Supermax Corp Q2 earnings up 18.3% to RM35.4m (Update)

Published: Wednesday August 28, 2013 MYT 1:25:00 PM
Updated: Wednesday August 28, 2013 MYT 1:38:36 PM
Supermax Corp Q2 earnings up 18.3% to RM35.4m (Update)

KUALA LUMPUR: Glove maker Supermax Corp Bhd's earnings rose 18.3% to RM35.48mil in the second quarter ended June 30, 2013 from RM30mil a year ago, underpinned by higher revenue due to an expansion in capacity.

It said on Wednesday its revenue jumped 42.2% to RM330mil from RM232.10mil a year ago while earnings per share rose to 51.3 sen from 4.41 sen.

"This was largely because of new capacity added from new and refurbished lines. The higher revenue enabled the Group to record a 19.5% increase in profit before tax and 16.2% increase in profit after tax," it said.

In the six months ended June 30, 2013, its earnings rose 17% to RM67.88mil from RM57.98mil while its revenue rose at double the [ace or 35.3% to RM650.54mil from RM480.62mil.

"The surgical glove capacity expansion at the Sg Buloh plant is progressing with five of the seven lines planned having been commissioned since May 2012.

"The remaining lines will continue to be commissioned in stages when the additional capacity of sterilisation facility are allocated to Supermax Group," it said.

Supermax said that besides surgical gloves, the group was also moving ahead with fast tracking its plans to build and complete plants 10 and 11 in Meru, Klang within the next two quarters.

It said these new plants could be inter-switchable between natural rubber and nitrile glove production.

"When the two new plants as well as the converted plant have been fully commissioned by the first quarter of 2014, it would increase by 6.9 billion gloves which is more than double the Supermax Group's current nitrile capacity from 5.4 billion pieces per annum to 12.3 billion pieces per annum," it said.

Supermax said the higher production capacity would result in nitrile gloves forming 53% of the group's total installed capacity while natural rubber latex gloves would account for the remaining 47%.

It also expected competition to be more intense for nitrile gloves and it had expected revenue from additional sales of nitrile gloves to be within 9% to 11% from the additional capacity it would be adding to the market in 2014.

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