IRL strengthens financial position

IRL strengthens financial position

Industrial Research Ltd (IRL) has strengthened its financial position despite a challenging external operating environment, says Chief Executive Shaun Coffey.

He recently outlined IRL’s financial performance in a quarterly report to all staff of the Crown Research Institute.

IRL has built on its positive result at the end of the 2008 financial year to record an after tax surplus of $731,000 for the end of the 2009 financial year.

This is nearly a $200,000 improvement on the 2008 financial year end result of a $543,000 after tax surplus.

IRL Chief Executive Shaun Coffey says a collective effort to sharpen IRL’s focus and strengthen engagement with industry from across the organisation had enabled the company to significantly improve its position.

“It can’t be denied that the last 18 months have been challenging for businesses across the board and R&D providers have been no exception. In conjunction with IRL’s renewed focus on industry engagement, our strategy of retiring debt over the last two years has also had a positive impact on our bottom line.”

Shaun Coffey said the prospects for the year ahead looked good. “A lot of work has gone into increasing the ‘pipeline’ of potential contracts. We have more than doubled our pipeline in 2009. Our focus is now on improving the conversion rate of these potential deals to actual deals.”

He said the launch of IRL’s What’s Your Problem New Zealand? competition, which seeks to raise the profile of private sector investment in R&D and offers a prize of up to $1 million in R&D services from IRL, had a already had a significant positive impact on increasing the value of the ‘pipeline.’

“We are still several weeks away from announcing the winner but with more than 100 companies entering the competition, the lines of communication have been opened with many ambitious firms who realise the value of investment in R&D as a tool to raise productivity and company growth.”

Revenue improved from $57.0 million in the 2008 financial year to $60.3 million in the 2009 financial year.

“We are looking forward to improving our financial performance over the coming year. If we can continue to contain costs and keep our focus, this should be eminently achievable,” says Shaun Coffey.

ENDS

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