Making anything from machinery gears to figurines, the additive manufacturing facility run by Ultra Clean Asia Pacific (UCT), a unit of Nasdaq-listed manufacturing-solutions player Ultra Clean Holdings, is the largest commercial 3D-printing facility in Southeast Asia, and still has capacity to spare despite receiving five to 10 orders per day.

Industrial additive manufacturing is set to grow in the future of manufacturing in Singapore, thanks to the versatility, low cost and creative potential of the process, say industry players.

“Additive manufacturing is in its ‘mature pioneering stage’ here – it will only grow,” said Lavi Lev, UCT’s senior vice president for Asia.

“It has solid solutions to problems, and in some cases even solutions looking for a problem – which means I have this new technology, maybe someone can do something with it.”

Even as traditional manufacturing continues to slow in Singapore, posting its first contraction since the global financial crisis, additive manufacturing is showing signs of growth.

The government has thrown its support behind the industry, identifying it as one of the key sectors to grow back in 2013 under a “Future of Manufacturing” scheme.

Last September, Spring Singapore and the National Research Foundation announced the formation of the National Additive Manufacturing Innovation Cluster, which will help companies develop capabilities in 3D printing.

Led by National Technological University, the cluster will look at the latest research in 3D printing and study how to translate it into commercial uses in the industry.

US-based safety-solutions company Underwriters Laboratories announced last September that it had invested US$8 million (Bt278 million) to open a Global Additive Manufacturing Centre of Excellence in Singapore, which will focus on training, material and process qualification, advisory services and research in 3D printing.

“Myanmar and Indonesia are good markets so we are paying a lot of attention to them. As for the former, we are still waiting out the political situation so as to give them time to stabilise,” its managing director and co-founder Mac Ngan Boon told the media at the sidelines of the Cambodia international airports’ new terminal extension launch ceremony on Wednesday.

The engineering and construction services company won in 1995 a concession with French construction player Vinci to build and operate Phnom Penh International Airport and Siem Reap International Airport.

Muhibbah Engineering signed an additional 20-year concession to continue to develop the two airports as well as a third one, the Sihanoukville International Airport, which was added to the deal in recent years.

Muhibbah Engineering had a 21percent stake in the joint venture, Vinci, 70%, while the balance 9% was held by a local entity.

“The aviation business is a gateway into a new country. We roll out a lot of promotions for the government to attract tourists. We usually see a lot of results within six months,” Ngan said.

“Cambodia is experiencing tremendous growth in its economy, about 7%. We are riding on that growth, while working with their government to roll out initiatives to draw tourists into the country,” Muhibbah Engineering group finance director Shirleen Lee said.

Siem Reap and Phnom Penh airports had doubled their capacity to 12 million passengers, collectively.

Passenger arrivals grew 13% to 6.5 million passengers for the financial year 2015.

According to AllianceDBS Research, Muhibbah Engineering’s 21percent stake in the Cambodia airport concession was estimated to be worth RM677mil with a 5% annual increase in passenger traffic until 2040.

“Revenues are also in US dollar, which is a boost to earnings given the weak ringgit,” the research house said, giving the stock a “buy” call with a target price of RM2.90 for its diversified business.

“The Cambodian airports are a significant contribution to the group, however, the bulk of our construction business is driven by infrastructure projects in Malaysia,” Lee said.

Muhibbah Engineering has a market capitalisation of RM1.1bil with an orderbook worth more than RM2.6bil excluding its Cambodian airports business..

“We are trying to clinch more projects in the construction industry in Malaysia, where it is now most buoyant. Twenty years ago, there weren’t such sizeable mega projects,” Lee said. “The RM2.3bil can last us the next two to three years.”

“Globally, the construction business is still very slow so we are trying to maintain our turnover and growth from last year. Our priority for now is to maintain our deliverables,” Ngan said.

Speaking on the reduction of capital expenditure (capex) in Petronas, Ngan said: “Everyone would be affected by that. But our advantage is the group’s diversity. As such, we will continue to pick up more downstream work to mitigate against the cost-cutting in the upstream sector.”

Meanwhile, foreign exchange loss in the weakening of the ringgit would not carve a significant dent in Muhibbah Engineering’s financial statements.

