{"id":5962,"date":"2020-06-22T11:53:29","date_gmt":"2020-06-22T03:53:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www2.ift.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/?p=5962"},"modified":"2020-06-22T11:54:50","modified_gmt":"2020-06-22T03:54:50","slug":"jacob-wong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/jacob-wong\/","title":{"rendered":"How an IFTM degree helped entrepreneur Jacob Wong prepare for launch"},"content":{"rendered":"\u4e2d\u6587\u6458\u8981 \/ Summary in Chinese<\/span>\n

IFTM alumnus Mr. Jacob Wong appears to be a young man in a big hurry. After helping his family launch the successful \u00c9lys\u00e9e Bakery chain in 2014, and graduating from IFTM in 2017, he is now busy with a venture to bring smart technology to vending machines.<\/p>\n

Mr. Wong is an entrepreneur who likes to launch new lines of business, and he says the knowledge and skills gained from his education at the Institute have helped him immensely.<\/p>\n

He graduated with a Bachelor\u2019s Degree in Tourism Retail and Marketing Management. While he has always enjoyed an entrepreneurial mindset, the formal training at the Institute in fields such as marketing gave him the tools to put business ideas into practice.<\/p>\n

He first applied that know-how in launching \u00c9lys\u00e9e Bakery Co. Ltd. \u201cI went on an exchange in the Netherlands in my second year at IFTM. At the same time, my family visited France for business research,\u201d Mr. Wong says. \u201cAfter that, we decided to open a specialty, French-style bakery.\u201d<\/p>\n

The idea to position the \u00c9lys\u00e9e Bakery brand as a seller of French-style products was first proposed by Mr. Wong, who took on the marketing function. He remains deeply involved in the management of \u00c9lys\u00e9e Bakery to this day.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe invited a person from France to work with us,\u201d he says. The person worked as a baker and pastry chef. \u201cWe use French-style furnishing. We play French music in the shops. We make our products according to French recipes.\u201d<\/p>\n

The strategy has been so successful that many in Macao think \u00c9lys\u00e9e Bakery is French-owned, a misconception that pleases the owners.<\/p>\n

Shortly after he graduated from IFTM, Mr. Wong decided to venture out on his own and into the field of highly engineered vending machines. The inspiration came during a visit to Hong Kong in 2018 to help his family set up an \u00c9lys\u00e9e Bakery branch. \u201cI saw some cashierless stores, which was something that utterly did not exist in Macao at that time,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

His company, IM Technology Ltd, is much more than just a trader in vending machines, Mr. Wong says. IM Technology offers a key-in-hand service.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is more like a package,\u201d he says. \u201cWe write the code for the machine\u2019s operating system. We can customise the appearance of the machine. We can offer mobile advertising.\u201d The company also helps enterprises develop sales and marketing strategies.<\/p>\n

IM Technology offers 2 types of vending machine: one for retail sales, and another dispensing freshly brewed coffee and other hot or cold drinks.<\/p>\n

The business has helped draw Mr. Wong back to his alma mater. He is currently working with IFTM to create a vending machine that is tailor-made for the Institute. The machine will use cloud technology, allowing IFTM to use it for posting announcements and to publicise special activities.<\/p>\n

Value-added education<\/b><\/p>\n

Mr. Wong says what he learned at IFTM has helped him greatly in his youthful career as an entrepreneur. \u201cMany IFTM students might say that there are large amounts of group projects at the Institute,\u201d he says. \u201cIn fact, this builds team spirit. I\u2019ve learned how to communicate with others through these projects.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Institute\u2019s group projects offer students opportunities to work with real companies, for instance on developing marketing plans, Mr. Wong says. \u201cIn the end, these companies give us feedback accordingly, to let us understand whether our ideas are feasible. This is something that is very valuable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Wong is full of praise for the range of exchange programmes available at IFTM, and for the requirement that all students pursuing bachelor\u2019s degrees complete an internship in Year 3. He says these features of an IFTM education have helped him formulate an outlook on entrepreneurship.<\/p>\n

\u201cMacao is too small. Going on exchange to the Netherlands broadened my horizons,\u201d he says. \u201cI got the chance to explore the world and I did learn a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

His curricular internship at the Galaxy Macau integrated resort made another big contribution to his vocational development. \u201cDuring those 6 months I helped write the standard operating procedures for the retail department,\u201d he says. \u201cThere were things I was able to understand through this work, things that I could never learn from textbooks.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

IFTM alumnus Mr. Jacob Wong appears to be a young man in a big hurry. After helping his family launch the successful \u00c9lys\u00e9e Bakery chain in 2014, and graduating from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":5964,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55,136],"tags":[1415,108,20,1416,1414,145,1417],"class_list":["post-5962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-main_headline","tag-elysee","tag-entrepreneur","tag-entrepreneurship","tag-im-technology","tag-jacob-wong","tag-tourism-retail-and-marketing-management","tag-vending-machine"],"views":3,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5962"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5962\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5968,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5962\/revisions\/5968"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}