StemLife confident of better results for FY17

KUALA LUMPUR: Stem cell banking company StemLife Bhd, which is no longer listed on the local bourse, expects its net profit and revenue for the financial year ending June 30, 2017 (FY17) to improve compared with last year.
This is given its current focus on expanding coverage into more areas in the country, especially Sabah and Sarawak, increasing number of products and services for mother and baby, and investment in educational and promotional activities to increase public awareness.
“Currently we already have a presence in the Klang Valley, southern part of Johor Baru, Ipoh and Penang. We will continue our focus in these markets but we see there is still so much potential for our business to grow in Malaysia,” its CEO Yap Eng Gee said at a media briefing yesterday.
“We will also continue to invest in educational and promotional activities such as pre-natal workshops organised with partner hospitals, ground exhibitions as well as participation in related seminars and forums,” she added, noting the company currently has a strong balance sheet, with over RM70 million of cash and liquid assets.
To date, StemLife has partnered with about 200 private hospitals nationwide, and banked in more than 60,000 cord blood stem cells. It has successfully released 15 cord blood units for transplantation that involved the treatment for thalassaemia, cerebral palsy, brain injury and leukaemia.
The company, which was established in 2001, is the first cord blood banking company in Malaysia to provide umbilical cord blood-derived stem cells for use in treatments.
Its delisting follows the completion of the acquisition of a 99% stake by Singapore-listed Cordlife Group Ltd (CGL) in March 2017.
With the acquisition, StemLife is now majority owned by CGL and a subsidiary of the largest cord blood banking group in Asia with presence in seven countries including China (in Hong Kong), India, the Philippines and Indonesia – with more than 180,000 cord blood units stored.
“It has just been a month since we completed the delisting process. We will further leverage on the experience, expertise and resources of the CGL group in Singapore,” Yap said.
For the six-month period ended Dec 31, 2016, the company posted a net profit of RM1.44 million, eight times higher than the RM175,000 it posted a year ago, mainly due to higher gross profit during the period and the absence of impairment loss from the write-off of investment.