Plastics firm Carclo suffers an 'extremely challenging' year

Carclo, which is based in Ossett, West Yorkshire, has announced its results for the full year ended March 31 2019.

In a statement, Carclo said: "The year to March 31 2019 was an extremely challenging one for Carclo, and this remains the case today.

"The operating and financial performance at Wipac, the main business in the LED Technologies Division, deteriorated through the year, driven by a significant number of new programme launches.

"The group's other operations made good progress during the year, with the Carclo Technical Plastics Division and the smaller Aerospace Division both seeing year-on-year improvements in underlying operating profits."

Overall, Group proforma unaudited adjusted profit before tax decreased by £2.7m to £6.4m and net debt increased to £38.5m, from £31.5m the year before. The underlying loss before tax was £0.7m, compared with a profit of £9.1m the year before.

Commenting on the results, Mark Rollins, chairman said: "The year to 31 March 2019 was an extremely challenging one for Carclo, with Wipac's poor operational and financial performance putting significant pressure on the whole group.

"However, with Technical Plastics and Aerospace delivering encouraging performances in 2019, which have continued in the first half of the current year, and Wipac's immediate cash needs being funded by its customers, the group's net debt has fallen over the past six months. This is providing a foundation for the ongoing long-term funding and pension contribution negotiations which, along with a successful exit from the Wipac business, are key to the future of Carclo."