At $38.9 million, net profit for the year is 87 per cent ahead of the IPO forecast and 112 per cent above the FY2014 result. Earnings per share, from continuing operations for FY2015, was 27.9 per share up from 14.1 cents per share in FY2014.

Scales Corporation managing director, Andy Borland, says the company continues to actively invest in its business with $15.8 million in capital expenditure during FY2015, of which $11.3 million is categorised as ‘growth capital expenditure’.

The company also managed to lower net debt to $16.2 million at 31 December 2015, which brings average net debt for the year down to $32.5 million.

Horticulture

The Horticulture division delivered outstanding growth, with Underlying EBITDA increasing from $23.9 million in FY2014 to $40.0 million in FY2015, an uplift of 67 per cent for the year, Mr Borland says. He attributes the profit to the performance of premium varieties, such as Mr Apple, Diva and Fern Ridge Fresh.

“It is pleasing to see that investment deliver both a material increase in volume and price during FY2015. 418,000 more premium TCEs were exported in FY2015 than in FY2014, an increase of 40 per cent. Improved premium varietal mix, especially higher volumes of NZ Queen and Diva, coupled with continued strong demand for our premium apples contributed to the New Zealand dollar FOB pricing for premium varieties increasing by 15 per cent in FY2015.

“During FY2015 we sold more than 3.15 million TCEs of our own-grown fruit, beating a volume target we had set down for FY2018. Accordingly we have established a new target of 3.5 million TCEs of our own-grown fruit by FY2020,” Borland says.

The storage and logistics, as well as the food ingredients divisions also performed well.

Outlook 

He suggests that the early signs for the FY2016 apple crop are looking positive, which allows to company to reconfirm its forecast  FY2016 EBITDA of between $48 million and $55 million.

Source: nzx.com