KORTRIJK, Belgium — Barco announced a first-quarter 2009 operating loss of 6 million euros, attributing the blame in part to the weak corporate events sector. But the company’s chief executive, Eric Van Zele, who assumed his post in January, noted better-than-expected order volume in March, particularly for digital cinema products, and expressed cautious optimism for the rest of 2009.
Although orders for the quarter decreased by 19.4 percent to 158.0 million euro, and sales were at 144.7 million euros, down 11.2 percent from the year before, Barco said its order book at the end of March 2009 was at 366.5 million euro, up 13.2 percent from the total 323.9 million euros the year before.
Even so, gross profit fell 36.2 percent in the quarter, to 39.0 million euros from 61.1 million euros the year before, and EBITDA was 7.3 million euros, compared to 19.5 million euros in the first quarter of 2008. The company posted a net loss of 0.9 million euros, compared to a net gain of 6.6 million euros the year before.
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