18.08.2008

Profits slip at Boom as revenues rise

Australian crane and access company Boom Logistics has reported full year revenues to the end of June of A$410.3 ($356 million), an increase of 17 percent.

The largest increase in percentage terms was in crane sales that jumped 43 percent to A$68.6 million ($59.5 million) while the overall rental business grew by around 10 percent to A$341.2 million ($296 million).

The company says that most of the rental growth was in crane rental while Access rentals, through Sherrin and Moorland, only posted minimal year on year growth.

Pre tax profits dropped by 43 percent to A$27.65 million ($24 million) due, to a write off of some goodwill, a A$1.2 million correction from last year along with, according to the company, poor weather and higher costs in Western Australia through casual re-rent costs, poor integration of Moorland into Sherrin and too rapid a pace of growth causing overheads to spiral in some areas.

Chief executive officer, Brenden Mitchell said: “Boom Logistics is making good progress across its business, cash flows are robust and it has a strong asset base. The resources and infrastructure pipeline continues to drive favourable business conditions across our markets.”

“Whilst revenue has continued to grow strongly, a more disciplined approach to Boom’s cost environment is required. A number of initiatives in this area have already been implemented and we are seeing early signs of progress. I am confident the results will be evident as early as the first quarter of FY2009.”