Frutarom, a producer of flavours and fine ingredients, continues to successfully implement its rapid and profitable growth strategy, reflected in its organic growth and the execution of strategic acquisitions.
The company reports record sales of US$473.3m for 2008 – a growth of 25% compared with 2007, excluding the effect of the strengthening of European currencies and the Shekel against the US dollar.
Without excluding the aforementioned effect, sales increased by 28.5%. At the same time, Frutarom achieved an increase of 34.8% in the annual gross profit to $176.3m, an improvement of gross margin to 37.2% compared to 35.5% last year, a leap of 64% in operating profit which totalled $56.6m, and a significant improvement of operating margin to 12% compared to 9.4% during the same period last year.
During 2008, Ebitda grew by 57.2% and reached $76.3m, while improving the Ebitda margin to 16.1% compared to 13.2% during the same period last year. In 2008, net profit grew by 53.9% and reached $37.2m compared to $24.2m during 2007, and net margin reached 7.9% compared to 6.6%.
President and CEO, Ori Yehudai, said: “During the last months of 2008, the economic atmosphere in the world, which permeated to the global economy, materially changed the growth trend characterising most of the world’s economies in recent years. Frutarom entered this challenging and crisis-related economic period as a leading global, stronger-than-ever company, with a solid capital structure, experienced global management and varied and diversified customer base.
“Our core businesses are mostly geared for the food industry, which is considered stable and defensive. We are partners in the creation process of essential products, which answer the basic human needs of consumers around the world. Such needs do not vanish in times of economic crisis, and indeed, analysing previous economic crises tells us that the food industry and industries related usually demonstrate relatively low sensitivity to the effects of slowdown and instability in the macro-economic environment, especially in comparison to many other industries.
“Frutarom’s management is wisely and determinedly preparing for and coping with the effects of the economic crisis. We are convinced that we will be able to achieve our goals and double Frutarom’s turnover, so that it will reach $1bn by 2012.”
Source: Frutarom
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