Synergy House Berhad (Malaysia)

Trle Company was incorporated in Malaysia as a private limited liability company on 3 August 2021 under the Companies Act 2016.
The Company is principally engaged in investment holding and provision of management services.
Our history can be traced back to the incorporation of Malgames Industries Sdn Bhd on 27 July 1990 by Teh Eng Lee, Teh Ah Leh @ Teh Kwee Leong, Teh Kwee Chuan, Tan Kau Tiah @ Tan Ching Hai, Tan Eu Tee, Yew Ah Kow and Teh Kim Lan who are family members and relatives of our Executive Directors, Tan Eu Tah and Teh Yee Luen. In the early years of our business, we were involved in the manufacturing of small wooden furniture such as stools and chairs, and wooden toys such as rocking horses and carrom boards.
In 1997, our Executive Director, Tan Eu Tah, who was identified as the successor to his father, Tan Kau Tiah @ Tan Ching Hai, joined our Group as General Manager where he mainly assisted his father in setting our Group's business direction and implementing our Group's business strategies. In 1999, our Executive Director, Teh Yee Luen, joined our Group as Marketing Manager, whereby he was mainly responsible for managing our Group's marketing initiatives, as well as exploring business opportunities to expand our Group's furniture export market. Bringing with them their insights in the global furniture market through market research and observations during their tertiary studies in the USA, Tan Eu Tah and Teh Yee Luen began to lead our Group's expansion into the design, development and manufacturing of RTA home furniture using wood panel products (e.g. medium-density fibreboard, particle board and plywood).
The move to use wood panel products for the manufacturing of our home furniture was to help ensure the sustainability of our Group's business, as opposed to using solid wood which is typically sourced from natural forest or plantation where we may face supply constraints in the future. Further, this was also in line with our Group's business strategy to supply home furniture suited to smaller houses as a result of increasing urbanisation and the trend of smaller homes built in and around major cities globally.
In addition, through sales and marketing strategies led by Teh Yee Luen, the company successfully expanded our export markets from 1999 onwards. During this period, our sales model was solely B2B whereby our customer base comprised chain-store retailers and wholesalers, and our products were all labelled under third party brand names.
In view of the growing sales of our RTA home furniture and with the intention to scale up our business, Tan Eu Tah and Teh Yee Luen, embarked on a transformation initiative to drive the expansion and growth of our business in 2004 by transforming our business model from the manufacturing of home furniture to solely focus on the design, development and sale of home furniture, with manufacturing works fully outsourced to third party manufacturers. The company management believed that this transformation initiative would eliminate any manufacturing limitations, and unlock more growth opportunities to expand our business in tapping the global furniture market.
In 2004, as the initial step of the transformation initiative, our company underwent a name change from Malgames Industries Sdn Bhd to Synergy House Furniture Sdn Bhd to reposition our Group as a company focusing on the design, development and sale of home furniture. This was followed by the implementation of 2 key initiatives that contributed to the success of our business transformation, as follows:
- Establishment of a dedicated in-house D D team
As we aspired to become an industry player fully focused on the design, development and sale of home furniture, the company recognised the importance of having in-house capabilities to continuously develop and launch new home furniture designs to respond to the demand from global consumers along with changing market preferences. In 2004, we established a dedicated in-house D D team, to focus on the development of new home furniture designs
- Outsourcing our manufacturing works as well as building and strengthening relationships with third party manufacturers
Since 1999, we gradually outsourced parts of our manufacturing works to third party manufacturers, and the company have maintained relationships with these third party manufacturers to support our business.
In 2004, the company started to fully outsource our manufacturing works for our home furniture to third party manufacturers, to enable us to solely focus on the design, development and sale of home furniture. In the same year, whilst retaining certain machinery for assembling prototypes in the D D process, we disposed our production lines, thereby successfully transforming our business model to focus on the design, development and sale of home furniture. Based on our business transactions in the Financial Years Under Review up until the LPD, we have engaged approximately 57 third party manufacturers cumulatively which are mainly from Malaysia, China, Indonesia and Vietnam that we outsource our manufacturing works to.
