THURSDAY, March 28, 2024
nationthailand

Group Lease aims to be in 20 countries by year-end

Group Lease aims to be in 20 countries by year-end

GROUP LEASE (GL), a digital finance firm listed on the Stock Exchange of Thailand, has targeted expansion of its corporate footprint from seven countries in Asia at present to 20 countries worldwide by the end of this year.

“Our model of digital-finance platform can apply to any country. That is why we can expand very fast,” said GL chairman and chief executive officer Mitsuji Konoshita. 
Having just returned from visiting South African, Konoshita said he saw enormous growth potential in Africa as a whole as well as the emerging economies in Eastern Europe. 
From its home base in Thailand, GL has expanded to six other countries in Asia – Singapore, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Indonesia and Sri Lanka. 
According to Konoshita, the target next this year is to expand GL’s type of consumer finance blending with information-technology business to 13 more countries in Africa and Eastern Europe, thus boosting GL’s total worldwide corporate presence to 20 countries. 
The company’s Bt260.41-million net profit in the third quarter of last year marked the eighth consecutive quarter of record-high profits and raised total nine-month profits in 2016 to Bt738 million. 
Given the continuous robust growth of the Cambodian market and the huge growth potentials of the relatively untapped market in Indonesia, senior executives are confident that quarterly profits will continue to break new records from here on. 
GL’s shareholders in early December gave their consent to the company’s plans to acquire 29.99 per cent of Commercial Credit & Finance (CCF), a highly profitable finance company listed on the Sri Lanka stock exchange, and full ownership of BG Microfinance Myanmar (BGMM), a microfinance firm in the newly emerging and booming market of Myanmar. 
These acquisitions – coupled with the recent entry to Indonesia, the largest market in Asean with a population of more than 250 million – were part of an aggressive expansion plan that GL’s senior executives described as the “Great Leap Forward”. 
A combination of organic growth (such as the highly successful businesses in Cambodia and, more recently, Indonesia) plus mergers and acquisitions (such as the CCF and BGMM deals) will drive this new phase of major expansion, they believe. 
Company executives are bullish on the CCF acquisition, since it is a well-managed and highly profitable company. It was projected to generate net profits of US$22 million (Bt790 million) this year in 2016, rising to about $30 million next this year. Having completed the 29.99-per-cent acquisition of CCF, GL was to start consolidating its share of the CCF profits in the current Q4 fourth quarter of 2016.
They are now projecting that profits in 2017 will further double from the anticipated Bt1 billion this last year – thanks to profit contributions from the recent acquisitions plus additional revenues from other existing operations in the region.
Looking ahead into 2017, Konoshita said the “Great Leap Forward” strategy would see the company expanding its corporate outreach from Asia to Africa and Eastern Europe to pursue its quest to become a truly global company.
He added that he had recently visited South Africa and was very impressed by the economic dynamism there. Likewise, he also foresaw huge growth potentials in various emerging economies in Eastern Europe. 
By blending high-margin consumer financing with efficient but low-cost IT, GL says it has been able to score rapid business expansion with high profitability. 
The end objective is to become a global company serving some 2.5 billion clients.
 

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