HONG KONG, Apr 1, 2021 – (ACN Newswire) – China Leon Inspection Holding Limited ("China Leon" or "the Company"; Stock Code: 1586.HK) today announced its audited 2020 annual results for the year ended 31 December of 2020 ("Reporting Period"). Revenue during the review period was approximately RMB 574.0 million, an increase of 44.8% from approximately RMB 396.5 million in 2019. Profit for the year was approximately RMB 74.9 million, an increase of 160.3% from approximately RMB 28.8 million in 2019. Basic earnings per share was approximately RMB12.59 cents (2019: RMB6.04 cents). The board of directors recommended a final dividend of RMB 0.0375 per share.

The sound performance during the reporting period was mainly due to benefited from the support by China's national macro policies and the improving market demand amid the global public health event as well as the complex and volatile macroeconomic environment in 2020 and the management of the group focused on high-quality development, carried out the concept of platform construction throughout the work, accurately grasped the market trends in each segment, deployed strategic advantages in areas, and continued to improve the quality and efficiency of the group's operations and steadily enhanced its comprehensive competitiveness and brand influence.

Mr. Yang Rongbing, Vice Chairman and Executive Director of China Leon, said: "In 2020, China and Singapore, our major business markets, were the first to restore normal production and operation ,because they had introduced effective prevention and control measures, so that the overall business of the Company was growing well, with continuous increase in all businesses. Besides, We explored the in-depth needs of our customers, overcame the obstacles due to the pandemic, strove to improve the service quality and expanded more business in the onsite inspection, technology consultation and training sectors. As a result, we won praise from our customers, and our business undertaking capability was raised rapidly, which indicated that we were already on a rapid development track and that we successfully attained the initial strategic development goal set for the energy inspection industry."

Continuous enhancement of brand influence and credibility
The Company has obtained CMA "Qualification Certificate of Inspection and Testing Agency" issued by the Certification and Accreditation Administration of the People's Republic of China and the CNAS "Laboratory Accreditation Certificate" issued by the China National Accreditation Service for Conformity Assessment. In overseas, it has obtained ISO17025, ISO17020 and ISO14001 certifications. The Company has reached the standards for internationally recognized testing and inspection agencies and other authoritative standards in terms of professional capabilities, and we employ a comprehensive quality management system to govern quality control and operating procedures for stringently controlling the quality of services. The Company has been granted full membership of China Entry & Exit Inspection and Quarantine Association and Chinese Certification and Accreditation Association, and rated as a contract-abiding and trustworthy company for a number of years in a row. We are a full member of TIC Council (a merger of IFIA and CEOC). The recognition of all of these qualifications assures that our inspection reports are more internationally credible.

Diversified customer structure
On the basis of maintaining stable and good partnership with key customers such as CHN Energy, Shaanxi Coal Group, China Coal Group, Yitai Group, Datang Group, China Resources Group, CNPC, SINOPEC, CNOOC, ChemChina, SinoChem, Shell, BP, Exxon-Mobil, Chevron, Total, Saudi Aramco, ENOC and Rosneft, etc., the Group engaged newly customers in new energy, such as Goldwind Science & Technology, SANY Heavy Industry, China Huadian Corporation, China General Certification Center and Tianjin Zhonghai Engineering Management Consulting Co., Ltd.. During the reporting period, we were expanding more regional customers and carrying out centralized marketing in specific industries, like the cement, iron and steel and papermaking industries as well as chemical factory, which further expanded our quality customer base.

Continuous strong growth in energy inspection business
In 2018, the Company acquired Saybolt (Tianjin) Metrology & Inspection Co., Ltd. and Leon Overseas (Hong Kong) Limited (formerly known as Core Laboratories (Hong Kong) Limited), and then . Saybolt (Singapore) Pte Ltd ("Saybolt (Singapore)") in 2019, which marked two major milestones for the Group in terms of globalization and business diversification, and enabled the Group to successfully venture into the petroleum business in the Asia-Pacific Region and extended its services, such as technical testing and inspection as well as analysis services (including product and service certification) for oil, natural gas, chemicals and fuel bulk cargoes, to cover Singapore and the surrounding areas, thus broadening its business scope. The comprehensive and systematic output management enabled us to expand the effectiveness of our M&A assets, grow our business capabilities rapidly and enter a positive payback period, thus resulting in a significant increase in the Group's overall operating income. The volume the Group's oil business segment increased significantly during the year, thanks to the increase in the volume of oil trade transhipped from Europe and the Middle East via Singapore to Southeast Asia. Meanwhile, the coal testing segment of the Company continued to grow steadily, with a gradual increase in its market share and new highs in various core indicators such as number of certificates issued and overall business revenue.

