Kaburu Mugambi
6 May 2008
Nairobi — Uchumi Supermarkets has recorded a Sh113 million pre-tax profit within nine months of its trading year, up from a loss of Sh257 million for the year ended June 2007.
Uchumi Supermarket
The chain store made Sh50 million of the pre-tax profit during the first three months of this year.
The company's net sales rose from Sh3.5 billion for the year ended June 2006 to Sh5.2 billion during the nine months between July 2007 to March 2008.
Uchumi sunk into insolvency on June 1, 2006, though it re-opened 45 days later following the government's injection of Sh675 million and a compromise from PTA Bank and Kenya Commercial Bank. Uchumi owed the two banks Sh956.7 million separately. Initially it reopened five branches in July 2006 followed by nine more bringing the total number of re-opened stores to 14 currently out of the previous 17 branches before it was placed under receivership.
Uchumi receiver manager Jonathan Ciano Monday said the organisation progressively continues to respond positively to the implementation of the Uchumi Rescue Plan.
"The recorded continuous growth of sales revenue levels, customer numbers, sustained margins among other benchmarks have surpassed the company's recent past four years' performance," he told reporters at Uchumi Ngong Hyper, Nairobi.
The company is in the process of identifying a strategic equity partner, a process expected to be complete by August.
Mr Ciano said that the procurement process would have a first stage comprising the prequalification of bidders based on certain requirements.
Requirements
"Specialist receiver and manager hereby invites interested parties, whether or not citizens or corporation of the Republic of Kenya, to participate in the prequalification of bids," he said.
Bidders must be consortiums of institutional or financial investors of good standing and have ability to influence or contribute to the management of Uchumi positively.
Those applying could also be international supermarket operators with a prescribed level turnover of $1 billion annually.
Also individuals or investment groups of good standing, which have an investment capacity of between Sh200 million and Sh1 billion and ability to influence or contribute to the management of the company positively, could bid.
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