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natural cool holdings limited
Letter to
Shareholders
Dear Shareholders
It has been a challenging but rewarding year as Natural Cool braced itself against all odds to deliver a profit before tax of
S$3.28 million. Despite a lackluster environment with property cooling measures staying put while developers and property
buyers adopting a wait-and-see attitude, Natural Cool’s pipeline of air-conditioning and switchgear distribution projects
remained strong and healthy. Regardless of the macro-economic conditions, Natural Cool’s business fundamentals have
once again stood the tests and remained sound ever since it achieved public listing in 2006. The year under review also
saw the company continuing its effort to embark on productivity enhancement programmes as its response to the tighter
labour market environment. In addition, staff empowerment has become even more significant in this highly competitive
environment where tardy decision-making is something that we can ill afford.
Moving ahead, the global economic outlook for 2015 appears uneven. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) expects
the world economy to grow at 3.5 per cent, down from earlier projection of 3.8 per cent. The downgrade reflects a
reassessment of prospects in China, Russia, the Euro zone and Japan as well as weaker activity in some oil exporters
because of the sharp decline in oil prices. The United States is the only major economy for which growth projections have
been raised. Stagnation and low inflation are still concerns in the Euro zone and Japan.
Based on Singapore’s Ministry of Trade & Industry (MTI) estimates, our economy is expected to grow at a more modest
pace ranging from 2.0 to 4.0 per cent in 2015 with externally-oriented sectors such as manufacturing and wholesale
trade likely to bear the brunt of a challenging global economic environment. Domestically, labour scarcity will continue to
plague sectors such as construction, retail and food services in which growth may be weighed down by labour constraints.
Despite the negative externality, we know that Natural Cool is not a novice to challenges and we have the necessary
wherewithal to ride on the continued growth of Singapore’s built environment industry which is projected to reach between
$29 billion and $36 billion in 2015.
Joseph Ang Choon Cheng
Executive Chairman
Tsng Joo Peng
Chief Executive Officer
