KUALA LUMPUR: GFM Services Bhd is confident that the need for facilities management (FM) services will pick up and continue to rise in 2022.

Managing director Mohammad Shahrizal Mohammad Idris said having aware of the challenges ahead, the company will continue and tailor its services to be outcome-based rather than tasks-based.

"This approach is to suit the actual demand of the clients, thus allowing us to package our services more competitively.

"Our operational arrangement has to be robust enough to handle such variations and uncertainties.

"We will put focus and emphasis on FM service components that are critical during this pandemic time, namely the hygiene, safety, security, and communication technology services," he told The New Straits Times.

GFM also expects the healthcare sector's FM trend to evolve to improve patient outcomes.

"To date, we have been serving several specialised healthcare facilities.

"However, healthcare to us is a very competitive market, and we have not considered this to be our focus area for business growth," he said.

Mohammad Shahrizal said the pandemic has also accelerated the use of smart technology, and FM's role will be increasingly connected to technological advances.

"In this respect, we are rolling out Internet of Things (IoT) solutions and GFM Enterprise Management System (GEMS) with mobile features at our project sites for more effective service delivery.

"This allows us to gather real-time data on building performance and energy consumption to facilitate our efforts in lowering carbon footprint," he said.

As the role of FM becomes more adaptable with technological advancements, GFM is allocating around 1 per cent of its annual budget to initiatives related to digitisation and technological improvement in FM service delivery.

"Moving forward, we are working on expanding our orderbook as we tender for more contracts from the private and public sectors.

"We are actively doing business development, be it through direct engagement or collaboration with partners and have identified several opportunities in both the private and public sectors," Mohammad Shahrizal said.

He said GFM also sees FM jobs in the hospitality service industry as one significant potential in 2022.

"This will be one of our focus areas for 2022.

"Throughout the FM value chain, our collaborative approach will also cover initiatives involving our service delivery partners in the form of vendor development program.

"We have been successfully collaborating with qualified and quality partners over the years, and it is our commitment to continue this program in the years to come," he said.

For the third quarter (Q3) ended 30 September 2021 (FY21), GFM's net profit rose by 36.7 per cent year-on-year (YoY) to RM2.6 million, whilst revenue marginally increased to RM27.4 million from RM26.9 million in the same quarter last year.

For the nine-month (9M) FY21, GFM's revenue grew by 7.8 per cent to RM91.1 million from RM84.6 million in the same period last year.

The higher revenue was on the back of GFM's continued delivery of FM services during the Full Movement Control Order 3.0 period and revenue contribution from GFM's provision of operations and maintenance (O&M) services at the Pengerang Integrated Complex (PIC) in Pengerang, Johor.