P/F Bakkafrost is a Faroesesalmon farming company based in Glyvrar on the island of Eysturoy in the Faroe Islands. Bakkafrost is the largest fishfarming company in the Faroe Islands, and one of the biggest private employer in the islands, if not the biggest. Bakkafrost is the eighth-largest fish farming company in the world. Regin Jacobsen and his mother Oddvør Jacobsen are the main owners of Bakkafrost, Oddvør Jacobsen owns 9.5% of the shares and Regin Jacobsen owns 9.3% of the shares. There are currently more than 3000 different share owners from 22 countries.
History
Bakkafrost was established in 1968 by the three brothers Martin, Hans and Roland Jacobsen, also named "á Bakka" instead of Jacobsen, which refers to the place name Á Bakka, where they come from. The current CEO since 1989 is Regin Jacobsen, also known in the Faroe Islands as Regin á Bakka, he is the son of Hans Jacobsen, while the current CFO Høgni Dahl Jakobsen is the son of Martin Jakobsen. The first ten years they worked with herring, but in 1979 they started to work with salmon farming. In 2009 Bakkafrost produced 30.650 ton gutted weight. They had 14 licenses in 13 fjords in the Faroe Islands and owned 44% of all fish farming licenses in the Faroe Islands, mainly in the central and northeastern part of the islands. Bakkafrost has salmon slaughterhouses in Klaksvík and Kollafjørður, through the company Faroe Farming, of which they own almost 50%, they also have a slaughterhouse in the southernmost island Suðuroy in the villageVágur. Bakkafrost also owns a further processing factory in Glyvrar. A few months before Bakkafrost was registered on the Oslo Stock Exchange the company merged with another Faroese company, Vestlax, which was also a salmon farming company. On 26 March 2010 the company was registered on Oslo Stock Exchange. In April 2011 Bakkafrost bought the Faroese company Havsbrún for 1,1 billionDanish kroner. After this Bakkafrost could control the whole chain of production from the salmon feed, to the further processing of the salmon. In 2010, before the Havsbrún was merged with Bakkafrost, Havsbrún's turnover was 823 million Danish kroner, and the operating profit was 238 million Danish kroner. Havsbrún at that time also owned 33,3% of Hanstholm Fiskemelsfabrik AS in Denmark along with 78,1% of the shares in the salmon farming companies Faroe Farming and Viking Seafood. In September 2014 Bakkafrost was worth 6.1 billion Danish kroner. At the same time Regin Jacobsen and his mother Oddvør Jacobsen became the first billionaire-family in the Faroe Islands, when their Bakkafrost-shares of 9,2% and 9,4% were worth 1.1 billion Danish kroner. In 2014 Bakkafrost sold 44,013 tons of salmon, and the same year the company had a profit of 899 million Danish kroner before taxes, the company paid 255 million in taxes, so after taxes the profit was kr 647 million. In March 2015 Gøtuvík became the first fish farm in the Faroe Islands to carry ASC certification, which is an internationally recognized standard backed by the WWF. On 28 May 2015 Bakkafrost shares were sold for 206 Norwegian kroner. On the same day the worth of Bakkafrost grew to kr.10 billion, a record high. Bakkafrost owns 40% of a lumpsuckercleaner fish farm in Svínoy.
Honours
2015 - Company of the year
2015 - Stockman-prize for small or middle size companies
2014 - Bakkafrost was chosen as the second best middle-sized companies, which are listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange, chosen by 600 persons. It is IR Nordic Invest which together with Oslo Stock Exchange and Dagens Industri, which makes the appraisal.
2014 - Regin Jacobsen, CEO of Bakkafrost, won the prize as the best director for middle-sized companies, which are listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange.
