Growth and innovation During the year, $189 million was invested...

Growth and innovation

During the year, $189 million was invested in organic capital projects and innovation to drive sustainable growth. This included the following:  $30 million for the ongoing Australasian Fibre Packaging asset refresh program to upgrade or replace assets to enhance quality and increase capacity to meet market demands. The cumulative investment commitment made to the asset refresh program now exceeds $120 million.  $8 million to complete the final build phase for the $23 million waste water treatment plant at B9, with commissioning of the plant in progress and expected to complete in the first half of FY19.  As part of the Orora Global Innovation Initiative, the commissioning of two new ‘state of the art’ high speed, large format digital printers (one each for OPS and Fibre Packaging), which takes the cumulative investment under this initiative to in excess of $45 million.  $7 million investment in new small format can capacity at Beverage Cans (NZ).

Looking forward:  Driven by the success of the Orora Global Innovation Initiative thus far, a further $30 million was committed to continue the focus on bringing new, innovative, customer-led product solutions to life, as well improving productivity in the plants. This takes the total to $75 million. This additional amount is expected to be invested over the coming two to three years.  As announced in May 2018, the construction of a new $35 million warehouse at Gawler to increase capacity to hold inventory on site, reducing offsite pallet storage and transport costs is now underway and expected to be completed by end of calendar 2019.

Outlook

Orora expects to continue to drive organic growth and invest in innovation and growth during FY19, with constant currency earnings expected to be higher than reported in FY18, subject to global economic conditions.