Further expansion of our export markets and range of offerings to include bedroom furniture specifically designed for children
In 2004, the company further expanded our export markets to more countries to expand our market reach for the sale of our home furniture. In 2005, the compay expanded the range of our bedroom furniture to include bedroom furniture specifically designed for children such as bunk beds and study desks. These furniture were labelled under third party brand name. In 2006, Tan Eu Tah and Teh Yee Luen acquired the entire equity stake in SH Furniture from former shareholders who are family members and relatives.
Establishment of our own brand of bedroom furniture for children and adoption of a B2C sales model
After accumulating the relevant experience in designing bedroom furniture for children for third party brand names, our Group launched our own brand of bedroom furniture for children, namely TOMATO KidZ, in December 2011.
In recognition of the increasing popularity of e-commerce in the furniture industry, in 2012, we set up our first in-house online store at www.tomatokidz.com to directly market and sell our inhouse branded TOMATO KidZ home furniture to end-consumers in Malaysia.
Further, between 2019 and 2020, the company established and began selling our products directly to end consumers in Malaysia via our online stores, namely TOMATO KidZ, TOMATO Home and Synergy House Furniture on 2 third party e-commerce platforms, azada and Shopee. Our products sold on these third party e-commerce platforms are labelled under our own brand names, such as Synergy House. Additionally, in 2020, we set up another in-house online store at www.synergytomato.com which markets and sells a wider range of our in-house branded products (i.e. TOMATO KidZ and Synergy House) directly to end-consumers in Malaysia as compared to our first in-house online store at www.tomatokidz.com which only sold TOMATO KidZ branded products. Products sold on our in-house online store at www.tomatokidz.com were delivered to our end-consumers. Products sold on our in-house online store at www.synergytomato.com are available for self pick-up at our showroom or prototype assembly facility. Other than our self pick-up service, end-consumers also have the option of getting their orders delivered directly to them through a third party logistics service provider.
The establishment of our in-house online stores and online stores on third party e-commerce platforms marked the start of our B2C sales model. This has allowed our Group to have direct contact with end-consumers, enabling us to gather first-hand information and insights on consumer preferences as valuable inputs for our product development, as a means for further driving our business growth. In December 2021, we ceased the operation of our first in-house online store at www.tomatokidz.com with the intention to gradually phase out the sale of our inhouse branded TOMATO KidZ products which are mainly kids furniture targeting a more niche market, and shifted our focus on selling affordable RTA home furniture with a larger target market on third party e-commerce platforms and our other in-house online store at www.synergytomato.com. Subsequently, in March 2023, we ceased the sale of our TOMATO KidZ branded products for our B2C sales.
In 2020, the company expanded the geographical coverage of our B2C sales to the USA when we began to market and sell our products under third party brand names to end-consumers through Customer C Group's e-commerce platform in the USA.
Subsequently, in 2022, the company further expanded our B2C sales in the USA, Canada and the UK by marketing and selling our products to end-consumers in these countries through more third party e-commerce platforms, namely Amazon in the USA, Canada and the UK, as well as Customer C Group's e-commerce platforms in Canada and the UK. Our products sold through Amazon in the USA, Canada and the UK are under our in-house brand names whereas products sold through Customer C Group's e-commerce platforms in Canada and the UK are under third party brand names. Further, in the same year, we have also engaged an ecommerce solution provider known as Cenports Commerce Inc (“Cenports”) to sell our inhouse branded products in the USA through e-commerce platforms owned or operated by various third parties who allow Cenports to sell products through their platforms. Moreover, we have also expanded our B2C sales in Malaysia by marketing and selling our products under our in-house brand names to end-consumers in Malaysia through an additional e-commerce platform known as WOWSHOP.