Plan to rebrand products
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A2 Corporation will rebrand its products in Australia in a strategy to raise growth and turnover.
Freshly named chief executive to the "sci- tech" firm Anthony Lawler says A2 will leverage on the joint venture relationship with Australian Stock Exchange-listed Freedom Nutritional Products (FNP) to drive expansion in Australia, then Japan. Now, A2's sales are about $A5 million ($NZ5.65m) a year.
FNP was formerly known as So Natural associated with similarly branded products including soy milk, cookies and pastas. FNP has exclusive rights to "Thorpedo" food and nutritional products, associated with Australian swimming sensation Ian Thorpe.
A2 already distributed its six main products in more than 1000 Australian stores, Lawler said.
The milk would eventually be branded Freedom A2 milk, taking it on again from its origins as a start-up in 2000 by the late Dunedin entrepreneur Howard Paterson and scientist Dr Corran McLachlan.
The Auckland firm launched across the Tasman in 2003, and in 2006 bought back the Australian business that had been licensed to Singapore-listed consumer goods giant Fraser & Neave.
A2's business in Australia would be transferred into a new 50/50 joint venture entity A2 Dairy Products Australia (A2DP) from June 1, he said.
FNP brought significant dairy industry knowledge, retail grocery expertise, extensive management experience, as well as access to milk supply through its majority shareholder, Lawler said. "I view it as getting to where we want to faster, quicker and bigger than we would have without having FNP, because I think we were going well in Australia."
Significantly, FNP also had a joint venture with Japanese dairy company Yakult Honsha. "We're hoping at some stage to leverage that relationship and look at the Japan opportunity." No firm date had been set in terms of setting up in Japan.
FNP had agreed to inject an undisclosed "cash investment" to support marketing and the development of A2DP, with other capital requirements, revenues and profits shared. A2 would be entitled to royalties from the joint venture granted over A2's products.
"We're going to get some economies of scale, and we go from being just one company with several lines of milk, to being part of an overall company that is operating in several categories and the trade takes notice of that," Lawler said.
FNP chief executive Geoff Babidge said the joint venture represented a significant step in FNP's strategy to invest in specialised nutrition segments.
Lawler is just eight weeks into the chief executive role and has previously worked with dairy giant Fonterra.
Related: Plan to rebrand products
Additional information:
Plan to rebrand products: from www.stuff.co.nz
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