Investing for new capacity – primed for growth Fibertex Personal Care
Financial performance Fibertex Personal Care generated revenue of DKK 1,314 million in 2011, compared with DKK 1,237 million in 2010. The revenue improvement was driven by higher selling prices triggered by higher raw materials prices. Volumes sold declined during the year. The drop in volumes sold was attributable particularly to a change in the buying patterns of certain major customers, and certain Middle East markets were affected by political unrest in the region causing a drop in sales. EBIT for the year was DKK 148 million against DKK 160 million in 2010. The decline was mainly caused by the lower volumes sold in H1 in Europe, but EBIT remained high despite the downturn and was at the upper end of the most recent guidance range. Net interest-bearing debt increased from DKK 471 million at December 31, 2010, to DKK 589 million at December 31, 2011. The increase was due mainly to the investment in the substantial capacity increase in Malaysia and a higher working capital tie-up.
’07
22
1,314
1,237 935
1,090
1,008
Revenue (DKKm)
’08
’09
’10
’11
Business development Fibertex Personal Care has production facilities in Denmark and Malaysia and is well-renowned for its quality, service and innovation in both Europe and South East Asia. For the third time, Fibertex Personal Care received a ‘Supplier Excellency’-award from Procter & Gamble in 2011, which is bestowed on only the very best of their suppliers. Fibertex Personal Care makes it a priority to retain its position as technology leader. The company gives key priority to innovation and product development in close collaboration with customers and to being strongly focused on customers’ productdevelopment and efficiency-improvement requirements. As the previously announced R&D centre in Malaysia has now been set up and has the planned staff resources, Fibertex Personal Care can now provide service and innovation in Asia at the same high level as the innovation centre in Denmark. There was a clear tendency in 2011 for ever stricter requirements for efficient logistics and planning. Due to the requirements the company’s customers face from major retailers for shorter and shorter lead times, Fibertex Personal Care has devoted a lot of time and effort to change in-house processes and enable the company to meet these requirements. The market generally gives high priority to cost savings, but also to new products with special characterics. As a result, sales of specialty products improved in 2011, including supersoft products, products with high performance leakage barriers and, not least, print products, which Fibertex Personal Care can deliver through its partly-owned business Innowo Print in Germany. During 2011, Fibertex Personal Care worked to align its operations to the current market situation of lower demand relative to 2010 and on preparing to exploit new opportunities in the European and the Middle East markets. The Fibertex Personal Care Division in Malaysia performed very well in 2011. Capacity utilisation was high and production efficiency was satisfactory all through the year, and products were of a high quality. At the end of 2011, Fibertex Personal Care increased its capacity when a new high-capacity line was commissioned in Malaysia. As an environmentally conscious company, but also as a substantial consumer of energy, Fibertex Personal Care has made a significant effort over a