"Our proud claim is that most Australians use an AMCOR product or service everyday"1

AMCOR (known for much of its life as APM) is one of Australia's ten largest companies. Through Containers Packaging (FY 95 AUSD $2511 million Earnings Before Interest and Tax [EBIT]) and AMCOR Fibre Packaging (FY 95 $2187m EBIT ), AMCOR is the leading packaging business in Australia and New Zealand. In recent years it has also spread into North America, Europe and Asia.2

Throughout the world AMCOR has 180 plants that manufacture packaging. These packaging businesses generate almost two thirds of AMCOR'S total sales.2

AMCOR Paper Group (APG) (FY 95 $2384 m EBIT) operates the major paper making business in the western Pacific and is the central division of AMCOR. APG has recently expanded into the United States and has plans to expand into Malaysia. Through AMCOR Merchanting and Trading, (FY 95 $219 m EBIT) AMCOR has substantial fine paper merchanting and envelope manufacturing interests in Australia and New Zealand and a network of trading offices throughout the Asia Pacific region.2

AMCOR has a 50% interest in Kimberly Clark Australia (KCA), (FY 95 $336 m EBIT) the Australian market leader in tissue and personal care products and a 42% shareholding in Spicers Paper, (FY 95 $152 m EBIT) a fine papers merchant and stationery manufacturer. 2

AMCOR employs 25 000 people at 350 plants and offices in 21 countries. It has 95 000 shareholders, including 13 000 employee shareholders. 80% of shares are owned in Australia.2 45% of sales and 25% of AMCOR's profits are now generated overseas.

AMCOR has had a very impressive track record. In the past 5 years profits have risen by at least 20% every year and AMCOR have had a run of 20 consecutive half year improvements over the past 10 years.3

Net profit is down 12% to $365m for FY 96, with Australian earnings down13% to $475.3m.Volatile paper prices and excess capacity have slowed production at the Maryvale and Burnie mills.4

In March 1996 AMCOR announced that they would invest $380 m in fine paper manufacturing to seek a bigger slice of Australia's fastest growing paper market, the only industry segment where it does not dominate.5

A D (Athol) Lapthorne
Chairman
Age 68. BSc. Appointed Chairman February 1994. Director since 1973. Chairman National Mutual Life Association of Australasia Ltd Group, Ericsson Australia Pty Ltd Group. Director Beswick Pty Ltd Group. Former Managing Director Monsanto Australia Ltd.

E A (Elizabeth) Alexander AM
Age 52. BCom, FCA, FCPA, FAIM. Appointed Director April 1994. Partner Price Waterhouse. Director Boral Ltd, CSL Ltd. Member Council of the Australian Defence Force Academy, and the ASC Corporations and Security Panel. Former Director Gas & Fuel Corporation of Victoria. Past State and National President Australian Society of Certified Practising Accountants.

M A (Tim) Besley AO
Age 68, FTS, BEng(Civil), BLegS, FIE Aust, FAIM. Director since 1985. Chairman Commonwealth Bank of Australia, Leighton Holdings Ltd. Director Clyde Industries Ltd, Fujitsu Australia Ltd. Member Metal Trades Industry Association NSW Council and National Executive. Chancellor of Macquarie University. Governor of the Council for International Business Affairs. Former Managing Director Monier Ltd. Former Secretary Commonwealth Department of Business and Consumer Affairs and Comptroller General of Customs.

R (Ross) Cameron
Age 64. BCom. Director since 1988. Managing Director Containers Packaging 1986 to 1993. Joined Containers Ltd Group in 1954. Director McPherson's Ltd, Yarra Valley Water.

N R (Nobby) Clark AO
Age 66. BCom, FCPA, FBIA. Appointed Director June 1993. Chairman Ashton Mining Ltd, Foster's Brewing Group Ltd, Sun Alliance Holdings Ltd, Melbourne Business School Foundation Ltd, Council for Equal Opportunity in Employment Ltd. Director Mayne Nickless Ltd, Santos Ltd, Melbourne Business School Ltd. Former Executive Officer National Australia Bank.

R T (Rod) Halstead
Age 52. LLB (Sydney), LLM (London). Appointed Director April 1994. Partner Clayton Utz. Director Asarco Australian Holdings Inc, Boral Ltd.

