Alpine Posts Q1 Sales, Profit Declines

By Joseph Palenchar -- TWICE, 8/18/2011

Iwaki, Japan - Alpine Electronics sales, operating profits and net profits fell in the April through June quarter because of the aftereffects of the Great Japan Earthquake and Tsunami, the yen's appreciation, and "increasingly intense price competition" in the North American car audio aftermarket, the company said.

U.S. and European sales of aftermarket navigation, however, were "positive" because of "positive customer response to the strong cost performance of our affordable priced navigation systems."

The earthquake caused difficulties in procuring parts and materials and reduced production levels among the company's automaker customers, Alpine noted.

Alpine's global consolidated OEM and aftermarket sales fell 5 percent in the first quarter of fiscal 2012 to 46,673 million yen ($609.7 million), with operating income falling 61.6 percent to 1,543 million yen (20.2 million) and net income falling 55.7 percent to 1,121 million yen $14.6 million).

The company, however, upwardly revised its first-half (April through September) sales forecast to 95 billion yen ($1.24 billion) from a previously forecast 90,000 million yen ($1.18 billion), but that amount would still be below the year-ago 98,020 million ($1.28 billion). The company cited "robust" sales in Japan and automaker customers that "appear likely to be able to recover unit production earlier than expected."

The company also upwardly revised operating and net income forecasts for the period to 2,500 million yen ($32.7 million) and 2,000 million yen ($26.1 million), respectively, compared with a previous forecast of no operating or net income. The revised forecast would still be below the year-ago 6,993 million yen ($91.4 million) and 4,969 million yen ($64.9 million), respectively.

First-quarter sales in OEM and aftermarket car audio fell 23.6 percent to 14.2 billion yen ($185.6 million), but sales in the Information and communications segment, including OEM and aftermarket navigation and display products, rose 6.4 percent to 32.3 billion yen ($422.1 million).

In its fiscal 2011 year, ended March 30, Alpine returned to the black, posting a 19.4 percent gain in sales, an operating income gain of 486 percent to 11.2 billion yen, and net income of 6.03 billion yen compared with a year-ago net loss of 1.25 billion yen.