SMC PRIMED FOR EARLIER THAN EXPECTED RECOVERY

Conglomerate San Miguel Corp. (SMC) is poised to recover “sooner than expected” from the havoc created by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, according to its parent company, Top Frontier Investment Holdings Inc.

Top Frontier maintained its positive outlook for SMC even as it hailed the latter’s initiatives to help the rest of the country recover from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the quarantine has slowed down SMC’S growth momentum, Top Frontier said SMC, deemed as its crown jewel, was primed to recover lost ground in the coming months, noting that strategies had been put in place to adapt to the new business environment.

“As we transition to our next normal, I am confident that San Miguel Corp. will recover its footing sooner than expected,” Top Frontier chair Iñigo Zobel said during the company’s stockholders meeting.

Earlier, SMC president and chief operation officer Ramon S. Ang said that to stimulate and help boost the Philippine economy at this critical time, SMC would continue to invest in growth-creating and job-generating projects and proceed with capacity expansion and infrastructure development initiatives.

Among the measures mapped out by SMC to adjust to the challenging environment were to make supply chains more resilient, update operating and selling models, keep its cost base appropriate and manageable, increase efficiencies and rationalize spending, as well as protect cash flows while pro-actively managing its working capital.

Top Frontier hailed SMC’S initiatives to help the country during the pandemic, including the recent inauguration of its Better World Edsa COVID-19 polymerase chain reaction (PCR) laboratory in Mandaluyong, that could process 4,000 tests daily and further expandable to 12,000 daily. It aims to test some 70,000 employees and extended workers in SMC’S nationwide network, and boost the country’s overall testing capacity.

SMC has spent over P13 billion in assistance to the country, a package that includes food donations to vulnerable communities, disinfectant alcohol to health facilities, medical equipment and personal protective equipment, free toll and fuel for medical health workers, emergency quarantine facilities, assistance to the agriculture sector, advance tax and other payments to government, and continuing compensation for its workforce.

Outside of SMC, Top Frontier said its mining subsidiary Clariden Holdings Inc. also continued to undertake mine site activities, including in-fill drilling, that are “consistent with existing mining laws and mindful of environmental and social impact.”