Challenger Technologies takes revenue hit

Challenger Technologies has experienced a significant slump in retail sales.

While group revenue for the Singapore IT products and services provider remained flat at S$256 million (US$184 million) for the nine months to September 30, its third-quarter dropped 16 per cent to $74.4 million.

This was mainly because of a decrease of $7.5 million in retail sales brought on by the weakened market, as well as a $5.6 million fall in corporate sales.

CEO Loo Leong Thye says the company will continue to enhance its omnichannel offerings so it can reach offline and online customers faster.

Net profit fell by about 16 per cent to $9.1 million for the nine months, and for the third quarter took a 49 per cent dive to $1.8 million. The company says this was caused by an impairment provision of about $1.2 million for investments in a last-mile delivery provider, which has since scaled down. Without this, net profit for the nine months and third quarter would have decreased by 6 and 17 per cent respectively.

The rest of the decrease was because of lower gross profit from lower revenue, despite a marginal increase in gross profit margin.

To date, the group has 44 stores in Singapore, comprising 25 Challenger superstores and 19 small-format stores.