|
RFM
Corp. will list its property arm Philippine Townships
Inc. (Philtown) at the Philippine Stock Exchange by the
first quarter next year in order to focus on its food
and beverage business.
Jose A.
Concepcion III, the company’s president and chief
executive officer, said RFM wanted Philtown, a
P2-billion firm, to “pursue its own destiny” alongside
other top property developers of the country and raise
money for itself.
According to the plan, 30 percent of Philtown will be
initially floated to the market for the public. During
the next few months, the remaining 70 percent of the
company will be opened to the RFM shareholders.
When the
phases of going public are complete, Philtown will have
to raise money for its property development projects,
just like most listed real-estate firms are doing,
Concepcion said.
“We want
RFM to focus on food and beverage business. We have to
list it first [at the PSE] and eventually the
shareholders of RFM today can expect eventually to own
the shares of Philtown directly,” Concepcion said at the
sidelines of the company’s stockholders’ meeting
Thursday.
The same
strategy was used when RFM also listed Swift Foods Inc.
at the PSE in 1994, wherein it was to be a separate
company but majority-owned by the Concepcions, among
others.
Swift
assumed RFM’s business of manufacturing, marketing and
distributing processed and canned meat products, poultry
products and commercial feeds.
According to Felicisimo M. Nacino Jr., the company’s
chief operating officer, there are three to four
projects in various stages of negotiations that Philtown
is working on at the moment.
“We did
not expect Philtown to be this big. The idea really is
for RFM to exit out of property development or have a
very minority position,” Nacino told reporters.
Philtown
started as an in-house property holder and developer of
RFM’s various land ownerships in the country. As years
went by, the company had developed big-ticket projects
such as the One McKinley Place at The Fort in Taguig,
and the Metropolitan Tower in Rockwell in Makati.
Philtown
is also developing a property on Taft Avenue in Manila
right in front of De la Salle University, and Nacino
said RFM is eyeing such kinds of projects in the future,
possibly near Katipunan Avenue in Quezon City.
The said
strategy was part of RFM’s plan to reorganize the
company, which started in 2000, to focus on its food and
beverage business, which were hit by a downturn two to
three years ago.
It was
only recently that RFM was able to swing to
profitability from a net loss of P421.75 million in 2004
to P213 million net income in 2005 and P202.55 million
last year.
“From
the investors’ viewpoint they were confused that we are
a food and beverage [firm] but there is significant
property development embedded in the company. So they
cannot value the company,” Nacino said.
RFM,
which still has to face a labor dispute, was
incorporated in August 1957 under the name Republic
Flour Mills Inc. and was originally into the flour
milling business.
It
gradually entered into agribusiness, grocery, and other
areas of food manufacturing. In 1963, plant facilities
were commissioned to produce cooking oil and margarine.
In 2000,
however, the company decided to divest its noncore
business and sold interest in Consumer Savings Bank and
Psi Technology. In 2001, it sold all assets in tuna
processing and later that year its entire interest in
Cosmos Bottling Corp. |
