Aldan Technology aims to expand kiosks business regionally

• Looking at raising funds via IPO to expand regionally, boost R&D and marketing
• Sees growing trend in virtual teller machines, hopes to have bigger presence in financial services

AFTER spending over 10 years growing the domestic market, Aldan Technology Sdn Bhd, which solutions have touched many Malaysians' lives, is all set to expand its presence outside Malaysia.

"We are currently in talks with potential partners in Indonesia and Thailand, as we are looking at expanding regionally," said Aldan Technology executive director Chiang Kai Loon (pic) in an interview with Digital News Asia in Puchong recently.

Chiang added that the company is also looking at raising funds from the capital market.

"Initial public offering (IPO) is in our plan. In order for us to expand regionally, we need some resources, marketing funds as well as research and development funds. 

"We would also need a bigger facility. An IPO is a choice for us to expand at a timely manner and more effectively," Chiang explained, without providing further details on whether the company is already in talks with investment bankers.

Introducing Aldan Technology

Aldan Technology, which was established in 2003, develops self-service kiosks and related solutions that are used in the financial, aviation and hospitality industries. 

The kiosks it develops are used by millions of Malaysians. For example, it develops self-service check-in kiosks for budget carrier AirAsia Bhd.

It is also known to be one of the companies which develop the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) kiosks that are located in some of the key bank branches. Malaysians use the kiosks to print their EPF statements. 

Aldan Technology has been developing kiosks for AirAsia and EPF for more than seven years. 

Meanwhile, in the hospitality sector, it develops some of the hotel check-in kiosks and loyalty kiosks that are used in Resorts World Genting.

"Our offerings include providing conceptual, architectural designs and engineering of kiosks. We also develop computer software for these kiosks," said Chiang.

Recently, the company developed the "first of its kind" kiosks, dubbed the  Virtual Teller Machines, for Bank Simpanan Nasional (BSN). The virtual teller machines allows its bank tellers across Malaysia to serve customers in multiple locations remotely and concurrently via live virtual banking operations.

This means, a BSN teller in Kuantan, when not serving any customers, could service a customer in a busy branch in Kuala Lumpur, thus allowing idle resource to be efficiently deployed and to reduce wait time during peak hours at the branch.

Under the initial deal between Aldan Technologies and BSN, the latter would acquire 93 virtual teller machines for approximately RM30 million.

In total, it has developed over 3000 units of kiosks for various customers and it is producing an average of 40 units a month. It can also produce as much as 100 units a month. 

Bumpy pasts

During the early days, Aldan Technology was having a tough time selling its kiosks to potential customers. 

"I remember going to a hotel operator and presented what the company and the kiosks can do. They did not believe a Malaysian company can do this and would rather buy the same product from foreign companies," said Chiang.

"So, we had to build a prototype from scratch and bring it to their board room and demonstrate to the board members."

The move paid off as Aldan Technology managed to seal the deal with the hotel operator. However, Chiang was not entirely happy as the hotel operator went on to buy new kiosks from rivals. 

"I think customers do not understand that we invested a lot of time and money on developing and designing the kiosks from scratch. (By doing this), other companies can just look at our designs, make some minor modification, and then sell to customers," says Chiang.

Yet the hotel operator experience proved useful for Chiang who realised that he needed to do something to increase customer stickiness. "We realised that we needed to increase our focus on software."

One of its first projects where Aldan Technology offered both hardware and software solutions was its EPF project. 

"The job with EPF started about 10 years ago, or about 1.5 years after we were established."

Future outlook

Moving forward, Aldan Technology hopes to secure more jobs in the financial services industry. 

Chiang believes that his virtual machines can help banks to improve customer experience and relationship, as it can serve customers' needs. 

In fact, with the right processes in place, customers can get their ATM debit cards, open a banking account, and others, from these machines securely.

"Because our virtual teller machines are quite unique, we hope to offer this product and solution to other banks locally and also regionally," said Chiang.

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