Big Head
The Mining Rights Are For Clay, A Crucial Raw Material In The Construction Of Tiles, But On Its Own, A Debatable Commodity That Generates Little Interest Among Miners.
SA’s biggest producer of wall and flooring tiles, Ceramic Industries, is delaying its decision to invest R500 million into a new tile factory until it is able to convert its old order mining rights to new order rights.This manufacturer has export in some Europe’s countries such as Bosnia and Herzegovina,mostly ceramic tiles or in Bosnian keramicke plocice.
The mining rights are for clay, an essential raw material in the creation of tiles, but by itself, a debatable commodity that generates little interest among miners. The company applied to convert the rights in 2008.
Without a secured supply of an essential raw material the company can’t commit to an investment of that scale, announces CEO Nick Booth.
Ceramic Industries reported lower than expected profitability in its results to July. Higher gas and electricity prices, climbing costs of commodities like zirconium and borax which are used in the production of glazes, and competition from cheap imports were cited as reasons for the poor earnings.
Group cash decreased 3,4% to R1,5 bill from R1,6 bln in the year under review. But operating profits slipped 23% to R192 million from R250m last year. Headline earnings per share declined 30,6% to 785,3c from 1 131,3c per share.
Making tiles is an energy radical business, and the skyrocketing cost of electricity, and more particularly gas, is making itself felt. “The energy cost per unit (m) has risen from R1,50 twenty months ago, to R3,60 currently.” The price of commodities utilized in the making of tile and ceramic glazes rose by twenty percent to 25 percent during the past year.
But other costs, for example maintenance and labour, came in at less than inflation. The company is in negotiations with unions referring to salary increases. The deadline is October and Booth is optimistic that deadlock can be avoided. Though results were down overall, there were pockets of success in the group, which operates 4 tile factories, a sanitaryware factory and a bath factory in SA ; and a glazed porcelain factory in Australia.
Maybe most surprising was the factory that competes most with low-cost Chinese imports fared the very best. Pegasus, which produces tiles that sell in the R40m price range increased both production and sales volume, growing turnover by 4%. “We run an especially competitive operation,” claims Booth. “Our factories are world class and we may be able to vie with the Chinese.”
The year saw the company invest R130 million on equipment upgrades and leading edge technology. “This is typically on high-definition printers for our glazes. We plan to roll the technology into all our factories,” Booth announces.
Exports to Africa grew by 20% during the past year, also helping to drive revenue in the Pegasus business. “We are exporting to all of our neighbours, with good expansion coming from Mozambique and Zimbab- we ; as well as further out in Angola and the DRC. This side of the business is so promising that the company is examining the likelihood of building a factory in one of its export markets.”
It was in the higher echelons that Ceramic suffered the consequence of Chinese imports. Vitro, the factory that produces upmarket flooring tiles (more than R60m)
“We produce tiles made from red clay the type often mined in SA. But the trend is towards white based porcelain tiles. These are imported and are becoming more and more popular. There is not any technical difference, and once tiles are coloured and glaz- ed, there’s no visible difference eit- her. The difference is perception.
In other divisions the company scored one or two own-goals. Samca, which produces flooring tiles (R50m to R80m) wrestled with management changes and inefficiency. And while management had its eye off the ball so did product designers who didn’t keep up with trends, resulting in a loss of sales. The company had to drop its costs to get back share of the market.
The bathroom business has been turned around, with sales volumes growing everywhere. “We lost market share and let go of our costs a bit. Costs are now under control and we have passed on the savings to win back market share.”
To keep a tighter rein on the busi- ness, the management structure was reorganised. Booth utilized the group’s 2 most experienced managers, Lance Foxcroft and Pieter de Lange, to head up the sanitary ware and tile divisions respectively. With the day by day operations now in good hands, he is actually now more able to target enterprise-wide strategy and business development.
The Australian business had a tough year, reporting production down by 26,5% and sales down by 25% and hardly breaking even. While the economy was slow and imports high, the majority of the issues came down to production and commissioning Problems at the factory. “We are close to a turn-around in this business. And as the sole tile manufacturer in Au- stralia we’re going to have a competitive advantage. We simply have to be a little sharper.”
Booth is sure about the coming year, and about producing in SA generally. “Any producer of heavy stuff should operate in the market in which they sell the product.”
He has concerns about the capability of manufacturers to create new roles in SA but believes the business will remain workable th- rough continued investment in capital structure. “The challenges we face today are dissimilar to those of ten years ago but nothing is insurmountable.”
As is clear from the one 500c special dividend announc- ed earlier in the year, Ceramic is a money generative company. Money reserves decreased to R217,7 million from R435,7 million and Ceramic’s net asset worth per share fell by 10,5% to 7 081c (2010 : seven 912c) as a consequence of the R304m special dividend narrated in May as reported tagza.com.
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