SINGAPORE, June 4 (Xinhua) -- The Singapore Business Federation (SBF) on Tuesday launched the SBF BusinessASEAN Network at the ASEAN Conference 2019 as part of its efforts to help businesses based in the city-state expand into the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region.
According to a press release from SBF, its BusinessASEAN Network comprises market-focus business groups, one for each target country, and will bring together business leaders, market practitioners and other stakeholders to connect, communicate and collaborate.
The first batch of these business groups will be BusinessVietnam, BusinessIndonesia, BusinessThailand and BusinessMyanmar, and more such business groups will be launched in the future to cover other ASEAN countries.
SBF Chairman Teo Siong Seng said that the market-focus groups would help SBF obtain an in-depth understanding of companies' needs, so that the SBF know how to best furnish resources, including market knowledge, regulatory requirements and business connections to facilitate their expansion into the wider ASEAN region.
"Additionally, we hope to foster collaboration amongst local businesses, so that they can work together to collectively offer more compelling and competitive value propositions," he said.
According to the SBF, ASEAN's GDP is expected to grow at an annual average of 5.2 percent from 2019 to 2023, maintaining ASEAN as a bright spot in the global economy and possibly making it the fourth largest market in the world by 2030.
