New college's bid to recover RM50 million
Published on: Thursday, July 16, 2015
Kota Kinabalu: Asiamet Education Group, formerly known as Masterskill Education Group (MEGB), is the midst of disposing its properties at Likas Plaza Juta here to generate cash flow and repay debts, the Daily Express has learnt. The move comes following MEGB's takeover by SMRT Holdings and Creador II LLC under an arrangement said to have cost around RM176.2 million earlier this year.The process allowed the troubled MEGB to conduct a restructuring exercise and consequently renamed as Asiamet Education Group for the purpose of rebranding.
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Asiamet is currently consolidating its properties here with much of the exercise having started under the previous MEGB management last year. "Our two newly constructed college blocks adjacent to the main campus are already put on sale for RM50 million. "The main campus, meanwhile, would also be sold on a rent-back agreement to Asiamet. This way we can still operate the college," according to a source. They are also in the midst of looking for a potential buyer or buyers for the new college blocks and have also stopped renting nearby shoplots that supported previous operations.
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"This is due to the management's aim to make Asiamet asset-light, reducing its liabilities to stay afloat on a slimmer and lean operation," the source added. The college is scheduled to re-launch as the Asia Metropolitan University College sometime in September or October.
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"But it is still too early to confirm. However, the media will be invited for the opening and questions could be asked directly to the directors who would also be around at the time," the source added. It could not be ascertained how much Asiamet would gain from the local exercise but it has been reported last month that they are in the midst of disposing RM217 million in property assets country wide to enhance its cash position and rename all its campuses. Last month, it had already sold off two property assets in Petaling Jaya, Selangor and in Masai, Johor for RM79.7 million to one Brilland Property Sdn Bhd. It also could not be ascertained whether there would be any lay-off of staff as part of the group's restructuring exercise which is expected to be completed before end of the year. According to Asiamet Executive Director Datuk R Palan, the company will look into cost efficiency measures and other programmes in demand to be introduced into its reopened campuses. "We'd like to turn around the business operationally, not in terms of properties or assets being sold off (one-off gain) alone," he was quoted as saying last month. Masterskill College, which has been in business in Sabah in 2008, opened its college doors in Plaza Juta sometime in 2009. It was the first college in Sabah to focus on medicine, pharmacy and physiotherapy. The college also enjoyed a steady business from 2010 to 2012 due to overwhelming number of students who enrolled for its courses due to the lower requirement to obtain study loans. At one point, the school had between 2,500 and 3,000 students who only had to have three credits in the SPM examination to obtain a full study loan, which was the requirement at the time. Students were said to be able to obtain up to RM60,000 loan, with excess of around RM20,000 pocket money as course fees were only around RM48,000. MEGB went into the red in 2012 after facing a steep decline in student enrolments and revenues largely due to the overdependence on nursing programmes and reduction of the National Higher Education Fund Corporation (PTPTN) loans. Today, the requirements had also been raised from three to five SPM credits to be eligible to obtain loans from PTPTN, with only those registered as hardcore poor being considered for them. Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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