Singapore, April 13:

Asia Pacific corporate chief executives are more concerned with managing co-sts to push profit growth compared with their US counterparts whose focus is on sustaining revenue expansion, a survey sho-wed. The Conference Boa-rd, a business membership and research organisation, said in its survey that 42.2 per cent of Asian CEOs rated profit growth as their main challenge, followed by ‘sustained and steady’ revenue growth.

Speed, flexibility and adaptability to change was tied in second position. The third concern was how to retain customer loyalty. “Asia is all about profit growth,” said Rainer Schu-ltheis, a programme director for organisation. This was because low cost adva-ntage was at the ‘core’ of Asia’s competitiveness.”

“Asia competes on low cost. Protecting that competitive edge is very important, so CEOs are very much focused on managing cost,” Schultheis said. CEOs in the US were more concerned about revenue growth, while those in Europe considered their companies’ adaptability to cha-nge as the main challenge.

The focus by US CEOs on revenue growth “would appear to reflect confidence that after years of belt-tigh-tening, they are relatively comfortable.”