Lichtenburg Nut Company Business Plan — Implementation Roadmap

The phases from plant construction and commissioning to full volume, dependencies and the gate at each stage.

Section 21 of 37

Implementation Roadmap

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Figure 1. Twelve months from financial close to first commercial despatch

20.1 Workstreams and milestones

Table 46. Implementation roadmap by workstream

Phase	Months	Key activities	Milestone	Dependency
Pre-close	minus 6 to 0	Anchor private label contract negotiated and signed; APSS application submitted; executive appointments; site lease agreed; equipment specified and quoted	Financial close with all conditions precedent satisfied	The anchor contract is the binding constraint; without it, close should not proceed
Construction	1 to 8	Site handover; food-grade fit-out and civils; equipment procurement with forward cover; utilities including solar and standby generation	Building complete and ready for plant installation, month 7	Municipal approvals; equipment lead times of 16 to 24 weeks on the roasting and milling train
Installation	5 to 11	Process plant installation; filling and packing lines; laboratory fit-out; IT, ERP and warehouse management	Mechanical completion, month 11	Building completion; imported equipment delivery
Commissioning	9 to 13	Water and product trials; recruitment and training; FSSC 22000 implementation; trial production and customer sample approval	First commercial despatch, month 13	Certificate of Acceptability; customer sample approval
Supply establishment	2 to 12	Grower contracting for the first season; intake infrastructure commissioning; first in-shell receipts	1,200 t of in-shell received and stored by month 12	The September to November contracting window; missing it delays production by a full season
Ramp	13 to 24	Private label and bulk volume build; second shift phased in; industrial account development	1,180 t and EBITDA break-even reached in month 18	Plant reliability; customer conversion
Brand launch	20 to 30	Tsala listings, artwork, trade activation and regional distribution	Own brand at 12% of volume by end of Year 2	Follow-on equity tranche drawn in month 26
Phase 2	37 to 43	Snack nut roasting, seasoning and packing line; warehouse extension; additional silo capacity	Snack nut production from month 43	Funded from operating cash flow and the revolving facility
Phase 3	73 to 79	De-bottlenecking of the roasting and milling train to 4,800 t nameplate	Capacity available for Year 7 volume	R30m committed expansion tranche drawn in month 74

20.2 Critical path

The critical path runs: anchor contract signature (month minus 4) to financial close (month 0) to building completion (month 7) to plant installation (month 11) to Certificate of Acceptability and trial production (month 12) to first commercial despatch (month 13). Two items sit on the path with limited float and warrant particular attention.

Equipment lead time. The roasting, blanching, colour sorting and milling train carries a 16 to 24 week lead time and must be ordered by month 2. Late ordering pushes mechanical completion beyond month 11 and risks missing the retailer range review cycle.
The grower contracting window. Contracts for the first season must be concluded between September and November. A close date that misses this window delays first intake by a full year, which the plan cannot absorb. This is the single strongest argument for closing before the end of the first quarter of the calendar year.
FSSC 22000 certification. Certification cannot precede a period of documented operation. The plan assumes certification between months 9 and 14 with first retail despatch in month 13, which is tight. Industrial and institutional customers may accept supply on a documented HACCP system pending certification; national retailers generally will not.