Business

Saturday October 31, 2009

Tradewinds unit plans to buy Mardec for RM150mil


KUALA LUMPUR: Tradewinds Plantations Bhd (TPB), a subsidiary of Tradewinds Corp, has proposed to buy Mardec Bhd for RM150mil in a move to expand its business into the downstream activities of the rubber industry.

“The acquisition of Mardec, which is well established with proven track record in the processing and trading of rubber, and manufacturing value-added rubber and polymer products, provides a strategic fit to the TPB group’s planned growth in this sector,” the company told Bursa Malaysia yesterday.

“It is also complementary and synergistic to the group’s long-term plan to develop an integrated rubber-trade township at Padang Terap (Kedah).”

TPB said it intended to expand its rubber activities downstream into the processing and marketing of rubber products to take advantage of the synergistic benefits arising from integrated activities.

It said it had diversified its plantation activities into rubber plantation with the acquisition of 11,404ha of agriculture land in Padang Terap, out of which 5,670ha was proposed to be planted with rubber trees.

The group had recently completed its acquisition of 1,057ha of mixed agriculture and development land within the area.

The land comprises 450ha of matured rubber plantation, bringing its planned rubber plantation to 6,120ha, the largest commercially-owned rubber plantation in a single location.

Mardec’s primary concern is to raise the quality of rubber produced. For the financial year ended Sept 30, 2008, Mardec posted a revenue of RM1.51bil but a pre-tax loss of RM26.5mil. The company had borrowings of RM404.7mil and assets of RM560.2mil.

Ernst & Young had valued Mardec at RM140mil to RM160mil.

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