AGM Statement

API Group PLC
30 March 2007


 

 

 

30 March 2007

 

                                 API GROUP PLC                                  

 

                            CHAIRMAN'S AGM STATEMENT                            

                                                                                

At today's Annual General Meeting of API Group plc, Richard Wright,
Non-Executive Chairman, made the following statement.

 

'In the preliminary announcement in December of the Group's results for the year
ended 30 September 2006, we indicated that our businesses in the US and
Asia-Pacific were continuing to perform strongly and that we anticipated some
improvement in the performance of our European businesses. This has proven to be
the case.

 

Since December, demand for the Group's foil products has been robust in most
major markets and we have continued to perform well in the strategically
important North American and Asia-Pacific regions. In contrast, the performance
of our European foils business was impacted by difficulties sourcing product
from China. A variety of issues lead to restrictions in factory output in China
and while production in our UK facilities was increased to compensate,
profitability in both regions was adversely affected. The problems have now been
addressed and the Chinese facility has returned to full production.

 

Progress with the new foils manufacturing facility near Shanghai continues to be
in-line with our expectations, with construction scheduled for completion in
mid-2007. Production of foil will commence later this year and output from the
new Chinese facility is forecast to increase to almost 50% of the Group's total
available capacity by the end of 2008.

 

In Laminates, we continue to reduce our exposure to less attractive markets and
to restructure manufacturing to return the business to acceptable levels of
profitability. Good progress has been made in the first half and while still
loss-making, the underlying performance represents an improvement over the same
period in the previous year on lower sales volume.

 

As indicated in the preliminary statement, the Group's accounting reference date
has been changed to 31 March and the Group is currently in an 18 month
accounting period. The problems encountered with the supply of product from
China have adversely impacted performance in the six months ending 31 March 2007
and consequently the Board expects the results for this period will not show an
improvement over the same period in the previous year.

 

The Board expects the results of the Group for the remaining 12 months of the
accounting period to be comparable to the current market expectations for the
year ending 30 September 2007.

 

Ends

 

Enquiries

 
David Walton, Chief Executive, API Group plc                 01625 858 700
                                                                          
Tim Spratt / Nicola Biles, Financial Dynamics                020 7831 3113

 

 



                      This information is provided by RNS
            The company news service from the London Stock Exchange