SUBANG JAYA (Nov 20): Supermax Corp Bhd, the world’s fourth biggest glove maker by production capacity, is in talks with potential targets to acquire a contact lens maker in Japan as part of plans to become a dominant player there. 

“We are talking with a few contact lens players in Japan, so that we can move into the market quickly. We want to be a dominant player in the Japanese contact lens market (and it can be done) through acqusitions," its group managing director Datuk Seri Stanley Thai Kim Sim told reporters, after the group's annual general meeting today.

“We will reveal details of this when we announce to Bursa Malaysia. It will be a strategic acquisition,” he said. 

Meanwhile, Supermax expects to secure a licence to sell contact lenses in Japan by the fourth quarter of next year (4Q 2018). Currently, Supermax sells to about 30 countries.

“We are waiting for more licences to be issued from the respective health ministries, which will allow us to sell our contact lens in regulated countries," Thai added. 

“We are expecting by 4Q 2018 to get the Japan licence. This takes a longer time because all the clinical tests are required to be conducted in Japan by the Japanese testing laboratories,” he said.
 
The contact lens business is expected to start contributing positively to the group's bottomline in the second half of 2019 (2H 2019), he added.

“Going forward, it (contact lens business) is promising. It is the investment that we are looking for to contribute substantially to the group's bottomline in (2H 2019),” he said. 

Supermax ventured into the contact lens manufacturing in 2014.

At 3.38pm, Supermax shares were up one sen or 0.49% at RM2.05, with 8.06 million shares done, bringing it's market capitalisation to RM1.35 billion.