Berjayapak Sdn. Bhd. 35th Annual Dinner
Speech by YAB Tuan Chow Kon Yeow,
Chief Minister of Penang
Berjayapak Sdn. Bhd. 35th Annual Dinner
23 March 2019
Mr Ooi Chang Seaw and Mr. Ooi Eng Leng
Founders of Berjayapak
Ms Ooi Lay Pheng
CEO of Berjayapak
Board of Directors Mr. John Ooi and Mr, Lee Soon Swee
Respective Chairmen, Presidents & Representatives of timber board, councils and Associations
Distinguished guests
Ladies & gentlemen
Good evening to all of you.
It is with great pleasure for me to join you tonight to celebrate Berjayapak’s 35th anniversary in this packaging industry.
My heartiest congratulations to the founders, Board of Directors and all the staffs in Berjayapak. I heard of your amazing achievements in the past couple of years. Berjayapak was recognized in 2017 as one of the top100 SME fast moving companies in Malaysia. The company courageously accepted Malaysia Timber Industry Board Lean Creanova project and you emerged a champion in the Lean journey in April 2018. It continued on its lean journey to the MPC level and was recognized for Lean Management in Dec 2018. The company was also the recipient of the prestigious Golden Bull Award where it was being recognised as an outstanding SME in Malaysia.
Last year, Berjayapak was invited to participate in the Global Wood Packaging Forum in Minneapolis USA and was recognized by the leaders in the global forum as Malaysia’s market leader in the wood packaging industry. We must say we are very proud of Berjayapak in the global arena, especially when the forum organizing committee raised Malaysia’s flag for the first time. Berjayapak have made Malaysia proud in the Global Wood Packaging Forum.
SME Corporation annual report showed that 98.5% of business establishments in Malaysia are SMEs. There are 907,605 SMEs in Malaysia, of which 76.5% are microenterprise, 21.2% small enterprises, and 2.3% medium enterprises. In 2017, SMEs contributed RM435.1 billion to the nation’s economy which amounted to 37.1% contribution to Malaysia’s overall GDP, 66% to overall employment and 17.3% to overall exports. The government has set a target for SMEs to contribute 41% to GDP by 2020 and expects SMEs play a greater role to support the country’s economic growth.
Due to globalization of markets, technology advancements, ever changing needs and demands from the consumers, it is important for SMEs to adapt to the forces of changes and evolve to be competitive in many different dimensions such as design and developing of new products, adopting latest technologies and smart operating procedures for its manufacturing processes, and introducing new ideas for sourcing, human resources and business strategies.
We noted that Berjayapak has grown from one generation to the next generation. The founders are passing the business to the next generation in the recent years. I would also like to congratulate the current Management of Berjapak as you are able to seamlessly take over the company and continue the legacy of your founders. It is so inspiring to see Berjayapak being awarded and recognised within Malaysia as well as in the international wood packaging fraternity. This shows that the company has put in tremendous focus and effort on continuous improvement to drive the company forward. Berjayapak is a good model to the local SMEs, having served the local multinational companies and the communities with great diligence the past 35 years and many more years to come.
Once again, please accept my heartiest congratulations on this momentous event. I wish Berjayapak continuous and greater success in the future.
Thank you.