Looking ahead, Mr. Yang Rongbing, Vice Chairman and Executive Director of China Leon, said "2021 marks the start of the "14th Fifth Year" of the country and is also a special year in the process of China's modernization. China Leon actively responds to the development strategy of the country to seek progress while ensuring stability. Based on the achievement in M&A operation over the past three years, the Company firmly implements the 2+X strategy, which, the number "2" of the 2+X strategy

represents coal and oil product inspection, the two existing business pillars of the Group, as well as the further development in the field of energy and commodities inspection and testing; while the "X" represents the expected areas and room for future growth of the Group, focusing on renewable energy and other ESG related fields with long-term sustainable growth potential. Based on the principle of developing the "X" business in chronological order and on the solid market position in the field of commodities and energy, the Company will aggressively expand the following three major TIC sectors: (i) new energy inspection and testing; (ii) regular TIC inspection and testing; and (iii) new industry inspection and testing."

About China Leon Inspection Holding Limited
China Leon Inspection Holding Limited is China's first international third-party independent testing organization listed on the main board of Hong Kong Stock Exchange (stock code: HK1586). The Group has in nearly 30 branches and professional laboratories in multiple countries and regions across the globe, dedicated to providing professional testing and authenticating services for global clients. Chine Leon provides services on inspection, testing, measurement and authentication for over 5,000 global clients in energy and commodity fields, including coal, petroleum, petrochemical, electricity, and bulk minerals, covering major trading hubs in China and the Asia Pacific region at large.


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HONG KONG, Apr 1, 2021 – (ACN Newswire) – GOME Retail Holdings Limited (HKEX stock code: 493) announced its audited annual results for the year ended 31 December 2020 (the "Reporting Period").

Strengthened Development in the Second Phase after Successfully Completing the First Phase of "Home . Living" Strategy

In 2020, GOME completed the first phase of strategic development under its "Home . Living" strategy, and started in-depth development in a more refined manner in the second phase. In particular, GOME accelerated the development of its dual-platform new retail ecosystem powered by technology, intelligence and innovation, and established the "Social + Business + Sharing" GOME ecosystem with focus on online operation by integrating online and offline platforms and utilizing the strength of proprietary operation and third party external supply chain.

During the Reporting Period, the novel coronavirus ("COVID-19") pandemic boosted the development of the "Stay-at-Home Economy" and led to change in consumer demand in the market. To capture the opportunities, GOME has stepped up efforts to further implement social marketing and expand its digital local retailing business built on its dual online and offline platforms by leveraging its resourceful supply chain, nationwide logistics network and professional services. In particular, the large home appliance business, which was affected seriously by COVID-19, started to recover in the second quarter of 2020 as reflected by the 31.3% growth in overall sales revenue in the second half of the year comparing to the first half of 2020. Overall gross profit margin also showed a trend of month-on-month recovery since the second quarter this year, and up by about 1 percentage point in the second half of the year comparing to the first half of 2020. 1,034 new county-level stores were open throughout 2020, representing a YOY increase of over 100%. The number of GOME's online communities also saw significant growth and passed the 1 million milestone with coverage of over 100 million users. Online and offline members reached more than 200 million, including over 1 million with paid membership. In December 2020, the first order conversion rate of new customers was 15% and the repurchase rate of members was 31%, representing a YOY increase of 64% and 21% respectively, and the membership activity increased by 105% YOY. In the first quarter of this year, the estimated sales revenue of the Company achieved over 170% YOY increase. These were all attributable to the effective digital operation of GOME's online and offline platforms.

