15th Apr 2005 11:30
Senior PLC15 April 2005 Senior plc ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING - CHAIRMAN'S STATEMENT At the Annual General Meeting of Senior plc today, the Chairman, Mr JamesKerr-Muir, said: "Senior delivered an encouraging set of results in 2004, achieving an increasein the underlying earnings per share and a further reduction in net debt despitethe adverse effects of the weakened US dollar and significant raw material priceincreases. Senior also made significant progress in building the foundationsfor an improved future performance. The civil aerospace market continues to strengthen with the number of commercialpassenger flights having recently returned to pre 9/11 levels. Most of theGroup's major aerospace customers are increasing their build rates and the newA380 and JSF programmes continue to gather momentum. Current demand for the Group's automotive products is marginally weaker in bothNorth America and Europe and raw material pricing pressures continue. The Groupwill be little affected by the MG Rover situation with recent annual sales to MGRover running at only £0.3m. In recent months, there have been a number of important programme wins for newautomotive product applications, principally for diesel engines in the USA.These will generally go into production towards the end of 2006 ahead of themore stringent North American emission laws that come into effect on 1 January2007. Group capital expenditure is expected to be higher than normal in 2005 ascapacity is installed to produce these new automotive products and the Groupextends its machining capacity and capability in the Aerospace Division. As aresult, net debt is likely to be higher at the end of 2005 than it was at theend of 2004. In the Industrial Division the disposal programme that began in 2000 has nowbeen completed. Following the rationalisations carried out in 2004, the threeremaining businesses are in good shape to make a healthy contribution in 2005. Trading for the Group for the first three months of 2005 has been in line withthe Board's expectations." For further information please contact: Senior plcGraham Menzies, Group Chief Executive 01923 714702Mark Rollins, Group Finance Director 01923 714738 Finsbury GroupCharlotte Hepburne-Scott / Gordon Simpson 020 7251 3801 This announcement, together with other information on Senior plc may be foundat: www.seniorplc.com Note to Editors: Senior is an international manufacturing group with operations in 11 countries.Senior designs, manufactures and markets high technology components and systemsfor the principal original equipment producers in the worldwide aerospace,automotive and specialised industrial markets. This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock ExchangeRelated Shares:
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