Sagajuta eyes year-end listing

KUALA LUMPUR: Sagajuta (Sabah) Sdn Bhd hopes to complete its backdoor listing by year-end, to turn the company into a bigger real estate firm.

Jerneh Asia Bhd, 37 per cent-owned by Robert Kuok, is acquiring Sagajuta and then listing it under a reverse-takeover exercise as part of its regularisation scheme.

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) has been signed between Jerneh, Sagajuta and Generasi Cipta Sdn Bhd, which owns 60 per cent of the Sabah developer.

If the MoU becomes an agreement, it will pave the way for a backdoor listing of Sagajuta, which is behind the RM1.2-billion 1Borneo project in Kota Kinabalu.


The proposed acquisition forms an essential part of Jerneh Asia's regularisation plan pursuant to Practice Note 16 and Practice Note 17 of Bursa Malaysia's Main Market listing requirements.

"We are fine tuning the last bit of the agreement and it should be finalised by year-end followed by the listing. We want Sagajuta to double its current size," its group managing director and chief executive officer Datuk Raymond Chan told Business Times.

Chan said Sagajuta is planning to buy more land in Sabah, Klang Valley, Penang and Johor to enable it to undertake development projects worth more than RM3 billion at any one time.

Cash-rich Sagajuta currently has three on-going projects worth a combined RM1.7 billion. They are 1Sulaman and 1Likas in Sabah, and 1Gateway in Klang. The projects are being carried out without bridging loans.

For fiscal years 2008 and 2009, Sagajuta posted revenues of RM297.6 million and RM194.6 million respectively.

Chan expects the company's earnings to improve this year, largely contributed by its existing projects and recurring income from 1Borneo.

1Borneo, now worth about RM300 million, consists of a 1.5 million sq ft hypermall, four hotels, four residential towers, shop offices and a "seaworld".