Operating Model Continued to Improve and Cash Position Maintained at Healthy Level

During the Reporting Period, the Group actively responded to the challenges posed by the pandemic by adopting stringent cost control measures and a relatively low-cost online inbound marketing model, coupled with an asset-light franchise operating model, which reduced substantial operating expenses such as rent and labor cost, enhanced operational efficiency, improved the overall profitability of physical stores, increased both customer traffic and sales while also effectively controlling the costs. In 2020, GOME's marketing expenses decreased by 24.3% YOY, administrative expenses decreased by 14.9% YOY, and other expenses excluding major non-operating factors decreased by 14.3% YOY. In terms of financing, GOME is forming a positive operating cash flow thanks to the support of more banking facilities and credit terms offered by suppliers, and has successfully redeemed bonds totaling over RMB3.8 billion in 2020, with all debt service funded by the Company's own cash holdings. At the end of the reporting period, GOME's cash and cash equivalents amounted to approximately RMB9.6 billion, maintaining at a healthy level of around RMB10 billion.

Upgraded Both Online and Offline Operations to Develop a Brand New Omni-channel Digital Platform

In 2020, GOME constructed the industry infrastructure through digital and standardized transformation of online and offline stores, products, transaction processes and service quality, which improved the transaction efficiency and service experience and facilitated the optimization and upgrade of the nationwide store network after the pandemic subsided. GOME has established a three-level service scope structure across the country to meet the demand of household customers in 3km, 5km and 8km radius based on different types of stores, scenarios and customer experience, which formed a grid-based coverage and optimized the store layout and service offerings.

In the future, the Company will continue to rapidly expand its network and complete the basic layout of its offline platform with franchising as the main focus supplemented by proprietary operation, aiming to have 6,000 physical stores in the next 18 months and achieve a monthly active users of over 100 million by diverting customer traffic from offline to online platform. In terms of offline platform, the Group has completed the online migration of more than 3,400 stores nationwide by setting up dedicated webpage for each store, which enabled such stores to carry out internet and digital operation and serve GOME customers in 3-8 km radius through video guide, professional shopping guide and concierge services, thereby becoming the closest and most reliable shopping guide for the customers under the one-stop service model of "real-time online reply + on-time and speedy product delivery + in-store and at-home services".

For online operation, the Group owns an E-commerce trading platform, social sharing platform, large social network, and wide range of community members to support localized operation. The GOME APP has been completely revamped and restructured with the addition of the 1.0 entertainment module including "Video Shopping Guide", "Meixin" and "Short Video + Livestreaming + Matches". The coverage of mini program was further expanded, and the grid-based community expansion was completed, which enabled compact operation. In January 2021, our revamped mobile application was finally launched to the market under the new name of "FUN". Since its launch and up to the end of March 2021, the estimated GMV of "FUN" APP grew nearly four times YOY with MAU stabilized at about 40 million and DAU of nearly 10 million on special offer days. The layout, functions and style of the online platform have taken shape and will continue to release new benefits in the future.

Continuously Explored New Retailing Models and Created Interactive User Experience with Entertaining and Social Features

Based on the grid-based layout of physical stores, GOME actively carried out community marketing to integrate online and offline operation, and further utilized its strength in supply chain, logistics service, video promotion and community-based social network.

In addition, by leveraging its advantageous resources, GOME has developed a high-quality livestreaming product promotion model of "informative content + most popular IP + immersive scenes" to create refreshing and upgraded experience for consumers. In 2020, GOME cooperated with CCTV News, a reputable news outlet, to carry out livestreaming product promotion events in 31 provinces across the country, showcasing GOME's "New Store Image" and localized retailing to consumers in China.

Capitalizing on the favorable development trend, GOME strengthened its efforts in entertaining-oriented marketing model by launching the "FUN" APP in the beginning of 2021. Its core strategy is to facilitate transactions driven by social network where merchants and customers may sell and buy products and services on the platform in an entertaining way. With such interactive experience, entertaining content, fun and enjoyable marketing initiatives and the sharing and social features, GOME has developed a unique retailing ecosystem, which laid a solid foundation for the continuous development of GOME's digital, platform-based and entertainment-oriented operations under the theme of "social + business + sharing".

