Sri Lanka’s premier automobile battery producer Associated Battery Manufacturers (Ceylon) Limited (ABM) has showed a healthy financial performance recoding a turnover of Rs 3.36 billion in the financial year 2017/18, a top- line growth of 24% year on year.
The company’s profit before tax (PBT) has also seen a significant increase to Rs 272 million which is a bottom- line growth of 12.5% over 2016/17.
ABM Director, CEO M Ramachandran attributed this encouraging financial performance of ABM Exide to quality and product perception which is clearly highlighted by the low returns and number of failures coming down drastically. Ramachandran said that warrantee replacements have declined to a record low percentage of 2.2 which is very good in the international standard average. The CEO said this year they target to further bring down the warrantee replacement percentage below the 2.2% mark and this will be possible with the improvements carried out in the product and manufacturing process.
ABM has also recorded a 59% growth in battery exports mustering export revenue of US$ 1.33 million in 2017/18 by exporting to Myanmar, Singapore, UAE, Indonesia and the Maldives.
Ramachandran said this year they plan to move into Cambodia and Vietnam. Elaborating on goals for this year the CEO said they aim at a turnover of Rs 4 billion and that will be in track of achieving the 5 billion target as envisaged in his five year plan for the company. He said the company also plans to introduce products for electric and hybrid vehicles and would be moving to Lithium Ion batteries to cater to that segment. For this he said they would be collaborating with a foreign company and have already began negotiations with a fortune 500 Korean company. He said by end of this year they will be ready with a complete proposal.
Ramachandran also disclosed that ABM’s latest introduction to the market would be the start stop system Led acid battery which will be introduced this year. This will be done in collaboration with the Sri Lanka Institute of Nanotechnology (SLINTEC) where in the laboratory test has been completed and the product test is being carried out now. With the introduction of this cost effective start stop battery the vehicle fuel efficiency will increase by 12 %, he said. The CEO said the two-wheeler battery production which they commenced last year has received a good feedback and over 50,000 motorcycle batteries were sold last year. This year the company plans to manufacture a minimum of 120,000 motor cycle batteries.
A high-speed assembly line with an investment of Rs 80 million has just been installed to strengthen the operations of the company. ABM also won many feats in 2017/18 winning the Runners Up position for the category Manufacturing Engineering Sector at the Business Excellence Awards conducted by the National Chamber of Commerce and also won the Commendation Award at the Taiki Akimoso 5S Competition conducted by Japan Technical and Cultural Association (JASTECA) in March 2018.
Ramachandran added that they would be aiming for greater heights in the 5S field this year.