The delegation of Westfood has just finished their trip to the US with the main activities of participating in the food fair and working with business partners. In the current business model, foreign markets including Europe, the US, Japan and Australia are key to Westfood’s revenue structure. Market development is, therefore, the prime concern after basic investments related to the automation of production processes and the availability of raw materials are in the process of being finalized.
The business situation of Westfood and Group will be updated in detail in the letter to shareholders in early December, but I can quickly share some interesting information. Compared to the same period last year, Q3’s sales decreased slightly, 205 billion VND compared to 222 billion VND, due to the impact of the investment activities. However, gross profit increased sharply from 35 billion VND to 50 billion VND, largely due to the positive impact of material autonomy. Operating profit increased sharply from 8.4 billion VND to 19.2 billion VND and profit after tax was 7 billion VND last year compared to 16.6 billion VND this year.
In terms of performance, Westfood is an important contributor to the overall efficiency improvement of the Group. The gross profit margin increased from 15.7% to 24.6%, while net operating profit increased from 3.8% to 9.4% and net profit after tax from 3.2% to 8.11%. These figures say that the efforts to change of Westfood and the Group are being reflected in business performance and will, in principle, be reflected in share prices. I hope that these positive factors will continue in 2018 when fundamental investment activities are finished and shareholder value will increase from efficiency.
Westfood is a member company (97% of the shares) of the Paddy Agricultural Technical Materials (TSC on the HSX). TSC is a member of F.I.T.
Wishes shareholders and interested investors success.
Quach Manh Hao
Strategic Advisor
Some photos of Westfood BOD’s representatives attending the fair and meeting with partners in Houston – Texas, New York and Los Angeles: