Regulation and ‘scandals’ drive growth in Eurofins food testing ops
The firm said its food testing business had gone “from strength to strength” as it reported operating profit (EBITDA) leapt by 37 per cent year-on-year to reach €55m for the first six months of the year.
Structural trends
“Across our businesses, the food testing business goes from strength to strength, driven by positive structural trends (regulation) and market developments (food scandals),” said a company statement.
Food and feed testing generates around 40 per cent of company revenues, a Eurofins spokeswoman told FoodProductionDaily.com
She said that food scandals such as the dioxin contamination in eggs and meat in Germany at the beginning of 2011 had boosted business but that its beneficial effects had been limited.
“Incidents like this are not a gamer-changer for us as we already process huge volumes of tests as a matter of routine,” she added.
The company said it had seen increasing revenues and a growth in market share in its historical strongholds – such as Germany.
Eurofins also reported that revenues had risen 22 per cent to €372m and that net profit had trebled to €14m compared to the same period last year.
Emerging market weakness
CEO Giles Martin said good growth had been achieved despite it relatively weak presence in emerging markets.
“The strong organic growth, achieved despite the fact that our presence in emerging markets is still limited, reflects the benefits of our investments in building a world class laboratory network,” said the company head.
The firm currently operates just a handful of testing laboratories in key global developing countries such as India, China and Brazil.
“We recognise that our entry into emerging markets has been quite late compared to our competitors,” added the spokeswoman. “Our development in these markets is coming from our Western clients and those exporting product to the West. Testing take up by local companies in these countries is still nascent.”
