1st Sep 2016 08:21
LONDON (Alliance News) - 600 Group PLC on Thursday said its full-year pretax profit came in at less than a third of what it was a year earlier, due to restructuring costs, though it said these actions should boost its future performance.
The distributor, designer and manufacturer of industrial products posted pretax profit for the year ended April 2 of GBP1.0 million, down from GBP3.7 million a year earlier, despite revenue rising to GBP45.3 million from GBP43.8 million.
The profit decline came as net operating expenses rose to GBP15.6 million from GBP11.0 million, 600 Group said, citing costs associated with staff reductions in the UK and the expanded integration programme for its two laser businesses TYKMA and Electrox.
600 Group noted it had been impacted by the challenging market conditions in the machine tool sector with a "much weaker than expected" performance in the UK and Europe, where business conditions were "very fragile".
However, 600 Group said both its US and Australian machine businesses matched their performance of last year, which it said was "quite an achievement considering the difficult state of the markets".
The company said its trading since the year-end had been in line with its expectations, and expects the actions taken to reduce overheads and become more efficient will yield better margins on increased sales in the future.
"Despite the difficult trading environment which we have experienced this past year we have taken the necessary actions to maintain if not improve the performance of the operating subsidiaries in the US and UK as well as improve the financial strength of the company. We maintain a strong market position thanks to our industry recognised brands and are taking active steps to increase our worldwide distribution network to accelerate revenue growth," said Executive Chairman Paul Dupee.
Shares in 600 Group were untraded on Thursday, having last traded at 9.62 pence.
600 Group takes its name from an early head office address at 600 Commercial Road in East London.
By Hannah Boland; [email protected]; @Hannaheboland
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