B T (Brian) Loton AC
Age 66. BMetE, Hon FIEAust, FAusIMM, MAIME. Director since 1992. Chairman BHP, The AusIMM Education Endowment Fund. Vice Chairman National Australia Bank, Director Australian Foundation Investment Company Ltd. Senior Member and International Councillor The Conference Board. Vice President and Executive Committee Member Australia Japan Business Co-Operation Committee. Councillor The Institute of Public Affairs Ltd. Former Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer BHP.

D B (Don) MacFarlane
Managing Director (as of July 1996)
Age 56. BSc. Joined AMCOR 1957. Deputy Managing Director from 1/1/1995. Director since 1993. Appointed Managing Director Australian Paper Manufacturers (now AMCOR Paper Group) 1990. Former Chairman Australian Manufacturing Council Industry & The Environment Committee. Past President National Association of Forest Industries.

D E (David) Meiklejohn
Executive Director
Finance and Administration.
Age 53. BCom, DipEd, FCPA, FAIM. Joined AMCOR 1966. Director since 1985. Chief Financial Officer since 1981. Chairman Kimberly-Clark Australia Pty Ltd. Director Colonial Life Assurance Society Ltd, Spicers Paper Ltd, Treasury Corporation of Victoria.

G R (Garry) Ringwood
Managing Director
AMCOR Fibre Packaging
Age 47. BCom, FCPA, FAIM. Joined AMCOR 1968. Director since 1993. Appointed Managing director AMCOR Fibre Packaging 1990. Director International Corrugated Case Association. President Packaging Council of Australia. Member of the Commonwealth Agri-Food Council. Council Member RMIT University.

Z E (Ziggy) Switkowski
Age 47. BSc, PhD (Nuclear Physics). Appointed Director July 1995. Chairman and managing Director, Kodak (Australasia) Pty Ltd since 1992. Chairman Hermes Precisa Australia Pty Ltd. Vice President Victorian Employers' Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Director Australian Quality council. Member Business Council of Australia, Australian Manufacturing Council. Trustee Melbourne Exhibition Centre.2

Retired: S D M (Stan) Wallis AO
Managing Director (until June 1996)
Age 56. BCom, LLD (Hon) Monash, FCPA, FCIS, FAIM. Joined AMCOR 1960. Deputy Managing Director 1975. Director since 1975, Managing Director since 1977. Director AMP Society Principal Board, Australian Foundation Investment Co Ltd. Vice President Business Council of Australia. Currently Commissioner, Inquiry into the Banking Industry

Top Twenty Shareholders

AMCOR is one of Australia's largest companies and for more than 120 years has been the nations major paper maker. For most of its life the company was known as APM. In the 1970's the company changed direction and embraced a large scale entry into packaging, transport and computer services, retailing, importing and exporting and increased technological innovation. In 1986 the company became AMCOR.

By the end of the 1970's the pulp and paper industry in Australia consisted of six companies, operating seventeen pulp and/or paper mills spread over six states. With Paper and Packaging, APM owned eight mills with fourteen paper and paperboard machines in six states. Smorgon Consolidated Industries had one mill operating in Victoria and operated three major paper and paperboard machines. The other major companies were ANM and APPM.

A report released in 1979 by the Forest Industries Advisory Council stated that the profitability of Australian Pulp and Paper Manufacturers was below the level of most of the manufacturing sector. But in conversion, like cartons and fibre containers, profits were ahead of most of the industry. Packaging was the area to get into, but for APM to get involved it had to become fully integrated and make major acquisitions. This meant company takeovers and entry into the overseas market.

APM did not have a strong overseas image. In 1985 APM invited thirty-one institutional investment advisers on a tour of Gippsland pine forests and Maryvale. APM representatives also went to Hong Kong and London to meet international bankers and institutional investors. The company was striving for a new identity and in 1986 its new official name became AMCOR. APM was retained for the Pulp and Paper division and its related corrugated fibre box making operation. AMCOR then set out on a national tour, with AMCOR jet and started nationwide television promotions to sell the name to the public. In 1986 AMCOR's tax earnings had risen to $162.8 million, sales increased by 33% and sales topped $2 billion for the first time.

By 1987 AMCOR had streamlined its operations, to ten paper machines and three pulp mills. AMCOR started a new pine pulpmill in Gippsland and was now self sufficient in pulp. They also started a new Business Papers machine at Maryvale producing computer and office papers breaking APPM's monopoly. AMCOR then sold its 11% shareholding in New Zealand Forest.

