8th Mar 2016 08:53
LONDON (Alliance News) - LED lighting company Dialight PLC on Tuesday said it swung to a pretax loss in 2015 following a downturn in some key end markets and will spend 2016 focused on restructuring itself for a return to health.
Dialight, which makes high-specification lighting fixtures for industrial and commercial applications, along with traffic lights and signalling lights for railways, made a pretax loss of GBP3.9 million in the year to the end of December, compared to a GBP15.5 million profit in 2014.
Revenue fell, down to GBP161.4 million from GBP159.8 million, but the profit hit was exacerbated by restructuring costs, including the group winding down its traffic and vehicle businesses in order to focus on its lighting and obstruction businesses. This added to a slowdown in orders from key markets, particularly the oil and gas sector.
The group said at the time of its review it would scrap its dividend for 2015 and it does not envisage any further payouts until 2017 at the earliest.
"2015 was a difficult year for Dialight. A downturn across a number of our markets exacerbated operating challenges. We took immediate action in the second half of the year to address these issues, including improving operational processes in our manufacturing plants and reducing headcount. I would like to thank all of our stakeholders for remaining supportive of the company during this transitional period," said Michael Sutsko, Dialight's chief executive.
The company also appointed two new non-executive directors to its board on Tuesday, Martin Rapp and David Thomas, who will join at its annual general meeting on April 26.
Rapp is the former chief executive of Laird PLC, the FTSE 250-listed electronic components manufacturer, where Dialight CEO Sutsko worked prior to taking up his current role last year. Thomas is the former chief financial officer of UK engineer Invensys PLC.
Dialight shares were down 6.0% to 485.00 pence early Tuesday.
By Sam Unsted; [email protected]; @SamUAtAlliance
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