Welcome to the Top Glove website. Whether you are an existing or potential customer, shareholder, business partner, or employee, I invite you to explore this portal and learn more about all we have to offer.
Our exciting journey began in 1991, as a local business with 1 factory, 1 glove production line and 100 employees. Since then, we have been pushing boundaries and identifying innovative ways to deliver on our Business Direction to produce high quality gloves at an efficient low cost, the result of which we have attained international acclaim, emerging as the world’s largest manufacturer of gloves with 41 factories, 682 production line and a capacity of 63.9 billion pieces of gloves per annum. Our consistently strong performance and robust growth in market capitalization with a return to shareholders of 7,657% (as at 7 August 2019) since its listing in 2001, also led Top Glove to be included as a constituent of the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI. We are also privileged to be the preferred employer to an 18,000-strong diverse workforce, who are the lifeblood of our company.
Indeed, we have undergone much change over the decades and continue to be open to doing things differently, with a view to improving the way we work, for the betterment of our manufacturing operations, company performance and people. In all we do, we are guided by our core values which include foremost, working with Honesty, Integrity and Transparency, which are the tenets of our Business Ethics and the very foundation of our company. We also believe that health truly is wealth, to which end we practise Top Glove’s 5 Quality Wells Clean Well, Eat Well, Work Well, Exercise Well and Sleep Well daily, so we remain fit and well-positioned to contribute positively and compete effectively.
Our journey doesn’t stop here. In fact, we have set our sights even higher going forward. As a growing and dynamic company, we aim to capture 30% of the world market by 2020 and to ultimately become a Fortune Global 500 company by 2040. These may be ambitious goals but we do not set goals which are easy to attain; we set goals which are good for our business and good for our people. While the road towards success may be challenging, we believe that as we continue to work harder, faster and smarter and leverage advanced technologies, we will be able to overcome them just as we have in the past.
Good Revenue Growth Amidst Challenging Environment in 3QFY2019
We are pleased to have delivered a positive growth in Sales Revenue and Sales Volume for 3QFY19 despite an increasingly challenging business environment, characterized by a spike in raw material cost and intense competition.
For 3QFY19, the Group’s Sales Revenue came in at RM1.19 billion, 8.1% higher than 3QFY18 and up 2.6% against 2QFY19. This followed an increase in Sales Volume of 9% versus 3QFY18 and 2% versus 2QFY19, in spite of the challenging environment. However, Profit After Tax eased by 37% and 29.5% year-on-year and quarter-on-quarter respectively to RM75.2 million, attributed to a 22% surge in the price of natural rubber latex compared with 2QFY19, coupled with strong competition. To offset the increase, Top Glove effected upward revisions in its average selling prices, the impact of which will only be reflected in the following quarter (4QFY19), owing to a time lag in the cost pass-through mechanism.
On a 9 months basis, we attained Sales Revenue of RM3.6 billion, an upturn of 20.5% compared with the corresponding period in FY18, which already amounts to 86% of the total Sales Revenue in FY18. In tandem, Sales Volume also grew 15% compared with 9MFY18. Profit After Tax was RM293.5 million, softer by 12.5%, with the impact of the spike in latex prices cushioned by a stronger performance in the first half of the financial year.
In keeping with our commitment to deliver shareholder value, Top Glove declared an interim dividend of 3.5 sen per ordinary share, payable on 16 July 2019.
Top Glove is well-positioned to cater to global glove demand, which is projected to grow by at least 10% annually and will continue expanding our operations. In progress is the expansion of several existing facilities, which will boost the Group’s total number of production lines by an additional 224 lines and production capacity by 22.8 billion gloves per annum. By December 2020, Top Glove is projected to have a total of 872 production lines and a production capacity of 83.3 billion gloves per annum.
A testament to our consistently good performance and high standards of corporate governance, Top Glove was recently added to the Hijrah Syariah Index (effective 24 June 2019), following a semi-annual review of the FTSE Bursa Malaysia Index Series, whilst also maintaining its standing as a constituent of the FBM KLCI.
In another development, Top Glove recently launched its flagship green product, BioGreen Biodegradable Nitrile Gloves (Powder-Free), in conjunction with World Environment Day. Developed to safeguard the environment while protecting the user, these gloves are proven to biodegrade at least 10 times faster compared to conventional nitrile examination gloves, thereby providing an "end-of-life solution" to help reduce the accumulation of waste in landfills. In line with our commitment to sustainability, we will also continue to level up our practices in the ESG space particularly in terms of labour practices. In recognition of our community outreach efforts, Top Glove was also named CSR Malaysia Company of the Year (Manufacturing) in the CSR Malaysia Awards 2019.
We have not performed as well as we hoped in 3QFY19 owing to external factors beyond our control. However, we are positioned to do better in the next quarter to conclude our financial year on a stronger note, which we are confident of achieving in view of the increased product quality, automation and process efficiency we have put in place. We will continue to focus our resources on improving our product quality, cost structures and process efficiency, through the adoption of A.I., digitalisation, advanced technology and R&D, rather than external factors which are not within our control.
TOP GLOVE, TOP QUALITY, TOP EFFICIENCY
GOOD HEALTH, SAFETY FIRST & BE HONEST
Tan Sri Dr Lim Wee Chai
18 June 2019