SPC modernises image after $100m capital raising

The century-old Victorian fruit and vegetable processor SPC has launched a new corporate brand as it wraps up a $100m capital raising.

SPC chairman Hussein Rifai said symbolised ‘the hope for a better tomorrow’.

The century-old Victorian fruit and vegetable processor SPC has launched a new corporate brand as it wraps up a $100m capital raising entirely backed by Australian investors.

SPC, now owned by Sydney-based private equity firms Perpetuity Capital and The Eights, which purchased the business from Coca-Cola Amatil last year, will on Tuesday launch its new vision, ​“It’s Time For Better”, which aims to support SPC’s global growth strategy and the diversification of its portfolio of products and brands.

The new corporate logo represents a dynamic sun which chairman Hussein Rifai said symbolised “the hope for a better tomorrow”.

He said the sun represented the company’s global vision while retaining a strong link with nature and Australia. “SPC stands for Smart, Passionate and Collaborative. Our rebranding is multi-stage. First is redoing our corporate image and focusing on our new thematic: better food of the future,’’ Mr Rifai said.

SPC’s new corporate logo.

“The next stage will see each brand and product refreshed. You will see it in some of our biggest brands over the next year.”

SPC owns some of Australia’s most iconic heritage food brands including SPC, Ardmona, Goulburn Valley and ProVital.

“Over a long period, we have seen an increase in reliance on foods imported from overseas which has resulted in losing the skill and expertise of agri-businesses in Australia. To safeguard Australia’s food security we need to protect our intellectual property in creative foods as well as foods of the future. We also have to create more valued-added food products so that we can stand on our own two feet and take our products to the world,” SPC CEO Robert Giles said.

“Even with a global pandemic, we have seen our business go from strength to strength — in 2020 alone we have launched over 100 new food and beverage products.

“We firmly believe that it will be manufacturers and innovators like SPC who will help drive Australia’s post-COVID economic recovery.

“We must all take the opportunity to support those businesses so they can become leading brands that service not only the Australian population but the world.”

SPC is currently conducting a $100m capital raising via a private share placement offer that will value the Shepparton-based company at almost $260m.

“We appointed Shaws & Partners as lead managers. The good part about it is we haven’t had to go overseas to get capital — it is all Australian capital. Because of how well we are performing, if we get less than $100m in the raising, we are not fussed,” Hussein Rifai said.

He said SPC was currently trading well above budget for the current year after posting earnings before depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of $45.6m last year from revenue of $284.1m. This compares to a $13m loss two years ago.

“We have been significantly above budget this year, top line and bottom line. We expect that is going to get better as we continue the process of integrating Kuisine,’’ he said.

SPC last month signed a deal to take a controlling shareholding in Kuisine Group, a $30m Sydney-based business that manufactures high-quality prepared meals and finger foods through its subsidiaries the Kuisine Company, The Gluten Free Meal Company and The Good Meal Company.

The deal, which gives SPC the ability to increase its ownership of Kuisine to 100 per cent, has allowed it to diversify into non-supermarket channels and develop a new range of health-­related food products.

It was the group’s first move into the frozen prepared-meal category.

In October 2019, Kuisine was awarded a second five-year contract to supply 72 per cent of ready meal requirements to the NSW Health hospital network.

At full rollout, this contract will require provision of 9 million meals per annum to NSW hospitals.

The Good Meal Co has also spent the past three years developing an online e-commerce platform dedicated to servicing NDIS and aged care home customers.

The acquisition of Kuisine came after SPC’s recent agreement to acquire the Helping Humans business, which produces healthy beverages, post-mix, and fermented botanicals products.

Dates, jackfruit and pomegranates have also been added to the SPC product portfolio over the past 12 months, the latter through the purchase of the PomLife brand from Australian Pomegranate Growers.

Mr Rifai said SPC was currently in negotiations for another significant acquisition that he expected to be completed in the new year.

“We already have another local, Victorian-based acquisition in the pipeline in one of the target categories we are looking at. We are hoping pre-Christmas we will have a term sheet signed,’’ he said.

SPC recently appointed Frenchman Hubert Houtrique, a former executive of Danone and Lion Group, to the new role of general manager quality and operational improvement.

Originally published as SPC modernises image after $100m capital raising