The OEM increased sales year-over-year but saw operating income decline.
Brother’s results for the first quarter of 2015 show net sales of ¥177.05 billion ($1.4 billion/€1.3 billion), a 10.4 percent increase on the first quarter of 2014, but operating income fell by 7.4 percent to ¥15.2 billion ($122 million/€111 million). Profits increased by 7.9 percent to ¥15.9 billion ($128 million/€116 million), while the printing and solutions segment saw net sales grow as operating income fell.
The printing and solutions segment saw total net sales of ¥116.9 billion ($943 million/€859 million) over the first quarter, an 8.5 percent increase over last year’s sales of ¥107.7 billion ($868 million/€791 million). However, operating income fell from ¥11.7 billion ($94 million/€86 million) in the segment last year to ¥10.9 billion ($87 million/€80 million) this year. Within the segment, communications and printing equipment saw sales of ¥103.7 billion ($836 million/€762 million), an 8.2 percent rise compared to the same period last year, which saw sales of ¥95.8 billion ($772 million/€704 million).
For the financial year, Brother forecast that it would see net sales grow by 17.4 percent to ¥830 billion ($6.6 billion/€6.1 billion), alongside growth in operating income of 0.8 percent to ¥58 billion ($46 million/€42 million). It also expects a sales increase in the printing and solutions segment of 10.3 percent overall to ¥523 billion ($4.2 billion/€3.8 billion), alongside a 9.8 percent increase alone for communications and printing equipment to ¥463.1 billion ($3.7 billion/€3.4 billion).