The US computer company IBM indicated its intention to expand its market in China in 2005 while meeting its partners in Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei Province last Wednesday.

Song Yun, the newly appointed branch manager of IBM in Central China, said the company had confidence in expanding the market of its On Demand Express Portfolio solutions, specially designed for China's small and medium-sized enterprises.

According to Song, the potential IT market in small and medium-sized companies worldwide is valued at 300 billion US dollars. There are more than 10 million such companies in China, making up about 99 percent of the country's registered companies. Together they spent more than four billion US dollars on IT products and services in 2004.

Introduced to China in the fall of 2003, the Express solutions have 1,000 customers in China in banking, securities, insurance, automobile manufacturing and retailing. IT products and services for China's small and medium-sized enterprises generate one third of IBM's profit in China, the company said.

(Xinhua News Agency March 14, 2005)