Pneumatic components supplier Airtac International Group (亞德客) posted a record-high net profit of NT$2.03 billion (US$66.2 million) for last year, or earnings per share of NT$10.72, on the back of growing automation equipment orders from China.
The figure represented a 47 percent jump from NT$1.38 billion in net profit in 2015, with cumulative revenue up 21 percent to NT$10.62 billion, a company filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange on Friday last week showed.
Airtac’s board approved cash dividends of NT$5.5 per share on last year’s record net profit, compared with NT$4 in 2015.
The company attributed the strong performance to increasing market share in China, despite a foreign exchange loss of 39 million yuan (US$5.7 million at the current exchange rate) in the fourth quarter of last year.
The firm, which sells its products under the AirTAC brand, last year commanded a 16 percent share of the Chinese market, compared with 14 percent in 2014, company data showed.
The Taipei-based company is the second-largest pneumatic component maker in China after Japan-based SMC Corp, the world’s largest pneumatic component maker.
Revenue from Chinese customers contributed about 90 percent of total sales, the data showed.
EXPANDING PRODUCTION
The company plans to increase capital expenditure from last year’s NT$1.5 billion to NT$2 billion this year, in a bid to build up capacity at its plants in Taiwan and China, it said.
Airtac operates three production bases in Tainan and China’s Guangdong Province and Ningbo, with annual output totaling nearly 1.7 billion yuan, company data showed.
The two Chinese facilities manufacture valves and air source processors, while the Tainan base supplies high-end products, such as cylinders, the data showed.
Airtac plans to increase overall capacity this year by 20 percent year-on-year by building new plants and purchasing machinery equipment, it said.
In December last year, the company spent 69.5 million yuan on a nearly 150,000m2 plot of land in Ningbo, on which it plans to build another facility, it said, adding that construction would begin this quarter, but declined to provide a detailed schedule for construction.
The company said it plans to spend NT$900 million to build two new plants at its Tainan facility, which are expected to begin operations in the second quarter of next year.
Airtac shares on Friday remained unchanged at NT$284 in Taipei trading.
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