Disclaimer: This article is in no way financial advice, nor solicitation to buy or sell shares in this company. It is purely for educational purposes only. You are highly recommended to conduct all necessary due diligence and make your own informed decisions before making any financial decisions. The writer already owns shares in this company and may at any point in time increase or reduce their position without prior notice. Do not try to copy trade!

Last week, I attended Rhone Ma’s AGM to learn more about this Malaysian company who operates in the Animal Health industry, offering products and solutions mainly for livestock and companion animals including feed, supplements, pharmaceuticals, vaccines, diagnostics services and so on. So, I’ll share my notes and what I know about the company for everyone’s knowledge.

History and a brief background of Rhone Ma

Rhone Ma Malaysia started when the current management team led by Dr Lim Ban Keong did a Management Buyout of the animal health division of the company they used to work for, Rhodia Malaysia, 25 years ago.

For your information: Management Buyout is when the management team of a company makes an offer to buy and take over the company from the owner.

Starting with an annual revenue of just about RM19 mil a year, the company in its latest fiscal year recorded a revenue of nearly RM212 mil which is a CAGR of about 10.9% over the whole period.

While the number itself isn’t particularly outstanding, their steadfast focus in their niche for such a long time is commendable—not many listed companies in Bursa have such a track record where the core business and core team of the company remains unchanged for a quarter of a century.

In 2016, the company was successfully listed on the main market of Bursa Malaysia and raised about RM31.6 mil, which was mainly to build a new manufacturing plant and warehouse to cater for the increased demand for their products. The new manufacturing plant, which was completed sometime around 2022-2023, would have increased their total production capacity by about 400% upon full utilization.

However, Rhone Ma faced obstacles in ramping up production mainly due to strict certifications governed by the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA) Malaysia, which included a 12-18 month production stability testing before commercial production. This is because Rhone Ma is dealing with pharmaceutical products that could be potentially dangerous, if not produced within the required specifications and tolerances. Notably, in the recent 1Q2025, they have managed to secure their 1st product NPRA certification for this new plant, and will start increasing production this year.

Separately, Rhone Ma, in 2020, acquired a 49% stake in A2Fresh Holdings Sdn Bhd for about RM7.8 mil which owned 3 companies involved in the ruminant business, providing:

• Ruminant (cattle, goat, sheep etc) feed and healthcare;

• Cattle farming equipment; and

• Directly own a small dairy farm of about 300 cattle producing pure A2 milk in Batang Kali.

With this acquisition, Rhone Ma expanded their scope of livestock products and services to cover the main farm animals of Malaysia: poultry, swine (pig), and ruminants (cow, sheep). Today, the company has mostly recouped their cost in this investment already from the profits of the subsidiary over the years.

In 2023, A2Fresh Holdings formed a 35:65 JV company called Jemaluang Dairy Valley Sdn Bhd (JDV) with Kulim Malaysia Berhad (a former listed company and an arm of JCorp of Johor Sate), together with the East Coast Economic Region Development Council (ECERDC) to build a full-scale integrated dairy farm in Jemaluang (in Johor, near Mersing) which is expected to produce about 5.4mil liters of fresh A2 milk per year upon completion by early 2026. This would put JDV’s farm’s size to be close to that of Farm Fresh’s Muadzam Shah farm. Rhone Ma’s effective stake in this venture is about 17%.

Business breakdown