISES have become much more willing to try new products and services, according to a survey of 500 such firms by the Singapore Malay Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SMCCI).

The inaugural study found 72 per cent of respondents intend to explore new ways of doing business within the next two months. Some 67 per cent said they want to use IT to innovate and 79 per cent are looking for ideas and advice on how to develop new products.

The survey findings buck the common view of micro-enterprises, defined as businesses with annual turnover of less than $1 million, says Vector Scorecard, the consulting firm that did the study. Many micro-enterprises were thought to be close-minded, with few seeing a need to expand.

'From our anecdotal experience and daily dealings with micro-enterprises, we try to encourage them to deploy or adopt innovative processes, but we saw a low percentage of them take up new things about three years ago,' said Vector Scorecard's Asia-Pacific managing director M Nazri.

Only three or four out of 10 micro-enterprises were willing to try new things at that time, he said.

'They were very comfortable to do things the old way, because times were good and do not call for them for revamp. Now that the crisis has happened, new dynamics have forced them to realise that the same approaches they had before will not be effective today.'

However, only 40 per cent of survey respondents said they want to expand overseas. A similar proportion said they are willing to share profits with partners if they can find suitable ones to venture overseas together.

There is a stronger demand for professional services. For instance, 84 per cent of respondents said they require basic financial management systems. Although only 37 per cent said they have no problem maintaining and growing their client base, Mr Nazri said this is because their client bases are small.

'More than 80 per cent of their clientele is based on a few customers - they do not have a diversified portfolio of clients,' he said.

'They have not embarked on a methodical approach of marketing and sales yet because of limitations in resources.'

Seventy-nine per cent of respondents said they need help accessing new markets via the Internet, while 93 per cent intend to focus on branding and marketing in the near term.

As for funding, Mr Nazri said there is low reliance on government funding schemes because of eligibility concerns 'because a lot of the grants here are basically disbursed based on needs and potential.

They want to see scalable businesses.' Unfortunately, many micro-enterprises find it a challenge to show that, he said.

Akbar Kader, chairman of EDC@SMCCI and vice- president of SMCCI, said: 'Micro SMEs form a big part of the business eco-system, yet their needs and challenges are so fragmented and varied.

As a result, they may fall outside the ambit of conventional business solutions, schemes and programmes offered by both policy-makers and service providers from the private sector.'

The SMCCI survey was done between last November and April this year. It was not race-specific. The findings were unveiled yesterday at a half-day seminar on strategic business road-mapping, organised by the Enterprise Development Centre at SMCCI.

This article was first published in The Business Times .