Gardenia, Massimo, High 5

Silver Bird Group Bhd, the manufacturer of white loaf bread High 5

Silver Bird is the only listed packaged white bread manufacturer on Bursa Malaysia, while Gardenia Bakeries' parent company, QAF Ltd, is listed on the Singapore Exchange. Massimo is owned by Federal Flour Mills Bhd (FFM). FFM is owned by PPB Group Bhd.

QAF owns 70% of Garden Bakeries while the other 30% belongs to Padiberas Nasional Bhd (Bernas), which is owned by Tan Sri Syed Mokhtar Al Bukhary.

Gardenia Bakeries operates the largest bakery operation in Southeast Asia with eight fully automated production lines with a production capacity of more than 700 million loaves of bread, snack cakes, buns and rolls per annum.

In 2010, its Malaysian operations contributed S$268.7 million (RM654.6 million) in revenue to QAF, an increase of 12.4% from 2009.

In 3QFY2011 ended Spt 30, QAF recorded a 14% increase in revenue to S$248.4 million (RM605.14) million), after seeing an increase in revenue across its business segments.

In 2010, Silver Bird's revenue stood at RM593.5 million, an increase of 0.8% from 2009.

Profit before tax (PBT) in 3QFY11 was RM4.45 million, which meant that Silver Bird's gross profit margin was only 1%. In the previous corresponding period, the group made RM2.8 million in PBT on the back of RM439.6 million in revenue.

Smaller brands in Malaysian white loaf bread market include Kunci Emas by Kilang Roti Kunci Emas Sdn Bhd and Federal Bakery.

The Edge Malaysia 9 January 2012