“Naturally in a company like ours, we would either gain or lose in the ordinary course of business. Our job is to attain contracts and tie those contracts to their respective bids and rates. We do not speculate as we are not forex traders,” he said.

Founder and CEO of Creador Brahmal Vasudevan had on Tuesday unveiled plans to grow the chain into a major national player.

He added as the Malaysian consumer becomes more sophisticated, there would be increasing healthcare needs and retail pharmacies will play an important role serving this need.

“Based on our estimates, the Malaysia pharmacy space is still fairly underpenetrated. Creador sees an exciting opportunity for us to invest in and create a modern retail pharmacy offering world class experience for our customers. We have set aside RM100mil to support RedCap’s growth,” he said.

In phase one, Creador acquired D’Apotic Pharmacy last April as the platform to grow this investment.

For phase two, Creador teamed up with Ian Cruddas, who was instrumental in building out some of the large retail chains in Malaysia.

“Together with our management team, Creador is committed to drive this transformation, leveraging on our experience in partnering with entrepreneurs across our key markets to build RedCap into a world class business,” added Vasudevan.

Other successful consumer brands that Creador has invested in Malaysia include Old Town White Coffee, Bonia, GHL and CTOS.

Creador is a private equity firm focussed on long-term investments in growth-orientated businesses in South and Southeast Asia

A filing with Bursa Malaysia on Wednesday showed that it bought back 100,000 shares on March 2.

The average price which it paid for the shares was RM1.59 or a total of RM159,000.

In an earlier filing, the Employees Provident Fund Board ceased to be a substantial shareholder after it disposed of 7.30 million shares on March 7.

The sale of the shares saw its shareholding reduced from 145.98 million shares or 5.24% to 138.68 million shares.

During the rally in the share price, the EPF had disposed of 8.28 million shares on March 4.

FMI’s shares can be changed hands on the market once the YSX starts its first day on March 25, according to the YSX statement.

FMI is among a few companies shortlisted for the listing. Others are First Private Bank, Myanmar Citizen Bank, Myanmar Thilawa SEZ Holdings Plc, Great Hor Kham Plc and Myanmar Agribusiness Plc.

The country’s flag carrier is forging ahead with this plan despite growth constraints at Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport, PAL president Jaime Bautista said in a briefing on Tuesday marking the company’s 75th anniversary.

PAL is currently rated “three-star” based on the latest audit by Skytrax. PAL shares this score with several budget airlines and major US carriers.

Bautista said this would change as PAL rolls out more international destinations, improves its services and continues its refleeting program that most recently included an order of six next-generation Airbus A350-900s.

Bautista said PAL would also spend US$80 million to reconfigure eight of its all-economy Airbus A330s, which would cut seats from 414 to just more than 300 seats. He said this would increase legroom in economy while allowing the airline to add higher-margin business-class and premium economy seats.

PAL’s management led by chair and controlling shareholder Lucio Tan decided on this strategy in November 2015, Bautista said, amid queries over its market positioning.

“We have to be differentiated from other airlines,” Bautista said at the sidelines of the press conference. “We revisited our mission-vision. That will drive our strategy.”

Bautista said the plans were in step also with growing its profitability and volume. He said PAL would end 2016 more profitable than last year, partly as its operating costs benefited from lower fuel prices. PAL also plans to carry 14 million passengers in 2016, up from 12 million last year.

He said the target was to achieve a passenger load of 75 per cent this year, up from 71 per cent in the previous two years.

The refleeting and subsequent route expansion were key components of PAL’s goal to become a five-star airline, he said.

The carrier, which has 75 planes, is taking delivery of five Airbus A321s and two Boeing 777-300s in 2016. It will also take delivery of two more A321s next year. Its long-haul fleet is mainly comprised of B777s, Airbus A340s and A330s.

PAL is studying more routes in Europe, which it serves through flights from Manila to London. In two years, PAL might launch flights to Paris, Amsterdam, Hamburg and Rome, pending the results of an ongoing study, Bautista said.

He said the airline was also keen on increasing revenue by tapping fifth freedom rights the Philippines has with counterparts in Asia, Australia and the Middle East. For example, PAL will start on June 25 this year daily services between Taipei and Kansai (Osaka, Japan). It opened last January flights between Dubai and Kuwait and Dubai and Jeddah.

“PAL has not been very active using 5th freedom rights, we will do what other airlines have been doing,” Bautista said.