Meanwhile, based on the new strategy, GOME established the "Home . Living" showroom to showcase high-quality products and create unique experience for its offline platform, implemented the plan to optimize the layout of GOME stores through renovation and business format upgrade, striving to provide customers with the best immersive consumer experience. It also diversified and enriched the offline scenarios by offering a combination of service and content such as video promotion, livestreaming promotion and match broadcast, thereby creating a fun and enjoyable in-store experience for the customers. Looking forward, by maintaining a high standard of retail operation, GOME will fully promote the new model and mechanism of entertaining retailing to enable merchants and customers to sell and buy quality products and services and share their experience on the "FUN" platform, and facilitate the platform and merchants to acquire natural customer traffic at lower cost in a more efficient and sustainable manner, and improve the user stickiness and repurchase rate, thereby enhancing the GMV and profit of the platform.

Expanded and Strengthened Advantages in Supply Chain and Services and Accelerated Digital Development at Its All-out Efforts

After transforming to the "Home . Living" strategy, leveraging its 34 years of extensive experience in proprietary operation in vertical market, the Company launched more carefully selected products and provided digital and intelligent management tools to serve external merchants and the general public under the idea of "being the pioneer of the industry in terms of uniqueness, quality and innovation", thereby establishing a win-win cooperation among GOME, merchants and users. It accelerated the expansion in non-electrical appliance business through stringent selection of products for its proprietary operation, established partnership with more external parties based on stringent selection standards, and developed an open supply chain platform for stringent selection of quality products and services covering all categories.

During the Reporting Period, GOME House Manager under the Group also continued to provide "home installation, cleaning, repair and maintenance and renovation services" to customers. With the optimized logistics and delivery services, GOME has applied its service capabilities in more business scenarios to continuously enhance customer satisfaction and shopping experience. The Group also utilized the power of big data analysis from its online platform to conduct research on consumer behavior and proposed "eight major procedures" for product selection in order to carefully select premium products from various perspectives. Based on massive data, supply chain support, bargaining power with suppliers and the intent of offering benefits to the consumers, GOME formed in-depth cooperation with the suppliers, reduced the prices through direct sales and control product quality at source in order to reward the consumers. During the Reporting Period, GOME has completed the infrastructure for its logistics service platform by setting up centralized warehouses, city warehouses and in-store inventory, and maintained a nationwide logistics network with 5 million square meters of storage space. With the fast delivery and flash store delivery provided by Anxun Logistics, GOME achieved fast and on-time delivery of products to customers and enhanced the turnaround efficiency, setting the highest industry standards with optimal user experience.

Introduced Strategic Partners with Huge Customer Base to Achieve Win-Win Cooperation and Mutual Development

The Group will continue to implement the multi-dimensional marketing strategy by sharing supply chain resources and opening up the logistics network, and form strategic partnership with different channels such as JD.com and Pinduoduo to provide carefully selected high-quality products in all categories to consumers while bringing abundant customer traffic and resources to merchants, so as to share resources, reduce costs, enhance efficiency and achieve win-win cooperation and mutual development for GOME, its customers and merchants.

In April and May 2020, GOME formed strategic cooperation with Pinduoduo and JD.com, respectively, demonstrating the industry's recognition of the value and potential of GOME's unique resources. In 2021, GOME will further develop its strategic partnership with external high-traffic platforms and third party suppliers and strive to achieve traffic integration and mutual empowerment. In addition, it will also establish a comprehensive supply chain to share advantageous resources and continue to develop the new retail model of online and offline integration to create greater synergy. The Company expects to maintain strong growth in the future with the empowerment of the online and offline platforms and the "FUN" APP covering all scenarios.

The Company management concludes: "In 2020, despite the impact of pandemic on retail industry, the Group actively tackled different challenges and adversities with concerted efforts by leveraging its strengths accumulated over the years, effective business strategies and excellent service capabilities. In 2021, we presented the 'New GOME' with new mindset and ushered in a new stage with new development pattern. For future operation and development, we will focus on facilitating strategic upgrade to develop a new platform layout and enable mutual and targeted support between online and offline platforms, thereby reducing operating costs and fully improving our profitability and user experience. Meanwhile, we will also accelerate the development of digital operation at all-out efforts, continue to expand and strengthen the advantages in supply chain and services, open up the supply chain to cooperate with more third party suppliers, put more efforts in stringent selection of quality products, and ensure premium shopping experience based on highest service standards in the industry. The launch of the 'FUN' APP kicked off GOME's ambitious plan for entertainment-oriented retailing business. To support this plan, we will uphold the core value of new retail to 'create and share fun and enjoyable sales and shopping experience', utilize our unique strength to upgrade the business models and facilitate the development of a digital and platform-based retail ecosystem with entertaining features to fully release the huge potential of 'New GOME'."



