Hero's profits up 50% last year

Hero's profits up 50% last year

JAKARTA (JP): PT Hero Supermarket, a publicly listed retail company, reported a 50 percent increase in its net profit to Rp 23 billion (US$9.9 million) last year.

Hero's president, Ipung Kurnia, announced after an extraordinary shareholders meeting yesterday that the profit increase was supported by a 22 percent rise in revenues.

"Based on our unaudited report, we booked approximately Rp 778 billion in revenues as compared to Rp 638 billion in 1994," Ipung said.

He added that the firm expected a sales growth of 20 percent this year.

Ipung explained that at yesterday's meeting, the shareholders approved the management's proposals to increase the company's authorized capital to Rp 450 billion from Rp 140 billion, to split one old share into two new shares and to set up a new company.

"The split will be undertaken by halving the nominal value of the shares from Rp 1,000 to Rp 500. It will double our total shares to 235.4 million," he said.

The new company to be set up, according to Ipung, will manage Hero's convenience stores, with a total investment of Rp 7.7 billion.

"We plan to set up eight more convenience stores this year. So at the end of the year we will have 20 convenience stores," said Ipung.

Hero, which was founded in 1971, operates 62 outlets throughout the country. It is slated to set up 11 more outlets this year. (08)