KUALA TERENGGANU [26 February 2008] – GOLDEN PHAROS BERHAD continued to improve its financial performance, posting a profit after tax of RM3.5 million for the fourth quarter ended 31 December 2007 compared to a loss after tax of RM0.4 million in the corresponding quarter in the previous financial year.

The Group registered a profit after tax of RM11.2 million for the year ended 31 December 2007, a significant improvement compared to the profit after tax of RM2.1 million recorded in the previous financial year ended 31 December 2006. The encouraging results were contributed by higher revenue of RM118.8 million, an increase of 19% against the previous year, resulting from increased sales in the harvesting & sawmilling and manufacturing segments by 24% and 14% respectively. The logs extraction has also increased by 31% from 34,878 hoppus tonne in 2006 to 45,810 hoppus tonne in the financial year ended 31 December 2007.

Golden Pharos Berhad (GPB) Chairman Dato’ Mohammed Azlan Hashim said the Group’s performance has improved significantly since the rationalisation exercise of its shareholding under Terengganu Inc, the investment holding company of the State Government of Terengganu. Under the supervision of the newly composed Board of Directors and with enhanced management resources, the Group has undertaken several initiatives at both corporate and operational level to facilitate decision making, improve its yields, gain greater operating efficiency and achieve cost reduction in its various activities.

“With better planning and coordination, the Group can better tap the value-chain benefits of its integrated upstream, midstream and downstream operations,” said Dato’ Mohammed Azlan.

The Group will continue to focus on its improvement initiatives to achieve sustainable positive performance and growth.

About GOLDEN PHAROS BERHAD

Golden Pharos Berhad was established in 1986 and listed on the main Board Bursa Securities Malaysia Berhad on 13 September 1993. Terengganu State Government is the major shareholder of the Company with 47.1% equity interest held via Terengganu Incorporated Sdn Bhd.

GPB Group’s operations in the timber-based activities are divided into 3 major segments ie. upstream, midstream and downstream. The upstream activities involve in administering approximately 130,000 hectares of forest concession under sustainable forest management principles and the selected logs harvesting activity.

The midstream operations are mainly involved in sawmilling, kiln drying and finger jointing with primary timber supplies from the Group concession.

The downstream operations involve the manufacturing of engineered and solid wooden doors and glass processing activities. The manufactured engineered doors have obtained Chain of Custody (CoC) certification, as at least 70% of the wood used in the engineered doors comes from well-managed forests. The glass processing activity involves the processing of float glass into architectural glass for construction and accessory items and tempered safety glass for building construction. The tempered safety glass conforms to export markets’ standards i.e. American National Standard Institute (ANSI:Z97.1-1984), British Standards (BS 6206.1981) and Malaysia Sirim Approval Standards and was recently awarded with the ISO 9001:2000 for its processing activity. The Group glass’s products adorned some of the prominent buildings in Malaysia e.g. Crystal Mosque at Taman Tamadun Islam Terengganu, Terengganu Indoor Stadium, Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre and Kuala Lumpur International Airport.

Link to Bursa Malaysia