Even if you're not familiar with the name of Starlight International, you'll certainly know the names of some of its major customers.

The Aberdeen-based consumer electronics company produces TV and audio equipment under such famous brand names as Hitachi and Amstrad, and supplies some of the largest retail chains in North America, including Wal-Mart and Toys 'R Us.

In this respect Starlight is typical of a great many Hong Kong exporters and manufacturers who are relatively small in global terms, yet are more than capable of winning business from some of the world's leading multinational conglomerates.

And like many similar businesses, Starlight has expanded its reach and outlook during recent years by becoming a public listed company, while retaining strong links to its founding family. Chairman Philip Lau and his brothers Anthony, Andy, Eric and Jacky are all actively involved in managing the group's day-to-day operations.

The company also typifies the changing nature of Hong Kong's export sector in that all its manufacturing now takes place across the Guangdong border in factories in Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Zhongshan, Panyu and Guangzhou. However, its shipping, accounting, purchasing and marketing functions are still firmly based in Hong Kong, along with some of the warehousing and technical support operations.

But with many of the raw materials and components shipped in, and most of its production shipped out, through Hong Kong, there is often a huge volume of trade paperwork to process, especially during peak months between August and November when Christmas orders are being fulfilled. The Import and Export Declarations alone can run into hundreds a day.

Not too many years ago this paperwork was all done by hand and required a team of nine full-time shipping staff to process it. But while business has increased many-fold since then, today it takes just five people, thanks to computerisation.

"More than 90 per cent of our internal communications are now handled by e-mail and wherever possible, we also use e-mail for dealings with our overseas customers and suppliers." Says Starlight's shipping supervisor, Terry Wong.

The use of EDI is currently much less common, despite Starlight's list of blue-chip retail customers, but Ms Wong fully expects it to become the standard way of doing business over the next few years. And when it does, Starlight will be ready.

A former user of the Government's Diskette Submission Scheme for Trade Declarations, Starlight was among the earliest companies to take the opportunity of moving to full EDI lodgement when Tradelink's ValuNet service became available in mid-1997.

"We normally prepare and send declarations twice a day," Ms Wong explains. "It's much faster and easier to use than the old method. Our only complaint is that sometimes it can be quite difficult to log on to Tradelink early in the morning or late in the afternoon, so we have to wait for quieter periods.

"Otherwise we find the service and support are ver good - if we've had technical problems, Tradelink has always sent someone to help by the next day."

Ms Wong is looking forward to the arrival of further Tradelink services that will reduce the paperwork still further, although Starlight will not need to take advantage of the Chinese declaration service due for introduction shortly. "Our mainland factories are all our own subsidiaries, so we don't have a problem in handling the Chinese names, while our overseas customers like to do business in English," she points out.

"We're very used to working in English now - but we are constantly looking for ways of working faster and more efficiently. Electronic commerce is definitely the way of the future."