Business News - WA
At Close Of Business Podcast October 3 2024
(upbeat music) - All the latest business news from WA deliver daily. At close of business, news briefing. - Good afternoon and welcome to the At Close of Business podcast. I'm Isabel Vieira with your Thursday afternoon headlines. A frontier energy placement to raise more than $23 million has been scrapped after the solar energy aspirants share price plummeted earlier this week, while uncertainty hangs over incoming chair Mark McGowan's start date. The $23 million raise was to be the second chance of a $40 million placement of frontier shares at 25 cents each, but was subject to shareholder approval and will not go ahead. Frontiers said the decision was made in conversation with joint lead managers, Baron Joey, unified capital partners and Adkin Mount Capital Partners. Those who took up a position in the placement will not be required to go through with it and the placement agreement has been terminated. The first chance of the placement was already completed, bringing in more than $16 million at 25 cents at the end of August. It comes as the fallout continues from the Australian energy market operators award of WA energy capacity credits for the 2026/2027 operating year, where frontiers proposed $304 million will ruin a solar project missed out. To read the full article visit businessnews.com.au. In other news, gold mining executive Simon Lee will retire in November after calling time on a prolific multi-decade career of success, which has fingerprints across the sector in Australia and abroad. Malaysian-born Mr. Lee, in his 80s, was chair of Emerald Resources from its inception in 2014 until last year, overseeing its growth to a Cambodian-focused producer of scale with a market capitalization of $2.4 billion. The company announced today that he would retire after its AGM on November 29th. Emerald Chairman Jay Hughes, who took over from Mr. Lee last year, said the former chair had a significant role in building Emerald up to the business it was today. Speaking to business news, Mr. Lee said he had a knack and instinct for business from a young age, which translated into success as an entrepreneur and businessman across multiple sectors and countries. To read the full article, visit the business news website. And lastly, paddock-to-plate producers have won a temporary reprieve from the closure of a key Abattoir's custom kill service, as owner Westpork considers a new niche operation. Westpork-backed Dardnut butchering company has moved to extend its custom kill service until February, previously due to end next week after it gave small farmers just four weeks notice. It also flagged plans to potentially build a new multi-species processing facility at its DBC-picked-in site. The Southwest Abattoir was understood to be the last large-scale operation accessible to small producers who were preparing for the busy Christmas period amid statewide Abattoir capacity issues. It's understood the DBC Abattoir was grappling with capacity constraints that affected the processing of its own products and of making the service closure call more than two weeks ago. To read more, visit the business news website. That's all from me, up next on the podcast. I speak to Mark Baier about a manufacturing success story in WA's Super Yacht sector and some of the challenges and opportunities in the industry. Stay on top of the latest news stories that are impacting your business, industry or sector. The new Look Business News app gives subscribers breaking news alerts, access to editions, articles by category, as well as our advanced data and insight search function to find projects, people and companies. It's your mobile portal to the latest intelligence on commerce, politics and industry, wherever you are. Stay informed at critical times and download today. Visit businessnews.com.au/app. Download on the App Store or get it on Google Play now. Welcome back to the At Close of Business podcast. I'm Isabel Vieira and today I'm joined by Mark Baier. Mark, how are you going? Very well, thank you. That's good. It's Mark. In the latest edition of the Business News magazine, you've written about a luxury boat manufacturer, which you've described as one of Perth's little known manufacturing success stories. He entails a little bit about them, who they are, what they do. Sure. So, Vycal International, a business set up by Gunnar Vykinger. He was curious about the name. He was a migrant from Iceland and came from a family that had a long history in boat building. So, he came out, he was a young man, did his apprenticeship and got into the industry. But along the way, he's built up this amazing niche for his business. So, for the past 30 years, his company builds tenders for super yachts. So, price tag north of $6 million for one vessel. Think of these as a very, very upmarket tinny that you take out to your big super yacht. Yes, and some yachts have a few tenders. Well, yes, some super yachts have four or more tenders. And in fact, the super yachts themselves are designed so that the tenders get housed inside a garage so that when you're sailing around the Mediterranean, you can have all these little boats or smaller boats traveling around with you. So, yeah, if you spend $6 million on a tender, I just think how much you spend on the super yacht itself. And look, you know, really high-end luxury. You know, I saw this most recent vessel that they've built in their factory down at Bibberle Lake. You know, really high-quality sort of leather and timber finishes. All the latest technical gadget tree. Gunnar's son, Linden, he's now managing director of the business. He said that latest vessel is possibly the most technical, technically sophisticated tender ever built anywhere. So, and that's all happening in that little factory unit in Bibberle Lake. Pretty impressive. There you go. And, you know, like I said, out of Bibberle Lake, how do they compete with what is, you know, a global sector? Yeah, look, their customers almost invariably are international, so they're relying on their reputation. Gunnar's comment is that this kind of, or their vessels can only be built in a, I guess, an advanced country with a really highly skilled labor force. Okay. So it's not, you know, it's not a really big team. They've got it. At their peak, they'll have about 75 people working in their factory. But, you know, it's everything from marine engineers, stainless steel fabricators, composite lemonators, glaziers, upholsterers, carpenters, painters, electricians. And you said, look, it's a challenge to get the people they need. But Australia is the kind of place where you can do it. Yeah, there you go. And WA has a long history of the, you know, the super yacht. And, you know, if you've written that, there's a few changes going on in the sector. How's it shaping up? What's it looking like? Yeah, well, look, Vycal got their start by working with Ocean Fast. So they were a pioneer of the industry in WA. That business got bought by Ostall and then eventually got shut down. But there's two other big operators in the space that actually build super yachts down at Henderson. And listeners might have seen the news last week that we reported. One of those companies, Silver Yachts, is planning to shut down their WA operation and move their manufacturing to China. Okay. And the theme that's come through is that the focus on defense work in that whole shipbuilding precinct around Henderson is making it really tough for other industries. And they feel as though they're being squeezed out. The state government, a few years ago, started work on a fabrication facility to help the super yachts industry. That facility, after about $20 million of spending, was half finished. And it's sitting there, half finished. So governments very big on defense and orcas and submarines and that big opportunity. But they talk about looking after other industries like super yacht builders and all the support people. Well, you know, in total, estimated there's about 1,400 people employed in that industry. But at the moment, they're feeling really squeezed and waiting to see just how it's all going to pan out for them. Yeah, absolutely. Well, listeners can check out the full article in the most recent edition of the Business News magazine or read it online at businessnews.com.au. Mark, thank you for your insights. Thank you as well. The latest business news, deliver daily. Subscribe and rate the show wherever you listen to your podcasts. For all the latest business news, visit businessnews.com.au. (upbeat music) [BLANK_AUDIO]