Business News
Baldwin Reports Earnings for Q3 FY08
Wednesday 30. April 2008 - Baldwin Technology Company, Inc. (AMEX: BLD), a leading global manufacturer of process automation technology for the printing industry, reported net sales for the third quarter ended March 31, 2008 of $59.2 million, compared to $53.2 million for the third quarter last year, an increase of 11.3%. Currency translation favorably impacted sales by $4.3 million for the quarter.
Net income for the quarter was $2.0 million, or $0.13 per diluted share, compared to $1.3 million, or $0.08 per diluted share for the similar quarter last year.
Net sales for the nine months ended March 31, 2008 were $171.1 million compared to $144.6 million in the comparable period last year, an increase of 18.3%. Currency translation favorably increased sales by $9.3 million for the nine month period.
Net income for the nine months was $3.3 million, or $0.21 per diluted share, compared to $3.0 million, or $0.19 per diluted share in the prior year.
Net income for the quarter included a partial release of the valuation allowance against U.S. deferred tax assets of $1.2 million, which had a favorable impact on the tax provision for the quarter of the same amount. The Company continually reviews the need for the valuation allowance and released a portion of the valuation allowance due to the sustained and projected profitability of its U.S. operations.
Backlog at the end of the quarter was $63.1 million, compared to a backlog of $52.7 million at the beginning of the fiscal year, and $61.9 million on December 31, 2007.
President and CEO Karl S. Puehringer, commented, “Sales have continued to show resilience during a challenging period in the printing equipment market. As reported in previous quarters, we continue to drive growth and expansion in emerging markets. In developed countries we focus on strengthening our service and support relationships with the OEM press manufacturers and the printer and publisher customer base.
Changes in product mix, the effect of lower sales volume in the European entities and the strong Euro have continued to pressure margins; however, we have been able to mitigate these pressures somewhat with:
Innovation – our new Cleaning Platform, which defines a new standard for cleaning performance;
Continued progress on strategic sourcing initiatives – sourcing machined components in low labor cost countries
Productivity improvements obtained by the recent restructuring in Germany, as an example, and
Repositioning the Companys manufacturing footprint, one component of which was increased manufacturing of one product line in the U.S. to take advantage of the lower U.S. Dollar.”
John Jordan, Vice President and CFO, noted, “We are closely controlling operating costs – year to date OPEX before restructuring decreased to 26.6% in 2008 from 27.2% in 2007. We are continually searching for ways to be more efficient given the current economic climate.
Although trade receivables and inventory increased during the year by $10.1 million, the increase attributable to foreign currency rates was $10.5 million. Thus, on a currency-effected basis, trade receivables and inventory decreased by $0.4 million. In fact, during the current quarter, we reduced working capital excluding cash, adjusted for currency effects, by $2.7 million. We also repurchased 148,325 shares of our common stock and made net repayments of debt of $4.6 million during the quarter as a result of improved cash management activities.
Finally, our ability to release a portion of the valuation allowance against the U.S. deferred tax assets is further testament to our ability to continue with sustainable profitability in our U.S. operations,” concluded Mr. Jordan.