AZARIA FAREEN
Government is committed to encourage, motivate and assist Fijians in starting up small business so they can grow and contribute towards the economic development of the country.
As such, Investment Fiji has been providing free advice to those businesses in need and those looking to explore new market opportunities.
This has not only led to supporting small and medium businesses to perform better but it can contribute to a business operating efficiently to acquire more market reach and also employ more people.
Foneology was one business which received the guidance in connecting to a new overseas market. Company managing director James Trusler said they are the only company providing mobile phone warranty work for offshore countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia and are just starting business with Philippine’s.
“We are really big on export services where we receive phones from offshore from various countries in South-East Asia Pacific and we repair it in Fiji and export it back to their countries,” Mr Trusler said.
“Investment Fiji is more than willing to help us as they know the different processes and have lots of contacts in overseas. We’ve had some challenges with Malaysia once and they directed us to their counterparts which helped a lot.”
The three times winner of the Prime Ministers International Business Award, Mr Trusler said he attributes these achievements to the hardworking capabilities of his staff.
“I have been lucky to be awarded few times which makes everyone motivated and the staff appreciate being recognized for all their hard work in a big way. It makes us work harder and look for better opportunities and improve our services,” the entrepreneur said.
He says that over the years the company has been very focused on quality and has quality control staff who check every phone before it goes back overseas.
“I believe that I have outstanding technicians who can repair to the expected quality of the manufacturer’s expectations, as when a phone goes back to the manufacturers it is in a brand new status – it shouldn’t have scratches or finger marks on the screen because then we will get return jobs,” Mr Trusler said.
“We employ around 40 staff with a good pay package and by diversifying we have been able to employ more people, and because we are doing export services we are paid with offshore remittance which contributes towards the Fijian economy.”
Mr Trusler says it is important for him to develop the capabilities of his employees so they can not only perform better but also back their progress in their careers.
“Over the years we have sponsored staff to study further and we are very fortunate that some of the manufacturers we work with are very supportive to provide staff training. They get professional manufacturer training and go to New Zealand to get trained and every time Samsung has a flagship model we receive training,” he said.