Top Glove Corporation Berhad is a Malaysian rubber glove manufacturer who also specialises in face masks, dental dams, and other products. The company owns and operates 50 manufacturing facilities in Malaysia, Thailand, China, and Vietnam. They also have marketing offices in these countries as well as the United States, Germany and Brazil.
History
The company was founded in Malaysia in 1991 by Tan Sri Dr Lim Wee Chai, with one production line and staff comprising 100 people. Wee Chai's parents are rubber plantation owners and traders. Top Glove has since become the world's largest manufacturer of gloves, commanding 26% of the world market share.
Top Glove was listed on the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange (now) or Bursa Malaysia in August 2001. In the span of a year, Top Glove Corporation Bhd's listing was promoted from the Second Board to the Main Board on May 16, 2002.
On 28 June 2016, Top Glove was also listed at number 9 on the Main Board of the Singapore Exchange.
In 2017, Top Glove announced that they would launch a new condom business in 2018 with a RM30 million (US$7 million) investment.
As at 28 February 2022, Top Glove had a shareholder fund of RM6.95 billion and for 2QFY2022 the Group achieved Sales Revenue of RM1.45 billion.
As of November 2021, Top Glove has 812 production lines, 50 factories, 195 countries of export and 2,000 customers.
In April 2018, Top Glove concluded its acquisition of leading surgical glovemaker, Aspion Sdn Bhd, its biggest M&A to date, which would see Top Glove emerging as the world's largest surgical glove manufacturer.
In April 2020, the company announced that it would manufacture face masks due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Due to rising demand for protective gear in response to COVID-19, Top Glove's profits had risen by 400% by mid-December 2020, with the company announcing a 20-times increase in quarterly net profit to RM 2.4 billion (US$590 million)
Corporate identity
Headquarters and major facilities
Top Glove launched its new headquarters Top Glove Tower on 1 October 2015, located in Setia Alam, Shah Alam. It was officiated by Sultan of Selangor Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah. Top Glove has a total of 50 factories across Malaysia, Thailand, China and Vietnam. Out of the 37 glove factories, 32 are located in Malaysia, three in Thailand, and one each in China and Vietnam.
Philanthropy
Throughout 2020, Malaysia will experience slower adverse demand due to the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Top Glove claimed that it would offer a total of 9,000 job opportunities for locals throughout 2021, to help address the rising unemployment rate in Malaysia. In a statement, Top Glove stated that it "hopes to achieve the target through a year-long recruitment campaign".
In July 2020, Top Glove contributed three million gloves worth RM700,000 as well as medical equipment such as ventilators and medical suits worth RM300,000 to the Ministry of Health Malaysia (MOH). This initiative was facilitated by the Tan Sri Muhyiddin Charity Golf (TSMCG) Foundation which helped to disseminate these supplies to the hospitals and health departments identified by the MOH for the use of frontline professionals.
In November 2020, the company donated a total of RM185 million to the government's COVID-19 fund set up to battle the pandemic.
Controversies
Labour controversies
In December 2018, The Guardian reported that migrant workers were allegedly being subjected to forced labour, forced overtime, debt bondage, withheld wages and passport confiscation. The company has denied these allegations and claimed that it has since improved its labour initiatives, which include the introduction of a zero cost recruitment policy.
An investigation by Channel 4 News in June 2020 found that staff were living in cramped conditions, paid £1.08 an hour, forced to work overtime to meet the demand for gloves during the COVID-19 pandemic, and could not adequately practice social distancing despite the company claiming appropriate measures were taken. Workers, many of whom were migrants, also claimed they paid up to $5,000 in recruitment fees to secure employment, leaving them in debt bondage. Top Glove did not address any specific claims but called the investigation inaccurate.
In July 2020, Top Glove engaged United Kingdom-based ethical trade consultancy Impactt Limited to assess the presence of forced labour by reference to the International Labor Organization’s 11 Forced Labour Indicators, propose corrective action plans to improve the Group’s labour practices, and monitor the Group’s implementation of the corrective action plans.