Profits for a profit of $20 million.

In South East Asia, AMCOR owned three corrugated box plants in Singapore and Hong Kong. The two plants in Singapore operated as AMB Packaging Pty Ltd. These were joint ventures by Anfor and Metal Box Singapore Ltd. They serviced the packaging requirements of the computer and electronic industries in the region. The Hong Kong fibre box plant began operating in 1987 under the name Interpac Containers. AMB bought a fibre box plant owned by Malayan Fibre Containers in Kuala Lumpar in 1989.

The Port Huon mill in southern Tasmania which closed in 1982 due to recession was restarted and exported pulp to Taiwan, Korea, Indonesia, Thailand and India. Export sales to the western Pacific in 1989 exceeded one million tonnes. Port Huon closed again in July 1991 when world prices for unbleached pulp fell by 30%.

The Business Papers project at Maryvale came on line in 1989 and successfully secured most government business in Australia. Re-Right, the first recycled stationery paper, was also launched in 1989.

In the late eighties, Kimberly Clark's operation was also expanding. A $100 million dollar machine was added to their Millicent plant and another machine was established at Albury to produce non-woven materials. A disposable nappy plant costing $20 million was built at Ingleburn, near Sydney, and KCA approved $250 million investments for the next five years.

AMCOR established itself in England with the building of a greenfield site making corrugated boxes in Cambridgeshire. This cost AMCOR $46 million. In New Zealand, Kiwi Packaging acquired most of the paper and packaging plants of UEB Packaging, thereby giving Kiwi a major share of the New Zealand market. AMCOR entered Canada in 1989 when they bought for $139 million, Twinpak Inc, a prominent plastics packaging manufacturer. Twinpak had sixteen plants and distribution throughout Canada. Also in 1989 AMCOR purchased the American company Sunclipse Inc for $225 million. Sunclipse was a private company which operated three corrugated board manufacturing plants and had a fourth under construction. They also owned five converting plants and ten distribution centres for its corrugated boxes and its paper and plastic packaging materials.

In late 1989 a bitter price war broke out with the end result being Smorgon closing down paper machines in Brooklyn (Vic) and virtually withdrawing from the packaging industry. Smorgon sold three box plants in Broadmeadows and Box Hill in Victoria and Revesby in Sydney to AMCOR and two other plants to Visyboard.

AMCOR had become one of the leading packaging companies in the world with a diversified group of some sixty businesses. The advance into packaging was an important cushion in any future recession as food and most consumer products required packaging.

In 1989-90 AMCOR's net operating profit rose by 20% to $181 million. They expanded by acquiring the remaining interest in Sunclipse (USA) and purchase of Twinpak in Canada. The also purchased a 49% interest in SACOC, the French corrugated box manufacturer. They built a $46 million plant in England. In New Zealand AMCOR purchased a steel can making plant from J.Wattie Foods. AMCOR also purchased Smorgon's corrugated box plants and embarked on a $180 expansion of KCA.7

In 1990-91 net operating profit increased by 26% to $228 million. Major acquisitions included a 18.7% investment in Spicers paper, a leading converter and distributor of fine papers in Australia, New Zealand and the United States.

On the 13/9/93 AMCOR entered into an agreement with North Broken Hill Peko Ltd to buy for $415m the pulp and paper manufacturing and paper merchanting businesses of APPM. The acquisition expanded AMCOR's existing interests in native forest-based virgin fibre papers. Merging the businesses helped AMCOR to develop and sustain an internationally competitive white papers manufacturing industry in Australia 10

For the year 1994 AMCOR announced that their objectives were "to achieve continually improving returns on funds invested in the company and increase benefits for all shareholders" 11.

They also integrated APPM fine paper manufacturing and distribution business into AMCOR. There was the final acquisition of John Sands and Gromark Packaging in Australia and a 50% share of Holfelder in Germany. It commissioned the McKinley mill in New Mexico and new corrugated box plants in Australia, Malaysia and the United Kingdom. AMCOR also started construction of three new box mills in China; a new can-end making plant was completed at Ballarat and acquisition of 51% of equity not already owned in the UK in Corrugated box manufacturer Willander Holdings, was undertaken.