Megaworld net profit up 12% in 1st quarter to P1.25B

TYCOON ANDREW Tan’s property development unit Megaworld Corp. increased its first-quarter net profit by 12 percent to P1.25 billion from a year ago, driven by residential real estate sales and office rental portfolios.

Consolidated revenues amounted to P5.73 billion, up 23 percent from a year ago, the company disclosed to the Philippine Stock Exchange yesterday.

Rental income from Megaworld’s business process outsourcing office and retail developments grew 36 percent to P809 million from a year ago.

The company did not disclose how much revenues were booked from residential sales.

Megaworld ended the quarter with cash assets of P23.2 billion and total assets of P100 billion.

Company chair and chief executive Andrew Tan said he remained very bullish about the prospects of the Philippine economy as well as the Philippine real estate industry.

Megaworld senior vice president Francis Canuto attributed the company’s strong residential sales and rental income to “the strength of the company’s business model.”

The company has seven ongoing projects within Metro Manila and several residential developments within the Makati central business district and in San Juan. It was the first to develop an information technology park in the Philippines through its project in Eastwood City, which provides a 24×7 work environment to BPOs servicing the global market.

With the success of Eastwood City, Megaworld expanded its portfolio to McKinley Hill, which is now home to some of the biggest names in the BPO industry.

Megaworld is acknowledged as the leader in office development and is the biggest BPO office landlord. At the end of 2010, the company had about 384,000 square meters of office space in its portfolio. It is expected to complete another 78,000 square meters of space this year.