I’m Nicole Or. I founded FusionLens in 2017, along with a partner. I am a trained engineer, specializing in developing mobile apps. My teammates and I have been developing mobile photography technologies. This is our core strength – optical engineering and computational photography on mobile devices.

Things were going exactly to plan and I was running a business that I had trained for.

But life is never that predictable, is it?

The Coronavirus pandemic struck and the world plunged into fear and confusion. People stayed home and businesses suffered. The only protection we seemed to have from the deadly virus was a simple mask.

At that time, right at the beginning of the pandemic, there were no suppliers of masks in Hong Kong.

I decided that it was time to contribute to the need of the hour and dived into the hygiene products sector.

I set up a new business - supplying masks, something the country needed the most at that time. Soon, we started expanding.

Corporate client orders (B2B) started growing steadily, especially for customized masks. Since then, I have been putting more effort into the development of those.

What actually started off as a desire to help, is now a growing business; one whose sales have exceeded our original mobile lens business sales by 20%.

One thing that helped me pivot quickly to the new business was my online presence through Facebook and Instagram. It has helped me greatly in not just reaching new customers but also in conversion to sales. It also gave me the courage to step out of my comfort zone to share my behind-the-scenes stories and product details on FB Live. This helped strengthen the bond with my customers as it eased their worries during these troubled times.

My earlier business and this one are widely different and learning new skills helped me make that switch at a time when it mattered the most.