AGM 2019：Anniversary Annual General Meeting of Shanzhai City

The Annual General Meeting of Shanzhai City celebrating the 4th anniversary of the company was successfully held on 24th January 2019 in Hong Kong. The AGM was led by SZC’s founders Dr. Tat Lam and Chris Gee. They reviewed SZC’s operational performance in fiscal 2018 and forecast possible challenges the company might face in the coming years.

Milestones Reached

Dr. Tat Lam was highlighting the growth and accomplishments of SZC’s global network in fiscal 2018 at the annual general meeting.

In 2018, SZC initiated 6 pilot projects in China, Brazil, Southeast Asia and Hong Kong, and established strategic partnership with 28 global partners. Key investment highlights and accomplishments included:

• Brazil: Early Childhood Development Project with Brazil Government
• China: Early Childhood Development Project in Guizhou (貴州) and Gansu (甘肅) with China Development Research Foundation; Platform Coop for Food Safety Source Tracing in Guizhou
• Hong Kong: Time Voucher Program cooperated with the Hong Kong Council of Social Service
• Laos: Community Currency and Seed Bank Project
• Myanmar: Social Impact Bonds Project with MM Community

SZC also started up 4 new projects in fiscal 2018. The projects concern about human right issue in Malaysia, child poverty issue in Yunnan and rural poverty issue in China. We expect pilot experiments for these new programs will be implemented shortly in 2019.

Industry Trends and Challenges

Chris Gee, SZC’s founder and Chief Operating Officer, was outlining some potential challenges the company might face in the future.

At the meeting, Dr. Lam and Gee concurred impact investing industry was growing quickly in 2018. Many investors whom they met at international impact investing conferences and meetings expressed their interest in entering the market and investing on our products. Such growth is exciting not only because it will bring in new investors and more capital, but also because it will work to enhance professionalism of impact investing practice in the near future.

Although there is an encouraging momentum for impact investing, in interactive sessions, Dr. Lam, Gee and SZC’s Director of Product, Tim Lin, expressed their worries regarding the thorny business environment of the industry.

Tim Lin, SZC’s Director of Product, expressed his concerns in respect of business prospect of impact investing in one of the interactive sessions.

Many of our partner institutions and clients agree there is an urgent need for adopting technological advancement to optimize their sustainable operation. They believe use of big data, automated data collection and analysis, and blockchain technology are very important for them to provide better and more efficient services to end beneficiaries. However, a lack of funding always hinders or even deters them making impact investing decisions. Therefore, how to simplify impact data reporting infrastructure and make our techniques and technological tools become more cost-effective will be SZC’s assignments in 2019.

About Shanzhai City (SZC)

Founded in 2015, Shanzhai City is a social enterprise and start-up aims to alleviate poverty and promote community development through tech solutions that enhance the accessibility and reliability of high-quality impact data. We have a deep store of community development and IT solutions development expertise, which we incorporate into tech solutions that benefit communities and support investment. For more information, see https://shanzhaicity.com/