wtl30 Oct 2013 18:27
The company used to boast of an addressable market of around US$2bn a year, which was based on commercial sales to businesses in the US and Europe.
However, its market has increased to US$14bn since the development of its Firewall products aimed at consumers as well as businesses, using ultra-violet technology to purify at the point at which the water is dispensed.
Firewall eliminates the chance of contamination from the nozzle from which the water is dispensed and is a huge leap forward in technology that creates two massive opportunities.
The first is the consumer market, and the group has developed a range of models for the home that are being sold by partners such as Indesit Hotpoint. It will market under the Waterlogic name in Japan through its distribution partner, Alconix.
The Firewall technology also has a ready market in emerging nations such as India, where water quality is still an issue, and the company has a distribution agreement with Eureka Forbes
The competition for the company is still traditional bottled water, where the group has a significant edge.
There are companies that install point of use units, but none have the economies of vertical integration provided by Waterlogic’s manufacturing arm.
And it is this, allied to the ability to reduce central costs such as marketing spend, which provides an instant win when Waterlogic makes bolt-on acquisitions. The cost of sales drops, and profits instantly rise.
Its largest deal to date was done in Australia, where it bought Cool Clear Water, a company that turns over A$16.9mln and made EBITDA of A$9.3mln. It acquired Culligan as part of the same deal, sewing up a further A$6.9mln of revenues. The total cost was A$60mln, though this has given the group a fairly significant base in Australia.
It means the group is carrying net debt of around US$35mln, although it still has headroom with its lenders and cash of US$13.8mln that will finance other, probably more modest, bolt-ons to the business.