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Clare winemaker toasts China online following signing of new deal that will provide access to 470 million consumers

Clare Valley winemaker Tim Adams has described a deal his company has signed with ASX-listed technology provider SmartTrans as a “game changer”.

A CLARE Valley winemaker has described a deal signed last week with an ASX-listed technology provider as a “total game changer”.

Tim Adams Wines will use the payment platform of Melbourne-based SmartTrans Holdings to expand its reach within the Chinese market. SmartTrans will provide e-commerce services via its SmartPay system, which has in excess of six million Chinese users.
And as part of an existing alliance, SmartTrans will provide marketing support with targeted text messages to around 470 million China Mobile and China Telecom customers.
For its part, SmartTrans, which has former deputy prime minister Mark Vaile as its chairman, will get a commission on the Tim Adams products it sells, as well as a transaction fee on each payment processed.
Mr Adams said his company, which has 35 employees, two cellar doors and a restaurant, has been exporting to China for a decade. Behind the UK, it is the company’s second largest export market but that would it become number one by the end of the year, Mr Adams said.
“The traditional distribution model has been challenging over the years, with cultural and language difficulties,” he said.


“Having direct access to hundreds of millions of potential buyers is a total game changer and for our wine growers in Clare.”
While unwilling to disclose raw figures, Mr Adams said he now expects that over the next two years China will become “in a very, very significant way” the company’s leading export market.

“We’d expect our current numbers to grow during that period by between five and tenfold,” he said.
“The UK is growing at a very healthy rate of between 12-15 per cent, but China is certainly going to surpass that in the very near future.”
SmartTrans managing director Bryan Carr said the partnership is an example of how a business can gain access to the growing Chinese e-commerce sector.
“I’m confident that this alliance will be the first of many such collaborations,” he said.
“We’re currently in advanced stages of negotiation for similar agreements and anticipate that we’ll be making an announcement in this regard shortly.”
The relationship between Mr Adams and Mr Carr came about through mutual friend Hugh MacGillivray, who is the son of Two Dogs alcoholic lemonade founder Duncan MacGillivray.
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