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HONG KONG, Mar 31, 2021 – (ACN Newswire) – HKC (Holdings) Limited ("HKC" or the "Company"; stock code: 190) will convene the Court Meeting and the Special General Meeting ("SGM") at 10:00a.m. and 10:30a.m., respectively, on 23 April 2021, for the purpose of considering and approving the resolution in relation to the proposed Privatisation of the Company.

On 17 January 2021, the Company and Genesis Ventures Limited ("Genesis Ventures" or the "Offeror") jointly announced that the Offeror requested the Board of the Company (the "Board") to put forward a proposal (the "Proposal") to the holders (the "Scheme Shareholders") of Scheme Shares for the privatisation of the Company by way of a scheme of arrangement (the "Scheme").

If the Proposal is approved and implemented, all Scheme Shares will be cancelled in exchange for the payment of HK$8.00 (the "Cancellation Price") for each cancelled Scheme Share.

In addition, the Company resolved to declare the payment to Shareholders of a second interim dividend of 13 HK cents per Share in lieu of a final dividend for the FY2020, which is not conditional on the Proposal having become effective and will not be deducted from the Cancellation Price.

The independent financial adviser, Anglo Chinese Corporate Finance, Limited, considers the terms of the Proposal to be fair and reasonable as far as the Disinterested Scheme Shareholders(Scheme Shareholders other than the Offeror Concert Parties) are concerned, and it advised the Independent Board Committee to recommend to Shareholders, Scheme Shareholders, or Disinterested Scheme Shareholders, where applicable, to vote in favour of the relevant resolutions to approve the Proposal and the Scheme.

In making the recommendation, the independent financial adviser has considered that: (i) The cancellation price represents a premium ranging from approximately 79.0% to 122.2% over the closing prices of the Shares on the Last Trading Date (12 Jan, 2021), and over the last 5, 30, 60 and 180 trading days up to the Last Trading Date. This is an unusually high premium over the traded market price for privatisation proposals for companies listed in Hong Kong. It is also higher than the price of the Shares as traded over the past five years. (ii) The Share price has been partly supported by Share buybacks by the Company from September 2019 to July 2020, with the number of Shares being bought-back contributing up to approximately 62.7% of the trading volume during this period. The last Share buyback undertaken by the Company was on 3 July 2020 when the Share price closed at HK$4.87, and since then, the Share price has dropped gradually and closed at HK$3.63 on the Last Trading Date. With a margin of only 0.24% above the minimum public float requirement, it is unlikely for the Company to be able to undertake any significant additional Share buyback or the Offeror and its concert parties to conduct any significant Share acquisitions under the current shareholding structure. (iii) Since 2019 up to the Last Trading Date, the average daily trading volume of the Shares has been thin in general, taking into consideration the Share buybacks, and it is difficult for Shareholders to dispose of a significant number of Shares in the open market without causing an adverse impact on the market price level of the Shares. (iv) The future prospects for the Group's properties is uncertain given oversupply of commercial properties in Shanghai and the recent government policies to control property prices and to reduce the leverage of property developers. (v) Payment of the cancellation price of HK$8.00 per Share in cash, as well as the second interim dividend of HK$0.13 per Share, gives the Scheme Shareholders flexibility to redeploy capital invested in the Company into other investments that they consider more attractive.

Assuming that all of the conditions are fulfilled or waived, the Scheme will become effective on 18 May 2021 (Bermuda time) and the listing of the Shares on the Stock Exchange will be withdrawn at 4:00p.m. on 20 May 2021. Cheques for payment of the cancellation price to Disinterested Scheme Shareholders and cheques for payment of the second interim dividend to Shareholders will be despatched on or before 28 May 2021.


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