-
Nuplex managing director John Hirst - Source: ONE News -
Watch Video
-
Related
Nuplex CEO John Hirst is taking a cautious approach to the sustainability of the company's return to profit.
The resin manufacturer on Thursday reported a near six-fold increase in its first half net profit on higher sales.
Its net after tax profit was $34.6 million to the end of December, compared with $5.9 million a year before.
John Hirst says he is delighted with the result, which comes after a hard year for the company during which is was forced to raise fresh capital.
He says the turnaround was achieved through several factors including cost reduction and a "fair amount of restructuring."
"Clearly there was some pick up in demand, a very strong position in Asia particularly China, a great turn around in the second quarter in the ASEAN group. China was good for Europe too because we supply so speciality products out of there."
"We also had quite a lot of market penetration from new high-tech technology, which gave us better margins and generally I guess business conditions were somewhat more favourable."
But Hirst says he will wait for the end of the financial year before being fully convinced of a bounceback.
"Current sales levels around the world would indicate that it is being sustained but we will wait and see. I'm cautiously optimistic about it."
Hirst says he still has concerns about the manufacturing sector in New Zealand, which he believes has been decimated over a number of years.
"I am hoping that with a little bit of pick up in the market that the remaining members of the community here will get enough production volume through their operations to sustain their business," he says.
"It's very encouraging that we've got the turn around, let's hope it's the start of better things."
